Posted 1/20/2007 02:48:00 PM by Douglas

It's been a while, but it looks like Houston bashing is making the rounds again as some kind of response to Bush 43's energy policy. Remember, he's from New Haven.

As President Bush readies a new plan on global warming, environmentalists say an 18-lane highway going up in Houston speaks volumes about how people in his home state of Texas view the planet.

Not really. The Katy Freeway, Bush's position on global warming and the way Texan's look at the world don't really have that much in common.

I-10 West to Katy is a mess. Katy is a huge population center for Houston, and I-10 is major east-west interstate route. I don't know if rail would ease commuter congestion, but something had to be done, and this has very little (if not nothing) to do with Bush.

Texas has a long history of putting energy interests ahead of conservation. The nation's second most populous state also generates greenhouse gases as one of the world's largest oil-refining and petrochemical manufacturing centers.

Huh? Yes, that's true, but what's the point? Pollution is an unfortunate byproduct of industry, but to demonize it like this means you'd have to denounce all its advantages, too.

"Texas has always been pretty far over on the side of exploiting natural resources and not worrying about the consequences," Richard Murray, a political science professor at the University of Houston, said. "Texas generates a huge amount of carbon dioxide because we are such big energy consumers."

And producers. And I know for a fact that the other states without the luxury of huge oil and gas deposits appreciate heat and electricity that comes from Texas.

The sprawling Houston metropolitan area, home to more than 5 million people, caters to drivers. Multi-deck parking garages are affixed to most large apartment complexes and there are drive-through lanes at pharmacies, banks, dry cleaners and coffee shops like Starbucks Corp..

Right. Because Houston is the only city with urban sprawl, the only place with drive-through services, and of course, the only place on earth you'll find a drive-through Starbucks. Pure genius. Look, urban sprawl isn't the best thing on earth, but it's certainly not unique to Houston. It's everywhere, and it exists because (wait for it:) most people don't want to live on top of each other.

But this article is all over the place:

Bush has pushed for the use of alternative fuels like hydrogen and ethanol and in his State of the Union address a year ago decried America's "addiction" to oil.

I don't have it in me to rant about ethanol today, but I'm sick to death of hearing about our "oil addiction," and ethanol isn't going to do a thing to reduce CO₂ emissions. It actually creates more.

I just have one request. If you're a hack journalist looking to make an ad hominem attack on the president, please, leave Houston alone. It's not a perfect place, but it's not the epicenter of the world's problems, either.