Yikes! The Utility Bills are Here

If the war in Iraq is being waged to benefit the  American consumers of gas and oil for heating, then it is singularly unsuccessful.  I just received my heating bill which was three times higher for December than for January.  The electric bill was “only” twice a high.  This put my cost for heating and lighting my house at roughly $600.  Outrageous is hardly a description of my feelings about this.

There is an artificial stimulation of energy price increase that is the result of opportunism and greed.  It is also related to the difficulty in building new refineries in the United States and the completely misguided prohibitions on drilling in areas we know can provide these resources.

Our friends in the preserve the wilderness movement are misguided and irresponsible.  Their policy initiatives in forested areas have actually caused more damage and loss than good forest management techniques would have.  For example, vegetation, like all life forms, must be able to breathe.  When forests get too thick they die. Many Western forest are dying.

When the world consumes more fuel sources than are being discovered, economies die.  As India and China consume more of the world’s resources other nations must consume less.  This is going to be quite a shock for the so-called developed nations.  At the moment India and China consume 22% of the world’s commodities encouraging price increases from oil, copper, and aluminum to steel.

Sensible exploration and extraction should be our goal, especially if we are determined not to develop alternate fuels.  Between North and South America the riches still to be found in the earth most likely could replace or at least compete with current sources in
Arabia.
I wonder how our wacky liberal friends are going to feel when they can’t push their hate America agenda and have to change it to hate China?