Why doesn't the silliness of this proposal surprise me in the least?

President Obama's energy adviser has suggested all the world's roofs should be painted white as part of efforts to slow global warming.

Professor Steven Chu, the US Energy Secretary, said the unusual proposal would mean homes in hot countries would save energy and money on air conditioning by deflecting the sun's rays.

More pale surfaces could also slow global warming by reflecting heaKjt into space rather than allowing it to be absorbed by dark surfaces where it is trapped by greenhouse gases and increases temperatures.

This is Obama's science guy. Woe is us.

While every school child knows that light colors reflect light energy while dark colors absorb it, color itself is only a single factor, and not every a terribly important one, when it comes to heat absorption. The reality is that "black" asphalt doesn't have significantly different specific heat capacity than say granite, which isn't all that surprising since 90% of asphalt is mineral content--rock.

Are we going to paint all the rock white too?

The specific heat of asphalt is .92 Kj/Kg K (kiloJoules per Kilogram in Kelvins). Different types of asphalt have slightly different values. That's the same as clay, but less than brick (.100) and substantially less than dirt (1.26) and wet soil (1.5). Why is wet soil such a good heat sink? Because water is one of the best heat sinks we have, with a 4.187 specific heat value.

Now about how much of the earth's surface is covered by water?

Yeah.

An administration committed to policy informed by pseudo-science.