Thursday, May 22, 2008

Drill Now!

Let's start drilling for oil today. Let's start building more oil refinaries today. Let's start searching for alternative energy sources today. That's right we should drill for our in the U.S. while still looking for new alternative energy sources. The two are not mutually exclusive. They are both a very vital part to short and long term security in the U.S. With Oil Prices heading to $4 a gallon and possibly higher the U.S. congress decided to bring the CEO's of the oil companies to Washington so they could tell them how bad they are being. The truth is it's mostly not there fault. The United States has spent the last thirty years without buliding a single new oil refinary while at the same time passing laws making impossible to drill for oil. Why are prices going up and up? Because we don't have enough oil. As simple as this is it's the truth. We need to start drilling off of both Coast and in Alaska. Whenever someone suggest this the response is always, "That won't make a difference for ten years!" Well here's another question, WHY DIDN'T WE START TEN YEARS AGO OR TWENTY. Because ten and twenty years ago people were saying the same thing and everybody agreed. If we had started then we wouldn't be facing $4 probably going to $5 a gallon gasoline. If we don't start now who knows what these prices will look like in another 10 years.

I'm all for finding new, reneweable and affordable sources of energy, but is there really any way to know how long it's going to take to develop these sources of energy. In the meantime we need oil! If America starts drilling, and turning coal into oil the price will come down. OPEC would be scared out of their minds that we might not need them anymore and the price of oil will drop sharply. It'll probably go to around $2-2.50 a gallon maybe lower. Gas might never be a dollar a gallon again, but it could be alot cheaper than it is now.

As important as all that is it's not the most important reason we need to drill for oil. Having countries like Iran, Saudi Arabia, Venezula, and others being able to squeeze us anytime they want for anything they with the threat of cutting off the oil flow makes us vulnerable as a nation. If we have to go to war in the Middle East again, and we will eventually, we will need to be able to supply for our own energy needs. Otherwise we could be strangled to death by high oil prices. Drilling is a very important part of becoming energy independent. Without it we will be at the mercy of tyrants who only have their self interest to worry about. They will drive oil prices up to a point that our economy will be crippled.

Today Congress had begun to delibrate on off-shore oil drilling. While it looks like Alaska will stay off limits for the foreseeable future, lifting the ban on off-shore drilling would be a great start to bringing oil prices down and becoming energy independent. While I realize drilling is only a temporary fix and that long term we must transition away from oil, until we can find enough alternative energy, and make it affordable enough to be bought by regular people, let's drill!

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1 comment:

  1. I agree, we should be allowing drilling in our own country instead of having to beg other countries to drill more.

    All this "it won't help for ten years" stuff is stupid anyway. Prove to me it won't help for ten years. Your telling me it takes ten years just to drill some oil? Didn't they build the Alaskan pipeline in only 3 years? And that baby stretches across the entire state for crying out loud...

    http://patrick-holdontoyourbutts.blogspot.com/

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