It appears Osama might just have a problem...CONgress might be passing legislation he can't veto without committing political suicide for the Demonrats.
++++++++++
The
House Thursday passed an energy measure to fund highway and
transportation projects that also included contentious language to
kick-start the Keystone pipeline and open the Alaska National Wildlife
Refuge (ANWR) to drilling.
The bill seeks to expand offshore
drilling for oil and gas and create a shale oil leasing program, and
passed mostly along party lines 237-187.
“Instead of more
gimmicky stimulus spending or pork-laden bills of the past, this bill
would permanently remove government barriers to job creation and support
improving America’s roads and bridges,” said House Speaker John Boehner
(R-Ohio).
Rep. Doc Hastings (R-Wash.), chairman of the House
Resources Committee, said that in addition to developing energy for the
U.S., money paid to the government for leasing the federal property
would pay for infrastructure projects without raising taxes or adding to
the deficit.
“Sadly, the president’s actions in office have been
anything but pro energy,” Hastings said. “In fact, his rhetoric is 180
degrees from his action -- since taking office, this administration has
repeatedly blocked energy production.”
By opening three percent
of lands in ANWR to drilling, Hastings said it would produce more than a
trillion barrels of oil -- enough to provide the U.S. with energy for
200 years.
Democrats objected to the ANWR provision, as well as
the pipeline language that directs the Federal Energy Regulatory
Commission to approve the pipeline within 30 days.
“This bill is
nothing but red meat, political propaganda at its worst,” said Rep. Jim
McGovern (D-Mass.). “Opening up ANWR will do nothing to lower gas
prices.”++++++++++
More at the link.
Of course the Demonrats object - if the public realizes that oil drilling can result in $1.00 gas again, and an end to the extortion we see from people like the Iranians, they might also realize what Demonrats really are, and stop voting them into office!
Three percent of the Alaska mosquito preserve will power the USA for 200 years? What would 100% of that do? There's all that oil in the Dakotas and Montana they recently discovered, too.
Oil can be a lot cleaner than oil for generating power. It's easy to strip out sulfur and other nasty compounds from a liquid, and our transportation can remain based on high-energy liquid hydrocarbon fuels until someone figures out how to make a battery that can contain the same amount of usable energy in the same space as a tank of gas or Diesel - and be recharged in the same time it takes to fill a fuel tank.
And when that happens, we will have the electricity available to charge those new batteries - generated from abundant, clean oil.
Who knows - we might even be able to afford real space travel again. There's megatons of helium 3 on the Moon, and untold wealth out in the asteroids, waiting to be recovered with no ecological insult to our planet beyond rocket launches powered by pure hydrocarbons and liquid oxygen. Given a cheap source of He3, we could finally see those fusion power plants we've been promised would come on line "in the next ten years" ever since the 1960's - and at that point, we could finally stop using oil for fuel. It's infinitely more valuable as a chemical precursor for plastics and other products.
You have to do things in logical order - first you develop and implement the true clean reliable power source, THEN you stop using the older technology. You don't dump the old stuff until you have a good replacement ready to go. That's the big lesson the Demonrats and greenies can't grasp.