I Wear Pants;401938 wrote:Does this only apply for us then? Because I'm pretty sure our freedom has nothing to do with Iraq.

An unstable middle east is never a good thing. That region has an extremely valuable natural resource, and that resource is essential to America's security.

sleeper;402448 wrote:An unstable middle east is never a good thing. That region has an extremely valuable natural resource, and that resource is essential to America's security.

Like it nor that's the case...until we put the environmental extremists in their place and tap into America's own vast oil reserves. And - oh yeah - we should quickly develop alternative energy sources like - oh I dunno - nuclear power for starters.

Vast oil reserves? We don't have them. Even if we started using all the oil on our land it would only supply like 10% of what we need or something like that (can't remember the stat).

I do agree with you on the nuclear power though. Also wind power is promising (I know I know "but the wind isn't always blowing") because we have so much damned land.

Sleeper, did you ever think part of the reason that region is currently unstable is because two of the countries are being constantly blown up and occupied? "They gots oil" is a terrible reason to get American soldiers killed.

I Wear Pants;402810 wrote:Vast oil reserves? We don't have them.

OK, let's say NORTH America at least:

http://www.kiplinger.com/businessresource/forecast/archive/The_U.S._s_Untapped_Bounty_080630.html
http://dailyreckoning.com/oil-shale-reserves/
http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2009/09/03/bp-discovers-vast-oil-reserve-gulf-mexico/ NOTE: This one is ironic at least when taken in the context of the oil spill. It also lends credibility to the conspiracy theorists who think the oil spill was rigged to prevent further Gulf drilling.
http://fossil.energy.gov/.../npr/publications/oil_shale_roadmap.pdf
http://www.arationaladvocate.com/peakoil.htm
http://www.legion.org/landingzone/19424/time-call-oil-reserves

....there's more! Depends on which political hacks you tend to believe doesn't it? I tend to believe there is PLENTY of untapped oil reserves worldwide but the climate change fanatics are blocking the path.

Bottom line: We have oil but we import foreign oil because (a) it's cheaper, (b) we want to use other sources first before we tap into our own (my theory of course), and (c) environmental extremism.

I Wear Pants;402810 wrote:They gots oil" is a terrible reason to get American soldiers killed.

I agree....DRILL NOW, drill often.

We have 4X the amount of energy stored in coal that Saudi Arabia has in oil. But coal is "dirty", "unsafe" and "evil". Coal-to-gas plants are being built. They haven't been historically viable because of the cost of oil, but they would seem to be a good, safe bet at this point.

We could do a lot more with coal and shale oil, but the enivronmentalists and politicians refuse to embrace a very viable short-term solution because of the all-or-nothing attitiude of the general public regarding clean energy. If it isn't green, most people don't want to hear anything about it.

Obama supported coal-friendly legislation when he was a Senator (IL is one of the top coal producing states in the country). Interesting that you hear nary a peep from Obama regarding coal now. We just have too many gutless politicians in Washington that make bad policy just because it's what the ignorant public supports. There's very little effort to educate and sway public opinion on sound policy. The only persuasion we seem to get is when politicians are trying to push bad, illogical policies.

I can't remember could the Bloom Energy Server things run on coal?