Posted on 11/19/2001 8:32:37 PM PST by Cuban123
Though "we the people" do now at least have access to the truth via the internet, most unfortunately are still too d@mn lazy to acknowledge it UNLESS the Post, the Times or Peter Jennings points the "truth" out to them.
Actually, the Persion Gulf is not a wastelane. Neither is the Gulf of Mexico or the Texas plains or northwest Pennsylvania or the jungles of Venuzuala and Indonesia and Nigeria or L.A. city limits (well maybe that one) where oilwells are or have been drilled.
ANWR is arguably a wasteland. People opposed to drilling in ANWR must be made to understand that the Today show and the New York Times can damage their I.Q.
Can't agree move, but it reminds me of something very funny. I was visiting and touring the drilling rig my husband worked on some years ago, off the coast in So. Calif. I was curious when I saw shelves full of "Joy" diswashing soap, dozens and dozens of bottles. When I asked about why they had so much, I was told it was their first line of attack for oil spilled, seems it's excellent for breaking it up. I'm sure they were talking about very minor spills, but it cracked me up. I kept envisioning planes flying in dropping loads of "Joy" on larger slicks.
Can someone please post a picture of the part of the AWNR that is being drilled (I've seen it, really muddy and lifeless) and a map of Alaska with the REAL drilling amount? I believe that if you make a single pencil-point on a rather large map of Alaska, the place that is being drilled is smaller than that.
Don't take my word for it, read some of the reports from Alaska, as I have. Look at the photos above. THINK for two seconds. In that tundra, animals need places to hide... there are no trees, outcroppings, or caves. The pipeline is the ONLY thing to hide behind for miles in many areas. Also, the pipe itself IS warmer than the air around it. Ergo, it provides warmth, and shelter! Can you not even fathom simple premises like these without reading your copy points?
My position is simple - the earth belongs to the creator, not to us. We merely live here as tenants. We don't have the right to do whatever we want or destroy whatever we want, or even to use up all the oil we want. It's simple ethics, "teacher317."
Then, please, explain how you justfiy your premise while living in a fabricated and non-naturally-occurring house, driving a car (although even horse-back would probably present ethical problems for you), eating animals and plants that are torn from Mother Earth...
Some of your factual premises are simply incorrect. For example, we don't have to buy any oil from Saddam. If we simply raised the fuel efficiency standards on automobiles by a few mph, we would save far more oil than we could possibly obtain from ANWR.
As always, it is up to you liberals to tell us Amercians who love FReedom that we can no longer live our lives as we see fit, because you haev a different idea. Can you not understand that I WANT to buy oil to run the cars, tractors, lawn mowers, chainsaws, and heat my home... all of which I bought, knowing they use oil... because I wanted them, and am free to buy them. Neither your opinion nor your ethics weigh in on that decision, nor should they. I don't WANT more efficient vehicles. I WANT to buy vehicles that have enough room, power, and speed to satisfy me. You would rather force Americans to buy something else, because you say so. HOW can you justify that as FReedom and Liberty? Because you care?!?
You don't seem to care too much about oil spills, but some of us do.
Care all you want. Heck, drive on up and clean up some of the lingering damage from the Valdez you're crying about. You're FREE to do so! I would support you 100% in that endeavor! I would even admire your hard work, dedication to a cause, and your care for the environment. However, you'd rather have more of my money taken from me so that your representatives can hire some of their friends to do it (after skimming some off the top for themselves). Then you'd applaud as they passed more rules and regulations that tell me how to live my life... and then they take more of the fruits of my labor to do it!
And all the reports that I've read on the subject indicate that there is a shortage of inpectors in Alaska.
What does is take to get you to read? HIRE SOME MORE, if that's a problem. Costing America billions in revenue because you can't figure out how to pay 10 more guys to walk around to the drilling rigs on a monthly basis is ludicrous.
You seem committed to believing whatever the oil companies tell you, despite the fact that they have criminal convictions and fines for violating the law and obstructing justice.
I haven't heard from a single oil company. I'm committed to using logic, and facts from articles from National Geographic, and reports from Alaskan newspapers sent to me by my friends up there. Have you provided one logical refutation for any of my points yet? No. All you've said is that you have 'ethical problems' with drilling. That doesn't exactly reverse the legal, capitalistic, patriotic or logical reasons I've provided.
