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Offshore drilling: more sins of omission
More opportunistic, dishonest political gamesmanship from the Republicans, more irresponsible reticence (or ignorance?) from traditional news media.
First it was the gas tax holiday, a sham to end all shams, universally ridiculed by experts (and anyone who slept through freshman economics) but championed by Sens. Clinton and McCain. It was maddening to watch the media treat this nonsense as a real debate; it took a concerted and admirable effort from the Obama campaign to finally dismiss the "issue."
Well, here we go again.
John McCain, backed today by President Bush, is calling for an end to the ban on offshore drilling, ostensibly to "address the concerns of Americans who are struggling right now to pay for gasoline." Unfortunately, as the Energy Information Administration found, and McCain adviser Douglas Holtz-Eakin admitted, repealing the ban would have no effect on gas prices whatsoever until as late as 2030.
It's disappointing enough that our elected officials would advocate such dishonest policy. But it's downright infuriating to watch the news media, once again, pretend that this is a debate worth having.
Offshore drilling is a terrible idea. It would have no effect on gas prices and do little to reduce our dependence on foreign oil. It would serve only the interests of big oil. And the environmental effects would be disastrous--both the short-term ecological effects and, more broadly, the continued effect of carbon emissions on the earth's climate.
The news media's refusal to admit this is yet another example of its pathetic subservience to the insular, asinine
"debate" that goes on inside the Beltway, where our supposed public servants answer to no one but special interests. Without an independent media that places objective fact and intellectual consensus above partisan theater and political dramaturgy, it took this country two decades to recognize that our planet's climate was in crisis, four years to realize the invasion of Iraq was a sinister mistake, and six days to realize that people were starving in the New Orleans Superdome.
I expect Senator Obama once again to step in and effectively shut this thing down. But he shouldn't have to. Until the news media stops allowing politicians to manipulate the electorate with blatant dishonesty and starts doing its job as an accurate vessel for information, we'll continue to have these ridiculous "debates" that amount to nothing more than reality versus fantasy. And as the past eight years have shown, reality doesn't always win.
First it was the gas tax holiday, a sham to end all shams, universally ridiculed by experts (and anyone who slept through freshman economics) but championed by Sens. Clinton and McCain. It was maddening to watch the media treat this nonsense as a real debate; it took a concerted and admirable effort from the Obama campaign to finally dismiss the "issue."
Well, here we go again.
John McCain, backed today by President Bush, is calling for an end to the ban on offshore drilling, ostensibly to "address the concerns of Americans who are struggling right now to pay for gasoline." Unfortunately, as the Energy Information Administration found, and McCain adviser Douglas Holtz-Eakin admitted, repealing the ban would have no effect on gas prices whatsoever until as late as 2030.
It's disappointing enough that our elected officials would advocate such dishonest policy. But it's downright infuriating to watch the news media, once again, pretend that this is a debate worth having.
Offshore drilling is a terrible idea. It would have no effect on gas prices and do little to reduce our dependence on foreign oil. It would serve only the interests of big oil. And the environmental effects would be disastrous--both the short-term ecological effects and, more broadly, the continued effect of carbon emissions on the earth's climate.
The news media's refusal to admit this is yet another example of its pathetic subservience to the insular, asinine
"debate" that goes on inside the Beltway, where our supposed public servants answer to no one but special interests. Without an independent media that places objective fact and intellectual consensus above partisan theater and political dramaturgy, it took this country two decades to recognize that our planet's climate was in crisis, four years to realize the invasion of Iraq was a sinister mistake, and six days to realize that people were starving in the New Orleans Superdome.
I expect Senator Obama once again to step in and effectively shut this thing down. But he shouldn't have to. Until the news media stops allowing politicians to manipulate the electorate with blatant dishonesty and starts doing its job as an accurate vessel for information, we'll continue to have these ridiculous "debates" that amount to nothing more than reality versus fantasy. And as the past eight years have shown, reality doesn't always win.
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Well, this is a good test for Obama and his campaign. How effective can he be in re-educating the public, when there is HUGE resistance to getting the counter-message out there?
June 18, 2008 3:26 PM | Reply | Permalink
Carol, I was late in reading your comments and found my comments redundant. Spot on.
June 18, 2008 9:14 PM | Reply | Permalink
Agree wholeheartedly with both CarolBG and kash79. This is a real test for Obama. If Obama plans to change much, he will use his spotlight to educate and mobilize the public on issues like this.
Obama is in a position to expose the truth behind misleading information that's put out by media, corporations and reps in Congress. An educated, mobilized public is so key to good policies that will improve our chances of digging out of the hole we allowed the Bush gang and corporate reps in Congress to dig for us.
I just can't get over the transparent way media and many government reps use public fear about the rising price of gas as an opportunity to dupe the public into thinking that coal and more oil drilling is the answer. Anybody notice all the recent coal commercials? All the media interviews with various reps in Congress praising coal as an obvious solution to something? Surprise! The coal industry has recently donated lots of money to members of the US Congress.
If snake oil and extracting coal were solutions to our energy problem then we would not have a problem in the first place. Oil is running out and extracting coal is so damaging to the environment which means very costly to the taxpayer in the long run. Both cause global warming. It's insane to focus much on either one.
It seems obvious that a major effort toward practical, renewable energy solutions is what's called for, yesterday.
June 19, 2008 1:23 PM | Reply | Permalink
As Green Dreams alluded, I'm not sure that the oil industry really wants to drill off the coastline.
