By Jim Gibbons, Republican Candidate for Iowa’s Third Congressional District
Instability in the Middle East continues to deteriorate as Turkey saber rattles towards Israel. The Straits of Hormuz, in the Persian Gulf, is continually laced with underwater Iranian mines and patrolled by Iranian gunships. China purchases oil using Euro’s instead of Dollars – a currency hotly desired by Islamic Mullahs in an attempt to devalue the Dollar. While these are all important national security issues, all these geo-political strains affect Iowans directly – in the price we pay to power our companies, homes, and cars.
Instability in the Middle East, Iranian aggression, Chinese economic ploys, all artificially push up the cost of energy that Americans pay. Nothing affects our economy more immediately or directly (regardless of what they have been saying about health care) than the cost of energy. Everything from the price of airline tickets to a gallon of milk is affected by energy prices. However, this Congress is doing little, if nothing, to address this kitchen table issue.
The energy issue, specifically petroleum energy, has been ignored by the liberals in Congress. When Nancy Pelosi and Leonard Boswell took control of the House of Representatives they promised a "green-energy" policy that would not only put people to work but reduce the reliance on foreign oil. Well, it has been almost 4 years since Nancy Pelosi and Leonard Boswell made these promises and nothing has changed. A green-energy economy still exists in theory only and energy costs seem to be moving ever higher. Liberals in Washington are so committed to a green-energy-only economy, that Mr. Obama was roundly criticized when he proposed small, off-shore drilling in Virginia.
It is time we have an honest discussion about energy. While I support a "green-energy" policy and am hopeful that new technologies and new markets will continue to emerge, the United States is still primarily powered by oil. We sit on vast resources of petroleum that should be explored and developed, for the sake of our national security and our economy. We have tremendous natural gas resources, yet because the liberals in Congress have made fossil fuels a four-letter word, Congress has done little to harness this power. The mantra "drill-baby-drill" has been lampooned by the liberal media, but I believe that is exactly what we need to do.
They say the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again expecting different results. Simply importing oil from the Middle East, paying with American dollars, and expecting our geo-political problems to be resolved is insane. Enriching militant mullahs with dollars from America and Euros from China needs to end. The future of this country depends on it.
