Thanks for the article CD...I particularly liked this part:
Though offshore drilling conjures up fears of catastrophic spills, the petroleum industry rightly argues that safety measures have improved considerably in recent years. A 2003 report by the National Research Council found that only 1% of the oil that entered U.S. waters came from petroleum operations, like the offshore drilling platforms that run in the Gulf of Mexico — which also weathered Hurricane Katrina without massive spills. If it can be done in an environmentally friendly fashion — and with oil companies themselves footing the bill — opening up some new territory to drilling might be worth it. The reality is that our economy will run on petroleum for the foreseeable future, and that while investing in alternatives is the only way to secure truly low-cost energy over the long-term, we'll still need oil for decades more.
Spot on. What is wrong with oil companies making money? You make it sound as if they are stealing from us and that if they drill, we lose. The reality is that every million barrels of oil they pull out of American reserves is $140 million bucks that we don't send to Saudi Arabia...that doesn't serve to lower the value of our dollar...that doesn't fund IED's from Iran.
They also pay us for their leases, create jobs for Americans and pay tsaxes on their profits which CURRENTLY average 8% of sales (abou double their long term average). These profits are still less than what many companies average like Coca Cola. Let's hit the soft drink industry up for some alternative energy funding since they really have obscene profits!
