Drill Here, Drill Now, Pay Less: Stupid, Stupid, Stupid

The Republicans, from their dead-duck President to John McCain to the zombies who attended the Texas state Republican convention in Houston last week, have a new mantra: "drill now, drill here, pay less." This is the idea that we can reduce high gas prices RIGHT NOW if we just open up the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and all our offshore lands to exploration by our greedy oil and gas companies.

They are so anxious to shove this down America's throat that George Bush (remember him?) threatened Congress last week: "If Congressional leaders leave for the Fourth of July recess without taking action, they will need to explain why $4-a-gallon gasoline is not enough incentive for them to act.” What Bush did not say -- although I would not put it past the pathologically mendacious culture of the White House to do so -- was that allowing ANWR and offshore drilling would do anything to lower the price of gas in the near future.

Last Sunday on "Meet the Press," Senator Joe Biden took on the illusion of gas pump relief from this loony idea, pointing out that the oil and gas companies have plenty to room to dril if they want to:

They're not pumping what they could, number one. This is a gift, a gift to the oil companies by John McCain. They have now leased 41 million acres of offshore leases. They're only pumping in 10.2 million of those acres. Seventy-nine percent of all the offshore oil available off the coast of Florida, into the Gulf of Mexico, the Atlantic Coast, the Pacific Coast, lies within those acres that they now have. Why are they not pumping? Why are they not doing this? Why are they not pursuing what's estimated to be a total of 70--54 billion barrels of oil at their disposal right now if they pump? Why are these greedy fellows deciding they want to go beyond that? It's because they want to get it in before George Bush leaves the presidency. It's because they're not pumping the oil to keep the price up. They are not even drilling. So here you have 30 million leased acres they have right now that possesses 79 percent of all the offshore, and they're not drilling. And John says they need more? And it would take 10 years for it to come online.

Senator Lindsey Graham, obviously uncomfortable at being confronted with actual facts, sputtered that no offshore drilling was allowed, even though his home state of South Carolina would welcome that (a statement I predict will come back to haunt him). Biden responded:

Let's get the facts. You're entitled to your own opinion, not your own facts. Forty million acres leased offshore, number one. Number two, the first well to be dug from the time they lease, if Lindsey gives them access to more area, it'll take 10 years from the time the lease is let to the time oil comes out of the bottom of the sea in the new leases.

So the gimmick is not a workable one, no matter how much McSame et al. flog it. Tom Friedman, the New York Times columnist who's taken a year off to write a book about the green economy, comes along with a piece in yesterday's paper that gets at the heart of how silly and evil this idea is. The whole op-ed is worth reading, but here's a good highlight:

Two years ago, President Bush declared that America was “addicted to oil,” and, by gosh, he was going to do something about it. Well, now he has. Now we have the new Bush energy plan: “Get more addicted to oil.” ... It’s as if our addict-in-chief is saying to us: “C’mon guys, you know you want a little more of the good stuff. One more hit, baby. Just one more toke on the ole oil pipe. I promise, next year, we’ll all go straight. I’ll even put a wind turbine on my presidential library. But for now, give me one more pop from that drill, please, baby. Just one more transfusion of that sweet offshore crude.

This is a horrible idea that will do nothing to lower gas prices and will delay the time when we actually begin seriously investing in renewable and alternative energy sources. The Republicans should be ashamed for parroting the latest oil and gas company nonsense.