Posted on 02/22/2012 5:12:30 PM PST by Libloather
House Dems to Obama: Be ready to tap emergency oil reserves
By Andrew Restuccia - 02/22/12 03:20 PM ET
Three House Democrats urged President Obama Wednesday to consider releasing oil from the country's emergency stockpiles in order to lower gas prices.
The lawmakers warned that tapping the Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR), a 696-million-barrel stockpile of oil stored in salt caverns along the Gulf Coast, could soon be necessary to combat rising prices they say stem from market speculation.
“It is essential that the United States have an aggressive strategy for releasing oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve to combat the speculators capitalizing on the fear in oil markets and to send a message to Iran that we are ready, willing, and able to deploy our oil reserves,” the Democrats said in a letter to Obama.
“Signaling that the United States will continue to employ an aggressive SPR policy in the near term would send a strong signal to oil markets responding to the unrest in the Middle East.”
Oil prices have soared amid threats by Iran to halt oil shipments. Gas prices are also on the rise. The average gallon of gas cost about $3.58 on Wednesday, according to AAA — that's up from this time last month ($3.38 per gallon) and this time last year ($3.17 per gallon).
The White House approved the release of 30 million barrels of oil from the SPR last summer to combat supply losses from Libya that officials said were threatening the economic recovery.
The GOP roundly criticized the president for releasing SPR oil last year, arguing it was a ploy to score political points amid high gas prices.
Press secretary Jay Carney said last week that the administration won’t rule out tapping the reserve again.
“We never take options off the table, but I have nothing — no announcements to make or anything like that,” Carney said.
Emergency sales of oil from the reserve are rare and have occurred in 1991 at the outset of Operation Desert Storm and again in 2005 after Hurricane Katrina hobbled the Gulf’s refining sector.
Republicans are pummeling Obama over high gas prices, taking aim at his energy policies and calling for a dramatic expansion of domestic oil-and-gas drilling.
The president will tout his energy record Thursday during a speech at the University of Miami.
That
is
NOT
what
it
is
for!
I don’t recall that this reserve was built, at great public expense, as a political tool.
If the military runs out of fuel during a crisis, I’ll make a guess as to how and where they will use the last of it!
It worked for Clinton.
Hark! It’s the cry of the Democrat...
“Loot, baby, loot!”
It seems simple to me. Stop exporting oil.
Makes more sense than robbing the reserves.
....RATS know they are in serious trouble. OBAMA being ready means after the NBA playoffs and two rounds of golf, maybe he’ll respond, or he’ll go on vacation.
Psychotic moron Progressives in action.
IMHO
I think the Dems had better consider keeping their powder dry on this.
It’s going to be a long, hot-under-the-collar summer, and you can only shoot the oil reserve shot once, and the stooges only make asses of themselves blaming everyone and everything else only so many times.
It’s going to be a long, hot-under-the-collar summer. The good news is, that the cities will probably be pretty peaceful - a Molotov cocktail will cost more than a cocktail cocktail by then.
Petro Ping.
I guess they missed dumbass Pelosi’s demagoguery today that there is no shortage of oil and rising prices are being fueled by the evil 1% on Wall Street aided by those rascally Republicans that refuse to back anti-speculation legislation.
makes sense the dems see a person with a 12 inch gash in their side and call for a half inch square bandage to cover it up instead of a compress bandage and sewing up the wound.
i.e. they won’t open up alaska, all of the off shore drilling sites and drilling for oil on government land to solve the problem, long term.
Tactically perfect move by the president who wants to bring this country to it’s knees. Deplete the strategic reserve just prior to a middle east shooting war.
Makes total sense.
Getting ready to fool the sheep one more time. Thhis should be the last time that it will be necessary.
http://www.fossil.energy.gov/programs/reserves/spr/emergency_oil_requests.html
Requests for SPR Assistance
Requests for SPR assistance must be submitted in writing to the Deputy Assistant Secretary for Petroleum Reserves. The request should be by e-mail to david.johnson@hq.doe.gov (or FAX 202-586-7919), with copies to at least one other Washington, DC Program Office Point of Contact, and should include:
A description of the circumstances causing your supply shortage.
Our president is a butthole who kills attempts to locate new oil supplies in this country and vetoes efforts to buy oil from close friends, then tries to pin the blame for his fecklessness on others.
And his `wife’ is burning thousands of gallons of aviation fuel and premium gasoline each month to try and forget their miserable failure; this month, in order to `face-plant’ on Aspen’s bunny slopes.
It is so obvious that these people are attempting to set us up for the great fall. And they want to make sure that we have no resources on which to defend ourselves or to pick ourselves back up. They are doing every thing they can to make sure that when we die... Then we stay dead.
The USA's number one export for 2011 was gasoline & diesel fuels.
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