On 04/25/2011 02:12 PM, Jed Rothwell wrote: > ... Big oil, big coal, nuclear power, wind power and other vested > interests will wage all-out political war, saturating members of > congress.... > > The opposition may win this political battle. Cold fusion may never be > allowed.
There are something on the order of 200 countries on Earth. The United States is just one of them, and its influence is limited. It still has the biggest economy, but not by much, and in a few more years it will be in second place. In terms of industrial production it's slipped very badly since the 1950's, with much of the most sophisticated work being done in the Orient. The largest energy consumer on Earth, and consequently the largest market for a new energy source, is now China, not the United States. The U.S. is falling rapidly "out of the loop". Today, the United States is an overwhelming giant only in terms of its strength in arms. Unless you suppose the U.S. would go to war to stop some other country from developing cold fusion, I don't think it's plausible that a group of American lobbyists talking to American congressmen could prevent or even significantly slow its development, once there's a clear path forward. Big Oil's lobbyists could conceivably render the United States irrelevant to the world's energy future, but that's about it.
