If the Presidential candidates are serious about the U.S. achieving energy self-sufficiency,

they'll start talking about offshore drilling for oil and gas, the building of nuclear power plants, and mass energy conservation.

Comments

[ZZard in NoVA]

True enough. But try building a nuclear plant anywhere near where people live. The NIMBI crowd can tie that sort of thing up for years. Energy sufficiency be damned! In the meantime, it will also help if everyone faced the truth about what we’ve been doing for at least four generations.
The problem is world-wide and stems mainly from the fact that these high hydrocarbon prices we’ve only recently been seeing reflected in a realistic way at the gasoline pump aren’t causing enough pain to reduce demand. Throw in some speculation and you get the kind of shenanigans you see now.
Of course, we’re not buying tulips, but a means of transport and a lubricant of domestic commerce. But as long as putzes in the United States continue to drive SUVs and trucks to go 4 blocks for a loaf of bread, we’re going to see this kind of stuff continue.
We are hydrocarbon junkies who blame “Big Oil” or “speculators” at the first opportunity, then drive like maniacs in HUGE vehicles as soon as prices drop just a little. Prices have to remain high to kill this behavior. Pray for $5 gasoline for a couple of years. That will be a “game changer.”
Don’t think for a minute that even Exxon and the like can really “negotiate” with OPEC to get a price drop or a smidgen more in extraction, so maybe that’s a good thing. And what would OPEC be afraid of to stop their current policies, other than the American peso falling right through the floor? The only other threat to them is demand destruction, and when will that happen? Not for a long time, if they can help it.
The current incumbent wanker in the WH is obviously in the tank for the Saudis and the other Gulf sheiks; it’s embarrassing to watch Rice and Cheney and now W go hat in hand to some slick desert snake named “Abdullah,” begging for some kind of break. “If Your Royal Highness in His great and beneficent wisdom could see fit in these unique and troubling circumstances . . . .” “His Royal Highness” might reply: “I don’t think so, you pathetic second-coming of Franklin Pierce!”
Get a hook and yank that clown and his circus act off the stage before he takes us all over the cliff!
Worldwide extraction is at or near peak anyway, with Brazil and other places still a few years out, and demand continues to rise. ANWR may or may not have that much to yield; it could have been oversold and, at best, would give about 10 to 20 years of decent yield. After that, what? Are we talking cellulosic ethanol and cooking grease from Mickey D’s and Chikin’ Out? Are you shaving me?
In the meantime, Chavez as well as the gang that runs Nigeria, not to mention the maniacs in Iran and the plutocrats in Russia, are all laughing at us. They should be. Our behavior is a joke. And no one really wants to face the truth. McCain, Obama, Clinton, Pelosi and company won’t talk the truth, because people will tune them out if they try.
Just like a drunk or a meth freak with whatever substance is their poison, we keep on driving ourselves broke. It is very sad. I certainly think it’s a mistake to blame oil companies . . . at worst they are just the enablers. They are bar tenders; we’re the ones triple-ordering the double margaritas.
No, American consumers and policy makers, along with industries like the car manufacturers and the mind benders in advertising, should shoulder some or most of the blame. Fat chance that that will happen!