Periodically, a fever rages in the political class in Washington. Remember term limits? The fever raging among them now is that they must be addicted to physical fitness in order to qualify for high office.

But history, Arnold Schwarzenegger notwithstanding, does not suggest that people in the peak of physical fitness are any more suited to govern than the sedentary.

Indeed, as in most things, history’s lessons are contradictory. Winston Churchill started drinking at breakfast, Franklin D. Roosevelt was disabled, and William Howard Taft challenged his chefs and his tailors. Adolf Hitler was lazy, took no exercise, and was a vegetarian. In contrast, Saddam Hussein insisted on fitness and swam regularly in the Tigris with his coterie of murderers.

At one time, most American politicians were probably physically fit: People who have to travel on horseback end up that way. Only urban slugs, like Benjamin Franklin, got around by carriage and avoided the involuntary conditioning.

The horseback-riding factor is an important one. People who ride know that they feel much better after an hour on a horse than if they worked out an hour in the gym. Ronald Reagan rode throughout his presidency on horses provided by the U.S. Park Service. He said: “There is nothing better for the inside of a man than the outside of a horse.”

Given Reagan’s mythical status in Republican circles, it is astounding that the entire GOP has not saddled up. Can’t you see Republican members of Congress galloping up Capitol Hill at the mention of socialized medicine, amnesty for illegal aliens, or gun registration? Imagine Mitch McConnell and John Boehner shouting, “Tally ho”?

If you want a good example of the electability of the fit, it is George W. Bush. The president used to run on a treadmill, but now he takes half-day bike-riding excursions at the U.S. Secret Service training facility in Beltsville, Md. The concept of the leader of the free world hurtling around on a bike is most disconcerting.

Gerald Ford, always fitness-conscious, preferred the anonymity of swimming in the White House pool. Bill Clinton liked the idea of exercising, or he liked us to think he liked the idea of exercising. But his jogging was an embarrassment. Dwight Eisenhower had enough of that in the military, and preferred to putt on the South Lawn of the White House. There he engaged in a long war against the squirrels that stole his golf balls. Ike, I am told, deported them to Sylvan Theater on the Mall.

Of course, the man who had it both ways was Teddy Roosevelt. He loved sports of all kinds, but he was deliciously paunchy. Vigorous activities—of the athletic and gastronomic kind–were a way of life for him.

At the White House these days, the gym is a very active place. After a 16-hour day, I am told, a staffer was hoping that somebody would buy her a drink. No such luck. Her superior told her that she would have more energy if she went to the gym.

When Karl Marx was writing his tracts in the Reading Room of the British Museum, he was known for his flatulence and for always complaining about his poor health. And when Churchill was told about this, he declared that history was made by men who felt unwell.

Nevertheless, Arnold Schwarzenegger is something to behold: fit, trim and charismatic. Never mind that Clive James, the Australian-born writer, said Schwarzenegger looked like a brown condom filled with walnuts.

As Congress debates the new energy bill, nothing is dearer to the hearts of most Democrats than a provision known as the renewable electricity standard (RES). Simply, this means that electric utilities will be mandated to generate about 15 percent of their electricity from renewable sources such as biomass, landfill gas, ocean geothermal, solar and wind. Before Congress goes all the way down this road, it might want to take a look at the catastrophic misadventure that has befallen western Europe as a result of the pursuit of a similar goal.

Renewables are supposed to clean the air by reducing the amount of coal that is burned. But there is a hidden agenda: a pathological disinclination to use nuclear power.

Europe, like the United States, recognized in the 1960s that nuclear represented a new and secure way to produce electricity. But it ran into opposition from the anti-nuclear movement, particularly over concerns about nuclear waste. The new generation issue was shelved by the appearance of a new machine for generating electricity: the aeroderivative turbine. These are high-performance jet engines operating on the ground at very high efficiencies. They were seductive, and they seduced the world’s utilities. Their ideal fuel is natural gas which emits fewer greenhouse gases than burning coal and oil. Capital costs are low, and gas turbines are more easily sited than big traditional power plants.

Northern Europe, and Germany in particular, had turned against nuclear power and was keen to phase out coal. The North Sea was producing gas, and hard decisions on future electric generation could be avoided. Alone, France stuck with nuclear.

However, the new generating regime in Europe demanded additional supplies of gasóand they were available in abundance in Siberia. Little by little, Russia realized that it could secure a political advantage in Europe by becoming its principal fuel supplier.

Western oil companies rushed in to help the Russians exploit the Siberian reserves of gas and oil. Leading the charge was British Petroleum, closely followed by Royal Dutch Shell. The reasoning was simple: The Russians needed the technology and expertise of the West; and the Europeans needed Russian gas and oil.

A few countries recognized that a dangerous situation was developing. First among these was Finland. Although the green movement is strong there, the Finns had had an unhappy relationship with Russia and elected to build a fifth nuclear power plant, which is a lot of nuclear power for a population of 5.2 million.

Tony Blair’s administration was also concerned about Europe becoming too dependent on Russian energy. But the British prime minister was unable to convince his Labor party of the need to build new nuclear plants.

Germany, with its powerful green party adamantly opposed to nuclear, accepted the Russian Bear’s embrace with the greatest alacrity. When a new gas pipeline under the Baltic Sea is completed, Germany will be at least 50 percent–and probably more– dependent on Russian energy. Germany’s energy destiny has been decided for decades to come.

Already the former Soviet satellites of Poland, Belorus, Ukraine and Georgia have had their gas supplies interrupted for political reasons by Vladimir Putin’s Russia. Putin also moved against Russia’s largest oil company, Yukos, accusing its leader Mikhail Khordokofsky of tax evasion and other crimes and sending him to prison in Siberia. In no time, Yukos was broken up and seized by the state controlled entities Gazprom and Rosneft. Now, more than 50 percent of Russian energy is owned by the state.

Meanwhile, Western companies have been largely driven out of Russia. And a joint venture between Russia and British Petroleum, known as TNK-BP, is under pressure. Royal Dutch Shell, after investing more than $22 billion is being harassed out of Sakhalin Island in the North Pacific.

Optimistic Europeans had thought they could avail themselves of gas from the Caspian Sea, produced by Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan. The gas was to come through a pipeline under the Caspian and through the Caucasus. Not so fast, said Putin. This route, favored by the United States, displeased him. And Putin has talked the central Asian countries into a Black Sea pipeline controlled by Russia.

Also, without protest, the Europeans allowed Gazprom to buy the largest natural gas hub in Europe in Baumgarten an der March, Austria. It was sold to the Russians by the Austrian company that owned it. Now the Russian Bear’s arms are firmly around most of the European Union, controlling not only the traditional uses of natural gas–heating, cooking and chemical production–but also the new use of electric production.

What the Warsaw Pact failed to achieve in its hopes of dominating Europe, Europe has conceded to Russia through energy dependence.

The price of anything-but-nuclear may be very high indeed. It is not that the Europeans have not tried to deploy into renewables, particularly wind. Alas, they contribute less than 3 percent to Europe’s electric needs.

In the United States, natural gas is already under stress (30 percent of it going to electric generation). And siting terminals to import it is as difficult as siting new nuclear plants.

With the best will in the world, most utilities do not believe that they can generate 15 percent of their load from renewable by 2020. Renewables are an honorable concept, but not if the purpose is to delay further the building of nuclear plants that are urgently needed.