Off-shore Drilling: A Case of NIMBY

George Bush's defacto weak dollar policy, which true to form only served short term interests, is another large factor of the rise in Oil prices. Even if Larry Kudlow is reticant to admit it.

There is no additional refinery capacity to accomodate additional Oil. The best place NJ can start with is conservation. It always amazes me that the generation of soccer moms/dads who saved the whales, can't seem to get it through their thick skulls that now it's time to save the planet. Drive slower. Drive less. Go smaller. Take the cell phone chargers out of the outlets when your'e not using them. Participate in the NJ Clean Energy Program. Turn the thermostats up in the malls, for goodness sake.

Soldiers are dieing in their Hummers so we can Play Soldier in ours. And please know that the flat panel TV's we're buying use alot more electricity than conventional....SO DO SOMETHING!

If you wait for leadership on this issue it will probably be, too late.

It was a well done article in USA Today. It dosen't change anything that was written in my previous post. Energy is both important for the US and a money maker for the investors. Simplistic but true.

WE CAN NOT DRILL OUR WAY OUT OF THIS. The road to hell is paved not only with good intentions but also with false choices, and this may be one of the falsest choices ever. (Apollo's Fire) There is NO CAPACITY TO REFINE ADDITIONAL OIL! So stop trying to sell US on drilling. I suggest you read Apolllo's Fire, Igniting America's Clean Energy Economy by Jay Inslee and Bracken Hendrick's. It posits numerous, cost effective, job creating and sustainable ways to generate energy.

How about: "A Case of I'd like my Kids to be able to Ski in New Jersey" Ask Princeton Ski Shops or Mountaincreek Ski Resort how well this policy of OIL at all costs has worked out for them. And if we're going to try to sell offshore drilling as a boon for sport fishing, a group I include myself in, what about wind power. I suugest you read Apollo's Fire. And finally a poem;

When the last living thing has died on account of us, how poetical it would be if Earth could say, in a voice floating up perhaps from the floor of the Grand Canyon,(or the Jersy Shore) "It is Done." People did not like it here. Kurt Vonnegut

I'm not a particalur fan of Nancy Pelosi, so I didn't know I was parroting her. Where are we going to build the new refineries? Perhaps we can put them where you live and then see who gets a case of NIMBY. And while we're at it let's look at who underwrites refinery construction or expansion Mr. Pragmatic Conservative. The TAXPAYER in the form of municipal tax credits, corporate write offs and offshoring of profit. ("Free Lunch, How the Wealthiest Americans Enrich Themselves at Government Expense and Stick You With The Bill" by David Cay Johnston)

I feed my kids just fine thank you. Gas will have to go alot higher to effect my standard of living. But maybe you should direct some of your commentary at the marina owners in NJ who are trying to send their kids to college when NO ONE (except maybe you) can afford to fill their boats with gas. I guess they can wait the five years it would take to get these "vast reserves" on-line. Please do not posit Sen. Mitch McConnell, the fountain of misinformation, as evidence for anything other than the Chinese oil rigs off the coast of Cuba which are a FIGMANT OF HIS IMIGINATION.

You write, "do not feel free to step all over my standard of living by imposing do-nothing policies on me" That's really what is at the heart of the matter isn't it? Well Trochilus, I fought in the Persian Gulf, have blood on my hands and have seen men die to protect your standard of living, I'll be damned if you and yours are going to relegate my kids, our kids, to the same fate. And you call yourself a veteran. Shame on you! Now I'm getting frenetic.

It is truly unfortunate that the "Greatest Generation" begat the Most Selfish One.

JesseOKurtz,

Certainly one can only admire your optimism and your logic as a way to go about solving the problem.

Unfortunately, GotKids has an entirely different agenda, which is to grasp at any available straw, no matter how improbable or illogical, in order to defeat the possibility of problem resolution.

That agenda includes refusing to consider opening up any additional drilling or refinery capacity, as a basis for calming the markets, and thereby reducing gasoline or fuel oil prices.

