Oil is The Newest Conscriptee in the President’s Strawman Army

Boy, our President just loves the false argument, doesn’t he? I suspect that some time in 2013, the next administration will announce it has discovered a new sub-basement in the White House in which it found row upon row of strawmen, lined up like the terra cotta soldiers of a Qin Emperor. Barack Obama runs them out so often, it’s like he has some sort of special launch system with a strawman sitting on standby like a Viper in the launch tube of a Battlestar.

Here’s his latest favorite straw man, the one he has employed shamelessly whenever he talks about what’s passing these days for his national energy policy.

President Obama called for the elimination of billions of dollars in oil industry tax breaks Friday, while stressing that the United States can’t drill its way out of high gas prices.

“We can’t just drill our way out of the problem,” Obama said during an energy policy speech in Indiana Friday. “If we’re serious about addressing our energy problems, we’re going to have to do more than drill.”

Here’s the thing. No one — not even the most rapacious oil company blackguard — has said we can “drill our way out of the problem”. No one has even hinted that domestic drilling will bring down gas prices all by itself.

His argument is a dishonest dodge, a ploy to divert us from the inescapable fact that domestic drilling is a vital component in both lowering gas prices and securing a measure of energy independence. Heck, George Bush knew that (and demonstrated it), but we all know he was just a chimpy-brained cowboy, right? Only a complete dolt or a rock-ribbed environmentalist luddite (but I repeat myself) could contend that we can get back to sub-$2 a gallon gas on electric cars and alternative energy sources.

But that’s where our President is today. He’d rather slap a whopping tax increase on all of us, enrich his campaign contributors, and pander to the environmental lobby instead of so the serious and not all that difficult work it’d take to set us on the course to a stable and sure energy future.

I suppose we should be thankful he didn’t follow his Democrat colleagues in to “suck it up” land but why should we settle? It’s well past time President Obama empied out his strawman basement and got serious about the problems of his nation.

Other Posts of Interest:

• John McCain, Just As Unserious and Marxist as Obama on Energy
• Obama’s New Position: Sure, Let’s Drill. Why Not?
• Why Won’t Nancy Let Them Vote? Even She Doesn’t Seem to Know.

Tags: Energy Policy

Category: Thinking About Energy