Bush Calls for End to Ban on Offshore Oil Drilling

President Bush urged Congress on Wednesday to end a federal ban on offshore oil drilling and open a portion of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge for oil exploration, asserting that those steps and others would lower gasoline prices and “strengthen our national security.” In recent years, the president said, “scientists have developed innovative techniques to reach Anwar’s oil with virtually no impact on the land or local wildlife,” referring to the wildlife refuge by its acronym. He continued, “I urge members of Congress to allow this remote region to bring enormous benefits to the American people.” President Bush also urged Congress to approve the extraction of oil from shale on federal lands, something he said can be done far more economically now than a few years ago, and to speed the approval process for building new refineries. Mr. Bush sought to take full political advantage of soaring fuel prices by portraying Republican lawmakers as imaginative and forward-looking and the Democratic majority in Congress as obstructionists on energy policy.

Read the story from NY Times | No Comments | Posted June 18, 2008 at 7:44 PM by Sam Bear