07.08.08
Is Oil Exploration In 2008 What Immigration Was In 2006? - UPDATED
When taking into consideration the opinion of Rep. John Carter (R-Round Rock) when it comes to energy it must always be noted that he has a considerable stake in one of the largest oil corporations on the planet, Exxon Mobil. Therefore it’s no surprise that Carter recently said this.
U.S. Rep. John Carter, in an interview Thursday with members of the Killeen Daily Herald, said the issue of oil exploration will be the defining issue of this fall’s general election.
The GOP thinks that drilling domestically will do for them in 2008 what illegal immigration did for them in 2006. Let’s hope they’re right. With the price of oil soaring it now makes economic sense - it’s porfitable - for the oil corporations to drill on US soil and off the US coasts. What’s worse is the false reasoning Carter continues to use to justify this.
From Carter’s perspective, one reason oil prices are rising is because people are looking down the road in the commodities market.
“If we can bring onboard a crude product, we can be big players,” Carter said, referring to the need for the U.S. to tap into its own resources in order to be viewed as being on an equal playing field in the global market.
Carter added that by bringing our own oil resources into the world market, the price of oil is likely to decrease.
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“Drilling is the short-term answer,” Carter said.
Allowing drilling domestically is unlikely to lower the price and is not a short term answer. Don’t believe it? Try this, More offshore drilling does little at the pump:
Allowing oil drilling in U.S. offshore waters that are now closed to energy exploration would do little to lower gasoline prices paid by consumers, the government’s top energy forecaster said on Wednesday.
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Guy Caruso, who heads the federal Energy Information Administration, said consumers would see little savings at the pump.
“It would be a relatively small effect, because it would take such a long time to bring those supplies on,” Caruso said during a briefing at the Center for Strategic and International Studies on the EIA’s new long-term international energy forecast. “It doesn’t affect prices that much.”
Most energy experts say it would take five to 10 years to find oil in the closed areas and bring the crude to market. Caruso said the additional supplies would amount to only a couple of hundred thousand barrels of oil a day.
“It does take a long time to develop these resources, and therefore the price impact is muted by that,” he said.
The consensus is that drilling will do nothing to change the price of gas anytime in the near future. One economic benefit from this may be for those who own land where these corporations begin to explore for oil. That activity, oil and gas leases, which had dried up across Texas over the last couple of decades, is picking up again. The money made from an oil lease would probably do little more than cover the higher cost of energy.
But the GOP’s claim that drilling in the US is some panacea that will dramatically lower gas prices is a sham. Just like they thought building a wall and more border patrol would end illegal immigration. The slowing US economy is one of the main reasons immigrants, legal and illegal, an no longer choosing to come or stay in the US. The influx of immigrants to the US always been about our good economy, as opposed to the bad economies where the immigrants were coming from. Now that our economy is sagging, they’re are leaving for “greener pastures”.
The only way out of this oil and gas stranglehold were in is to find new sources of energy. And the only way big problems like that get solved are by a big investment of the people that will finance a research and development projects along the lines of putting a man on the moon. Oh, I don’t know, something like an Apollo Project?
The GOP/something for nothing conservatives are again trying to trick voter’s and keep their minds off real solutions and the many other serious issues - health care, stagnant wages, increasing income disparity, rising food prices, etc. - that they are facing. It’s doubtful clinging to this issue will help them anymore than the immigration issue did in 2006.
[UPDATE]: Via Bluedaze, Oil Exports Soar! Big Oil Caught With Pants Down!
First they said that High Impact Shale drilling at home would make us safer from the terrorists. The truth is that we get none of our gas from the Middle East. Most of our imported gas comes from Canada.
Now they push for access to our precious protected spaces like ANWAR and the coastline under the premise that we can become energy independent.
Then why are exports of oil soaring?
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This is about pure GREED and the sooner you people realize it the sooner we can do something about it.