Come one we are talking about gas that goes in a car.

I know Obama can preform Miracles, but he can't make America a country without Gasoline Powered Cars in less then 10 years.


The only two ways we can end our dependence on Foreign oil is...
1. We drill for more Oil off our Coasts
2. We use less oil

or You guys take over Alberta and free us from Stephen Harper and company.

I think you're missing something here. By shifting our energy needs, including that of our cars, to other forms of energy, including renewable energy sources and even the controversial biofuels, we can currently drill enough domestically to meet our needs.

Without these plans, drilling offshore accomplishes nothing. It takes too long to get us there, and it doesn't even come close to meeting our current demands.

And drilling offshore in the US won't eliminate our need for foreign oil in 10 years either. In fact, we'll hardly see any benefit at all in those 10 years, and that's why it's mostly pointless. In 10 years, some project that we could have gas prices that rival Europe's current prices, which would cause massive hardship in the US unless the continued switch to "Green" or alternate technologies doesn't increase.

And there is little guarantee drilling will serve the ultimate goal: Keep prices affordable so people can work to put gas in their tanks. Do we suddenly trust that companies won't try to take advantage of us like the OPEC may be doing? But what about 10-20 years after that when there is no more or the oil is even harder to get to. The answer is doing our best to move OFF oil.


Which will not *end* our dependence on Foreign oil... it will merely cut it.

The "green" part of this (optimize gas milage, switch to some renewable sources) is an activity that's already happening and will have far more impact on our oil needs than continuing to drill off our coasts. The offshore drilling may comfort Ford and Chevy but the mental shift because of the growing scarcity of oil has already begun and the American public are evolving at a faster rate than the corporations and politicians can deal with it.

The "scarcity" of oil (whether or not you believe we are at peak at not) has had significant impact on international oil usage in 2008, and it has been painful but mostly positive as it has allowed for some very innovative solutions.

I'm not against offshore drilling btw, I just think it's the wrong solution, a short term one, to a much more complicated problem. It's something to placate those Americans who fear the change and the death of the culture of the car/truck/SUV.

IMO there's nothing to be afraid of. There's a lot of opportunity for innovation and making money off of green technology now that it's popular and almost the norm. But it means the death of old business models.

I really don't care about Obama or McCain in this matter, we can't afford to wait for drilling to solve our woes and *where* we get it from isn't the most important factor here. The real future leader of this country would understand this and make finding a workable solution (such as tax incentives for green power use or creation? Mass city transit initiatives? Legislate a massive improvement to milage standards on a more aggressive timeline?) a top priority, rather than wasting their time. If onshore drilling is *part* of that, then so be it, but it should NOT BE THE FOCAL POINT of this important discussion. It's not a solution, it's a workaround.

If America (and the Western world in general) starts to go green the demand for oil will decrease, regardless of China/India's growth (they can't grow too much more with oil anyway) and the prices will naturally go down, which is why the price of oil has fallen $30 in a month. If we play our card right, in 20-30 years oil producers will be looking for people to buy their oil, the prices will be way down, and the economies of the middle-east will have had to move on to other industries to support their economies.

Keyword: foreign

Did you know that if Americans consumed the same amount of oil per-capita as Britons, America would be self-sufficient in oil? Nobody intends to phase out gasoline-powered cars in ten years. Not even Al Gore has dreamed of that. The point is to combine efficiency improvements, transit investments, and alternative energy (e.g., electric vehicles).

When it comes to the oil question the answer is in the middle. I believe that we do need to do offshore drilling. I know that it won't help us for sometime but while we are doing that we must start our focus on how we can start to be less oil dependent. We need to start looking at alternatives but until we can figure out a way to make it all possible, we need to continue to look for oil.

The irony is that it'll take almost 10 years for the new oil production to come online. I know I've called offshore a "stopgap measure" but it's a damn slow one.

We don't need to look for it. We know where it is. The oil companies literally have millions of acres of leased drilling fields that THEY ARE NOT DRILLING. In fact, McCain's veep Palin has tried to revoke Exxon's lease because they are sitting on untapped oil fields while trying to get a hold of ANWR on top of everything else.

Drilling does nothing, and it takes a long time for it to accomplish that nothing.

As Obama RIGHTFULLY stated, inflating our tires saves more oil than we'll get from all of the offshore drilling currently in dispute.

will Obama create a secrete police force costing billions of dollars and force people to inflate thier tires. Damn Liberals want to control our lives.


That would be a conservative response...

Better than the secret police force to ensure gay people repent of their sins.