A response to McCain’s gimmicks
Posted by zbigniewmazurak on July 6, 2008
McCain has offered American voters 2 gimmicks:
1) An authorization for oil corporations to drill in the OCS (but not the Rockies or the ANWR) and
2) A petrol tax holiday.
These gimmicks shouldn’t be enacted because:
1) a) According to the USDOE, the OCS wouldn’t yield any oil until 2030 – i.e. 22 years from now.
b) The OCS is not enough. The ANWR, if McCain also opened it to drillers, contains enough oil for 800 days (i.e. 9 bn barrels of oil. America consumes 20 mn barrels of oil everyday). So the ANWR alone could serve America as an oil source for 800 days (more than 2 years). For 800 days, it could serve not only the transport-related sector, but also everyone else. There are also economically-feasible oil shale reserves in the Rockies.
c) Dubya’s executive order on OCS alone reduced the price of oil by $9/barrel. A Congressional abolition of the ban on the OCS, the Rockies and the ANWR, if signed by a president, could also reduce oil prices. Why not sign such an abolition, then, if a Congress approves it?
2) a) It wouldn’t significantly reduce petrol prices.
b) It would deprive the Freeway Fund of cash, which is needed to maintain freeways.
c) Without freeways, American cars would consume more petrol than they do. (Which is why Dubya, an oil driller, endorsed that proposal.)
Instead, McCain should propose these things:
1) This plan:
2) This plan:
3) This plan:
4) This plan:
http://zbigniewmazurak.wordpress.com/2008/06/23/a-complete-list-of-my-political-proposals-related-to-the-us/
