Do you support drilling for oil in the 1002 area of ANWR?

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Lance:
I drive a pick-up truck and do computer programming for a living, but on weekends I cut and sell fire wood to make a few extra bucks and use the truck to haul small logs and deliver split wood but you will also see me or my wife driving it to the grocery store.
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You make a good point. My brother also needs a pick-up for hauling, but not every day. He looked into buying a commuter car to save gas, but the insurance made it prohibitively expensive.
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Lance:
Large vehicles are safer.
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Well, yes, but only if you’re in them. You have to balance the legitimate goal of your safety against the greater threat a larger vehicle poses to the people and property you might accidentally run into. Greater size sometimes comes with an increase in height, which might increase the chance of roll-over. Also, all other things being equal, a smaller vehicle is going to have a shorter stopping distance and ability at evasive manuevers.
When the option exists, it is better to choose the vehicle that is more safe by design than by mere inertial mass, since the danger to others is not increased accordingly.
(It does not follow that pick-ups are inherently less moral than cars!!! These decisions are not so simple!)
 
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BLB_Oregon:
You make a good point. My brother also needs a pick-up for hauling, but not every day. He looked into buying a commuter car to save gas, but the insurance made it prohibitively expensive.

-----, all other things being equal, a smaller vehicle is going to have a shorter stopping distance and ability at evasive manuevers.
When the option exists, it is better to choose the vehicle that is more safe by design than by mere inertial mass, since the danger to others is not increased accordingly.
(It does not follow that pick-ups are inherently less moral than cars!!! These decisions are not so simple!)
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You are exactly right, you can’t assume that because someone is driving a large vehicle to the store and they are the only one in it that they don’t need it. I have to drive an expressway to work and I feel much safer in my truck than in a small car. I am not saying that the small car is unsafe, just that I feel safer. The safety of a car has more to do with the driver than anything else. A small car driven by a safe driver is much better than a big SUV driven by a nut case.
 
Yes, wholeheartedly. Were it not for the failed energy policies of Carter in the 70’s we would not now be held in thrall by OPEC. Our failure to put aside the Nuclear Electric option, which would have freed up the oil and gas resources presently going into making electricity, and the de facto moratorium on building new refineries has put us into this morass of a murky geopolitical conundrum and a shortage of vital transportation fuels, so necessary to a country as large as ours.

The renewables have their place but come up well short both in quantity provided and cost.Recall that the alcohol in the 90-10 mixtures was subsidized by the federal government out of the general tax revenues. Ditto for most solar endeavors. Even oil from oil shale, which is plentiful in the US and Canada, has not reached the point of economic competitiveness.

Keep in mind that even with the elevated prices that we see now, there are no gas lines, unlike previous times. Thus there is a high likelihood that present prices in addition to being fueled by demand from China and India are also being manipulated by hedge funds and other billionaires.

I believe at present that we have only the Nuclear Electric option to fall back on as a viable replacement energy source. But until we get them on line (5 - 10 years at the glacial pace of the Congress), we should make use of all domestic sources of liquid and gaseous fuels. Keep in mind that the drilling now is not like that protrayed in “Giant”, but is much more in tune with preservation of the local environment.

Nearly a polemic, I know, but I do so tire of those who use the talking points of the radicals as “truth”

God’s Will be done

Francesco
 
I would hate to see any environmentally damaging situations. I love nature, I love animals and I respect what God has given us. I do believe that drilling and being aware of what we are doing are possible though. As far as the drilling goes, we can’t focus on anything but the actual drilling. I think this process has become advanced enough to not be catastrophic.

I realize that just having crews there will create some pollution (garbage, etc.) but I don’t think this is much different than any other operation. In fact, I think with the right amount of pressure, people in the area can force the companies to do massive cleanup during and after operations.

I will say, although I am for drilling, I am a little afraid of any harm coming to Alaska. I’m not a tree hugger by any means, but I am not for reckless destruction of environment but I really do not see that happening. Anyone care to help shape my opinion?
 
Any of you people actually live around oil wells & drilling? I have lived in Oklahoma for 57 years with oil wells and new drilling all around. I can remember the old Oklahoma City Field was a forest of derricks with oil spills common. A really nasty looking area by today’s standards, but just common place 40 years ago. Anyway, as the field was pumped dry, the derricks were removed and the land restored to it’s previous state. If you didn’t know that there used to be an oil field there, you would never know it by its appearance.

I don’t know why some many people have this unreasonable fear of oil spills. While they are not pretty, the land will eventually cleanse itself. So many environmentalists act like crude oil is some terrible chemical developed in Frankensteins lab. It is a naturally occurring mineral that for thousands of years has been bubbling to the surface and “polluting” the land and waterways.

