Oil Oil Oil, want a political post?

My husband and I have been listening to the world is flat on car trips.  Its long it has been taking us forever.  But what has really stuck out me was how we have stopped pushing science in our country, and we are falling behind.  We have less people getting science degrees, and we have less international students staying in the US after pursing degrees.  To continue to be a power house we need to stay on the forefront of science, bet yet we aren't and we aren't changing policy at all. Ever since the end of the Cold War we stopped pursing science.
The author also discusses how President W. Bush had the opportunity with 9-11 to say, ok lets get off foreign dependency of oil. To have the US really purse green technologies.  In a similar way to how the US rallied together to be the scientific leader during the Cold War.  But yet what did our president do?  Tell us to go shopping, thanks.  What would we expect from a President who's family is bed with the Saudis.  Nothing else.  
Here it is nine years later and we not getting anywhere closer to any new technology, other than maybe what Toyota and Honda have done with Hybrids.  But yet we do nothing, nor do we all care, all we want is the house market to bounce back so we can save our bad investments, our second home equity loan and go shopping. Every time I hear anything about the oil leak, it infuriates me that our private industry or government can no do nothing.  Nor are we doing anything to prevent this in the future other than having the same discussion of no drilling or keep drilling, I'm pretty sure there is a middle ground.
But have a done anything?  No, what can I do?  Write my congressman?  That might be beneficial, except for my first PolSci Professor who pretty much told us its the biggest waste of time, no one other than interns reads them, the Congressman doesn't care, and its only political nuts, and old ladies that write.  Now yes, I do realized that Professors are a lot more cynical than what world functions, but none the less, he has still prevented me from ever doing it except when the church leaders asked us to write them a few summers ago.