Apex Resources Inc (SLMLF)

[Ruellit]

Debate over Arctic oil drilling blocks energy bill!
Reposted from RB
http://ragingbull.lycos.com/mboard/boards.cgi?board=ABRG&read=90764

WASHINGTON (AP) -- A dispute over oil
drilling in an Arctic wildlife refuge is blocking
energy legislation and prompting the White
House to link the debate to national security
and the September terrorist attacks.

That has some Democrats in Congress and
environmentalists accusing the Bush
administration and Republicans of exploiting
terrorist fears to allow drilling in an area
where oil won't actually be pumped for a
decade.

"It's in our national interest that we develop
more energy supplies at home," President
Bush told business leaders recently,
demanding that the Senate take up energy
legislation "and get a bill to my desk" before
Congress adjourns for the year.

Opening the Arctic refuge for oil
development remains key to "an independent
energy policy for America," White House
spokesman Ari Fleischer said. He noted the
House already has approved energy
legislation, including drilling in the Arctic
National Wildlife Refuge, or ANWR.

But in the Senate, an energy bill that six
months ago was viewed as a priority has
slipped to the back burner, eclipsed by the
response to the Sept. 11 attacks and the
slumping economy.

Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle,
D-N.D., has put energy legislation on hold,
telling reporters: "The most important focus
for us now is the economic recovery plan,
the airport security plan and the appropriations bills."

It's clear that energy "is an issue that Democratic leaders want
to duck for now," Sen. Larry Craig, R-Idaho, contended.

Sen. Frank Murkowski, R-Alaska, said the reason is the Arctic
refuge. He believes he has the 51 votes needed to lift a 1980
congressional ban on developing the Alaska refuge's millions of
barrels of oil.

Key Democrats, however, have promised environmentalists they
will protect the refuge. That includes, if necessary, blocking a
vote with a filibuster -- a parliamentary tactic that requires
proponents of a measure to have 60 votes to limit debate.

Any debate is likely to be quarrelsome and disruptive, with each
side trying to wrap itself in patriotism and hurling accusations at
the other. It's a showdown Daschle would like to avoid.

"This is a critical dividing-line issue," said Sen. John Kerry,
D-Mass., who has pledged to lead such a filibuster. Among those
expected to join in are Democratic Sens. Joseph Lieberman of
Connecticut, Hillary Clinton of New York and John Wyden of
Oregon, he said.

The events of Sept. 11 and their aftermath have not changed
the debate over ANWR, Kerry said. Drilling there "will do nothing
to enhance our national security at this moment in time," he said
in a recent interview.

Murkowski, contending that oil can be taken from the refuge
without endangering the environment, called it a matter of "our
national security, as opposed to environmental extremists."

To press the point, he brought representatives from a number
of veterans organizations to Capitol Hill last week to deride -- as
one wrote Daschle -- "the heavy reliance of the United States on
foreign oil."

Bush administration officials have stressed the same point.

Interior Secretary Gale Norton called recently for action on
energy at a Capitol Hill news conference, in a speech to an oil
conference in Louisiana and in letters to radio talk show hosts.

"Every day the United States imports 700,000 barrels of oil from
(Iraq's) Saddam Hussein. ... It's time to start producing that
energy in the United States," Norton wrote the radio hosts,
volunteering to discuss the issue if invited.

Sen. Jeff Bingaman, D-N.M., chairman of the Senate Energy and
Natural Resources Committee, bemoaned "the almost obsessive
attention" focused on the Arctic refuge at the expense of other
energy matters.

There are other places in Alaska and in the Gulf of Mexico
where domestic oil resources have been ignored, he said. Growth
in energy demand "will overwhelm any future domestic production
even if ANWR were opened," he added.

The government estimates that at least 5.7 billion barrels --
and possibly as many as 16 billion barrels -- may be recoverable
from the refuge, although how much will be pumped will depend
on the price of oil. Environmentalists argue that ANWR has no
more than 3.2 billion barrels, not enough to dramatically ease the
country's reliance on imports.

"Drilling the Arctic refuge for a speculative six months supply of
oil 10 years from now will not do anything to enhance our energy
security," said Adam Kolton of the Alaska Wilderness League. He
called the national security drumbeat "an attempt to exploit the
tragedy of Sept. 11" to overcome opposition to opening the
refuge.

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