Posted on 06/18/2008 9:24:52 AM PDT by tobyhill
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- President George Bush, saying the United States "must produce more oil," called Wednesday for a lifting of the ban on offshore drilling.
"Congress must face a hard reality," Bush said. "Unless members are willing to accept gas prices at today's painful prices or even higher, our nation must produce more oil, and we must start now."
The remarks highlight the growing political pressure to reduce dependence on foreign oil and deal with rising gas prices. The issue has become central to the presidential election as $4-a-gallon gas and become a drag on an already sluggish economy.
Bush outlined a four-point plan to increase domestic oil supply.
The first step, Bush said, is to expand domestic oil supply by allowing drilling in the outer continental shell. He asked Congress to lift a federal drilling moratorium on offshore drilling. He said he would then lift an executive order that also bans drilling.
(Excerpt) Read more at money.cnn.com ...
About time...
It wouldn’t take an actual production increase, but merely Congressional action allowing drilling to resume, for oil speculators to desert the crude market in droves, and for somme sanity to return to oil pricing.
>>our nation must produce more oil, and we must start now.
And just where was your tribe of numb-nuts when all this was proposed in 2004? Anyone? Anyone?
Thats not going to happen because pelosi and co want to protect the earnings of those gov’t employee pension funds.
agreed...this will be a good wedge issue which BO will lose on...
of course were we honest with ourselves we’d admit GWB and the Republican controlled congress should’ve pushed this through six years ago....
It was actually a great speech by Bush. In fact, it was almost as good as the story that followed it on Fox News regarding women’s thong underwear and lawsuits.
I admit it — I love Kelly’s Court!
“Democrats have a plan to lower gas prices…join Democrats who are working to lower gas prices now.” – Then-Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), Press Release, April 19, 2006
Now as Speaker, prices have doubled and no plan exists. If the GOP and McCain can’t make headway with this, they don’t deserve to be elected to office.
Rush is starting it. “Energy Independence” should be the issue of 2008. No more dependence on Venezuela, Saudi Arabia etc. Sure it wont help today or even next year, but if we don’t start the campaign now, we’ll never get there. Let’s go Freepers.. Join Newt Gingrich on Drill here, Drill now. Energy Independence ought to be the issue.
Dumbo! You are rowing a sinking boat. Americans are angry and you have no solution but to make things even worse.
Buh-bye!
only took him 7-1/2 years to figure it out.....
Boilerplate from the Birkenstock crowd!
*sigh*
Bush has been pushing this since 2001 along with nuclear energy.
The useless RNC should be run out of the US along with the UN. Idiots.
Looks like some dumb arse in the GOP finally realized that this is a winning issue in the upcoming election and beyond.
When oil was cheap and plentiful, it was hard to get the public pressure on democrats to allow it. They still won't allow it, but it will be a losing issue for them if the republicans keep hitting them on it and win the easy debate on the issue.
sighing is right.
Loads of pessimism here.
Let’s just get it on!
Yes, but the GOP doesn't have a presidential candidate in the race who will push it.
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