The Steamboat Pilot & Today

Posted on July 18 at 1:24 p.m.
On Dril, dril, drill

How about Nixon, Ford, Carter, Reagan, Bush, Clinton, and every Congressional session for the last 40 years? Any honest brokers in there, or are they all poseurs? Is there anyone in today's arena whom you believe to be honestly dealing with energy policy?

Posted on July 18 at 12:28 p.m.
On Dril, dril, drill

Unfortunately, both exectutive and congressional action are required to get things moving. W is the most honest actor in this particular melodrama - he's not shilling for reelection.

Posted on July 18 at 11:23 a.m.
On Dril, dril, drill

steamboatsconscience:

There are a handful of shallow-water platforms that have been sitting off the Cali coast, unused, since before the moratorium was imposed. Those platforms can be operational in less than a year, in the areas for which they were intended.

Your 'where's the shipping capacity gonna come from' question was answered in the article you cited:

"These record prices have spurred a new wave of drill-ship construction. This boom could lead to renewed offshore oil exploration that would eventually bring more supplies to the oil market, and push down prices.

Already, 16 new drill-ships are scheduled to be delivered to oil companies this year — more than double the number delivered over the last six years combined. In fact, 75 ultra-deepwater rigs should be delivered from 2008 to 2011, according to ODS-Petrodata, a firm that tracks drilling rigs."

Supply and demand. It's not difficult.

The bigger issue is refining capacity. The Idiot Left, abetted by the Spineless Right, has seen to it that we haven't built a single refinery since 1976. If drilling is ramped up to the extent that it needs to be, we either build additional refineries or ship the crude abroad and pay foreign companies to refine it for us.

Posted on July 17 at 10:40 a.m.
On Dril, dril, drill

justathought:

It's not in the least bit coincidental. Speculators speculate. They gamble on what they believe future pricing will be.

They listened to W and started selling the market before a thimblefull of oil has been extracted. If Congress seals the deal, prices will continue to fall. That's how traders work - they discount the future.

Democrats have been slamming the President all week. They say it'll take a decade for any of that oil to make it to the marketplace (they're right); and oil prices won't decline for at least that long (they're wrong). And they, along with McCain & Obama, trash the speculators. And this week, we've seen a real world example as to WHY they're wrong. Reid, Pelosi, Salazar, McCain, Obama... ALL of them; along with an American media too stupid to even understand the issue, let alone make any effort to explain it to anybody.

We could actually begin extracting oil off the coast of California within one year if the moratorium is lifted. The Cali deposits are under shallow water in an area that's already been explored. Drilling platforms have been there since BEFORE the moratorium. They're talking about 10 billion barrels off the Cali coast.

But hey - better to go with Idiot Schumer's recommendation & buy from Saudi Arabia instead of taking care of ourselves.

Posted on July 17 at 9:40 a.m.
On Paul Potyen: Time for a change

Thomas Jefferson on the issue of slavery at the Second Continental Congress:

"It was like holding a wolf by the ears. You didn't like it, but you didn't dare let it go."

Posted on July 17 at 7:20 a.m.
On Wall found guilty of DWAI

sickofitall:

Happens all the time, because it can be an indication the vehichle has been stolen. When car thieves break into the steering column to start the car, the headlights are often locked into the bright position.

Posted on July 17 at 7:13 a.m.
On Dril, dril, drill

For those who deride drilling at ANWR & the Outer Continental Shelf, note the observation of nanny-state Socialist Chuck Schumer on the Senate Floor yesterday, re: the impact of elevated production in Saudi Arabia:

"If they [Saudi Arabia] produced half a million barrels more oil a day the price would come down a very significant amount and, at the same time, it would stop the speculation that keeps driving up the price of oil."

ANWR alone is projected to produce a million barrels a day. Had President Clinton not vetoed ANWR drilling 13 years ago, those million barrels a day would be available to us now, and we wouldn't be whining about $4 gas.

According to Schumer, half a million barrels a day from SAUDI ARABIA would cause the price of oil to "come down a very significant amount." Consider what twice that amount - produced in AMERICA through American jobs - would do.

Don’t take it from me, take it from the chairman of the Joint Economic Committee.

And am I the only one who finds it just a tad hypoctritical for Schumer - one of the loudest complainers about our dependence on foreign oil - to be lobbying for more from Saudi Arabia, while opposing development of our own resources?

Posted on July 15 at 1:17 p.m.
On Paul Potyen: Time for a change

Paul

You're assuming facts not in evidence, with all due respect. My vote is not motivated by fear. It is the result of my having judged McCain as the least objectionable of two bad choices.

Posted on July 14 at 3:03 p.m.
On Paul Potyen: Time for a change

Obama's lead is 2.7% nationally, according to pollster.com's average - but it's significantly more in the crucial states. http://www.pollster.com/08-US-Pres-GE-Mv...

Get ready for a Socialist in the White House.

Posted on July 14 at 2:02 p.m.
On Paul Potyen: Time for a change

dogd:

I don't disagree. I'm just not as enthusiastic about McCain as you are. I think he's the 2nd coming of Bob Dole - another honorable man whose political philosophies are steered by the wind on his wet finger.

That said, I'm voting for him for the same reason I voted Bush in 2000: he doesn't suck as hard as the other guy.