At the end of the day, Pickens should invest wherever he wants to invest - its his money. But he is looking out for himself, as he is an investor looking for a money-maker in energy or any other sector. If he needs to convince the market that wind is a good investment, then he has already made his investment and is looking to pump its value for his own profit.

I have to generally disagree with this statement. Not every billionaire is out to make himself money. A case in point is Bill Gates and his foundation. The charter for that organization is to invest money in developing solutions for world-wide poverty. The benefit Bill gets from that is merely philanthropic, which is not to be under-emphasized.

Now, with Pickens, he's in his 80's and he is wise enough to know that he'll die sooner rather than later. An investment like he is proposing is not something that he'll likely live to see the benefits from, but he might.

If this were merely an effort to make big-oil look pretty, then it would be proposed and implemented by corporations, not individuals.

You (and he) are both absolutely correct on several points: the USA is sweating its wealth to the world. We are a country of middle managers now. We produce nothing and we buy shit with borrowed cash -- borrowed from the Chinese or from the Fed. All the monkeys you see driving around in a Lexus or BMW and making a fraction of what you earn for a living are a direct side effect of the Fed printing extra money to delay an economic catastrophe. The end-result is ridiculously obvious to me, but not necessarily to others: If you're not already in-debt to a foreign entity, then you will be soon. Expect more shit than just the Chrystler Building being owned by foreigners. Think GM, Ford, Boeing, ExxonMobil, etc.

We're fucked.