Nancy Pelosi Just Saved The Planet!!!

"I'm trying to save the planet; I'm trying to save the planet."

- House Speaker Nancy Pelosi on why she opposes allowing legislation to come up for a vote to permit more domestic oil production.

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ARE YOU FEELING SAVED OR FEELING SCARED?

As if Nancy Pelosi's idiotic warblings are not ridiculous enough when this millionaire plutocrat is unaffected by the $4.00 plus gas prices her subjects must pay, her Senate cohort, Charles Schumer believes he has the authority to implore the Saudis to increase production by 10 million barrels a day. Let's see, the Saudis don't exactly love Americans particularly ones of Mr. Schumer's ethnicity. They do love our money. They love anybody's money who will pay top dollar for their oil. It's a whore's game with pleasure auctioned to the highest bidder. Depending on Saudi oil, well stand in line with all the other nations of the world and have lots of money. Further, though far from the worst oil producing states, the Saudi government has lots of political issues that could affect their oil supply.

Oil flows from Nigeria, one of the most corrupt and unstable countries in the world where rebels sabotage their pipelines to purposely cause environmental damage. Russia has oil for sale -- no love loss there. Of course closer to home, we can continue to hope that Hugo Chavez continues to love the profits CITGO, his United States petroleum through-put provides him. There's no telling what fancy or fantasy might cause a radical change of heart and no longer sell us oil. Closer to home, we buy lots of oil from Mexico. Mexico is not exactly the most stable business enterprise in the world. Their state run oil empire is inefficient and corrupt.

That leaves us with Canada, the people like earth most like us, our largest oil exporter. Canada, Canada, Canada, can you spare your brothers to the south a few more drops of petrol? Pretty please? We'll even let the NFL play one game a year in Toronto.

The United States has plenty of oil ready to be tapped now. The ANWR reserve isn't even one quarter the size of the Dulles Airport facillity in Northern Viriginia. The way the Democrats and Environmental daisy devotees act, you'd think we were going to bulldoze and pave the entire frozen tundra machine gunning Caribou and Polar Bears in the process. They've shown lovely romantic videos of rich northern wildlife prospering in their northern paradise when in truth the area discussed for drilling is a flat, muddy waste land in summer and just a big sheet of snow in the winter. A few oil rigs would be a nice break in the monotony!

Consider this, in 2005, the Gulf of Mexico was hit hard by violent hurricanes, Katrina and Rita, yet not one drop of oil spilled. Drilling is permitted of Louisiana and Texas. The rest of the Gulf is loaded with oil which the Cubans are going after to market to Communist China. First come, first served. Use it or lose it. Meanwhile, there's plenty of more oil ready to be tapped like a beer keg at a frat party along the Atlantic coast. Harder to retrieve, but loaded, are the Rocky Mountain shale reserves.

However, Hurricane Nancy blows harder with more fury and persistence than any force of nature and the hot air and destruction she generates affects all of America. It's not just a freak storm limited to the looney toons land of her San Francisco district which will probably soon look into the possibility of using marajuana sticks and stems for an alternate fuel. WOO-HOO, check that out!!!

As discussed previously, ALL measures to enlarge and modernize our energy supply must be pursued. All efforts must go full speed ahead to develop alternative fuel sources. There are plenty of technologies ready to go today which would be very appropriate and effective to produce some relief right now. Some day, the world will run out of oil. We need petroleum for lots more than fuel. Every drop we don't use today will be there for us tomorrow. As such, better fuel economy, conservation, and more use of shared and public transportation is also a high priority.

The point is, our energy situation requires action on all levels with every possible source being explored in the least restrictive free market conditions possible with the government serving as a facilitator not inhibitor. The government should be providing incentives for production and not punishing through excessive regulation and taxes.

Hurricane Nancy raises her rating to maximum force by also talking of excise profit taxes on oil companies. Who's going to pay those taxes? We are. The oil companies will have some means to offset those expenses. She also DEMANDED President Bush free up oil from the Strategic Oil Reserve which would be against the law so she would be compelled to initiate impeachment proceedings if he did that wouldn't she? Don't worry if this doesn't make sense, logic does not apply on Planet Nancy.

