Dr. Gal Luft, executive director of the Institute for the Analysis of Global Security (IAGS) is this week’s guest commentator on the Ethanol Minute Radio program, which is a national radio show broadcasting interviews with experts from all walks of life including elected officials, celebrities, energy and environmental experts, and businessmen and women. The Ethanol Minute is sponsored by Ethanol Across America.

Dr. Luft is an internationally recognized authority on strategy, geopolitics, terrorism, Middle East and energy security. He has been a strong advocate for the increased production of domestic fuels like ethanol.The IAGS is a Washington based think tank focused on energy security and he is a co-founder of the Set America Free Coalition, an alliance of national security, environmental, labor and religious groups promoting ways to reduce America’s dependence on foreign oil. Newsweek Magazine called him a “tireless and independent advocate of energy security,” the business magazine Poder called him “one of the most recognizable figures in modern energy and security issues,” and Esquire Magazine included him in its 2007 list of America’s Best and Brightest.

In this week’s radio message, Dr. Luft challenges recent regulatory efforts by the state of California that blames deforestation on ethanol production while failing to account for the carbon emissions of petroleum production. Furthermore, Dr. Luft calls the failure to account for the military consumption of petroleum while speculating about land use impacts as “intellectually dishonest.”

“Lets not let defenders of the status quo derail us from the cause of achieving energy independence,” said Dr. Luft.