Even Mr. "Yes We Can!" says "Oh, no you don't!" when it comes to opening up additional oil reserves for drilling. That's because Barack Obama has little or no problem with the higher prices.

Listen to how Obama says he likes the high gasoline prices, only wishing they has not gone up quite so quickly!

GotKids instead apparently supports the hard leftist agenda, which is to keep the stopper firmly in the new drilling and refinery capacity bottles, and thereby to promote the continuation of the pattern of instability in the oil markets, which the lefties will continue to try to blame it on the Administration for failing to sufficiently pursue alternative energy sources.

GotKids opined to a prior comment of mine, thusly:

"You write, "do not feel free to step all over my standard of living by imposing do-nothing policies on me" That's really what is at the heart of the matter isn't it?"

The answer, of course, is yes. As an American, I have an inalienable right to the "pursuit of happiness." And I also have a right to expect that the Congress will take the steps necessary to allow increases in drilling in some known and available oil reserve(s) here in the United States, so as to at least calm, if not reduce the price of oil.

But GK clearly believes otherwise, for reasons that escape both of us.

GK also says: "Gas will have to go alot [sic] higher to effect my standard of living."

Apparently, GK sides with the verminous left on this issue, and believes in an entirely different philosophy.

It is one that, as best as I can figure, is rooted in a fundamentally solipsistic and covetous "ideal" -- one that probably goes something like this:

"What is yours, should either be broken up, or at least incrementally become mine for the taking. And what is mine is currently insufficient."

So, we're not going to win the argument by convincing GK -- or the left. All we can do here is prod GK into revealing exactly how nonsensical and ultimately selfish those on the left can really be.

by Trochilus

GotKids,

A few lame citations to frenzy-oriented authors and their silly books and articles, does not win a debate, my friend.

Nor does quitting and showing us you're behind. But, you are obviously fresh out of ammo. So, I guess you needed a bogus exit strategy.

Had you taken care to read many of the comments above, including the original post by Dr. Marbach, it might have dawned on you that no one here is arguing against developing new and alternative sources of energy.

We are just questioning the wisdom of currently blocking all additional drilling, whether off-shore, in the shale reserves, or otherwise. But you won't address that issue, at least not intelligently.

Your position seems indistinguishable from the pompous, irresponsible, and idiotic view that the political left in this country is so fond of touting, i.e., that under no circumstances are any additional sources of currently available energy reserves to be tapped in order to stablize or even reduce current gasoline and fuel oil prices so that our economy and our people do not suffer needlessly in the mean time.

You lefties calculate that until suitable quantities of your devoutely-to-be-wished alternative energy sources are fully up and on line, that it is time for you to be mean, and to block any current relief whatsoever.

By pursuing anti-drilling, anti nuclear and anti-clean coal policies, you types doggedly believe that you will drive up current prices, and turn voters angrily against the our nations' energy industries.

But the arguments you make are ridiculous, and the public is getting impatient. Excess profits taxes will only affect United States-based energy companies.

Here's a fact.  Exxon-Mobil, our largest oil company, is only number 14 on the list of oil companies in size in the world. That's right, number 14!

Those liberal taxes will not even touch the thirteen largest oil companies in the world!

Who's side did you say you were on again?

And here's a little friendly reminder, GotKids: Two-thirds of the people in this country believe (correctly) that additional drilling here at home will help reduce oil prices in the short term.

Just the announcement of removing the Executive Branch bar the other day, measurably dropped prices. But the Congressional ban on everything is the one that counts. And experts say that new drilling could produce measurable quantities of crude in a very short period of time . . . within two years.  Not the seven or ten years you lefties prattle on about.

But in spite of the evidence,  Nancy, and Barack, and Harry . . . and their demagogue pal, Al, all say, NO!"  So please, keep it up! And, in the fall, you'll be out in the cold. You better get another exit strategy prepared!

by Trochilus

I don't profess to be nearly as smart or educated as any of you....

You all bring up very important and relivent points, however, I think that we can all agree on one thing.

We all recognize that alternative forms of energy are ultimately the most important focus for our future, our childrens future, etc. etc.

