I still love the fallacy that these eco-hippies try to generate, that the country can easily just flip some big, magical switch and VOILA!....everyone is using alt-fuels!

David Copperfield, Harry Houdini, and that loser that spends weeks in a freakin' bubble can't pull off that magic act.

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"I should be calling collect from jail for the things I commit each night in my head" - D. Mustaine.

You'll see elderly on fixed incomes dying this winter because they have to make a choice of food, medication or energy for heating in their homes. Remember your politicians when Older AMERICANS Die for the inactions of Politicians. (*)(*)(*)(*) finger pointing scum.

There is no magic switch. As Japanese car makers have learned, you can be ahead of the curve, and slowly takeover the market, or you can stick to a losing proposition and fall behind like the American auto makers. Do we have the capacity to evolve? That will be answered in November.

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"I want to stay as close to the edge as I can without going over. Out on the edge you see all kinds of things you can't see from the center." - Kurt Vonnegut

yep, to expect adequate alternate fuels to become available immediately is about as spurious as believing drilling more of our 2% of the world's oil reserves will offset the 70% we are now importing (which represents 25% to 30% of the world's total oil supply).
going beyond that specious expectation that our oil would comprise more than a drop in the barrel, next examine what happens to the oil after it is extracted. it is placed on the world market. the oil companies are not going to sell us oil from our national oil fields for less than the global fair market price, at whatever future time it is extracted. at best, the contribution of additional USA sourced oil would reduce the cost of fuel by mere pennies.

now, to compare your pumping proposition, sioux, with the alternate fuel proposal of the "eco-hippies", as can be seen above, there is NO valid reason to pursue your approach. we risk damaging our environment for almost NO observable economic benefit. there is a word to describe your drilling proposal: STUPID! yes, it's stupid to jeopardize an environment for no genuine tangible benefits.
in contrast, anyone with a triple digit IQ (which likely consist of more than "eco-hippies") will recognize that alternative fuels (and improved methods of conservation) are where the world MUST be headed if we expect civilization to grow and prosper. that the availability of significant oil is finite should make that truth evident. but because ronnie raygun upended every program President Carter initiated to move our nation in the direction of energy self sufficiency, we are now having to restart those initiatives again, almost 30 years later.
if you don't believe me, listen to T. Boone Pickens, who has offered a cogent proposal which explains how we transition from our current oil dependency toward national energy self sufficiency:
http://www.pickensplan.com/

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Quote:

"I like to watch the news, because I don't like people very much and when you watch the news ... if you ever had an idea that people were really terrible, you could watch the news and know that you're right."

Frank Zappa