Rachel Maddow brilliantly explains why domestic oil drilling doesn't help us AT ALL

[ProfessorPlum]

Run time: 06:21 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c0--Q9_KmAY   Posted on YouTube: June 18, 2010 By YouTube Member: StartLoving3 Views on YouTube: 11   Posted on DU: June 18, 2010 By DU Member: ProfessorPlum Views on DU: 2668

 
This is the explanation I've been waiting for - why drill, baby, drill is so fucking stupid as a policy.

[Joanne98]

1. FUNGIBLE

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fungibility

[Rhiannon12866]

20. +1!

:)

[The_Commonist]

2. "Energy Independence" is like...

...the "Pro-Life" goal of ending abortion.
It's something that is never going to happen.
It's a great thing for politicians to furrow their brows about and get all serious.
But, it's a notion designed to appeal to the rubes.

We simply need to pursue a policy of not burning oil for energy.

[Hamlette]

3. this is all news to me, why don't we/can't we keep the oil extracted from "our" "shores"?

did I miss it in her explanation? Couldn't we just say (I'm not advocating this position, just saying) all the oil extracted within 50 miles of our coast goes to our market to be sold at what we decide?

[ProfessorPlum]

4. That's socialism. Who are "we" (the government) to tell

oil companies how to run their business? See how that works?

[ihavenobias]

9. If We Drill in the US, We Don't Get the Oil (Cenk @ HuffPo 7/23/2008)

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/cenk-uygur/if-we-drill-in-the-us-we_b_114525.html

[Devil_Fish]

19. It's not "our" market. Oil companies are multinational and sell to the highest bidder. N/T

[loudsue]

5. I love that woman.

:loveya: She's incredibly smart.

[Beam Me Up]

6. Rachel is exactly right AND what she is saying actually explains WHY we do not

have "energy independence."

Many of us who were adults and paying attention back in the early 1970s understood that it was a VERY bad idea to develop an advanced, global, technological civilization based on non-renewable energy sources. Way beyond the pollution factor, there is the question of the long-range stability of such a global civilization based upon a finite commodity. Energy consumption (and other uses of hydrocarbons, such as plastics) has grown exponentially in the past 40 years -- and this is no surprise to anyone, especially the oil companies. Everyone who was paying attention understood that continuing to develop a hydrocarbon reliant infrastructure for this civilization would inevitably lead us to precisely where we are on the global political, economic and ecological stage: A converging global crisis of historically unprecedented proportions. Including economic upheaval, ecological disaster and resource wars.

The question I asked myself for years is, given the fact that this was foreseeable and foreseen, WHY has this been allowed to proceed to this point? WHY didn't we begin developing alternative energy sources 30 and 40 years ago? Had we done so, the energy infrastructure of this civilization could have been re-tooled to become more reliant on cleaner, more renewable, alternative energy sources. So why didn't this happen?

The answer, I believe, is that renewable energy sources are inherently decentralizing. That is to say, their development and implementation inherently decentralize the global energy market. Think about what this means. If you have control over the market for energy that employes, runs, feed, clothes and houses a global technological civilization, you are guaranteed VAST wealth and power unlike anything ever before in history. On the other hand, "energy independence," means that every nation -- indeed, every individual who has the capacity to technologically meet the majority of his or her own energy needs -- is "independent" and thus can not be controlled by a centralized, hierarchical energy market. Thus the centralized, hierarchical social, economic and political models that we inherited from past generations has become an anachronism that now threatens the survivability and sovereignty of all nations and the independence of all individuals -- not to mention that of the global ecosystem itself.

"Energy independence," is a feel-good phrase that everyone can get behind but what stands in the way of its actual implementation is a juggernaut of wealth and power that now threatens all of us -- a centralized, hierarchical system of wealth creation that must now be dismantled and replaced before it destroys us all -- and it will not go quietly.

[lyonn]

10. Gawd she is good!

We all need to understand that the drilling in the Gulf is not going into a U.S. oil pot. It is shared with the world. So, we have allowed drilling in the Gulf for Our Independence on oil? Not. Yet our Gulf is in the process of being destroyed from at least Louisiana to the Southern tip of Florida. That is a very unique, precious and profitable area.

Those political idiots in Texas are not feeling the pain from this tragedy, how smug they are.....

[swilton]

14. Totally agree

This is also why nuclear energy is being pushed...Due to security concerns its management and distribution is highly centralized. Furthermore, the same criminals that have created the energy monopolies of oil are pushing development of nuclear energy....

[booley]

7. I've explained this to cons before

They don't seem to ever get that the people they are defending are private companies and that what's good for these companies isn't' necessarily good for them.

It's almost like that "identifying with the oppressor" thing. Defending big business is a knee jerk reaction, even when that business is screwing them.

[Uncle Joe]

8. Rachel nailed it.

Thanks for the thread, ProfessorPlum:thumbsup:

[lyonn]

11. Ok, one more kick for the Professor...

and definitely recommend.

[DURHAM D]

12. What's missing - Bill Clinton.

Why? Perhaps because he didn't want to insult our intelligence because he actually knew that oil is fungible.

[gateley]

13. I just watched this (had it recorded) and came here to see if there was a vid so

I can send this far and wide. Agree - the problem is OIL.

We need to call the pols on this when they say if we drill here, we'll be using our own oil and not the Saudi's. They've gotten alway with this for too long.

Thanks for posting!

[Karenina]

15. . .

[mmonk]

16. Finally, someone in the media telling it like it is.

I've tried to tell people I know that all this is crazy BECAUSE the oil is sold on the world market, it doesn't go into some sort of holding tank for us to use in the future. If we want to get off oil usage (for the right reasons), then we need to reduce our use of it for over 90% of our transportation. That is the only way.

[dipsydoodle]

17. Very clever or her to avoid any mention whatsoever

of the petrodollar recycling scheme in the absense of which the USA would sink like stone as its the only thing which allows fiat money to be printed unabated.

[2Design]

18. Gawd she is so smart and articulate - now if we can get congress and pres to listen n/t

[herbm]

21. Says it all. American oil fields, British oil merchant, Micronesian flagged drill ship, world oil.

[demwing]

22. Fungibility vs World Market vs Addiction

Saying Crude Oil is a fungible commodity is accurate, but it has nothing to do with independence.

All "fungible" means is that X amount of the commodity in question can be substituted with the any other identical amount of that commodity. A barrel of crude from America is the same as a barrel of crude from Iraq.

Gold is fungible. An ounce is an ounce. Wool is not fungible, or at least, is less fungible due to differences in the quality of wools. But the fact that crude oil is fungible has no impact on whether we are energy independent.

Saying we should NOT purchase crude oil from the World Market has nothing to do with energy independence. Socialize the US oil industry - go ahead! Buy ONLY US crude. It won't matter. We peaked our crude production in the early 1970s at about 3.5 billion barrels of oil per year. That's about 9.4 million barrels per day. That's what the US produced at PEAK PRODUCTION, 40 years ago.

As of the year 2000, Americans CONSUMED about 20 million barrels of oil per day. That's more than TWICE what we produced, at our best, a generation ago. We can stop exporting our oil tomorrow, use it ALL domestically, and still not meet 50% of our demand. (http://www.eia.doe.gov/aer/eh/frame.html)

Pretending that the World Market has anything to do with independence is like pretending that a crack head can solve his problems by not purchasing the drug down at the street corner, but by making the shit in his own kitchen.

We are addicted to oil. We can not become energy independent till we break that addiction.