Seeing through the brain flexing by all of you and getting to the heart of your points is a little exhausting, however, GK is trying to make the point that not enough is being done to explore our options and that by drilling now to save a few cents a gallon is counterproductive to the effort we know we need to improve on. We know that the small percentage of funds that the major oil companies put towards R&D is minisquel compared to the profits they reep. It's not right.

On the flip side, I do agree with the "in the mean time" arguement by Commentor. If what you say is true and we will gain actual dollars on the futures of oil pricing, then it's simple. If we can agree to pass some kind of bill that would insure that as we drill closer to our shores and reep the benifits, we extend some of the savings/profits to gain ground on the effort of distancing our dependancy, then we all win. No matter what your stance may be.

Again, I'm just an average person. I don't write books or have the credentials that I'm sure you all have. Just an observation. Try not to be too harsh!

Hanks, thanks for bringing the discussion down to earth a little bit. On the issue of whther or not off shore drilling has any real short term benefit the answer is NO. Not maybe, not could be, but NO. http://mediamatters.org/items/200807180012?f=h_latest; not a fan of Media Matters For America, that is fine but look to the comments for some real meat and potatoes information form both sides of the deabte. Seems Trochilus gets his talking points from Sean Hannity and crew.

Want to know how much the Oil and Gas industry has spent on R&D of alternative fuels and/or conservation? Less than the dog food industry has spent on dog food improvements (Apollo's Fire). That is why the techonolgy is ALWAYS ten years away.

I can't read Troch's entire post (my daughter needs help with her reading) but the upshot as I understand it is the vehicles don't have the range he/we need. The question as I see it is, with the advent of GPS how much range do you need? Hydrogen filling sations could be stragically positioned to meet the range needs of long distance travelers and GPS can alert us along the way. But do not hold your breath waiting for the GAS stations to incorporate hydrogen filling stations. I can't go on. Really, read Appolo's Fire. It is avaiable at the librarys, just not mine because I have not returned it yet.

Best regards and thanks again Hanks.

You will obviously throw the baby out with the bath water. I almost didn't read the book because of Bill Clinton's forward. I don't care what Hillary Clinton takes credit for and why do you keep attacking me personally instead of taking on the issues.

So please stick to the issues and stop the hellfire and damnation. It's old and tired, just like your golf game.

I am not here to debate you or anyone else. I am here to have an open and honest discussion with my fellow NJ residents. If I wanted to debate, I would join a debate club or watch C-Span with a laptop. I come here because I know we will have opposing views and I respect that.

I went back and re-read Dr. Marbach's post and most of the comments. Nowhere, nowhere is the issue of refinery capacity broached. I'd say that is a pretty glaring omission. Nowhere, is the fact that it would take until 2012 for the leases to be finalized, nowhere are the myriad of other factors I discussed above or provided in the link to MMFA even touched upon. Which goes to the heart of the matter and that is that you and yours are polluting our discussion. I don't know how else to put it.

I'm glad you at least took the time to look up Apollo's Fire. But appearantly all you did was Google it. If you took the time to read past the forward you would see the book is not based solely on the issue of climate change. It is based on the issue of energy indepence and economic growth; hence the byline, Igniting America's Clean Energy Economy. You don't like Jay Inslee or Bracken Hendricks, or Center for American Progress or John Podesta, who by the way also served in the Bush admisistration, or anyone else for that matter, fine. I don't know any of these people well enough to like or dislike them. I want fact based analysis and I will reject any wing of political and economic ideology at every turn because it has proven to be utterly wrong. Wrong for me, wrong for my kids, wrong for my state and wrong for my country.

Now I want you to look up another book. "Collapse, How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed", by Jared Diamond. Surely the Pulitizer prize winning author of "Guns, Germs and Steele" does not offend thee. Which is what brought me to this place that has me up at 5am blogging to my wifes chagrin. Societies collapse, and they tend to collapse quickly. They collapse for a myriad of reasons but one that stands out to me for the purpose of this discussion, is when the people of a society can not reach resolution of an important issue and instead go round and round over it. Just think about it; abortion, health care, the environment, education, energy. What have we reached a resolution of in these last 10 years? Imus got kicked off MSNBC, and that's IT.

