Since the 1970s, an endless parade of government officials and candidates has campaigned on how we must act now, to get free of Middle East oil.
Yet, here we are, forty years later, still tied to the oil fields of Saudi Arabia and others, and every time some angry Muslim (is there any other kind?) throws a rock, our gas prices jump.
Why?
We only get approximately 14% of our oil from the Mideast, anyway; the rest comes from domestic drilling, Canada and Mexico.
Yet, it seems to be Arab oil production on which the petroleum industry bases its prices.
I’m sure there’s some solid, logical reason for this, but beyond the fact that it probably makes it cost more, I can’t come up with one.
Now, here’s our Dear Leader, the ever-compassionate, endlessly-caring Barack the Smooth, who, like every other president since 1973, when gasoline--if you could find any--jumped to an outrageous .40 cents a gallon, campaigned against foreign energy.
He had a chance to help us get a little closer to cutting ties with the Arabs, with a nice, shiny pipeline from Canada. (Insert buzzer sound effect) Wrong answer! Canadian oil is still technically foreign, but it’s at least a little more stable than the Mideast.
The pipeline’s builders will reapply for permits, and still hope to get things pumping by 2014. Obama has said:
“This announcement is not a judgment on the merits of the pipeline, but the arbitrary nature of a deadline that prevented the State Department from gathering the information necessary to approve the project and protect the American people. I'm disappointed that Republicans in Congress forced this decision, but it does not change my administration's commitment to American-made energy that creates jobs and reduces our dependence on oil.”
“To protect the American people” from what, exactly? Paychecks that stretch a little further?
So, it’s the Republican’s fault, because their “arbitrary deadline”—doubtless imposed to force his actually making a decision, rather than tap-dancing on it—prevented the State Dept. from getting the necessary information.
So, exactly how long have they known about this project? 2008; long enough to check things out and get informed. How about letting us drill for our own, then? Nope.
Even USA Today admits Obama “faced fierce pressure from environmentalists, who said they would be less likely to campaign for him, if he didn't block the project to move carbon-heavy oil from the tar sands of northwest Canada.”
I bet he did. Salamanders, fish, obscure--and even common—plants, animals and insects, are much more important than people, after all.
How come you never see these oil-hating tree-huggers protesting at any Middle Eastern embassies?
Understand: an oil-independent USA is exactly what the Left doesn’t want. Leftist liberalism has been laboring for 60 years-plus, to undermine and destroy the American republic, its government and culture, to replace it with their own statist, centralized, top-down vision. Radical environmentalism is just one crowbar they use.
Besides, Hungarian-born George Soros, the America-hating, leftist billionaire and owner and CEO of the Democratic Party, is heavily invested in Brazilian oil. Coincidentally, I’m sure, Brazil also just happens to be where many of our drilling rigs went, following Obama’s tragically unnecessary ban on drilling in the Gulf.
So; bottom line, Obama’s pandering to those very same “Special Interests” he so decried in his campaign; he probably worries that even typical Democrat chicanery (read: voter fraud and intimidation tactics) won’t be enough to save him in November.
Politics over people; how typical. The great Unifier, “The One”, is just another sleazy, self-serving politician, after all; in the words of Gomer Pyle: “surprise, surprise, surprise!”
Too bad there are still far too many liberal dupes out there who are still far too willing to give him far too many second chances.