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Offshore Drilling Ban (Possibly) Lifted


Rev7

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WASHINGTON (CNN) -- President Bush lifted an executive order banning offshore oil drilling on Monday and urged Congress to follow suit.

 

Citing the high prices Americans are paying at the pump, Bush said from the White House Rose Garden that allowing offshore oil drilling is "one of the most important steps we can take" to reduce that burden.

 

However, the move is largely symbolic as there is also a federal law banning offshore drilling.

 

"This means that the only thing standing between the American people and these vast oil reserves is action from the U.S. Congress," Bush said. Watch Bush announce lifting of ban »

 

Bush has been pushing Congress to repeal the law passed in 1981.

 

"There is no excuse for delay," the president said in a Rose Garden statement last month. iReport.com: Is drilling the answer?

 

"In the short run, the American economy will continue to rely largely on oil, and that means we need to increase supply here at home," Bush said, adding that there is no more pressing issue for many Americans than gas prices.

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...Hilarious. It's good to know that because he hasn't heard the gas forecasts, he's wrong about decreasing the price of gas...? You know, that really doesn't make a lot of sense. How is offshore drilling a bad thing? None of you have said anything, other than the standard rallying cry of 'Bush sucks'.

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...Hilarious. It's good to know that because he hasn't heard the gas forecasts, he's wrong about decreasing the price of gas...? You know, that really doesn't make a lot of sense. How is offshore drilling a bad thing? None of you have said anything, other than the standard rallying cry of 'Bush sucks'.

 

Okay-- I'll meet you halfway (because I still believe that Bush is a moron). Offshore drilling, in my opinion, only encourages us (being the United States) to continue its unhealthy, and unsustainable desire for oil, which is a supply that, at our current rate of consumption, cannot be sustained. Drilling offshore merely is a way of saying, "We're running out of oil in one location, so let's go to another!" Where the opposition to that would be, "No! Let's find something renewable that will hold long after oil is gone."

 

My two cents. :)

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That's true, Litofsky. What's also true is that right now, we NEED Oil. We need a stopgap measure in place so that we can research, develop, test, and deploy a new system.

Didn't Bush say something like that? Why not spend funding on new resources instead of something fleeting?

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Okay-- I'll meet you halfway (because I still believe that Bush is a moron). Offshore drilling, in my opinion, only encourages us (being the United States) to continue its unhealthy, and unsustainable desire for oil, which is a supply that, at our current rate of consumption, cannot be sustained. Drilling offshore merely is a way of saying, "We're running out of oil in one location, so let's go to another!" Where the opposition to that would be, "No! Let's find something renewable that will hold long after oil is gone."

 

My two cents. :)

I totally agree, but we aren't seeing that much advancement in alternate sources. We are addicted to oil. That is a fact. It will only continue to go up if nothing is going to happen. I personally just don't see much progress. If I could seriously do something to help the advancement, I would. However I can't, at the moment that is. :/

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So.....what's stopping the government? If the pukes in Congress want to fund all these "green measures" for renewable fuels, let 'em try. Meanwhile, they shouldn't get in the way of private enterprise. Allow for continued exploration via private funding (ie "big oil"). It's nice that driving the cost of oil up is what it takes to make otherwise noncompetitive fuel sources viable, unless you don't have lots of money to be spending on gas, or anything else affected by the rise in oil prices (too legion to mention, so I won't). :rolleyes:

 

Who exactly should fund these alternatives? Noone here is seriously suggesting the govt should coerce industry to move in other directions, are they? Let the feds and other levels of govt incentivize business to move in that direction. Afterall, we're not communists, right? I say that we should scrap any incentives by the govt to subsidize inefficient biofuels in the US (corn, anyone?) and stop throwing money down a rathole that needs higher gasoline prices just to appear competitive. Diversification of fuel sources (oil, coal, hydro, nuke, etc..), such as to make the US almost autarkical in that area is the desired goal. If "fossil fuels" have truly peaked and will be gone, that problem will solve itself in a few decades anyway. Another measure would abviously be to signifigantly improve gas milage on all newer vehicles.

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Okay-- I'll meet you halfway (because I still believe that Bush is a moron). Offshore drilling, in my opinion, only encourages us (being the United States) to continue its unhealthy, and unsustainable desire for oil, which is a supply that, at our current rate of consumption, cannot be sustained. Drilling offshore merely is a way of saying, "We're running out of oil in one location, so let's go to another!" Where the opposition to that would be, "No! Let's find something renewable that will hold long after oil is gone."

 

My two cents. :)

Right. Also the fact that additional drilling here won't affect world oil prices. And El Sitherino's point that it will be 4-5 (or 10+) years before this would have any impact whatsoever.

 

So in other words, Bush made a blatantly obvious attempt to make the Democrats look as though they're the ones standing between us and cheaper gas when the reality of the situation is much, much more complex. Not that he would ever be guilty of partisan politics or anything.

 

I totally agree, but we aren't seeing that much advancement in alternate sources. We are addicted to oil. That is a fact. It will only continue to go up if nothing is going to happen. I personally just don't see much progress. If I could seriously do something to help the advancement, I would. However I can't, at the moment that is. :/
Hehe, if we gave the alternative fuels industry the same incentives we gave "Big Oil" (i.e. Bush's family members and friends), I have every confidence that it could compete with fossil fuels. On the other hand, I acknowledge my position is entirely speculative, so take my argument with a grain of salt.
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Well... if you look at it now, the Dem's are the ones standing between us and cheaper gas. Granted its not cheaper gas right now, but it is cheaper gas down the road.

 

Well, if we are looking into other fuel sources for our vehicles, then we still need a stop gap measure for the interim, and then we would still need oil and gas down the road to power vehicles built before the Alternate Fuel Sources (Referred to as AFS later) were brought into common usage.

 

So, even if we develop great AFS, then we still need Oil. Heck, we're still going to need oil down the road for all the petroleum products we use in our daily life, so, I guess you're wanting to do without plastics?

 

In order to bring this one back on topic, it is a good measure for the interim, but, maybe government should try and use these incentives they've been showering onto the "Green" energy sources... and give some of them to the Nuclear sector.

 

Besides, I don't think Government wants oil to go away any time soon... After all, they still collect ~18 cents a gallon to spend on things other than roads.

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