Drill, Maybe, Drill

Extending existing oil leases as the president has proposed accomplishes nothing if the White House's environmental handcuffs won't let them be used. Lucy wants to hold the football for Charlie Brown again. When President Obama said during his Saturday radio address that "we should increase safe and responsible oil production here at home," the operative words were "safe and responsible." We will drill if it's safe for polar bears, caribou and West Texas lizards, and if it doesn't contribute to the "climate change" myth. Similar words were used to justify the seven-year moratorium on offshore drilling off both coasts, in the eastern Gulf of Mexico and in the seas off Alaska following last year's Deepwater Horizon explosion in the Gulf, even though no other wells were found to be unsafe. The Associated Press reported with a straight face that "Obama is directing his administration to ramp up U.S. oil production." In fact, what he proposed is extending existing leases in the Gulf of Mexico and off Alaska and holding more frequent lease sales in a federal petroleum reserve in Alaska. Using those leases is quite another matter...more