If we are dependent on Nancy Pelosi to save us, WE'RE DOOMED!!!

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The Strategic Oil Reserve: A Matter of National Security

Don’t Mess With the Strategic Oil Reserve

Nancy Pelosi and other Democrats on Capitol Hill are demanding that President Bush should release petroleum from the Federal Strategic Oil reserve so that in theory the extra supply could serve to help drive down prices. The reserve was created in 1975 by the Energy Policy and Conservation Act (EPCA) to create an emergency inventory of oil to provide a continuous fuel source with a current capacity of around 700 million barrels of oil in the event of a national emergency, a serious interruption in supply, so the nation’s economy could still function for an extended period of time while hopefully the potential issues causing the shortage are resolved.

One application of releasing fuel from the reserve came in 2005 after Hurricane Katrina shut down oil platforms in the Gulf of Mexico and caused damage to oil processing infrastructure in the region. By law, the President can only draw from the reserve supplies for true supply emergencies. There is no authority in the law to release oil to influence rising oil prices. In essence, the Speaker of the House is imploring the President to break the law. The only way the use of the Strategic Oil reserve could be changed would be through legislation passing both houses of Congress and the President signing it into law. Has Ms. Pelosi or her colleagues in the Senate introduced such legislation? Of course not.

The real essence is political. In her pleadings to utilize the Oil Reserve, Speaker Pelosi creates an unrealistic (and illegal) expectation. We have oil and we’re not using it creating the impression that the evil Bush administration who she has held responsible for everything that’s wrong with the world as recent remarks to the media would suggest.

If the President had the ability to put oil from the reserve into the domestic oil market, that would be an unwise decision. So many potential disruptions in supply are only one episode away from becoming a reality. Given the behavior of Iran leader, Ahmadinejad, the prospect of the closure of the Straight of Hormuz, a 21 mile wide sea passage dividing Iran from the Oman is a real and ominous fear. Forty percent of the world’s oil supply transports through the Straits. Any disruption could have a catastrophic effect on the world’s economy sending the major economies into a mad scurry to resolve the problem.
Meanwhile, Hugo Chavez, the unstable crazed dictator, of Venezuela has threatened using his oil as a weapon, our supply from those oil reserves could be one provocation away from being shut down. Additionally, numerous oil exporting countries either have unstable governments or are high-risk terrorist targets. Al Qaeda would not miss an opportunity to wreak havoc in the Saudi oil fields if given the opportunity. Additionally, with August and September approaching, that’s prime hurricane season in the Gulf of Mexico.

The situations cited above reveal the wisdom of our government creating huge oil reserves as not simply an economic necessity but also a matter of absolute national security. Tapping those reserves could be foolish leaving our country empty handed for options if any of the problems above were to materialize with a diminished oil reserve. the oil shortages in the 1970’s gave America a hint of some of the difficulties supply disruptions could hurl upon us. However, the percentage of imported fuel was much lower then. Now it far exceeds 60%.

The reasoning for maintaining the Strategic Oil Reserve is sound and obvious. Messing with this all important national resource would be at best a ill-advised quick fix with the possibility of catastrophic unintended consequences. Creating false hopes exploiting this valuable resource distracts from the hard realities and tough choices our elected leaders are failing miserably to face. Maximum effort must be devoted at once to produce the maximum amount of domestic oil possible to reduce our dependence on foreign oil often provided by nations that are no friends of the United States. Realizing that regardless, oil is a finite resource that is not good for the environment, massive efforts must be dedicated to developing new fuel sources and technologies and utilizing ones that are not currently being used advantageously such as nuclear power for electricity generation. Every day that goes by without addressing this problem makes the solution that much more difficult, demanding, and expensive.

Sadly, both Democrats and Republicans would rather play politics with the Democrats living in a fantasy world that massive efforts to harvest more oil isn’t absolutely necessary NOW. The goals and policies that guided energy production when gas was $1.50 a gallon addressed a very different reality than we face now. Every thing we do whether it’s the use of oil products in manufacturing or anything that needs to be transported is at stake. The public should take note of which elected officials are the obstructionists and deal with them accordingly in the upcoming election.