Palin bashes ‘cap and tax’ and commends Obama on nuclear

Sarah Palin’s much-anticipated speech Saturday night at the first National Tea Party Convention in Nashville included a one-minute-and-20-second disquisition on energy policy.  She hit on her familiar talking points — drill here, drill now, “cap-and-tax” sucks. But she also commended Obama for highlighting nuclear power during his State of the Union address, a brief departure from her otherwise sneering tone toward the president. (“How’s that hopey-changey thing workin’ out for you?” was more typical.)

Considering that Palin was paid $100,000 for the 40-minute speech, this excerpt represents $3,333 worth of her wisdom: 

And to create jobs, Washington should jump-start energy projects.  I said it during the campaign and I’ll say it now: We need an all-of-the-above approach to energy policy.  That means proven, conventional resource development and support for nuclear power.  And I was thankful that the president at least mentioned nuclear power in the State of the Union. But again, we need more than words, we need a plan to turn that goal into a reality, and that way we can pave the way for projects that will create jobs, those are real job-creators, and deliver carbon-free energy.

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And while we’re at it, let’s expedite the regulatory and permitting and legal processes for on- and offshore drilling.  Instead of paying billions of dollars, hundreds of billions of dollars that now are being sent to foreign regimes, we should be drilling here and drilling now instead of relying on them to develop their resources for us.

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So what we’ve got to do is axe that plan for cap-and-tax, that policy that’s going to kill jobs and that’s going to pass the burden of paying for it onto our working families. 

At another point in the speech, Palin extols the virtues of “everyday Americans” who, among other things, “grow our food” — reinforcing Tom Philpott’s argument that conservatives and progressives should be able to find common ground on food issues.

Here’s video of the whole speech; the food mention is at 7:25 and the energy section is at 30:00-31:20: