Black Gold: Why Offshore Drilling is Bravado

Written by Mekhami and Addendum by Pegleghippie; crossposted from Enigma Engine

I was working at my favorite West Texas hospital today, and a wealthy property owner came in for his daily treatment. Well into his 70's, this gentleman and I always had a good conversation and a good laugh while I checked him and prepped him for the treatment room.  He told me about the 10.4 million dollar property he's been dying to sell, and how he hasn't gotten any real offers yet. Eventually the topic, given my politivangelistic© nature, turned to offshore drilling, and the energy crisis. We sparred semantics for a few minutes before getting to the nitty gritty about it. He's a Republican (one of very few vices on the man) and so naturally, he's for offshore drilling.

He gave me a good reason for it though; we have to solve the immediate crisis before we can work on a permanent solution.  I tossed this around in my head during my work shift, wondering to myself if Obama could seriously be this naive about energy production, and the risk involved with NOT having the supply. The (only logical) Presidential nominee seemed so fallible to me at that moment. Of course, as I analyze the situation more, especially with the Rep. John Barrow hoopla. Seems he's not the greatest human being since Chuck "Walker" Norris.

So I got home and got to reading about the issue. And of course, media being biased as it is, both ways and indecisive, had plenty to say about the topic and both candidates' positions on it. I did some intensive research and reached some conclusions.

The following is what the OIL COMPANIES say:

• More offshore drilling means more supply, which means cheaper prices.
• Unreasonable restrictions on offshore property leasing has caused a bottleneck in their ability to produce our favorite black liquid.
• We love Republicans, and we have had intercourse with John McCain.

The following is the TRUTH which NEGATES what the oil companies say:

• The Big Oil companies have so much property in the Golf of Mexico that is unexplored and untapped.
• They are currently only using 20% of their currently leased property.
• They love Republicans, and have more than likely NOT had intercourse with John McCain.

So why are they begging for more property? It appears like they just want to have their cake and order more cake for free. More and more cake, hiding the old cake under the table and saying they just have big appetites. Well, folks, the appetites are a lie. They're obviously just squatting on more property to be of more net worth to have higher market share value and make more windfall profit. Capitalism at its glorious greedy failure.

Of course, like all good overfunded megacorporations, oil will strike back; They'll tell you some truth, actually. They'll say that it takes years to explore and develop working oil rigs offshore. Okay, decent response. To which I'll reply, if it takes you that long in your current property to explore and develop, won't it take the same time, if not longer, to develop on any new property? This is just logical deduction, this isn't even a complex equation. Don't try to spin-feed us half-mis-truths to serve your pocketbook's purpose.

This makes President(ial nominee) Obama's stance seem so much more plausible. More offshore drilling means more irreparable damage to the environment. Now, I know what you're probably thinking, if subconsciously - The environment isn't in your monkeysphere, but your decreasing savings account most certainly is. That's natural, that's okay. But the point is, they don't NEED more property, they've got vast amounts they haven't begun to explore, and it's just more greed from the biggest industry in the world.

ADDENDUM: by pegleghippie

Just to add on to the monkeysphere thing; Most people have been opposed to offshore drilling for a while now.  The gas crisis of the 70's was pretty awful, and I don't recall any of the history books mentioning that new offshore drilling began during that time.

And on the cost thing, most people seem aware that it's OPEC that is keeping prices high right now, not the diminishing supply.  That will change in the future, of course, as the supply does dwindle, and OPEC recently said they'd step up production to at least stagnate prices for a short period of time.  But really, new oil drilling now won't bring the prices down in the short term at all, and only briefly and slightly in the long term.  It just isn't worth the ecosystem destruction that it costs to get that oil.  Maybe after extraction methods and technology improve a bit...