He shows up on the TV when I'm on the elliptical machine at the gym. He pops up in newspapers almost daily. And now, T. Boone Pickens is even sneaking into fiction books.
Last night as I was curled up with my most recent fiction find, The Shack by William P. Young, I laughed out loud when Pickens of all people was mentioned in the first chapter. The main character, Mack, turns on Bill Moyer's show, and "the show tonight had something to do with oilman Boone Pickens, who was now starting to drill for water, of all things."
By now, most of us have seen his statistics-rich TV commercial. Some folks even caught him on Larry King Live the other night, where a viewer suggested that Pickens pay for all Americans to receive tune-ups and tire inflations. USA Today. The New York Times. The Wall Street Journal. CNN. These news sources are now quoting Pickens on at least a weekly basis, making Pickens' media spotlight almost as bright as Barack Obama's.
Boone as a child Boone on Time in 1985
Pickens is praised by energy leaders for his legendary success matched with his ability to be so forward-thinking, as well as accepted by the public at large for his "green-friendly" attempts. But a recent opinion article in The Los Angeles Times by Gal Luft asserts that Pickens' wind energy proposal will do little to reduce America's dependence on foreign oil. Unless his plan is coupled with a large boom in the public buying electric cars instead of gasoline-powered cars, Luft says that the U.S. will end up being more dependent on Iraq than ever before. Luft also refutes Pickens' proposal to shift from oil to natural gas, saying the U.S. is not yet rich enough in natural gas, and energy leaders should not depend on shale production to up the ante.
Leslie Haines, Oil and Gas Investor's
Editor-in-Chief, interviews Pickens
the Energy Capital Forum.
A&D Watch Editor Steve Toon with Pickens at the Forum.
Whether all of Pickens' proposals will work for the U.S. is still to be determined. He has certainly proved himself over the last 57 years of his career, and even if his advice isn't perfect, Washington needs an energy advisor (and not Paris Hilton) for the 2008 election if it's ever needed one. As he told the Oil And Gas Investor staff during our June Energy Capital Forum, our nation is in an energy crisis, and he is going to try to his best to give politicians some sound advice.
“I’m going to force this into this campaign. People will have to believe that I know what I’m talking about and that I have a message worth hearing. We’ll see if I have the credibility to force it into the debate," Pickens said on June 10.
It looks like you do have the credility, Boone. And the message is certainly showing up everywhere.
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