The morning of May 20, right-wing talk radio propagandist Laura Ingraham attacked Barack Obama on her radio show. The evening before, she attacked Obama while guest hosting Bill O’Reilly’s Fox “Republican” News show.

At issue was the recent overview Obama provided of American consumption, revealing that America has just 3 percent of the world’s population, but consumes more than 30 percent of its resources.

Obama was clearly framing the energy issue. This is something that both Republicans and their masters, big oil and the segment of corporate America that places short-term profits over America’s future, absolutely refuse to do. They will rely on personal attacks and distortions in a sorched-earth attempt to “win.”

The attacks by Ingraham continued with her call-in guest, failed Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney. He accused Obama of wanting to destroy the American way of life. That, in itself, is an interesting admission by two conservatives. Are they suggesting that Americans are wasteful by birthright, incapable of change, and hopelessly arrogant to the point of demanding the lion’s share of the earth’s resources with endless impunity?

That may describe conservatives, but it, hopefully, doesn’t describe the majority of hard-working and thoughtful Americans.

Meanwhile, Bensonwood Builders of New Hampshire and MIT are re-imagining energy and architecture, building a series of prototype structures that produce most of the energy they consume.

Seems like being “green” is saving “green” cash; quite different from the defeatist rhetoric of Republicans.

Mark Tardif, Waterville