Which brings me to my next topic, sorry for going long but I'm up, my wife is mad at me and I suspect we are the only ones here anyway.

Global warming and/or climate change is real. I reject every assertion that climate change is not real and that it is not perilous. I question the judment of those who initially rejected any and all mention of climate change and have now switched their argument to "we don't know if human activity is the cause." IT IS A LIE. The reason why I can say that is because I attended a very reasonable discussion held by a climate paleontologist from NASA's Goddard Institute. Now I can see you jumping up and down already, "That's James Hanson". Correct, the same James Hansen who risked his cushy job at NASA because he wouldn't let some holy hire fresh out of Liberty University Law School jerk with his scientific reports. The same NASA that put a man on the moon. The same NASA that 35 cents of every dollar I make helps go to paying for and if I can sleep at night knowing that a small portion of that money is being spent wisely I think it's NASA.

What she, the Doctor, explained to me was that the Earth's atmosphere and/or the temperature thereof is subject to what are called "forcings". There are cooling forcings and warming forcing. An example of a cooling forcing is a volcanic eruption and the ash spewed into the atmosphere. An example of a heat forcing is the carbon we are emitting and have been emitting exponentially since the industrial revolution. The idea that mankind is too small a factor to have that kind of effect was totally debunked following 9/11 when commercial air traffic was halted. Studies found that the atmosopheres temperature increased because of the lack of exhaust from airplne traffic. Counterintuitive, that reducing pollution and particualte matter increased atmospheric temperature, not really, but IT DOES MEAN WE ARE HAVING AN AFFECT. That's what is called SCIENCE.

Now what the Doctor of climate paleontology from NASA said was that she, the scientist, could not tell us whether the earth would ultimately cool as depcited in "Day After Tomorrow", highly unlikely were her words. But what she could tell me was that we are in uncharted territory. Based on Ice Core Samples which can show US what the earths atmosphere was like upto and including millions of years ago, we have taken earth's atmosphere, it's temperature and it's support of human life where it has never been before. That, I think is pretty scary and she was not being flambouyant, rhetorical or partisan. Those were the FACTS.

In closing Trochilus let me be frank with you. You are either an authoritarian follower or an authoritarian leader. I don't know you well enough to say which. That's OK, alot of people are, authoritarian followers. But do not expect that I will accept your leadership, or raise my kids to recognize your brand of righ-wing politcal ideology as the right kind of leadership to follow. You haven't got anything right in God knows how long and I don't think we can stand to be wrong for much longer.

Best regards.

GK,

Call it what you will -- a debate or a discussion -- you and I are not going to resolve the matter here. And call me whatever names you want, but you only demonstrate a serious weakness in your arguments by doing so. It is quite typical of those of you on the left these days.

But it is a fact that there is a serious disagreement among scientists as to what caused a period of warming from the 70’s through most of the 90’s. And the clear trend among scientists most recently is to question a predominant role based on human activity. The real demagogues in prompting the matter were James Hanson from NASA and his political sidekick, Al Gore.

The science of "climatology" is very young indeed, but when you have a leading figure like Hanson publicly declaring that the "debate is over," as to human-caused climate change, and more recently outrageously declaring that anyone from industry who challenges his conclusions should be put in jail, you know you have a serious problem and are witnessing a man with an obvious character flaw.

And, I would also add, your veiled and suggested identification of all of NASA’s successes over the years to the fact that James Hanson was working there, is a disgusting insult to NASA and the fine work they have done. It has been my experience in life that every organization, from time to time, spawns a bad apple. Mr. Hanson is in my opinion just such a bad apple.

