As you probably know, a few weeks ago the Senate added the Renewable Energy and Job Creation Act to a growing list of climate change bills it has killed this year. The bill would've extended several tax incentives for the development of renewables such as solar, wind, biomass, geothermal, and others. The public opinion backlash on this and other climate failures has been swift. Example: Earlier this week, NY Times foreign affairs columnist Thomas Friedman wrote a scathing column taking the Driller-in-Chief to task for his lack of leadership on renewable energy.

Friedman begins by reminding us of Bush's acceptance of America's oil addiction -- then contrasts this admission with his current solution for curing our skyrocketing energy gas prices: drill for more oil.

It's as if our addict-in-chief is saying to us: "C'mon guys, you know you want a little more of the good stuff. One more hit, baby. Just one more toke on the ole oil pipe. I promise, next year, we'll all go straight. I'll even put a wind turbine on my presidential library. But for now, give me one more pop from that drill, please, baby. Just one more transfusion of that sweet offshore crude."

Never mind that this "transfusion of sweet offshore (and ANWR) crude" would do nothing to lower gas prices in the short term -- and next to nothing in the long run -- but would surely destroy important natural habitats and increase CO2 emissions. Addiction is usually impervious to reason, after all.

Friedman goes on to catalogue all of the president's failures of leadership when it comes to promoting conservation and renewable energy:

This from a president who for six years resisted any pressure on Detroit to seriously improve mileage standards on its gas guzzlers; this from a president who's done nothing to encourage conservation; this from a president who has so neutered the Environmental Protection Agency that the head of the E.P.A. today seems to be in a witness-protection program. I bet there aren't 12 readers of this newspaper who could tell you his name or identify him in a police lineup.

(For those of you keeping score, the current head of the EPA is Stephen L. Johnson. Here's his picture, in case you do need to pick him out of a lineup some day.)

But Friedman saves his greatest scorn for the president's failure to push for passage of the Renewable Energy and Job Creation Act:

People forget, wind and solar power are here, they work, they can go on your roof tomorrow. What they need now is a big U.S. market where lots of manufacturers have an incentive to install solar panels and wind turbines — because the more they do, the more these technologies would move down the learning curve, become cheaper and be able to compete directly with coal, oil and nuclear, without subsidies.

Friedman ends with a draft of the speech he believes a president -- a real president, as he puts it -- should give on energy right now:

"Oil is poisoning our climate and our geopolitics, and here is how we're going to break our addiction: We're going to set a floor price of $4.50 a gallon for gasoline and $100 a barrel for oil. And that floor price is going to trigger massive investments in renewable energy -- particularly wind, solar panels and solar thermal. And we're also going to go on a crash program to dramatically increase energy efficiency, to drive conservation to a whole new level and to build more nuclear power. And I want every Democrat and every Republican to join me in this endeavor."

Given Mr. Bush's prior history when it comes to climate change and renewable energy, we probably shouldn't hold our breaths waiting for this one. But perhaps if we start now, we can get the next president to lead.