Climate change and national security top priority of bus tour

By JOHN HARRINGTON, Independent Record | Posted: Tuesday, October 13, 2009 12:15 am

At the tail end of a record-breaking Montana cold spell, a bus tour crossed the state today as veterans aimed to raise awareness of their concerns about climate change and energy security.

Operation Free, a coalition of veterans and national security groups, is sending a pair of buses across the country to raise awareness of what it views as threats to American safety brought by climate change and over-reliance on foreign oil. The northern route of the two-pronged tour began Monday in Missoula.

Speaking to a small midday crowd at Memorial Park at the second of three Montana stops Monday, South Dakota veteran Rick Hegdahl said domestically produced energy gives the country more security than buying oil from countries that may not have America’s best interests in mind.

“We are hugely dependent on the Middle East for fossil fuels. That can’t continue,” he said. “I want to see us create energy here that lessens our need for foreign oil.”

Operation Free is supported by organizations like the Truman National Security Project, the National Security Initiative, VoteVets.org and VetPAC.

The group supports the passage by Congress of the American Clean Energy and Security Act, which would establish a cap-and-trade system for limiting the emissions of greenhouse gases. Under the bill, the government would establish a national limit for greenhouse gas emissions, and firms that emit them could buy and sell the rights for those emissions, providing an economic incentive to reduce the amount of greenhouse gases they put into the atmosphere.

Critics claim the cap-and-trade plan would damage the country by raising energy costs – and thus, the costs for many products across the economy.

Introducing the touring veterans, local vet Art Compton acknowledged that the proposed legislation, which has passed the House and been introduced in the Senate, won’t please everyone.

“It may not be perfect, but any bill that’s passed is going to strengthen the United States’ negotiating position at upcoming global climate conferences,” he said.

By passing a bill of its own, Compton said, the U.S. would be in a better place to press countries like China and India to enact similar limits on greenhouse emissions.

Alex Cornell du Houx, a member of the Maine House of Representatives and a veteran of Operation Iraqi Freedom, said he saw firsthand the dangers of people becoming overly dependent on fossil fuel.

Citizens would wait in long lines and risk being out after curfew, du Houx said, in order to secure a simple tank of gas in a country rich in petroleum.

Exacerbating the problem for the United States, he said, is the fact that so many countries that sell oil to America are otherwise hostile.

“The reason veterans are really mobilizing on this and believe it’s important is because they feel it’s a security threat,” he said. “They’ve seen firsthand when they’re deployed why foreign energy is a threat to our security.”

The bus tour went from Helena to Billings, with stops in Miles City and Glendive also planned. The two-week tour wraps up Oct. 24 in Maine.

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