Midterm

We need to continue drilling off the Gulf Coast, Alaska, and other areas within our country that are currently not being explored. We know, through previous drilling experiences that the Coast of Southern California already has the most oil than any other place in the United States. It would be cheaper for the United States to drill where we know there is oil, instead of searching for it off the Eastern Coasts where we have no idea if there is even any oil. As with California’s southern coast a New York Times article stated “We know from earlier operations that it has significantly more resources than the all the newly opened areas combined. Yet most extraction there came to an abrupt halt in January 1969, after a Union Oil platform off Santa Barbara spilled more than 80,000 barrels into the ocean. There are still 40 or so active leases there that now produce some 40 million barrels a year safely. They have given us a good understanding of the geology, thus exploration would be quicker and less costly than in unknown areas, and the return more certain” (Lynch, 2010, para. 10-12). We also know that the drilling in the Gulf of Mexico and Alaska could bring us trillions of barrels of oil, yet we continue to import.

Changing the way we do things in the United States is a great idea, but it is an idea that will take a long time to take effect. In the mean-time, we need to use what we can get here at home. Otherwise, while we wait for the action to take place, we end up in an even larger deficit. We have places, like in Alaska, that have enough oil to sustain the United States for centuries. We could be exporting our resources to make money for going green. Then we could seriously change the way we do business. We should not procrastinate because as we pay these other countries, we are making agreements with them that make the United States look weak. The United States just cannot make up our minds because there is always someone to oppose it. “Much hope...