It is a fact that Hanson posted and misreported key data about the year 1998 -- a relatively basic mathematical error made by a man with a very specific agenda -- and, it was an error that he later tried to go back and correct quietly. He was caught at it. That data was extremely important to the debate because Hanson was claiming that the year 1998 was the hottest on record, suggesting that the earth was heating up in an entirely anomalous manner and that it was all our fault. The correction reestablished that 1934 was the hottest year, and we now know that in the intervening decade -- ten full years -- that several of the years have been significantly cooler than during years even preceding the beginning of the 20th century.

The 1998 error made by Mr. Hanson, however, contributed mightily to the hysteria that Al Gore has had a hand in promoting in the mean time -- namely that global warming is resulting in global climate change, and that it has predominantly all been caused by human activity. We humans, according to Gore, have been destroying our earth! Massive storms and floods would engulf us, according to his utterly dishonest movie!

But several years of dire hurricane predictions following Katrina, for example, failed to materialize the way those Chicken Little types confidently insisted they would. Year after year, all their storm predictions ended up sounding like scripts for Saturday Night Live’s, Emily Litella. "Never mind!"

Those "conclusions" underscored the political agenda, backed up with IPCC support, and called for massive trading schemes and huge governmental expenditures on a scale that is simply beyond the imagination. Al Gore has already made a ton of money promoting his rubbish based on his junk science interpretations from his movie. Your favorite book, Apollo’s Fire, posits the "truth" of all that as a basis for suggesting we all adopt a Jimmy Carter style "less is more" agenda, and that government planners be put in charge of directing it. Screw that!

Of course, Mr. Gore himself is no personal slouch. He has never owned up to the consequences of the bull he’s been feeding the public all these years. Though he preaches every moment about how we should all burn less fuel and use less energy like his little obedient acolytes, Al is personally burning up the midnight candles like there is no tomorrow.

A recent update investigation of Al Gore’s personal consumption in Tennessee establishes that in the past one year alone, Gore’s home used 213,210 kilowatt-hours (kWh) of electricity, which is sufficient to power 232 average American households for one month.

He is, in other words, a hypocrite beyond anyone’s imagining. He has also made an estimated $100 million on his speaking engagements and global warming-related investments.  Al Gore is the very embodiment of fear-mongering and personal greed.

But real scientists -- read the actual recent studies above -- are now finding that the conclusion that the warming trend was predominantly caused by human activity is deeply flawed. More and more of them look to more important factors solar activity trends, over which we human beings play no role whatsoever, as the likely primary cause of any real climate changes that take place. There has been a anomalous pattern of sun spot activity -- or I should say, a lack of sun spot activity, that has lasted for many, many years now.

Imagine that -- the sun is the primary factor in temperature changes on earth, not the kind of "corporate greed" that Al Gore is so fond of talking about, though he personally embodies that level of greed and wastefulness up to his eyeballs.

As for refinery capacity, your "problem" is fundamentally flawed. We can increase it and we should.  We should not allow our economy to go to hell in a handbasket because of demagogues on the political left.  If there are problems, we can fast track them. That is what we Americans are good at . . . getting the job done.

And, there is plenty of oil. 

A new estimate -- 90 Billion barrels of oil under the Arctic.  We do need energy independence, and there are experts soming up with ideas to pursue that goal.

by Trochilus

GotKids,

Regarding my statements re: sun spot activity, if you are really interested in knowledge, and not just the piles of polemical crud that you have been posting here on this comment thread, then just take a read of this. 

You might even want to give it to someone you are teaching to read.

As for your political attack, please, have at it. 

Here's a response.

Obama apparently doesn't like visiting wounded American soldiers, even though he pretends he wants to be the Commander-in-Chief. I guess that's why he cancelled his trip to Landstuhl Regional Medical Center in Germany.  Nice guy, huh?

I don't know about you, but I strongly suspect that God doesn't like that much either.

by Trochilus

As I patiently pointed out before, Barack Obama cancelled his trip to Landstuhl Regional Medical Center in Germany.

Due to the fact that he is running to be the "Commander-in-Chief" he could have at least had the decency to go there quietly as a private citizen, and without the press in tow (which is obvioulsly the ONLY reason he ever would have gone there in the first place) and no one could have possibly have had any objection at all.

