To Drill Or Not To Drill

....that is the $140 a barrel question.  And that, in turn, rests upon several other unreliable factors, such as the American people's collective economic knowledge (which is abysmal) and the ability of what passes for the "Republican" presidential nominee's ability to educate them on the connection between environmental extremism and getting shafted for $4.37 a gallon (the most recent regular unleaded price at my neighborhood filling station) at the pump.

As to the first, the trend is at least moving in the right direction:

A majority of Americans (57%) interviewed in a mid-May Gallup Panel survey approve of expanding drilling for oil in offshore and wilderness areas considered to be off-limits...

The current May poll result does, however, show a somewhat different attitude than Gallup has measured over the years in specific reference to opening up the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska for oil exploration. A Gallup trend question about ANWR was last updated in March of this year.

To wit, respondents still opposed tapping ANWR's billions of barrels of crude by a margin of 52%-43%.  Kind of a "tank half full" proposition - saying yes to drilling everywhere else but no to drilling in ANWR doesn't make any sense, but it's remarkable that the public is saying yes to drilling anywhere, even with gas prices going into orbit.

That was a month ago.  On Tuesday Rasmussen released a survey asking about offshore drilling and found that two-thirds supported it, a ten-point bump from the Gallup number.  But it didn't ask about ANWR and also indicated that 61% of "voters" believe oil companies should be required to squander at least a portion of their profits on alternative energy research.  Which, if you're interested in an impromptu politicoeconomic lesson, is the difference between fascism and what directly confiscating that profit would be (i.e. socialism).  An bit of ideological confusion that suggests the people participating in these polls are every bit as economically ignorant as feared.

Yet they do understand the whizzing digits on that tote board.  A Fox News/Opinion Dynamics poll this week showed 77% in favor of drilling in the Gulf of Mexico, and an eleven point bump to 53% who'd be willing to tell the caribou to vacate that tiny postage stamp of the vast Alaskan wildnerness so that their rulers can cease being held economic hostage by ragheads on the other side of the planet.  Beats me what the fig is so special about a piece of Godforsaken tundra utterly indistinguishable from any other plot of "the last frontier's" hundreds of thousands of square miles of emptiness.  How can mosquito-infested tundra be remotely describable as "pristine" anyway?

Charles Krauthammer deftly depicts the effect this real life case study in supply and demand has had on the presidential "race":

At a time when U.S. crude oil production has fallen 40% in the past twenty-five years, seventy-five billion barrels of oil have been declared off-limits, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration. That would be enough to replace every barrel of non-North American imports (oil trade with Canada and Mexico is a net economic and national security plus) for twenty-two years.

That’s nearly a quarter-century of energy independence. The situation is absurd. To which John McCain is responding with a partial fix: Lift the federal ban on Outer Continental Shelf drilling, where a fifth of the off-limits stuff lies. …

The oil crisis handed McCain an unexpected and singularly effective campaign issue. A majority of Americans now favor drilling in the Arctic and offshore. Democrats stand in the way of increased production, just as they did thirteen years ago when President Bill Clinton vetoed drilling in ANWR. Domestic oil production would be about 20% higher today if the Republican Congress had been allowed to prevail.

As expected and right on cue, Barack Obama reflexively attacked McCain. “His decision to completely change his position” to one that would please the oil industry is “the same Washington politics that has prevented us from achieving energy independence for decades.” One can only marvel at Obama’s audacity in characterizing McCain’s proposal to change our policy as “old politics,” while the candidate of “change” adheres rigidly to the no-drilling status quo.

McCain is a lot of things, but the man who opposed ethanol in Iowa — as Obama shamelessly endorsed the most abysmally stupid of our energy policies — is no patsy of the energy producers. Americans know that increased production is needed to complement reduced consumption as the only way to get us out from oil shocks, high prices and national security blackmail.

Actually, Lord Queeg has NOT "changed his position," as he still thinks ANWR should be marketed as a tourist attraction.  Which, I suppose, puts him solidly in the political middle he likes so much, as the above poll numbers indicate.

BO, on the other hand, is plumbing new depths of idiocy.  It is, to borrow a phrase from Ace, "toenail-eating profoundly retarded" to (1) call the environmental extremism that has dominated "Washington politics" and choked off domestic energy production for decades the road to "achieving energy independence"; (2) claim that that environmental extremism hasn't dominated "Washington politics" for decades (unless he's equating "energy independence" with nationalization of the energy sector); and (3) claim that taking the eminently commonsensical move of tapping our vast domestic energy resources would please "the oil industry" rather than the people whose votes he wants through relieving the upward pressure on gas prices, which is the clear direction of the aforementioned public opinion trend on this issue.

And then there's this story, which would never have arisen if Lucifer had had his way, and will go away if he gets elected:

Exxon Mobil, Chevron, Royal Dutch Shell, BP and Total SA are getting ready to formally announce historic contracts to return to Iraq some thirty-six years after the country's government took control of its giant oil reserves, the New York Times reported on Thursday.

The oil majors, and a host of smaller companies, are in talks with Iraq's oil ministry for unusual no-bid contracts to service the war-torn country's largest fields, said the newspaper, citing ministry officials, oil company officials and an American diplomat.

Beating out offers from forty other companies in Russia, China and India, the Western majors will announce by the end of the month contract agreement to run for one to two years, some five years after the U.S. military toppled Saddam Hussein.

Half a million more barrels a day from a now-friendly and allied country.  It helped mitigate the upward pressure on prices.  That's good news, right?  Sure - to everybody outside Obamanation, which currently is a minority of the electorate, even though an overlapping majority of the electorate says, "Drill Bambi!" (Well, "Drill!" anyway).  To Our Mr. Hussein and his nutrooters, that's vindication of their "no blood for oil" mania.  Given how much blood we've spilled, I see no reason why some oil shouldn't come back in the bargain.

'course, as Ace observes, we'd get twice that much out of ANWR alone.  Which suggests there isn't ANY price libs would pay for oil, which in turn helps explain why they enjoy seeing it right where it is and where it's going, in particular light of the party that is guaranteed to end up with unchecked power next year.

Ah, but for now, who knows?  We all know Barry can't handle tacking into the wind of public opinion.  He fled from Uncle Jerry, Father Pfleger, Tough Tony, Trinity United, his anti-NAFTA double-talk, and more recently reneged on public campaign financing and the FISA/NSA TSP deal.  Given how much the latter two are pissing off his bosomest backers already, what would he have to lose by heaving Santa's reindeer under the bus?  After all, where else are Obamanationals going to go?  And how much longer will they be able to afford the gas it'll take to get there?

Maybe even False Messiah can't bring himself to ever be seen as agreeing with this man:

Particularly when this man - as he has been on a great many issues over the past decade, much to the Left's frenzied consternation - is absolutely right.