A closely divided Senate voted Wednesday to approve oil drilling in an Alaska wildlife refuge, a major victory for President Bush and a stinging defeat for environmentalists who have fought the idea for decades.
[...for no good reason!--Jen]
By a 51-49 vote, the Senate put a refuge drilling provision in next year's budget, depriving opponents of the chance to use a filibuster to try to block it. Filibusters, which require 60 votes to overcome, have been used to defeat drilling proposals in the past.
[Whatsa matter Kerry, Rodham-Clintoon, Kennedy, Reid, et al?
Were you guys out in the hall when the voting procedure came up or did you chicken out?]
"This project will keep our economy growing by creating jobs and ensuring that businesses can expand," Bush said in a statement. "And it will make America less dependent on foreign sources of energy, eventually by up to a million barrels of oil a day."
Sen. Ted Stevens, R-Alaska, who has fought for 24 years to open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil companies, acknowledged it still could be "a long process" before a final drilling measure clears Congress. Lawmakers must agree on the final budget, something they failed to do last year, or Wednesday's vote would have been for naught.
Also, the House did not include an Arctic refuge measure in its budget, a difference that will have to be worked out in future negotiations.
Nevertheless, the Senate made clear by Wednesday's vote that a majority now supports tapping what is believed to be 10.4 billions or more of barrels of oil within the refuge's 1.5 million-acre coastal plain, said Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska. Two years ago, a similar attempt to use the budget process to open the refuge failed by three votes.
But that was before Republicans last November expanded their majority, adding a number of GOP senators who favor drilling. Only seven Republicans, all moderates,
[All RINO pretenders, they mean!--Jen]
bucked their party Wednesday and voted with most Democrats against opening the refuge.
Environmentalists said while the vote was disappointing, they haven't given up the fight. "It only strengthens our resolve to protect America's most pristine national wildlife refuge for our children's future," said Larry Schweiger, president of the National Wildlife Federation.
[How our "children" will get up to the wilderness of Alaska to frolic with the caribou is another matter!]
[...]
The oil industry has sought for more than two decades to get access to the oil. In 1980, Congress said the oil could be developed, but only if lawmakers specifically authorized the Interior Department to sell oil leases. Repeatedly Congress has failed to do so.
Environmentalists for years have fought such development, contending it would lead to a spider web of drilling platforms, pipelines and roads that would adversely impact the calving grounds of caribou, polar bears and millions of migratory birds that use the refuge's coastal plain.
[According to some who would know, the animals and wildlife in Alaska love the Alaskan pipeline that's already in place and cuddle up to it for warmth in the frigid winters!]
"The fact is it's going to be destructive," Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., said during debate on an amendment that would have stripped the drilling language from the budget measure. Democrats fell two votes short of the 51 needed.
[Just like John Kerry fell short of the votes needed to not be a proven loser!]
Kerry and other drilling opponents argued that more oil would be saved than ANWR could produce if Congress enacted an energy policy focusing on conservation, more efficient cars and trucks and increased reliance on renewable fuels.
[And this intellectual moron and East Coast egghead wonders why he didn't win the White House...
Actually, President Bush has also endorsed and supported programs promoting conservation, energy efficiency and renewable fuels.]
Drilling supporters countered that the refuge's oil can be pumped while still protecting the environment and wildlife.
Modern technology, drilling techniques and environmental restrictions would dramatically limit the industrial footprint that would be left on the tundra and protect wildlife, said Murkowski. "We know we've got to do it right. ... It's a fragile environment."
One GOP senator after another argued that with foreign imports accounting for more than half of the oil the country uses, every available barrel should be pursued. The Alaska refuge represents the largest potential onshore oil find in the country, they said.
"We won't see this oil for 10 years. It will have minimal impact," argued Sen. Maria Cantwell, D-Wash. It is "foolish to say oil development and a wildlife refuge can coexist."
[Has it occurred to the Dems like Cantwell that we'd be enjoying the use of this oil now if her party hadn't blocked us from using ANWAR for the last 25 years!!
ARGH!]
Cantwell and other Democrats accused Republicans of trying "an end run" by attaching the refuge provisions to the budget, saying the question of drilling in an ecologically pristine refuge — a "special place" as many environmentalists called it — should be debated as separate legislation or as part of a broad energy bill.
"It's the only way around the filibuster," countered Stevens, defending the use of the budget process. He said that approach is justified for issues that have special importance such as getting at ANWR's oil, something he characterized as a matter of "national security."
Notice the language of Al-Presseera: "getting at ANWAR's oil"... sounds like a sex maniac groping at a buxom girl!
I think we'll see the price of oil drop quite a bit, even if we may not be using ANWAR crude for a decade.
I hear they're dancing in the streets in Alaska, too, at the prospect of those new jobs that will be created and so much more money flowing into our 49th state when this gets going!
(And to think it was once called "Seward's Folly" for which the U.S. paid a mere $8,000,000!)
filibuster, so how's about doing the same with those judicial confirmations next?
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