The one issue that worries me is the price of gas and the

Democratic opposition to drilling in ANWAR and off the coast. As I talk to members of my working class family, the cost of energy is killing them. Frankly, they don't give a rat's ass about the preservation of pristine environments when balanced against their needs to get to work, feed their kids and pay for health care. We had better come up with an understandable and persuasive response to this because the RW is planning on jamming it down our throats as example #1 of our elitism and lack of connection with the realities of working and middle class life.

... to make much of a dent in prices?

the oil wouldn't be available for several years. Don't you realize the oil companies are just sitting on thousands of oil leases they won't even bother exploring. Why should they when they can do nothing and make a killing? They're using ANWR as an excuse.

unproveable by either. As a consequence ANWAR remains in many peoples' minds as at least part of a short/midterm solution to the dependence on foriegn oil.

a couple of years. Also, very gritty oil--not exactly "sweet crude." I've read it couldn't be refined in USA as there are
currently no refineries that handle such oil. So as soon as it would be pumped, it would shipped off somewhere else. The
oil companies naturally would like to drill any goddamn place that has oil, as they'll always profit. Wouldn't do a damn
thing for the rest of us.

expensive and therefore not profitable so why would BIG OIL bother?

also....enough land is already under lease and undrilled in Alaska OUTSIDE of ANWAR and I hope that is addressed as a response.

And that would be *if* there's actually enough oil there.

If you want to save $0.02 per gallon TODAY (as opposed to 20 years from now) you can properly inflate your tires, drive slower, or get an oil change.

How about tax credits to trade in the gas guzzler?

And a lawsuit to recover windfall profits from the oil companies? The recovery could be distributed to consumers.

Healthcare for all would help ease budget pressures on many families struggling to afford healthcare, which costs most households far more than even the highway-robbery price of gas at the pump.

how about a federal program to rebuild our crumbling infrastructure - hiring americans at decent wages?

How about help for college students struggling to afford tuitions that have doubled, tripled or even quadrupled? This is a huge drain on many families.

How about consumer protection laws to make manufacturers take responsibility for shoddy goods? I for one am sick of washing machines, computers etc that break a day after the warranty runs out. In Europe, manufacturers are required to have much longer product warranties on the very same products, I've heard. (If anyone can document that, please post.)

Drilling the last drops of oil is short-sighted, and not just to protect the caribou and polar bears. Petroleum based products contribute to global warming. Just look at Iowa and New Orleans, and imagine that scenario played out in dozens of U.S. coastal cities and towns if sea levels start to rise even a few inches from melting polar ice caps.

Far better to subsidize investment in alternative energy and short-term, fuel efficient vehicles. Pay people to go solar or put up windmills or buy hybrids! It's a lot cheaper than the loss of major cities like San Diego and Miami!

some kind of commmie? :sarcasm:

mention the .02 cent reduction in price YEARS from now, and the amount of oil isn't very much anyway. It's just oil
companies boondoggling.

... put it in their savings account, and in 20 years, they'll have saved more money than drilling in ANWR would save them.

In any case, I'm all in favor of off-shore drilling along the coast of any of The Red States, along with strip-mining the entire state of Utah.

They had to shut them down, but if something leaked, I didn't hear about it. They've survived multiple cat 5 hurricanes without any damage I've seen reported.

Did I miss something?

I mentioned the shutdowns in my post before.

It seems to me much more likely that you'd have a spill from tankers in a hurricane, rather than from an underwater pipeline.

I posted a question about this in another thread... It *seems* as if drilling might nowadays be less risking than importing oil. Importing requires tankers, which can be run aground and spill in hurricane weather -- or even without it. Given that we're getting the oil anyway, the underwater pipelines from oil platforms seem to have a better safety record in the last 20 years.

I haven't seen any study done on this, so I'm not saying that's true. But I can think of several oil tanker spills. The last drilling accident I remember was there in the gulf, back in the 80s, I think.

REMINDER: Katrina oil spills may be among worst on record (113 offshore platforms destroyed)
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=3482695&mesg_id=3482695

these filthy pigs are so addicted to oil and their profits, they do not want any alternative energy options.

Not only do oil companies and Alaskans get money for the drilling, they also make money charging the taxpayer for the clean-up... whether they actually find oil or not.

And that that six months of oil will be produced over a 20 year period. When I tell people that they are shocked, they believe the oil will be produced all at once and make the US Self-Sufficient. Also tell them it will NOT replace the huge amount of Mexican oil we will NOT be able to import do to the drop in Mexican oil production.

Also inform them that it is a better then 25% chance that much of the oil in ANWAR is Natural Gas NOT oil. If that is the case it helps relieve the upcoming Natural Gas Shortage, but does little in regard to Oil (And the Natural Gas would have to be shipped via a Canadian Natural Gas pipeline NOT the North Slope oil pipeline, whenever that Natural Gas pipeline is built).

...I think if Obama were to announce support for drilling in ANWAR, he'd probably lose as many votes as he gained -- maybe more. It doesn't fit in with his strategy.

The truth is, we're in lots of trouble. We need every kind of energy we can get, and then some. So yes, we should be drilling more, developing all those renewable energy sources, investing in new energy technology, conserving, improving efficiency, nuclear power -- all of that and we still come up short, given increasing demand. The numbers are against us for years -- even decades -- with all of those efforts included.

In that sense, the others here are right -- ANWAR itself is not a lot. It's just that we do need to "squeeze the sponge" everywhere until other resources come online. So that one issue is not worth getting too worked up over, and there is no good decision for Obama. I suspect he's better off sticking with the party line on this issue.

One statistic I haven't seen that I'd like to, from an objective source: We hear of oil tankers spilling. Offhand, the last pumping issue I can remember was an undersea leak in the gulf, and I think that was way back in the 80s...

