Want to make a difference in energy policy issues affecting the United States and your personal pocketbook during this election season?

An opportunity to stand up and voice your opinion in a forum that promises attention throughout Chicago and Northwest Indiana presents itself.

All you need to do is show up and voice your opinion.  One of Sen. Richard Lugar’s staffers will be on hand for the energy forum, so maybe your ideas could make a difference in the way America responds to energy issues.

Northwest Indiana is at the forefront of energy issues — we have BP in Whiting.  Windmills are producing energy in Benton and Newton counties.  Steel mills are cranking out the metal for more windmills.  We have some of the highest energy prices in the nation — special fuel blends and high residential energy rates.  The E85 corridor runs right through our region on I-65.  Trash-to-ethanol using Lake County trash could soon be a reality.

Don’t you want to be a part of shaping the future of energy issues?  Stand up and voice your opinion.  For or against off shore drilling, ethanol, more nuclear power, trash-to-ethanol, BP Whiting expasion, wind turbines in Lake Michigan, share your ideas with other opinion leaders right here in Northwest Indiana.

WBEZ plans an energy forum at Purdue Calumet in Hammond on October 28.  You must RSVP before October 24, see details below.

Here are the energy forum details:

Energy Issues and the 2008 Election.

Chicago Public Radio, WBEZ 91.5 FM is hosting a community conversation about Indiana’s future energy needs and the 2008 election. This event will be broadcast live from Hammond, Indiana.

Come be part of the audience and join in the conversation. The event will be hosted by Chicago Public Radio’s Gabriel Spitzer along with our Northwest Indiana bureau reporter Mike Puente. Speakers include Marty Irwin, Director of Indiana Center for Coal Technology Research at Purdue University, Celina Weatherwax, District Representative for Indiana Senator Richard Lugar, Jesse Kharbanda, Executive Director of Hoosier Environmental Council, and Otto Doering, Professor at Purdue University in Agricultural Economics.

The event is October 28th at The Calumet Conference Center at Purdue University Calumet, from 5:00 until 7:00 pm.

It’s free, but you must reserve seats by October 24th at www.chicagopublicradio.org/energyforum or call 312-893-2929.

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If Barack Obama wins will he pick Indiana Senator Dick Lugar to be his Secretary of State?

Is it just a ploy to try to win over Independents and non-committal Republicans?

Reports Sarah Baxter of the UK Times Online:

As Barack Obama enters the final stages of the fight for the Democratic presidential nomination, he is preparing to detach the core voters of John McCain, the likely Republican nominee, with the same ruthless determination with which he has peeled off Hillary Clinton’s supporters.

The scene is set for a tussle between the two candidates for the support of some of the sharpest and most independent minds in politics. Obama is hoping to appoint cross-party figures to his cabinet such as Chuck Hagel, the Republican senator for Nebraska and an opponent of the Iraq war, and Richard Lugar, leader of the Republicans on the Senate foreign relations committee. …

Obama believes he will be able to neutralise McCain by drawing on the expertise of independent Republicans such as Hagel and Lugar, who is regarded by Obama as a potential secretary of state.

Larry Korb, a defence official under President Ronald Reagan who is backing Obama, said: “By putting a Republican in the Pentagon and the State Department you send a signal to Congress and the American people that issues of national security are above politics.”

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