I can’t believe I want to quote semisatirical LA Times columnist Joel Stein–just ask my friends and former colleagues. But his "What’s so Bad About Foreign Oil" column today is about 70% right, Especially these two paragraphs:
If the candidates wanted to be independent from all oil, I’d embrace that green goal. But they only hate foreign oil. As if foreign oil was inherently different from good, God-fearing, strong-work-ethic American oil, the kind that is ignited by freedom and burns terrorism and France. To the commodities market, there is no American oil, no American cotton, no American aluminum, no American coffee — they all get bid on without national prejudice. Even I know that, and my academic study of commodities consists solely of watching "Trading Places."
If we were energy independent, the politicians imply, prices wouldn’t go up. But if you’re an oil-striking American dude — maybe a little naive, but smart enough to know that your hot daughter Elly May is going to be better off in Beverly Hills than the Ozarks — you’re going to shop your barrels to the highest bidder in the world, not just to whiny Americans with their near-worthless dollars. More oil procured from under U.S. soil means more oil on the global market, not more oil for just us.