Drill in Anwar, drill off the west coast, drill in national parks as far as I am concerned. I have lived around drilling and have never seen or heard of any catastropy because of it. As I write this, there is pumping going on within a 100 yards of the Oklahoma River. Nobody worries about it because the oil is too valuable to spill and so the oil companies make sure they don’t.
 
I never understood this idea that drilling for oil is some sort of violent rape of the land that will leave the area worse off than a nuclear attack.

As a general rule, if environmentalists are for something I’d be against it unless convincing arguments are offered to convince me since they are (at least their most vocal activists) nothing more than new age pagans who worship the creation and not the Creator. This earth was created to be inhabited and its resources used at our disposal. Oil wells are drilled all the time that just drill oil and take up a little real estate. Hey, the deer used to graze where your house is built, want to give it back?

Also, idea that as soon as evil Bush decides to pursue alternative energy it will magically not only be invented but become economically viable is simply pure fantasy. At the end of the day, if they were viable and economical the market would bring it out much faster than the government ever could.

We should continue using SUVs and any other vehicle we chose, drilling for oil, digging for coal and using nuclear power. Let’s stop all the self loathing and guilt we carry around for being a 1st world country. There is no global warming threat (junk science), Earth is not overpopulated, and the world is not coming to an end until Jesus brings it to an end. The only threat we face is the erosion of liberty at the hands of Government that will do more damage than any oil derrick or SUV ever could. If you don’t believe me, why don’t you ask Teri Schiavo? Oh I forgot, THE GOVERNMENT MURDERED HER!
 
I’m no environmentalist, but I will say that our focus has to be on finding alternative sources of energy. Drilling in Alaska would be a quick fix, but there is a definitive limit on how much oil is left in the world. Developing nations such as China and India are tapping severely into the total reserves of the world. It seems like our primary goal is to hold on as long as we can to oil, while making certain stabs at alternate energy solutions. More nuclear plans, more hydroelectric plants would help, as would more hybrid cars.

It’s easy to blame the SUV, but it’s also too easy to defend it… The SUV is symbolic and endemic of a larger problem. We live in a hyper-libertarian society that values nothing more than individual “freedoms and liberties.” Social radicalism and spartan economic policies both contradict that Catholic Church’s teaching on the concepts of solidarity and subsidiarity. People have no real concept of sacrifice in this country. Big houses, fancy cars, lots of bling… those are our gods… and they’re just mammon. We live in the most wasteful society in the world, and the Holy Father preached against this soulless materialism all the time. One of the greatest destroyers of traditional faith and families was the advent of the Levittown (along with the corresponding interstate highway system.) People abandoned their neighborhoods, their local parishes, for ticky-tacky housing developments. The increased creature comforts of the suburbs led to the rise of limosine liberalism, which has had a devestating effect on Catholic piety and beliefs. Think about it… after WWII, the Levittowns are constructed, with the interstate system, which greatly increases the size of the bourgeoisie, creating several new economic strata. People start to place their loyalties to wealth and keeping up with the Joneses over the salvation of their own souls. People start to look inward; to think that they are the master of their own domains, as opposed to God. This egocentrism leads to contraceptive use, to abortion, and to homosexual coupling.
 
I can’t believe the people who demonstrate absolutely no confidence in our technological abilities, which can only be a reflection on their lack of confidence in our educational system. Yet, I’ll bet they are the loudest to call for more money for the very schools systems they have no confidence in when the kids graduate and take jobs in energy industries. :banghead:

Meanwhile, they prefer the situation where we continue to need oil from other countries since the nuts and the Democrats are so scared of nuclear energy, which is the safest source of energy for humans and the environment. People are just fruitcakes, and their ignorance results in our brave men and women in uniform having to be deployed in areas of the world, at times, to protect the oil supplies that other countries are producing for us. It is a vicious cycle all due to crackpots who haven’t a clue of what we are capable of doing technologically.
 
I’ve done a lot of research on this issue and various reports throughout the years and I completely support drilling the area, as the footprint of current machinery is miniscule compared to what it used to be and report after report shows no adverse effect on the habitat in other areas currently being drilled. I think of it as a national security issue more than just an economic one.
 
Wow, did you get your choices for answers from the Times?

I vote, Yes, we need to produce more of our own oil and the caribou love it!

I’m a hunter, the last thing I would want to do is make the environment harsher on animals. As stated many times on this thread, the caribou love the pipelines!
 
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