But he didn't care to.  He preferred to go sight-seeing. 

Is it because he does not care about the injured troops? Is it because he only cares about the headlines? Sure looks like that to me. To me, that speaks volumes about his fundamental lack of character.

Now, back to the topic of this thread.

Yesterday, the Democrat United States Senate and House leaders each personally blocked any votes on amendments on pending legislation. Those amendments would have allowed new drilling.

Why did they do it? Because they knew that many of their fellow Democrats would have voted with the Republicans to allow additional drilling.

Obviously Reid and Pelosi could care less about the people of this country who are stuck with the artificially high crude oil prices that translate into higher prices at the pump.

Harry Reid later even lashed out at reporters in a stupid and insulting way on the subject of what those manuvers meant.

It also looks like he lied about what happened as well:

"On Thursday, Reid told reporters he offered Republicans "separate amendments" as well on oil shale drilling and on OCS drilling, although a review of floor proceedings this week shows no such specific offer."

Seems like he and Nancy may be a little short in the character department as well. Otherwise, how do you explain why Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi are undercutting the very democratic process that they are sworn to uphold?

by Trochilus

Counts heads.  The Democrats are in the majority -- however so slight in the Senate -- and they are the ones who are acting like children.

The "donors" you hold in disgust are the people who elected them to office, and who expect them to act upon and pass legislation that will benefit them. They refuse.

Clearly, over two thirds of the American people demand the passage of legislation to will permit additional drilling of oil resources in this country, and they correctly believe that such legislation will help to reduce oil prices and by extension gasoline and heating oil.

It is the obligation of leadership to post the legislation under the circumstances.  The refusal on the part of the Democrat leadership to allow the legislation come to the floor, or their use of unprecedented parliamentary manuvers to prevent any amendments to legislation to be voted on that would provide for additional drilling, violates their public trust.

by Trochilus

My brother is in Germany you ass, and his kids are asleep in my house tonight which is why I even bother answering your dribble. They would like to know why their Dad is fighting a war for oil. Perhaps you can give me a good answer because I certainly didn't have one. 

Obama obviously wanted to visit the troops otherwise it would not have been on his itinerary. The press was informed that they woul not be accompanying him to the base. The DOD called to inform Obama that only Senate staffers could accompany him and as I understand it they had already left. The retired General who I'm sure had never been denied access to a military base in his entire adult life was certainly pissed. Nothing strange there to you, I suppose?

When pressed, Obama had to ask himself some serious questions: who was paying for this leg of the trip (the campaign); whose plane was he flying on (the campaign); what was the purpose of the trip to Germany (to campaign). Personally, I'd prefer a President who can ask himself serious questions and come up with an honest answer, even when he/she may not like the result. I think we have all had enough with Presidents who ask themseves serious questions and then think God gave them the answer.

Sleep tight Trochilus, the pain will be over soon enough.

Duplicate omitted - see above.

For all of those who have been caught up in the ANWR hype, here is a link a post on the REAL story about ANWR.  Just click on it.

It is located at a website called Truth Or Fiction one of several such sites that actually examine a lot of the nonsense that has been flying around the web.

The graphics and the pictures certainly tell the true story. 

You can see the tiny portion of ANWR containing significant oil deposits, and why the hype you so frequently read is actually so blatantly misleading.  You will not read about this, or see the graphics and photos in the MSM.

by Trochilus

Got Kids,

Re: Your latest . . . you say,

What do you think? And I don't mean Trochilus.

So, who's the "authoritarian" one here?

As for your claims above, the only thing I can say is, what a crock! The bit about no animal access to the sea is just complete baloney. That rubbish was invented to garner the "sympathy" of animal rights folks. There is absolutely no truth to it at all. The area is absolutely huge.

Regarding your "map" . . . just because someone can superimpose graphics of what would be mega-gigantic derricks on a silouette of a map, doesn't mean it really looks like that!

Take a look at the actual photos of the area. That's what it looks like! We're talking about drilling in about a 2,000 acre plot, a mere dot on the map! The area is enormous.

