Rex Tillerson Godfather of Exxon Mobil Lies and Distorts

"I think the response to that is to have as many diverse supplies of energy as possible. And that means both in terms of geographic diversity. You want to expose yourself or certainly have access for the American people to as many different geographic sources of supply as possible. So the disruption in one area does not leave you ... hostage to any one area."

Last week, Obama called to "end the age of oil in our time," claiming that the United States could produce enough renewable energy to replace all U.S. imports of oil within 10 years.

But Tillerson said that "it's going to be very challenging to achieve that goal, in that period of time. And again, so much of the energy issue that the United States deals with and the world deals with, people I think do not have an appreciation for the lead times that are required."

Had the Reagan administration, back in 1980, not purposefully derailed plans to do exactly that - develop alternative energy sources and break the cycle of dependence on imports - we would have many diverse sources of energy by now. It is challenging to achieve that goal ONLY because corporations have obstructed achievement of it at every turn, and Reagan, Bush, Clinton and Bush Jr. administrations have each stood in the way of doing anything achieving it. Our politicians felt the more important thing to do was make a very few people wealthy beyond imagining, even if it meant betraying the people of the country and suppressing any semblance of democracy.