Oil companies have gotten a lot of political mileage by complaining that they haven't been granted any permits for new refineries in decades. Right-wingers have promoted this issue as if environmentalists are all that stand between us and cheap oil. But it strains belief that during two terms, Bush, Cheney and a Republican congress couldn't have gotten a few permits through the new, compliant EPA. Instead, oil companies have made the changes they want by reworking existing refineries and investing almost nothing on oil that they know isn't likely to arrive.
So now the big complaint is that ANWR and coastline environmentalists are all that stand between us and cheap oil. I don't think there's any more easy oil to be had. There's probably some deepwater oil, but I think the oil majors know they can't afford to drill for it at today's prices. I call BS.
June 18, 2008 3:46 PM | Reply | Permalink
The issue is not whether it's right or wrong to lift the federal ban on offshore oil drilling. The issue how we can convince a majority of Americans, that this McBush strategy is just a politcal pander.
Some polls suggest, while residents of FL, LA and CA don't support, a majority of Americans living in other states do think offshore oil drilling is a good idea.
They need to be educated, and it is yet another test for Obama's leadership to explian and trust the American people to crackdown this bogus proposal.
June 18, 2008 9:11 PM | Reply | Permalink
Here is the latest poll on the issue.
http://www.realclearmarkets.com/news/reuters/finance_business/2008/Jun/18/most_americans_support_more_us_oil_drilling_poll.html
June 18, 2008 9:16 PM | Reply | Permalink
Ethanol is the biggest catastrophe to hit the world in decades. We are literally starving the poor people of the world to make corn into car fuel.
June 18, 2008 10:46 PM | Reply | Permalink
War and instability in the Middle East raises oil prices. We can start by getting out of Iraq.
June 18, 2008 11:04 PM | Reply | Permalink
This may have been McCain's biggest blunder to date. First, with no likelihood that it will lower prices in over a decade, if at all, it is easy to shoot down as more pandering to big oil rather than effective action. Second--no, first--what were they thinking? It probably just lost McCain Florida. They honestly didn't think of that? Third, today Bush says the same thing, further tying McCain to Bush, who has no credibility left on oil or economics. Dumb move, and all to make a losing talking point.
June 19, 2008 12:20 AM | Reply | Permalink
The assumption is that "our" oil wouldn't enter the world's markets. Are American upstream producers and/or downtstreamers obligated to only sell American? Not to mention BP and the like.
June 19, 2008 1:58 AM | Reply | Permalink
Chase is infected with the Democrats own brand of ignorance -- that being a complete unwillingness to face reality on energy. There is no alternative to increasing domestic production. Hydrogen, wind, solar, and ethanol are not going to make up the difference, and they all have their own unintended negative consequences.
Global oil production will decrease over the next five years, while global demand increases. Where else are we going to get the oil we need, if we don't use our own resources? Does Chase have an answer for this? We act like we have a choice about increasing our own production -- we don't! It's one of those things you do in life, because reality forces the issue.
Oil companies can produce more oil from new fields, and it would take a lot less than 10 years to get it on the market, if you have the political leadership that streamlines all the regulations, fast tracks the permits, and sets production deadlines the oil companies have to meet or lose their tax breaks.
Democrats have been some of the loudest proponents of corn-based ethanol, which has been a disaster, and yet there is no call for change. If the party wants to keep the House and Senate, they better wake up to reality and get our domestic energy production up, instead of waiting on some magic rabbit to be pulled out of a hat.
June 19, 2008 7:59 AM | Reply | Permalink
What are your thoughts on Brazilian sugarcane?
June 19, 2008 8:41 AM | Reply | Permalink
Lots of words and nothing to back them up. You make some colossal assumptions--e.g., that supply could be increased within 10 years, which is the American Petroleum Institute's own estimate[1].
And you speak unequivocally about a very open-ended issue; it's laughably misleading to declare that increased domestic production is the only solution to the energy crisis. This country has a long, successful history of entrepreneurial science--in the 50s we confronted polio by developing a vaccine, not by increasing our iron lung capacity.
1. http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/2008003394_drill18.html
June 19, 2008 12:20 PM | Reply | Permalink
which one of these enterprenerial sciences is going to replace the gasoline engine? When is it going to happen, and how long is it going to take to make the transition? Maybe you missed the abysmal performance of corn-based ethanol to solve the issue. There could be plenty of other failures out there.
D, we're not interested in hypothesis at this point. The magic rabbit theory is getting old. I want to stick with what works, until we have a viable alternative that could be a decade or more away. That way, D, I don't have to pay $ 4 for a gallon of gasoline.
June 19, 2008 9:56 PM | Reply | Permalink
The People will be driving demand. Some of our innovative citizens are coming together from "opposite" sides in dealing with land use in Rocky Mtn West. Being an impatient purist in these matters is unhelpful.
IMO The People are more than ready to kick start another Age of Innovation. There is a backdrop of 3 plus decades of interest in utilizing energy provided by cheap or "free" means. We do have an impressive catalog of acquired knowledge; beginning with the most mundane of human needs, our shelter.....and so on.
When things don't pan out as envisioned as in the corn ethanol attempt, scrap the plan or diversify as suggested by Chino in his reference to Brazil and sugarcaine.
June 21, 2008 12:13 AM | Reply | Permalink
We don't have that kind of time, lally. We've got to ramp up our ability to produce more oil to protect this country from int'l falling production, OPEC shenanigans, and boosting our economy. NObody's going to stop the entreprenuers from doing their thing. I'm saying let's do both and stop wishing and hoping for a miracle.
Sustained high energy prices have airlines saying they can't take much more, and they may not be the only industry to start buckling.
June 21, 2008 12:54 PM | Reply | Permalink