The US Department of Energy was instituted on 4 Aug 1977 to lessen our dependence on foreign oil. Now, 33 years later what they have accomplished is creating and spending an annual budget of $24.2 billion; they have 16,000 federal employees and about 100,000 contract employees.
The scorecard: 33 years ago about 30% of our oil consumption was foreign imports. Today it’s 70%–does this sound efficient to you? And we’re now not drilling in the Gulf of Mexico.
We have now turned the banking system, health care, and the auto industry over to this same government—both the republicans and democrats have been a part of this, so this isn’t partisan politics. A simple question. What are we thinking?
I think I’ve found a way to either increase the manpower in our military or to cut the budget. Since we really need both, I recommend giving all the DoE employees the option of enlisting in the military or being laid off. Of course, our congress critters will have to approve a bigger military.
