Speaking Of Rising Gas Prices...

...let's take a bit more in-depth look. As we saw in yesterday's post, the root cause is primarily right here at home:

In 2011, Gulf of Mexico oil production will under-perform the government’s pre-Macondo forecasts by 355,000 barrels per day — almost 130 million barrels for the year. In 2012, the shortfall rises to 550,000 barrels per day — 200 million barrels. That’s fully one-third of the Gulf’s oil producing capability, and over 10% of total domestic oil production.

These are staggering numbers.

Alaska, our #1 oil producing state, will supply roughly 200 million barrels in 2012.

Two hundred million barrels is about what the U.S. imports from Iraq every year. Or roughly half of our Saudi Arabian import volume. Two hundred million barrels would supply all of Ohio’s yearly petroleum use, with quite a bit left over.

Replacing 200 million barrels of oil will require an additional supertanker full of oil every two days.

The Department of Energy’s Energy Information Administration (EIA) provides a rather dry but telling explanation:

Off shore oil production in [the 2011 forecast] is lower than in [the 2010 forecast] throughout most of the projection period [through 2035] because of expected delays in near-term projects, in part as a result of drilling moratoria and in part due to the change in lease sales expected in the Pacific and Atlantic outer continental shelf (OCS), as well as increased uncertainty about future investment in off shore production. [AEO2011 Preview, p. 8. Emphasis added.]

Moratoria, access and uncertainty: issues which fall squarely in the laps of Barack Obama and Ken Salazar.

The article goes on, and is well worth checking out in its entirety. The bottom line, though, is that the policies implemented by the Obama administration are having an increasingly negative effect on the American economy and the energy sector, and those effects will continue to worsen as long as the policies are left in place. We need a course correction, and fast.

But that's not going to happen as long as Obama is in charge. In fact, he's upping the ante and making things even worse:

President Obama is trotting out yet another policy aimed at forcing American’s to change our ways and embrace the green. Just a few weeks ago, the administration floated the idea of adding yet more taxes to our already overtaxed cars to serve the dual purpose of shoring up revenues as well as curbing driving habits (which one would assume can’t both be accomplished simultaneously, but I digress).

He also famously demanded more green to come out of Chrysler during the bailouts. Not green as in cash of course, rather green in the environmental whacko dream of tiny cars devoid of style and features. Luckily for the American taxpayer, Chrysler realized how bad for business this would be and promptly ignored the demands of the green police in favor of gas guzzling SUV’s which have helped put the company in a position to pay back government loans.

But now President Obama is embarking on something long promised to his environmental base in the hopes that he can change our habits so he can keep his campaign promise of slowing the rising oceans and healing the Earth.

Via Jazz Shaw at Hot Air:

[T]he Obama administration’s Department of Transportation (DOT) and Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) are quietly moving to make another round of changes to CAFE standards. (That’s Corporate Average Fuel Economy, for those keeping score at home.) The changes would affect model years from 2017 to 2025.

Remember: The important thing is that we are saved from the scourge of Man-Made Global Warming™, not worrying about silly things like jobs and the economy!

Remember yesterday's quote about how the EPA really doesn't care what effect its policies have on jobs or the economy at large? Bingo. The EPA gets its marching orders from the White House, so their agenda is Obama's agenda. We simply can't trust him to do the right thing for American jobs or the economy on this issue.

In fact, we can't trust liberals or leftists anywhere in the world to do the right thing - leftists in Europe have decided to ban cars altogether by 2050, all in the name of cutting emissions! They simply don't live in the same reality that you and I and most of the rest of the civilized world inhabits, and thus they cannot be trusted to govern in ways that protect you and I. And what about the current cars that run on electricity? To be blunt, they suck.

What is really needed is something that is well within our capability to do:

In 1995, the Republican-controlled House and Senate passed a balanced budget act, which contained a provision to open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) for oil drilling and exploration. On December 6th of that year, President Bill Clinton vetoed the bill, ensuring that not a drop of oil would be extracted from the barren land of this 20 million acre area. We have literally been paying for this veto for the past 15 years.

This gargantuan frozen tundra in the northeast corner of Alaska contains the most oil of any single untapped source within the borders of the U.S. According to the mean average estimate of the U.S. Geological Survey, there are at least 10.3 billion barrels of oil in ANWR. Most of this oil can be tapped through a drilling imprint of just 2,000 acres, or .01%, of the reserve area. In addition, there is an estimated 35 trillion cubic feet of natural gas in ANWR. Only an insidious gang of politicians hell-bent on undermining our national security, economic prosperity, and free market capitalism, could be so intransigent to impound this treasure from the American people.

Yet, for the past 15 years, a truculent group of Democrats, along with a handful of liberal Republicans in the Senate, has prevented another ANWR bill from making its way to the president’s desk. Now, with Obama behind the desk, he has promised to block any effort to drill in ANWR, the Outer Continental Shelf, the Rockies, and much of the Gulf coast. It is high time that we issue a direct challenge to Obama and quell his war on energy independence and productivity.

Drill here, drill now! Here are the stakes:

ANWR should be the first salvo in our counteroffensive against the Democrats’ war on oil. We must eventually fight for expanded drilling in the Outer Continental Shelf (OCS), the fifty states, and the Gulf of Mexico. It’s time for Republicans to launch a full scale assault on the energy hostage takers within the government. Fifteen years of holding our oil and gas exploration hostage is enough.

We are fighting for energy independence, job creation, national security, and the American way of life. Oil is a gift from God and is the bloodline of our economic freedom and prosperity . Republicans need to muster the courage to pass ANWR immediately. The American people are supporting us on this issue. If the Democrats continue to obstruct our energy development, we need to sever their bloodline in 2012; political power.

The Republicans are generally pretty shaky on this issue, so they need to hear overwhelming support for ANWR drilling. That means you -- yes YOU -- need to pick up the phone and call your elected representatives or write them an e-mail and demand they proceed before gas prices reach European levels.

The American people do support this, and our reps need to respond to this demand. Do your part to supply the political courage they need.