You continue to believe them, and characterize me as naive? Now that's amusing.
You show your naivete. I merely point it out. Now YOU'VE assumed where my information comes from. (How, um, NAIVE of you!)
You're obviously entitled to live in your little hate filled world where everyone who disagrees with you is a "hate-America'commie-socialist-liberal." It's always the jerks who go around accusing others of being anti-American that you have to worry about. You clearly seem to be one of them.
Yet another incorrect assumption of my character. You're very consistent, anyway. (What is it with the "HATER!" label liberals have to throw at anyone who doesn't toe their Party line?) I don't hate you, I hate what your ilk have reduced this country to, and what you would turn it into if you get your way. (As any good teacher would tell you, you don't chastise the person, you critique the behavior!) The policies you espouse DO promote Socialism, and that particular philosophy has seen dictators rise and kill 100,000,000 of their own citizens, in the past Century alone. I'd personally like to avoid all that. Also, I am not a jerk, I am merely trying to show you the incredibly obvious reasons why we SHOULD drill ANWR. Just because you don't like the fact that you're on the short side of a logical debate does not imply that I am a hate-monger.
Inupiat Eskimos First, Best Environmentalists
by Former Mayor Benjamin P. Nageak on ANWR Development
The Inupiat people of the North Slope have called the Arctic their home for thousands of years. Long before the riches of this land and its seas were "discovered" by outside cultures, the Inupiat built a world that centered on their interdependence with the vast and diverse animal life found in their seas, skies and land.
This world of the Arctic, including the vast expanse termed the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge by the United States government, has seen my people’s footprints throughout history. We used the resources God gave us to build a life for our families.
This is why it is hard for my people to understand how anyone can view ANWR as some vast, frozen wilderness untouched by human hands. This picture of ANWR leaves out one of its most important elements - the Inupiat people who have shared the resources of that land with its animals since pre-history.
I was taught by my father to respect the land and it’s resources because our very life depends on them. I realize life is different for me than it was for my father. But we are both the same in our dependence on the resources found on our lands. For my father, it was the food he hunted to feed his family. I also use the land to hunt food for my family. But the oil beneath the surface of ANWR can also provide jobs, schools and a thriving economy for my people.
I fully understand the fears of many people that the presence of the oil industry on the coastal plains will disrupt the wildlife. They fear that industry activity will destroy a part of this earth that should be preserved.
The Inupiat people probably feel those fears more strongly than people in the lower ‘48. This land is our legacy to our children. This land holds our future and the survival of our culture.
In 1969, when oil was first discovered on our lands, those fears were foremost in our minds as we fought for self-determination in order to be able to protect our resources. Since then, we have had over twenty years of working with the oil industry here. We enacted strict regulations to protect our land and the oil companies have consistently met the standards we imposed.
ANWR holds resources that can be extracted safely with care and concern for the entire eco-system it encompasses. The Inupiat people, working through the North Slope Borough, will act in the same careful, caring and cautious manner we always have when dealing with our lands and the seas.
We have the greatest stake possible in seeing that any and all development is done in such a way as to keep this land safe. Because it is our world. It is where we live. It holds the remains of our ancestors. It holds the future of our children.
The only advantage I can see is to keep the Alaskan pipeline full.
I'll still try to present my thoughts on the issue you raised, though... I think it's probably not a very wise course of action for several reasons...
1. Why on earth would you sit on a resource when it has present value, its price doesn't keep up with the rate of inflation (gas was about $1.109 when I was a teen, and was again this morning), and possibly no quantifiable future value? The Middle East's supply will easily last for decades. The price, supply, demand, and quality of the oil in the market is totally unpredictable 20+ years in advance. Comparing the two markets is risky at best.
2. Our supply may be totally worthless by the time the ME supply is tapped out. Alternatives are improving their cost-efficiency every day. (Nuclear, solar, etc.) Leaving it in the ground could very easily be throwing out national wealth.
3. Enough speculation. As for the certainties: America's economy needs help NOW. We need to send a clear message of independence from the ME NOW. Alaskans want to drill NOW. According to the most rabid environmentalists, helping the environment is necessary NOW (and again, we drill cleaner than the ME).
The only reasoned position I can see is to take the available wealth, security, environmental and economic benefits now, and not wait for possible benefits a few decades away.
