After the devastating crippling of America in the 1970’s due to the oil crisis in 1973, when Arabian members of OPEC embargoed oil to the U.S. over our support for Israel, then president Carter signed legislation creating the Department of Energy in August 1977, that was supposed to lessen our dependence on foreign oil imports, amongst other matters.
Ever since, we hear frequently from our politicians how we need to end our dependence on foreign oil, yet our dependence has steadily risen since the Department of Energy was created to the point that we now import some 51% of our needed oil from foreign countries, many hostile to us.
At the same time, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, “we are the third largest crude oil producer” in the world!
We also read, “the U.S. has more than 200 billion barrels of oil and 2,000 trillion cubic feet of natural gas that are recoverable with today's technology,” in an article in Forbes Magazine quoting a report prepared by the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners.
The article continues, “That's more than most OPEC nations. If fully developed, it would be enough to eliminate our 10-million-barrel daily diet of foreign oil for half a century.”
At a time we are so heavily dependent on foreign oil sources and at the same time have a scarcity of wage earning jobs in America, we read of our illustrious left coast politicians, namely Senators Patty Murray and Maria Cantwell joining in with other Democrats up and down the left coast advocating a “Permanent Moratorium” on off-shore drilling?
Touting the canard of “Green Jobs,” it is claimed the measure would, “permanently protect the $34 billion coastal economies of the three states, which support nearly 570,000 jobs in California, Oregon and Washington.”
Cantwell, positioning herself for reelection says, “One of the lessons learned from the disastrous BP oil spill is that without a fundamental transformation of the oil industry, another spill is possible, even likely. That’s not a risk I’m willing to take for Washington State’s beautiful coastlines and the communities that depend on them. More offshore drilling will not lower gasoline prices or reduce our nation’s dangerous overreliance on foreign oil, which is why we should be focusing on the promising clean energy alternatives that are better for consumers and can provide long-term sustainable solutions to America’s energy needs.”
Oh really, Ms. Cantwell? Using our own oil, drilled from our own sources within our boundaries and refined in refineries located with our state (5 in Washington State alone), “ will not lower gasoline prices or reduce our nation’s dangerous overreliance on foreign oil,” but having less of our own will?
And, that “risk?” What in life isn’t a risk? Off the top of my head, I imagine Ms. Cantwell is more at risk of being injured crossing the street than we are of more oil spills. And yes, I know they happen. But, since we so often hear of “greedy oil companies,” do you really think they enjoy losing Billions of dollars in profits from oil lost and clean-up fees for such an accident?
And while I’m at it, those “long term energy solutions” failed to produce electricity recently in Britain, during the worst cold-snap they have seen in years. That’s right, they FAILED when they were needed the most!
Left unsaid is just how “Washington State’s beautiful coastlines” will appear as hundreds of thousands of acres of coastline are fenced off and dotted with those same windmills that are not living up to expectations elsewhere?
Patty Murray chimes in with, “I’ve always opposed drilling off the coast of Washington. The tragedy in the Gulf Coast is a painful reminder that we can’t allow drilling anywhere on the West Coast. The economic and environmental devastation caused by the Exxon Valdez disaster is still impacting industry in our region, and we can’t allow it to happen again. Our environment and our economy are too important to risk, and this bill ensures that big oil companies can never roll the dice on the Pacific coast.”
A couple points here. The Exxon Valdez accident was not due to drilling, but to a drunken ship captain not at the helm or in control of his faculties at the time of the accident, being below decks sleeping it off and to malfunctioning guidance equipment that was not repaired as it should have been. The ship ran aground against a reef, puncturing the hull.
Does Ms. Murray advocate eliminating inter-state trucking when a driver pushes himself, gets in an accident and loses his load, sometimes being toxic materials as well? No, the driver, if he survives, is held accountable and the accident cleaned up.
But no one cries “shut down trucking.”
Maybe Ms. Murray, recently elected to a 4th term as Senator and insulting herself from the devastating collapse of our economy these past few years, can’t see that our environment and economy are already at deep risk by continuing our reliance on foreign oil and denying our citizens viable decent wage jobs.
Cantwell and Murray both frequently travel around the globe on Senate business and occasionally even grace us with their presence and last I recall seeing, they don’t ride bicycles all over or hop on a jet powered by solar panels or windmills for their travels.
I doubt you will even see them traveling about in one of those electric cracker box vehicles they want us to own, seeing how the BBC recently touted how one they experimented one could complete a 484 miles trip “in only four days!”
The UK Telegraph compared the “feat” to an “1830’s stagecoach” journey that could be completed in a little over 2 days.
So what was gained? Not much considering the driver often had to slow down to a crawl and run without heat during the height of a British winter to conserve enough battery to make it to the next charging station, where he sat for hours, recharging the batteries from a fossil fuel generated power supply.
Oh yes, after completing his journey, the electric car was loaded into the back of a truck, powered by a more conventional internal combustion engine, burning fossil fuel while the driver took the train back to London.
This is the step backwards advocated by Senator Maria Cantwell, Patty Murray of Washington, Senators Ron Wyden and Jeff Merkley of Oregon and Senators Barbara Boxer and Dianne Feinstein of California?
I often wonder just whose side are these left-coast Democrats on? Surely not the American citizen currently struggling to make ends meet and desperately hoping for a job that the oil companies, demonized as they are, are ready to give.
We have real energy needs that must be met in America. Petroleum remains the most efficient and economical method to meet those needs while alternate energy sources are being researched and perfected.
Knee jerk reactions of blocking off hundreds of thousands of acres of land from the public due to unsightly wind farms and solar panels doing the same are not meeting our needs. In the meantime, Billions of gallons of a cheap and efficient energy source sit idle underground and within our borders while some of the very people ready to permanently deny American jobs and place us more reliant on foreign oil block and oppose those same alternate energy sources when built in their backyards!
Senator Feinstein Seeks to Block Solar Panels In Mojave Desert
Environmentalists Fight Calico solar farm
Animals Rights Activists Blocking Wind Farms
Ted Kennedy Blocks Cape Cod Wind Farm
America, I think we deserve better. Don’t you?
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