Has anyone recently looked at whether the environmental threat is statistically larger to drill locally or to transport the oil from external sources? I'd be interested to see a report on that.

immediacy to this situation that does not lend itself to fact-based discussion. Much more often than not, the facts are on the Democratic side of the argument and still we lose the debate. I don't disagree with any of the comments made here but I fear that the RW will be able to position itself as the party that understands drivers' pain. We need to make all of the points set out here but it has to be in a context that recognizes fuel costs are a crisis for everyday Americans and we need to be talking in those kind of terms. When you are facing bankruptcy, the instinct is to do something and we can't be maneuvered to only arguing against ideas to increase capacity no matter how bogus.

There is no "today" solution for this problem. So there's no getting out of arguing only against things, as far as solutions that promise to fix it.

The truth is, since speculation is a large part of the issue, there's a small chance that announcing more drilling might calm the speculators down a little, and the price might drop -- a little. On the other hand, the saudis just announced they'd increase pumping, and that didn't help much either.

Once you get into our situation, even the fastest solutions are years away. That's why I'm not opposed to opening up drilling, nuclear, and just about every other form of energy quoted in this thread. It's only the combination of all of those things that can help. And by the time they do, our demand will have outpaced every new supply form we've added, and more.

I keep hearing that speculators are "way out of line" and that prices should be lower. But when the Saudis increase their pumping, they will be near capacity. And they're the last ones remaining who have that ability. And still, every month, the demand goes up.

By the time all these new hybrids are on the road, all these windmills are turning, all these extra solar panels are soaking up sun, we've gotten more efficient, and all that good stuff, the increasing world demand will still have outpaced the gains we've made.

We're in a real energy crisis now. The troubles we had in the 70s were just a fire drill.

We are going to run out of the easy to get oil and later we will run out of the hard to get oil. It's a finite resource and it can not be replenished. There is nothing that can be done to avoid the destruction of the countries who's economy and industry are based on fossil fuels. All attempts to move to a substitute will fail. You can't get something from nothing ...that's a law of physics. All resources are limited. Even dirt use has limitations. Try growing food on the same plot of land year after year without fertilizer. Even if we were to try to scale down to small towns and bicycles you would still need fuel for farms or you can try plow horses. Oh yea but then you have to grow animal food stocks and you better grow food for yourself too. Better have access to a good water source too. Live in a big city? You better fear mass food riots because it takes fuel to get food to you. Don't even think that you can grow your tomato veggie farm in your backyard because you need good soil and a large enough plot and you will need fertilizer and a gun to stop others from stealing your food. Any and every way you look at the problem of the end of oil, there is no solution. Your young children will not be driving cars and your grandchildren won't even know what gas is. Too many people live here to be supported by a subsistence life style as well. The only people who have a chance of surviving are the survivalists who have planned for this way in advance. If you live in a city or suburb I suggest you 1) buy some guns and ammo, 2) store up readily eatable canned food and water, 3 pay off your home, or move out to farm land and try to co-op and plan with others. All in all, if you think about all the connections to your standard of living and how they are affected by energy you will see that there is nothing that can be done short of moving to a 3rd world country where they are already living a substance life style. Moving to Panama, Costa Rico, Brazil, Argentina, etc. is not an easy thing to do. I have investigated it and found that after learning the language you need to be able to set up your own business because you can't work for anyone else by law. You will need to invest money in some way into the countries infrastructure, ie a big bank account or government bonds. Try checking it out...it is not an easy thing to do. The easiest country to move to is Canada and they are not going to be much better off than we will be. They have a short food crop growing season and if everyone moved out to the wilderness and hunted there soon would be no game left to eat. Besides that, it takes a pretty tough character to survive out in the wilderness.

Good luck with the oil dependency problems.

Yes, the waste is a problem but so is the endless consumption of fossil fuels. Japan and Europe have shown it can be safe. Shutting down our electric plants that are running off of fossil fuels seems like it would make a greater dent than a few months of oil from ANWR.

and it becomes the truth.

www.wearableartnow.com

n/t

REMINDER: Katrina oil spills may be among worst on record (113 offshore platforms destroyed)
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=3482695&mesg_id=3482695

It's a Repug FAKE solution, to lull us into a false sense of security that we have all the oil we need. We don't. Our oil-producing enemies have us by the short and curlies. The ones who lack connection with the realities of working and middle class life are Bushco and their rich cronies, who DO have access to all the oil they need. We need (or needed, YEARS ago, as Al Gore told us back in 1990) to reduce our dependence on the stuff. Forget about our "pristine enviroment". Think NATIONAL SECURITY. Saudia Arabia could ruin us by cutting off oil, or even just manipulating what they choose to sell us, at what price. And I don't think we have enough military left to invade any more countires. And Bush's "new" idea to do more offshore drilling? Politics, politics politics.




And BTW, "elitism" is also a Repug slur.

The problem is that the value of dollar is falling and as the result the price of oil goes up. The Saudis have in fact increased their productions by 400k barrels. It has not had an effect on prices.

Obama better put together a comprehensive plan to transition the country to renewables.

Nuclear isn't a permanent solution either...nothing that runs on a depletable resource is.

preserve those resources for a later date to be sold to the highest bidder by the federal government

just like most conservation projects...

from logging in Montana to the present day... it always ends up screwing the little guy... legislating him OUT of the competition... only to have the land raped and pillaged by DC cronies down the line

I'll tell you what, Chief.... You GIVE ALASKA BACK TO THE ALASKAN PEOPLE... then we'll talk resource exploitation and environmental degradation, OK?

deal?

if people could no longer vacation at the beaches.