Posted on 06/13/2008 8:29:18 AM PDT by Rufus2007
As gas prices increase, Congress is feeling more and more pressures from its constituencies to explore for oil in areas that are off-limits, including the Outer Continental Shelf and in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR).
Many politicians in Washington, D.C. oppose those efforts due to environmental concerns, but House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-MD) told CNBC’s “Squawk Box” on June 12 he’s not opposed to drilling, but said oil companies aren’t using the leases they have.
“Well, there’s nothing wrong with drilling,” Hoyer said. “But the fact of the matter is we have 80 percent of the leases that are currently authorized that are not being drilled upon - 80 percent on gas, 82 percent on natural gas. We have most of the outer continental shelf as well as the on-land, on-the-mainland leases that are not being used.”
(Excerpt) Read more at businessandmedia.org ...
%This is the party line. Every Rat on Fox news repeats it verbatim. Yesterday when pressed by Cavuto to state specifically which area was not being drilled the Congress critter could not and then repeated the talking point.
It was funny to see him exposed and tragic he didn’t know what he was talking about.
Thanks for posting this. I heard that exchange on Squawk box and had a gut feel that what Hoyer was saying was BS.
It’s part of being a Dimocrat. Lie and then yell louder when caught and then let the MSM explain your way out.
In Dec, 2006, as one of the GOP's last acts before the dems took control of Congress, the Domenici-Landrieu Gulf of Mexico Energy Security Act was passed. This opened about 2 million acres in Lease Area 181 to drilling.
Clair McCaskill was blowing off with the same “statistics,” earlier this week. it sounded bogus then. This just confirms it.
I saw this piece with Steny Hoyer on Thursday. Besides spewing lies about Republican positions (he stated as if it was fact that oil companies have the rights to drill lots of places but they choose to stick it to consumers and charge more by not drilling), he has a complicit CNBC talker Carlos Quintenilla (sp?) agreeing with his lies. Shameful for putting out lies, shameful for having the forum and media agree and shameful that the truth from a Republican perspective wasn’t presented.
The good news Dems in the house are feeling the heat. They have a bunch of red state first termers in jeopardy. If the pubbies press this hard, we could get some seats back.
If you were in the oil business and heard threats about ‘nationalizing’ your industry or a Windfall Profits Tax, would YOU increase production?
I wouldn’t work for free!
Today’s government seems to have forgotten it’s role in business affairs.
The progressives give us their plan, but we’re not listening.
Simple Principals of Democratic Socialism
Production for human use, not for profit.
Classless society where no person should exploit any other person.
Conservation of natural resources through sustainable production.
Changes in society and government should be made by free and open elections.
Widespread and full public education is essential to guarantee the equality of people.
People must have access to information and be allowed to communicate their ideas in order to make informed democratic decisions.
Public, collective ownership of the means of production and dis tribution and the democratic management thereof. (Not state ownership of every human enterprise)
Food, housing and health care are basic human rights and should be guaranteed to all.
Democratic socialism ought to be achieved democratically.
Can somebody tell me how this is untrue? First I have heard of this ‘oil companies aren’t using their leases’ thing. I am in an e-mail argument with a liberal friend and I know she is going to quote this.
I know oil companies take out leases on everything in sight ‘just in case’. Are they not drilling on them because environmentalists have stopped them or because the leases are unproductive or what?
The oil companies pay for the exclusive rights to these leases. Guess who they pay the money to, especially when the lease is offshore or on Gov. lands? The Oil Co. then has exploration and drilling/production rights.
The leases may be held by the oil co. but they may have been determined to be not viable or profitable!
Sometimes an oil co. may lease areas that it knows has no production possibilities just so it can have access to areas that they know have a viable oil/gas reservoir.
These critters are ignorant.
It is true. The guy yesterday referred to a second , smaller area and couldn’t say where it was.
See post 6 below and the other thread with an extensive discussion and a map.
If you read the article you will have your answer, but just to make it easy for you, yes they are dry. But take the time to read the article.
This is now the standard Rat talking point since I've heard Pelosi and Durbin say the exact same thing over the past two weeks. The GOP needs to hang this foolishness around the Rats' necks (but our guys won't for lack of testicular fortitude).
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.