Are Subsidies Only For Successful Industries?

       Why is it that some folks so bitterly hate the idea of giving subsidies to the alternative energy industry? When any industry begins, it needs help to become both affordable and successful. For the oil industry, that came in the form of government subsidy, although they may not have called it that at the time. Heck, the oil industry still gets mountains of subsidies today. Maybe that's the problem. Maybe people think we'll still be giving mountains of subsidies to the alternative energy industry many years from now.
       But no, the problem isn't many years from now, the problem is they don't want to subsidize the alternatives now. Everybody's heard of Solyndra, the solar company that got half a billion in loan guarantees and then declared bankruptcy. The main reason you've heard about it is because the anti-subsidy folks won't let you forget it. But if you go back into the history of the oil industry, you'll find loads of companies that went out of business.
       You never hear about the oil companies who got subsidies and still went broke. In the early days of oil exploration, they missed a whole lot more than they hit oil. It took time for oil research to figure out better ways of predicting where oil is. Well, guess what? Alternative energy needs the same sort of time to get it right too.
       What it boils down to is whether or not you believe in science? Are we causing global warming or not? Is there such a thing as global warming? Did Godzilla eat Adam and Eve's baby girl? Did Adam and Eve have a baby girl? These are the questions that keep great minds up at night. Great minds wonder why there are such silly questions. Great minds wonder why we still subsidize an overwhelmingly successful and hugely profitable oil industry, but refuse to give the same opportunity to alternatives.