Bean, Seals just don't get it

Little reported was a June 26 vote in the House where 10th District Rep. Mark Kirk and 175 other Republicans blocked a House bill from coming to a vote aimed at preventing the Secretary of the Interior from issuing new onshore and offshore leases on federal land to oil and natural gas companies already holding leases but not engaged in drilling (HR6251). Predictably 8th District Melissa Bean joined her Democratic colleagues and then went home to inform her constituents of her support for drilling.

Despite the claims of Democrats, it is a myth that oil companies have 68 million acres of leased public lands that contain large amounts of economically recoverable oil and that this already-leased land could produce 4.8 million barrels of oil a day, making it unnecessary to open up more land. Here are the facts:

(1.) The 1992 Comprehensive Energy Policy Act already requires that energy companies comply with lease provisions or risk forfeiture of the leases.

(2.) Much of the leased land has already been explored and determined not to carry enough recoverable oil to justify drilling, while enormous quantities of oil are known to exist in currently banned offshore resources and areas with shale oil

(3.) If a discovery of oil is made, the process of recovering it is a lengthy and costly one. Only then can a lease become "producing" for an oil company.

(4.) Where leases are issued, work is often protested and followed by litigation by extreme environmentalists, keeping leased lands in limbo for many years.

Unfortunately both Democratic Congressional leaders, Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid, regard fossil fuels as demons. Nancy Pelosi's aversion to oil stems from her desire to "Save the Planet" despite a growing number of scientists and climatologists who reject the theory that man's carbon footprint has much or anything to do with global warming.

When you go to the ballot box in November, remember who is really behind the outrageous prices you are paying for the energy that makes your job, home, car and living standards possible. Mark Kirk and Steve Greenberg, in his bid to unseat Melissa Bean, understand that our economic welfare and national security is tied to oil and coal until alternate forms of energy can offer viable replacements. Melissa Bean and Kirk's challenger, Dan Seals, just don't get it. They have hitched their stars to Democratic energy politics that would fail to reduce fuel prices, expand supplies, grow the economy or provide a stimulus for economic growth.

Nancy J. Thorner

Lake Bluff