US awash with oil

This is a note  I sent to Glenn Beck when the issue of oil was being discussed once again:


Thanks for once again (2/22) calling attention to the harm that's being done to our economy by not going after our own vast resources of oil and natural gas. Instead we leave it to foreign hostile nations to provide for our needs and face the consequence of paying the cost of their oil according to their whims or the unstable circumstances these countries find themselves in.

The extortionist pricing imposed on us in 2008 was the #1 cause of bringing down our economy. Everything else was the effect. When the price of a barrel of foreign oil was gradually raised to the peak of $147 a barrel, gasoline prices rose to over $4.00 a gallon, putting a strain on every family budget and every industry - most directly and noticeably the airline and shipping companies. Is it any wonder that some people would fall behind paying their bills and making their mortgage payments, especially the ones laid off because of the pressures imposed on businesspeople.?

This country is awash with oil and natural gas.  Just Google Bakken oil deposit and scroll to "Massive oil deposit could increase US reserves 10x."  In the 1870s John D. Rockefeller was refining 90% of the oil used in the US - his competitors the other ten percent and we were energy independent. (Google John D. Rockefeller in Wikipedia and look for the sub-title "Standard Oil").  The oil fields being harvested by JDR in almost every state in the union in the 19th century did not exactly dry up.

Our economy could soar replacing our dependence on foreign oil through the use of our own, and the capital and revenue it would generate could provide robust investment in research and development of alternative means of energy.  By offering China our oil at a price attractive to them, they wouldn't have to pay with hard cash but could be crediting our almost one trillion dollar account and gradually eliminating our debt to them.

Social Security

A note I sent to Sean Hannity when the subject matter being discussed was Social Security:


There is a solution to bringing about a healthily administered Social Security program. This is something that should be handled like an insurance program the same way we pay for auto insurance, homeowner’s, etc. Most of us pay into insurance programs that we hope we’ll never need.  I’ve driven accident free for 59 years.  I paid insurance all those years and don’t regret not having to avail myself of payment from the companies I dealt with.  Social Security could be handled the same way.  People should be made to understand that they’re paying into a program that they’ll only be able to collect on if they have the misfortune of being in a certain low enough income level to need it when they retire. That level could be determined periodically as the economy changes.  At the present time it surely doesn’t make sense that Social Security should be paid to people making a half-million dollars or more.  Bully for them for having the good fortune that through their industry and good fortune they find themselves in that income category.