Mcain and Obama on energy...

[Caeser2001]

John Mcain says drill here, drill now and build more nuclear power plants, use every available resource such as wind, sunlight, water, geothermal etc.

Obama says no to nuclear power, open to offshore drilling, says we will be completely independent from foreign oil in 10 years, I have yet to hear anything come out of his mouth as to where we're gonna get all this energy from, or is he just gonna "HOPE" for it? has anybody heard something come out of his mouth or was the tire pressure meters to measure the hot air coming out of Obama's mouth? He also says we are gonna reduce electricity use by 15%. Another idea was for plug-in hybrid cars to get off foreign oil, if we are all using plug-in hybrid cars and not drilling for oil, how are we gonna achieve both benchmarks?

 

[applesanity]

Obama's plan

It's those evil oil companies. They're so evil. Evil evil evil. It's time to change the way those big oil conglomos operate. It's time to change our viewpoints on alternative energy. Together we can change.

Caeser2001, I don't see the problem. Obama's plan makes perfect sense to me.

On a serious note, I can't believe McCain is running the worst campaign, ever ever. I've yet to hear him say, "drilling offshore will create thousands of new jobs, new skilled labor that will never be outsourced." He's on top of such a great issue here, with 69% of the backing of those polled, and he should just pile all over this thing. Or even some lame cliche like, "My opponent is tilting at windmills.... get it?" (crickets) but nope.

I've yet to hear McCain make a speech where he just repeats the word, "Change," about 2,400 times. Just the world, "Change" - nothing else. Then, at the end, he should say, "now seriously people. C'mon, you jerks." That'll be too funny.

 

[Caeser2001]

I have heard him say to move forward to alternative energy, which would create jobs by the way, but he hasn't gone into too much detail about this plan.

 

[S832]

The "Drill here, drill now" people are caught up on a catch phrase without understanding that it won't make a difference.

All the oil companies already have huge amounts of land which they don't use, they are only attempting to secure more natural resources for future use. It will not provide any real benefit in lowering gas prices.

 

[Bartholomew Roberts]

All the oil companies already have huge amounts of land which they don't use, they are only attempting to secure more natural resources for future use.

1. One reason oil companies do not use all the land they have is because they may not be finished exploring it or may be unable to obtain drilling rigs to operate it (there are only so many rigs and you have to compete for them with the global market in order to drill your land).

A second reason is that even where they do have oil and can produce it, there may be no infrastructure in place to bring it to market (i.e. pipelines) because environmental and eminent domain issues have prevented the construction of the pipeline.

A third reason is that because oil generates money, a planned oil well can generate litigation that will tie up or halt production for years as the various parties fight to determine who owns what.

2. Oil companies of course want to secure more natural resources for future use. Their entire business depends on it. They compete as private companies in a global marketplace where all of their competitors are state-owned, state-directed oil companies like China, Saudi Aramco, Yukos, etc. Exxon-Mobil (the largest American oil company) has a whopping 3% of world oil-reserves - and this is the largest oil company in a country that consumes 27% of the world's oil.

People trying to blame the oil companies for current prices are simply wrong. The politicians trying to do it are worse than wrong, they are lying demagogues trying to divert attention away from their own mismanagement.

 

[davlandrum]

People trying to blame the oil companies for current prices are simply wrong.

It would be a lot easier to blame other factors if oil company profits were not going through the roof.

 

[shortwave]

Your so right S832 and thats the very line of thought that has kept us from offshore and inland drilling thats got us to where we are today. Wouldn`t it now be nice, if say, twenty years ago we found ,drilled and capped our wells where we could`ve been using that as a bargaining chip when sitting down to the oil price negotiating table with the foriegn oil bandits. There`s no doubt drilling today will not bring prices down within the next few years but the same political fighting BS(Pilosi dissmissing Congress with oil drilling issues on the table) thats got us here today can and should stop. If we don`t this great nation will continue to be held hostage. As far as all the "fairy-tale" ideas Obama is trying to sell, keep in mind he`s going to do everything he`s promising without raising taxes P.S. While we`re drilling and finding oil lets work just as hard findind alternate efficient fuels for the future.

 

[Caeser2001]

As far as all the "fairy-tale" ideas Obama is trying to sell, keep in mind he`s going to do everything he`s promising without raising taxes

Most of us here see that but why doesn't the general population get it?

 

[Unregistered]

Our domestic oil will one day be essential for the survival of our nation. This is a gun forum, so many here should be able to relate to the idea of having an ammo stockpile. We stockpile ammo so we have it to use on a rainy day. Oil is the same. Our domestic oil is critical to our national defense and should not be squandered at this point just to save a few cents at the pump. As world oil supplies diminish, and as other countries grown in economic power, we will have more competition for oil. One day our only source may be our own. We should save it for an emergency.

Our grandkids probably won't think highly of our generation if we use up a critical national resource just to lower prices a few cents now.

 

[Bartholomew Roberts]

It would be a lot easier to blame other factors if oil company profits were not going through the roof.

Is there something wrong with making a profit these days? Was there a great public outcry to save the oil companies and help them when oil was $10 a barrel back in 1998?

Today those same wells that were economical to produce at $10/bbl are still producing oil (albeit not much); but the oil sells for $120 because demand is much higher. That is going to create a profit.

