Do You Like What You See At The Pump?

How's that Hope and Change working out for you at the gas pump?

If you are not outraged by what you are paying for a gallon of gas right now, you are either a far left kook eco-Nazi, or President Obama.

There is no legitimate reason for gas to be at 4 bucks a gallon. There is no shortage of gasoline or oil. Even if every drop of oil coming out of Libya was cut off (which it has not been), it would have no tangible effect on the amount of oil available to us.

So, what gives?

Two main forces are at work. First, we have market speculators who are driving up the cost based on fear, imagined shortages, etc. Their motive is stictly profit. This is an unfortunate effect of a free market - people who have no interest in oil per se' are buying and selling it simply to gain profit. I think that there is a simple way this profiteering can be curbed, to slow the wild swings in prices - make speculators hold on to the oil futures they buy for at least a year before they can be sold. That would drive out many of the quick buck hunters.

Second, we have the Obama regime. Normally, the President doesn't have much control over the price of energy, even though the public would think he does. Obama is an exception to that rule. His policies are plain - make the price of fossil fuel so painful that it drives our country to alternative energy. He has said this openly for years, and is proud of it. If you remember in the aftermath of Katrina, he wasn't upset that gas hit 4 bucks a gallon - his problem was that it hit us so fast that it was a shock to us.

Obama and his cronies are blocking new energy exploration at every turn. We can't get to the oil, gas, and coal we have because they won't let us.

There is more oil, gas, and coal in the ground than has been pulled out in all of the years it has been harvested. The largest reserves of these resources in the world are located within our borders or just offshore.

What I can't understand is why Obama is so against us being energy independent, while he gives money to other countries to do exactly what he won't let us do here. 2 billion dolllars to Brazil to help them develop off shore oil drilling. He publicly announced we would be Brazil's biggest oil customer when they got up and running. Huh? Give our tax dollars to another country so that they can sell us oil? Here's an idea - don't give our money away, and let our companies drill here.

Alternative energy is coming, but is decades away from being replacements for oil, gas, and coal. The technology has to mature to make it usable on a large scale. Electric cars with 40 mile ranges aren't usable. Wind power is unreliable, and no one (not even eco-Nazis) want the wind farms in their back yard. Solar is inefficient, the collectors are far too large, and the eco-Nazis don't like them either (remember them objecting to a solar farm in the Mojave Desert?). Nuclear's future is uncertain - it has been almost impossible to get new reactors online in the past 30 years, and now with Japan ....

Drill, baby, drill.

It isn't a Tea Party catch phrase. It isn't crazy right wing extremist hate speech. It is common sense for the survival of our country.

I am sick and tired to paying far too much money for no legitimate reason. Come on, Obama - get the hell out of the way and let us use the resources God placed here for us to use!

As a sidebar to this, do you remember the last time gas hit 4 bucks a gallon? News coverage was non-stop. Our way of life was ending. Thousands were junking their cars and buying bikes. Cash for Clunkers. Worthless SUVs being given away. Waiting lists for hybrid or small cars. Where is that coverage now? Without the mainstream media whipping up a frenzy, we've hit that dollar tip point with little fanfare, and no panic. Did the media do this to spare us? Hell no - they did it because Obama is in office, and they want to do all they can to keep gas prices from being a negative for him as he faces re-election.

Update - Shell Oil has spent 5 years and 4 billion dollars planning to develop offshore oil drilling off the north coast of Alaska. 2.2 billion alone has been given to the Federal Government for the leases to drill on. An estimated 27 billion barrels of oil are within reach - that is 250 percent more than has flowed down the Alaska pipeline in its entire history to date. Shell's plans were to start drilling this summer.

Well, maybe not. Obama's EPA has shut it down. A 4 person EPA appeals board has ruled that drilling would violate air quality rules for a village of 125 people, located 70 miles from the drilling site. The ruling stated that Shell had not figured in emissions from an icebreaker used in exploration when determining the overall environmental impact. A computer model, produced by Earthjustice, an eco-Nazi organization leading the fight to stop the drilling permits, was the sole evidence considered, apparently.

The 4 people on this board are all registered Democrats, all appointed by Obama's EPA leadership, and one is a lead attorney for the environmental activist group Environmental Defense Fund.

4 people, one with an obvious conflict of interest, have stopped a multibillion dollar project that would have assured our independence from foreign oil imports, based on rigged 'science'. Thousands of jobs, and billions of dollars for the Alaska economy have been derailed. I will not put forth my opinion as to what should happen to these four eco-Nazis.