Sadly, many of the most important things that we could do to benefit our long-term interests are also the things that are the least popular (or boring) in the present. An example is the news that the Department of Energy has invested $85M in promising young scientists in the area of clean energy. This is the kind of foundational, game-changing research that we need for the next generation of technologies to be created here. I think this is a great move which compares favorably to our nation’s proud tradition of investing in the future. Great, boring, news.
The watchout here is that we need to be prepared to put the right manufacturing policies in place to ensure that these technologies can be built here, creating American jobs, rather than almost immediately going offshore. If we don’t get these policies in place we will be minimizing the return on our taxpayer investment and giving much of the benefit to foreign countries. I have my fingers crossed and am prepared to fight that fight.