President Obama gave $2 billion to Petrobras, Brazil's primary oil company, to support their increased drilling efforts for oil off the Brazilian coast in June, 2010. Contrasting that with Americans' desire for more drilling off the Alaskan coast, among other states like Louisiana, one is left to think, "We gave that much money to Brazil, shouldn't we be developing our own oil projects a bit more too?"
But of course, that is not what most democrats want in the United States. More drilling means more pollution and more dead fishes. I am willing to face those facts, and I am glad that there are people in the world who care enough about the environment and life to want less drilling to spare our dear Mother Earth. The fact is that the more careless we are about any human project, the more likely it is to pollute and kill wildlife, and I can accept that fact and agree with the humanitarians in a desire to lessen the collateral damage we inflict for our own good, such as gasoline.
I also hold another point of view, and that is that I am sick and tired of my country relying on foreign powers(ones that would destroy us were they capable no less) to supply us with a natural resource that we can dig up right here by ourselves. We understand that the Middle East poses a threat and cutting them off may not be in our immediate best interest, but now what of South America? Are we to give Brazil the power to have more control in the world? Will it be a good thing or bad in the end?
How might Brazil act if given the power to control a large supply of the world's oil? It is already on the economic rise and seems to be doing quite well for itself. The 2016 Olympics in Rio will certainly be a test of the ages to see if one of the world's most violent cities can become safe for an international meeting place. I am interested to see how Brazil reacts, and exploring how it might will be saved for another discussion I think.
For right now, we NEED to take a look at how this decision affects our own country. Take a look at unemployment. A much overstated comment, but how will giving money to Brazil to increase their output of a good we can produce here help us? Were we to take advantage of our own resources, we could not only lower the price of gasoline, but increase the jobs in the United States and boost the economy. I don't believe it to be rocket science to figure that the more we can work on our own soil, the more people can be working. And what we need right now is more people working.
Of course many are content to sit unemployed. They, of course, vote democrat. I just had to throw that in. Democrat or republican, we've got to take every opportunity we can to increase jobs.
True, the weakening of the Middle-East's power to dominate the globe with its own oil is a good thing for the whole world, and yes, for the United States.
"More oil that is not concentrated in the Mideast is good for the world and good for America. It would be a lot better if we had the drilling here," said Gulf Oil CEO Joe Petrowski. "And it seems a double standard and it seems somewhat hypocritical to a country that desperately needs jobs...that we're encouraging other countries to create the jobs that we need."
The President's decision is not despicable, nor is it anything so bad that I would hate him for it, but I would wonder what holds back those democrats from supporting drilling(and in turn more jobs, more growth, and lower gas prices) on our own soil.
Further reading:
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2011/03/23/lawmakers-execs-slam-obama-boosting-brazils-offshore-drilling/
http://thenewamerican.com/tech-mainmenu-30/energy/6824-obama-commits-american-support-to-brazilian-oil
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