Wildlife Refuge or Oil Reserves

I was reading an article today about President Bush pushing ahead for drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, aka ANWR. I was struck by the justifications he used for drilling in ANWR while simultaneously avoiding the very same reasons for using the oil in the National Oil Reserve to mitigate recent oil price increases. It seems to me that if our oil needs are so urgent that we need to consider violating a wildlife refuge, then perhaps they are so urgent that we should be considering releasing some of the oil in the National Oil Reserves.

But of course President Bush isn't going to release any oil from the National Oil Reserve. That would reduce the cost of oil and eat into the record profits being posted by the oil companies. Despite the fact that this is EXACTLY why the National Oil Reserve was created in the first place. Bush's energy policies favor one segment of our economy, energy, to the detriment of our GDP and the pocket books of the American people.

If you want to know why the American economic recovery is so sluggish, you don't have to look any further than this administration's energy policies. It is a stone cold fact that when oil prices go up, American industrial production goes down. Economic recovery doesn't stand much of a chance when oil prices are rising. There are over 660 million barrels of oil in the National Oil Reserve; releasing as little as 30 million barrels could significantly cut the price of oil. A five percent draw-down of the National Oil Reserve would not pose any threat whatsoever to our national security.

Billions of our tax dollars have been spent pumping oil into the National Reserve. Why do we allow the government to deny us the benefit of the expenditure of our own tax dollars just so the oil companies can continue to make even more obscene profits?

In the choice between doing what is best for the American people and what is best for the oil companies from which his family derives their fortunes, let there be no doubt which way G.W. Bush will always decide.