There is simply no reasonable basis whatsoever to your claims.

As for "warming trends," apparently you simply have little regard for fact at all. There is no current warming trend! Cooling has been occurring for about a decade now -- 1998 was the last "high" year.

Why don't you actually read the latest studies? Read about the mathematical error by James Hansen.

Over the course of recorded history, ice records show that there have been two really significant prior "warming peaks" -- one beginning in about 100 B.C.  Current estimates are that temperatures back then were actually higher than the peak year of 1998, and there was another "peak" in about the year 1000 (remember the naming of Greenland?)

Please, explain either of them in terms of human causation?  Nothing to say?

The relatively cool period that preceded the 20th century warming is now seen as a significant dip, or drop known as the "little ice age." It lasted for about 700 years.

But you all want to do is blame everything on "corporations" or "oil men."

The truth is that you lefties just plain do not want to allow anyone to drill for oil because it will "let the air out" of your scheme to drive up gasoline and heating oil prices in order to to jam technology-forcing changes down our throats.  And you really don't seem to care much what happens to people in the mean time.

How else could you possibly explain this ridiculous nonesense ??!! Please . . . is he for real?  Tire pressure and tune-ups?

Or, should we all just have a good laugh?

by Trochilus

Just Sigh!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u-JmXVHxjxw

Below is more proof of the underlying validity of the MIMBY theme of this post by Dr. Marbach. 

Nancy Pelosi refuses to allow any additional drilling to come to a vote in the House for a very basic reason -- she knows it will pass!  So she and Harry have resorted to using questionable parliamentary manuvers to prevent a debate and a vote on the subject.  Doing so is violating the very basis upon which we elect Members of Congress -- to consider, debate and pass laws for the common good.

Her latest wacky conundrum is that, as she said: "I'm trying to save the planet; I'm trying to save the planet." 

Pulitzer Prize winning columnist Charles Krauthammer spanks that silly claim by making the case that the prevention of drilling here guarantees far greater environmental despoilation elsewhere, such as in places like Nigeria. 

Thus, he proves that Nancy and the Democrats' "seem blissfully unaware that the argument for their drill-there-not-here policy collapses on its own environmental terms."   And he also hammers at the so-called solid "environmental" basis for biofuels and ethanol. 

"The other panacea, yesterday's rage, is biofuels: We can't drill our way out of the crisis, it seems, but we can greenly grow our way out. By now, however, it is blindingly obvious even to Democrats that biofuels are a devastating force for environmental degradation. It has led to the rape of "lungs of the world" rainforests in Indonesia and Brazil as huge tracts have been destroyed to make room for palm oil and sugar plantations.

Here in the U.S., one out of every three ears of corn is stuffed into a gas tank (by way of ethanol), causing not just food shortages abroad and high prices at home, but intensive increases in farming with all of the attendant environmental problems (soil erosion, insecticide pollution, water consumption, etc.).

This to prevent drilling on an area in the Arctic one-sixth the size of Dulles Airport that leaves untouched a refuge one-third the size of Britain."

Face it; the Democrat argument, whether spouted by Obama, Reid or Pelosi, is simply coming apart at the seams. 

by Trochilus

Speaking in St Petersburg, Florida today, Barack Obama changed his position on offshore drilling, according to an AP story by Mike Glover, entiotled, "Obama shifts, says he may back offshore drilling."

From the story -- and just exactly as some of us have been saying right here:

"Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama said Friday he would be willing to support limited additional offshore oil drilling if that's what it takes to enact a comprehensive policy to foster fuel-efficient autos and develop alternate energy sources."

In fact, one of his statements sounds a whole lot like he just threw the Congressional Democrats right under the bus!

Getting awfully crowded under there, now isn't it?

"'The Republicans and the oil companies have been really beating the drums on drilling,' Obama said in the Post interview. 'And so we don't want gridlock. We want to get something done.'"

How did you put it before, Got Kids?

"Sigh! Just Sigh!

by Trochilus