I disagree, if this is the case then why should we get involved in any war? WWII? How many years have we been in other countries and how much money did we spend to rebuild Europe and Japan? I don't think you can compare Vietnam to this war. We didn't bomb empty forests and lose thousands of troops a day in the name of politics. We haven't been there 10 years, I don't know where you got that magical number? I totally disagree with your statement about pride, etc. You are suggesting when the going gets tough, in any war we should just run away when times get tough? War is hell, it is no picnic and sometimes you can't put a price tag on it. I do acknowledge, however that you have to pick and choose your battles. That is another story but once you are there you are COMMITTED like it or not. If you are saying that we shouldn't have went into Vietnam after all these years I would agree but only because the fall of the Iron curtain. Hindsight is 20/20, its awfully easy to question this kind of stuff but at the time communism was a real threat. A Democrat named John F. Kennedy got us into this war btw. Lyndon Johnson probably one of the worst if not the worst president ever is one of the reasons we lost this war, also his great society which is starting to crumble and has crumbled in the past. It took a Republican president to get us out of Vietnam although if you look at the aftermath of us pulling out, many people felt guilty then and some do today because of all the pro-US Vietnamese that were slaughtered. Let me just say like Vietnam, it took about 20 years later to see the fall of communism to where you could look back and see that war wasn't worth it. Fast forward to Iraq. It will probably take 10 years or maybe more to see if the Iraq war was justified, maybe it wasn't but anyone who judges this war before history isn't being honest.
You get this figure from where? Your dreams? Pelosi won't even allow a vote on it(because she would lose pre election) but claims it's because she wants to "save the planet". Yeah, countries like China, Venezuela, and any African country are so much better than America in regards to the environment. More world supply means lower prices while developing alternative energy. The dems offer no bridge to this. This is why they will be forced to allow it. McCain is still against drilling in anwr. He changed his position on drilling offshore. It appears he actually listened to people screaming about gas prices while Obama told us we needed to inflate our tires and just bite the bullet. Voters don't like the "bite the bullet" part of his solution so regardless of who gets elected, they will have to allow drilling or face losing re-election.
I don't understand why people on the left mainly, hate big oil so much. Without oil we couldn't drive our vehicles. We also wouldn't have plastics for everything you can possibly imagine. If there is anyone here who hates big oil that doesn't drive a car or have any plastic device in their house? Oil is a commodity and it is something that everyone needs. Its funny how all the big oil and corporations are evil while the same folks seem to ignore how corrupt big government is. I just have trouble understanding why people are so opposed to the oil industry making money and then turn the other cheek when other businesses, government, Fannie May and Freddie Mac get a pass?
Demand has fallen even in China this summer, without embracing alternative energy. How do you conclude the drop will be small? What is this based upon? American companies buying foreign oil enriches countries like Iran, Venezuela, etc. All countries committed to be anti-American. Now it's unlikely that those countries will be go broke but you wish to continue sending them $? If our American refineries are going to buy oil, why not from American companies, supplying American jobs, drilling American oil. That's really not a a difficult thing to grasp.
How do you figure that? Our proven reserves today are 21 billion barrels. This does not count ANWR or the OCS, where we are not allowed to explore. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oil_reserves This doesn't even include OCS or the oil shale in the Rockies. There is plenty of oil here. A whole million!!?? Wow! With the kind of $ these people have raised that reflects how much influence? http://www.factcheck.org/elections-2008/obamas_lame_claim_about_mccains_money.html And is doing so. I would argue that Obama is desperate to paint him as Bush but it doesn't appear to be working. McCain's RNC bounce did not just eat up Obama's lead and draw him even, he has gone ahead of him. As is her record of taking on Big Oil and cutting into their $.
I don't expect that to be a trend. Don't most believe China and India will have an increasing demand for oil? The amount of oil we'll put into the world market will be a small amount of the total, meaning it will have little affect on the price of oil. And I think we should keep in mind that not all sources of oil are equal; some are significantly more expensive to derive oil from and it seems the technology is still under development for some of these sources. This is a fine argument to me. I definitely prefer drilling to going to war for foreign oil and I'd like to see more of our money go to US companies and US employees rather than foreign companies. This may even help strengthen the dollar, which would in effect lower the amount of a person's income that goes into fuel costs. Still, I don't see drilling amounting to a big change at the gas pumps. Plus, we'll still be getting the majority of our oil from foreign sources. I do believe, however, that it would be quite lucrative to be on the cutting edge of alternative sources so that we can reap the benefits when there is more of a global market for them. It seems both sides want to explore this, and the stronger we go in to this, the better, IMO.
Of course, as will our demand but this year showed that demand can drop and did. It can do so again for any number of reasons. You say that, but what do you base that upon? What numbers? There are huge amounts of oil available in the Rockies, ANWR, and OCS. Estimates vary but they all agree there is a great amount there and it is not figured into the world's reserves. True but directional drilling and oil shale recovery costs are well below the current price of oil $110/barrel. This technology exists today. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slant_drilling#cite_note-3 This is one of the justifications Iraq gave for invading Kuwait years ago. They said that Kuwait was stealing their oil. The majority of our imported oil comes from Canada. I'm ok with that. Those guys have good bacon and strippers.:wink:
All the arguments I've heard on the subject. I haven't heard advocates for drilling say that we may have enough oil to make a significant dent in our overall foreign dependence or in the cost to fill 'er up. I'd thought I'd heard otherwise, but I wouldn't be shocked if I were mistaken. Aside from Canadian bacon, I was unaware of these Canadian facts. ...I'm Learning...
Then you have not done your own research. There is plenty of information out there showing how much oil is in ANWR, OCS, and the rockies. Just look for it. And as far as cost goes, the guy with the most can set the price, and right now that's OPEC, not us. If we tap into what we have, then that dynamic changes. Combine that with real efforts to get off oil dependence by pushing alternative energy, and the price of oil could become irrelevant to Americans. And we won't have to suffer horrendous spikes while trying to ween off oil. Horizontal drilling pushes the cost of a barrel of oil to $40. Oil shale is not much more than that. Both are well under the current price of $110/barrel, which was pushing $140 just 30 days ago. It's a pretty country and the people are friendly. Much better moods than their Michigan counterparts across the lake. Who knows, maybe they just liked my LSU hat.