As for the chart, it doesn't graph the ME's production or supply. Also, the downward trend from 1975 could have as much to do with regulation (and even the gas crisis of 79?) as it does with our supply or demand (which has only gone up, obviously).
Also, notice the second slide on the Power Point presentation on that site... all the data points after 1990 are above the yellow projection line, yet they have it continuing to trend downward. Just because they can fit a few years to a decently fitting bell curve does not mean the bell will continue indefinitely, that new production methods won't be found, or that new supplies won't be found. (The fourth slide oddly keeps our production capacity at 189 billion bbls per year, even past 2030... I'd REALLY have to take issue with a hard limit like that!)
Finally, their conclusive chart states that, "It is clear that it would take some 13 years (from today) for ANWR to begin making a sizeable contribution to U.S. oil supply and that while this would be a non-trivial contribution to supply, it really does not change the long-term outlook." Once again, it doesn't matter if the contribution is over 5% ('sizeable') to the U.S production... ANYTHING that will add to our wealth, job opportunities and independence (while cleaning the environment, decreasing transport prices, and diminishing the influence of the ME) is a GOOD THING. An analogous situation: Every household in this nation uses coupons that would 'not be a sizeable contribution', and 'won't change the long-term outlook' for the family... but every little bit helps! =^) Finally, again, Alaskans WANT to drill, and I want the concept of Liberty to be followed. Let 'em drill!
It looks as one-sided as a Shaq vs. Teacher317 dunking contest!
There will always be a market for petroleum products. Aside from electricity production, petroleum will continue to be a vital fuel for vehicles. We will never have a solar powered fighter jet or airliner. The chemical industry also relies on petroleum products for much of their production.
3. As for the certainties: America's economy needs help NOW. We need to send a clear message of independence from the ME NOW. Alaskans want to drill NOW. According to the most rabid environmentalists, helping the environment is necessary NOW (and again, we drill cleaner than the ME).
"it is clear that it would take some 13 years (from today) for ANWR to begin making a sizeable contribution to U.S. oil supply"
How is drilling in ANWAR going to help us NOW if it won't be up and running for 13 years?
Also, notice the second slide on the Power Point presentation on that site...
What is the link?
ANYTHING that will add to our wealth, job opportunities and independence (while cleaning the environment, decreasing transport prices, and diminishing the influence of the ME) is a GOOD THING.
Agreed. But we have a finite amount of oil in this nation. If we use up this oil now, instead of using the same amount of ME oil instead, where will we be then? We will have even less oil and they will have comparatively even more. All of these benefits will also come to us if we wait another 20 or 40 years before tapping this field.
I also notice that you could make the same exact arguments against the development of any other product or resource. I don't think we should stop mining the hundreds of finite ores that we have, and I don't think we should avoid any new sources.
LOL... my FReeper-lady-fair (slugbug) just pointed out you could say the same thing about the finite supply of oxygen... America! Stop breathing NOW! Save that resource for the future! =^) (okay, it's renewable.... but so is petroleum if you have the patience!)
Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't ANWAR belong to the Federal government, meaning all of us? While the wishes of Alaskan politicians, tribal groups, and citizens should be taken into account, this is land and oil belonging equally to everyone in the U.S.
As for oxygen, it is recycled very quickly by the respiration of plants. We'd have run out a long time ago if it didn't.
First, the federal government has no Constitutional reason to own the land. There is no public interest being served. What right do they have to take taxpayer money to deny Americans use of American soil? (The answer is "none").
Second, Sen. Daschle is preventing this issue from comging to a vote in Congress because he knows that both the American people AND their representatives will overwhelmingly agree with the "Alaskan politicians, tribal groups, and citizens", and want to drill the land... and he is against that. (The will of one man thwarting the will of the republic... you must be proud to have the little dictator on your side of this equation)
Third, the land and oil do NOT belong to us all equally. Everywhere that 'public' lands are drilled or mined, the proceeds don't get distributed to the citizenry. You might feel better by using such phrasing, but that doesn't change the reality of the resource-development industries.
(And lastly, I know that oxygen is immediately renewable... that's why I included it in my post. It was meant to be taken as a humor-break.)
I was under the impression that a royalty is collected from drilling on the North Slope. Previous ANS drilling has had a 90/10 divsion with Alaska, but the bill for ANWAR drilling mandates 50/50 sharing. Do these royalties never get collected? If not, is the money being retained by the oil companies?
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