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Tuesday, July 17, 2018

What Difference Would It Make - 2 Energy Production

In my continuing series discussing the differences between the policies of Republicans and those of Democrats for 2018, we have arrived at the subject of the production of energy.  Simply put, are heating oil, gasoline, natural gas and electricity more likely to be less expensive across the country if there's a Democrat majority or a Republican majority in Congress?

This is a key question.  Our country and our economy run on energy.  As the price of that energy gets higher, the availability of energy to power the country gets lower.  Energy gets priced out of the market and the amount used drops dramatically.

Since the 2016 election, the Republicans and President Trump have taken a series of steps to promote the production of more and more energy from American sources.  That tax cut bill includes the opening of a very small portion of the Arctic wildlife reserve for oil drilling.  Estimates are that there is close to twenty billions barrels of oil in that tiny area; the whole area is just a few square miles large.  The Democrats have pledged to shut down any drilling in the area.  Remember, the wildlife refuge is something like half a million square miles, but the area now opened for drilling is less than 5 square miles.  The refuge is preserved by the oil will get produced.  Then there's off shore drilling.  The GOP/Trump have opened up the areas under the oceans off our shores to drilling.  The Democrats want these areas shut off from drilling.  Once again, the GOP plan would increase production and decrease prices while the Democrats want to decrease production and increase prices.  Then there's natural gas drilling and fracking.  Fracking is the process which has made the USA once again the world's larges producer of natural gas.  It has been supported by Republicans.  Democrats have been trying to stop the use of fracking based upon their claim that it causes pollution.  That claim, however, remains unsupported by actual evidence.

There's a lot more on this subject, but the short version is this:  Republicans want to maximize energy production and minimize the price.  Democrats want to minimize production and maximize the price we pay for energy.  This is as good a reason as any to vote Republican. 

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