I think "energy independence" is often used loosely as a euphemism for "less oil dependence." At the end of the day, relying on other countries for corn ethanol, solar, wind, or hydro electricity is fine because any country can openly compete for our business. Oil production has become a natural monopoly, which makes it a huge security concern.

One way to approach this is to reduce our oil-specific energy needs (for example, gas cars) and migrate those to energy agnostic needs, so that your car can be fueled by a hydro plant in Washington State, a solar farm outside Vegas, some Brazilian Ethanol, some Virginian Cole, and some Saudi crude -- depending on each resources' availability to the grid.