Having said that, the profit margin of U.S. oil companies is a meager 8-9% and that doesn't include the future capital investment that they will have to continue making to even be in business 10 years from now.

 

[ken grant]

What good would drilling for more oil do? You don't have places to refine it.
Oil from Alaska is going overseas because of lack of places to refine on the West Coast.
Another major reason for the oil prices is because of the value of the Dollar on the World Market. It is very low and falling more as each day passes.

 

[Ruger4570]

I really have to laugh at people that are pizzed off at Oil Companies and their PROFITS.. Best I can recall, Big Oil makes about 8 cents a gallon while the Fed Gomerment makes something like 24 cents a gallon. O'Bam Bam wants to bang the oil companies for windfall profits, scuse me, didn't the Fed Gomerment make 3 times as much "windfall" profits. I haven't heard an outcry against the Feds and windfall profits , just that evil "big oil"
If you really want to drive down the profits of big oil, it is simple, don't buy their products. Otherwise, if you are not willing to walk, shut up! Nobody MAKES you buy Exxon Mobil products. Buy a bike.

 

[mountainclmbr]

Most of the land leased by oil companies have been explored by seismic sounding and is known not to have oil pockets underneath. To force oil companies to drill there anyway is the classic Democrat idea. Corporations will fail and the state will take over.

Oil is limited, but is a necessary bridge to the alternative energy sources that the Democrats also block.

The wind used for wind energy does not always blow. The sun is often blocked by clouds, snow or rain...or the night time. They may augment power production, but the baseline power and peak power production cannot count on this power every hour of every day so no current power production can realisticly be taken off line. Nuclear in the long term and clean coal in the near term seem the reasonable options.

 

[LightningJoe]

Unregistered has a point. If demand remains high, the value of domestic oil may greatly increase. Better to buy cheap foreign oil now and sell our oil for much higher prices later.

 

[Rapid1]

It would be a lot easier to blame other factors if oil company profits were not going through the roof.

Is there something wrong with making a profit these days? Was there a great public outcry to save the oil companies and help them when oil was $10 a barrel back in 1998?

I really have to laugh at people that are pizzed off at Oil Companies and their PROFITS.. Best I can recall, Big Oil makes about 8 cents a gallon while the Fed Gomerment makes something like 24 cents a gallon. O'Bam Bam wants to bang the oil companies for windfall profits, scuse me, didn't the Fed Gomerment make 3 times as much "windfall" profits. I haven't heard an outcry against the Feds and windfall profits , just that evil "big oil"
If you really want to drive down the profits of big oil, it is simple, don't buy their products. Otherwise, if you are not willing to walk, shut up! Nobody MAKES you buy Exxon Mobil products. Buy a bike.

heh, I made a post out of posts!

some of my retirement is tied to oil profits. I hope they keep doing a good job. they don't profit nearly as much (8-10% vs. 17-20%) as the drug companies. and our taxes are paying the bill for drug companies. meaning, you don't buy gas, you don't pay. you work, pay medicare taxes, and you are paying the drug bill whether you got drugs or not. only the very uninformed bitch about oil company profits.

hey, I need some drug stocks...

 

[applesanity]

As world oil supplies diminish, and as other countries grown in economic power, we will have more competition for oil. One day our only source may be our own. We should save it for an emergency.

America has a whole lotta oil. There's obscenely huge amounts of it just sitting in Colorado. Royal Dutch Shell wanted to start pulling shale out of the ground there; got a block from Congress instead.

Or in another light, if we achieve energy independence sooner than later, we'll grow in economic power, so these other countries you speak won't be able to compete against us.

 

[Bruxley]

There's obscenely huge amounts of it just sitting in Colorado.

2 TRILLION....with a 'T' TRILLION barrels of oil in oil shale. That is more then all the middle eastern reserves combined. Let's float parched with thirst on a sea of fresh water so we will have plenty in the future.....not a wise idea.

 

[Huntergirl]

Just the talk about opening up the coast and ANWR to oil drilling helped bring down barrel cost of oil, because the promise of increasing supply reduces the likelihood of speculators messing with oil futures. We saw this over the past week, and with a hurricaine looming on the Texas coast as well. Go figure. I saw tons and tons of oil shale in Western Colorado when I lived there, yes humongous amounts. Of course its close to elite recreational, tourist, bla bla bla hotspots. Colorado seems to be going California, in its rabid environmentalism and liberal agenda. It has built superduper homes on the edge of rapidly shrinking aquafers, how ironic and moronic. But thats liberalism for ya. I don't see shale getting ground up anytime soon. Wonder how many Hummers in Colorada? The Congress is polarized on energy, and democrats are showing their muscle and true colors.

 

[dm1333]

You didn't hear about Obamas' energy plan?

Tune up your car and fill your tires up with air.

I'll be happy when somebody actually takes up T. Boone Pickens on his challenge and meets with him to discuss alternative energy. As far back as 1990, IIRC, the DOE was stating that there was enough wind energy in the mid west to supply all of our electrical power. That was using the technology that existed in the late 80's, windmills have advanced quite a bit since then.

 

[black]

McCain needs to listen to the GOP base and Obama needs to get his mechanics license and a clue.

Obama's elitest comments make Americans look like utter fools...as if drivers don't know to keep air in tires. Obama the All Knowing also needs to understand that 90% of cars today can go 100K before a tuneup.