The Honorable Barbara Boxer

United States Senate

112 Hart Senate Office Building

Washington, DC 20510-3703

 

Dear Senator Boxer,

I am taking this unconventional approach to respond to your letter. My responses to you are indented and in italics. Your letter to me can be found in the bold type. In writing you I am wearing two hats, (1) as a business owner in California, and (2) as a local chapter leader of ACT! for America, a group that now numbers more than 60,000. ACT! for America believes, and promotes America’s national security and seeks to defend our American democratic values against the assault of RADICAL Islam. Since we see a relationship between OPEC (Persian Gulf Members) and the political religious organization we call Islam, we believe you can not speak of one without understanding how the two interface.

Since your response to my previous letter is of vital interest to members of ACT! For America, I am sharing this letter with that constituency, and so clearly this becomes an open letter. I need to recognize the article “Congress, Get Off Your Gas and Drill!”written by Chuck Norris. I have revised a number of his points listed below under “What Americans are Able to See and Understand.”  I am also indebted to an unknown American for some material in the four recommendations at the bottom of this letter.

I have read your press release of June 18, “Boxer Statement on Bush’s Solution to America’s Oil Addiction.” For the record, I’m not happy with Bush and his oil policy, but Congress must simply get with it! Once again however, it appears that you are much too interested in discrediting Bush rather than working for a solution. Your statement has to be one of the most incredible statements I’ve read. You speak of Bush’s hypocrisy and yet you refer to the 68 million acres of undeveloped leases that are not proven viable. Are you suggesting big oil should seek to develop those leases, leases they know they can never put a drill in as long as current policy and laws exist? How about freeing up the waters between Florida and Cuba. If you are really concerned about fouling our beaches, perhaps you could look at the technology of China, Venezuela and Cuba, countries already drilling in the area, and see the equipment they are using is far inferior to anything our people would put in the region. Those three countries potentially could create big problems for Florida and our east coast. You speak of a threat to America’s $60 billion coastal economy, yet during Katrina, of the hundreds of oil platforms in the Gulf of Mexico, not a single platform produced any pollution as a result of the Mother of all storms. Your letter and my response follows:



From: Senator@boxer.senate.gov

Date: Friday, June 20, 2008 12:23 PM

To: mpm@dc.rr.com

Subject: Responding to your message

 

Dear Dr. Myers:

Thank you for contacting me regarding high gasoline prices.  I appreciate the opportunity to hear your views on this important issue, and I share your concerns.

First, let me thank you for your response. Senator, I want to be kind in this letter, but the storm clouds are gathering rapidly for many members of Congress who clearly pursue their very tired agendas instead of aggressively working for solutions that will benefit all Americans. I am confident that you are pursuing what you honestly believe is best for America, however let me present a different view and alternative suggestions for a solution. You will find these listed at the bottom of this letter.

Gasoline prices reached an all-time high this year, and costs for food and other basic necessities are rising drastically.  As millions of Americans struggle under this increasing burden, oil companies continue to report massive, record-breaking profits – $123 billion last year alone.  This is unacceptable, and I want to assure you that I am working hard to lower prices and protect Americans from price gouging.

You are right about this being unacceptable, but you are mistaken if you really believe you will be able to protect Americans from price gouging. You know as well as most Americans, the oil companies are not the problem. The problem is to be seen in a failed energy policy, or lack thereof. Prices are not likely to decline until we have a national energy policy that helps to remove us from being held hostage to the Middle East and Venezuela. You represent an ideology that makes it impossible for America to develop her own resources, and for lack of that opportunity, we are rapidly becoming indebted to and being bought out by the Middle East, all with our own dollars. Have you recently checked middle eastern acquisitions of Wall Street and Main Street U.S.A?

I am proud to be an original co-sponsor of S.3044, the Consumer-First Energy Act of 2008.  This important bill would impose a windfall profits tax on oil companies to discourage price gouging and to help consumers offset the high costs of energy products, punish any country or company colluding in setting the price of oil, and limit excessive speculation in oil markets.

This bill will not provide a single barrel of oil, nor will it reduce the cost of a single gallon of gasoline. What it effectively does is exactly what it is designed for, which is to remove profits that otherwise would enable companies to do the deep well drilling offshore. According to a June 17 Rasmussen Report, 67% of Americans support Offshore Drilling. Your efforts should be to remove restrictions that enable our capitalistic system to work rather than creating bills like S.3044 that simply adds one more layer of bureaucratic restrictions to discourage the great American entrepreneurial spirit.

I applaud your colleague Senator Schumer, Chairman of the Joint Economic Committee. Schumer has suggested a “grand compromise” between members of the two parties similar to one he put forth 10 years ago where some Democrats would agree to open ANWR to drilling if some Republicans would agree to higher fuel efficiency standards. But then true to his partisan pedigree  he said, “Frankly, I don’t think this administration can pull it off … suggesting that Congress may have to wait for President Barack Obama or President John McCain to strike such a deal.” There you go.

S.3044 also includes a provision that is similar to legislation I authored that would require the Federal Trade Commission to investigate possible manipulation of gasoline prices any time prices rise rapidly.

Please, I feel patronized by your statement. You know where these price increases are generated. You don’t need the Federal Trade Commission to do another study to tell you or America what she already knows.

Unfortunately, on June 10, 2008, the Senate minority blocked further consideration of S.3044.  At a time when so many Americans are struggling to make ends meet and having to make the impossible choice between buying food for their families and filling up the gas tank, I am deeply disturbed that some of my colleagues prevented this important bill from moving forward.

The minority blocked S.3044 because they recognized it for what it was, an attempt to promote a political agenda rather than solve the problem. You understand that if the bill had real merit, you could easily override a presidential veto. America understands that your solution is no solution and that drilling must begin yesterday. Drilling certainly is not the ultimate solution but it will provide time for America to retool herself and escape the bondage of the middle east.I ask the question again, are you carefully monitoring the Middle East encroachment of our banking institutions and brokerage houses? Are you aware of recent developments with the London Stock Exchange? Very soon the transfer of that once great enterprise will be doing business in Dubai. What is an oil problem today will soon be a problem of survival.  America will simply no longer be the financial leader of the world. You have the enviable position of serving in the Congress that may be remembered for decisions that either allowed that to happen or prevented it from happening. You will have made your point with the Bush Administration and elected your candidate, but America will have lost. Americans deserve and want more from Washington. Will you be the statesperson you were elected to be and help create a National Energy Policy that meets the needs of America?

Opening up drilling in the United States is not the best way to achieve lower gas prices.

Clearly more of your constituents and other Americans say it is. I believe you are politically astute enough to not want to be on the other side of this issue from those you represent. The opening of drilling is not the complete answer, but it certainly is a step in the right direction. Without a comprehensive national energy policy that allows for the development of our own resources, I predict you can expect a major change in both houses in the 2010 and 2012 elections.

For example, drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) would provide us with six months of oil at most, and at great cost.  Furthermore, it would be more than a decade before we saw any of that oil.

These statements simply can not be supported by the facts. Your six month figure is predicated on the assumption that ANWR is our only source of fossil fuel, and if that were the case the statement is still not factual. Your statements are as unsupportable as those put forth before the first oil drilling in Alaska. We were told the Caribou herds would be devastated. Quite the opposite is true. The Central Arctic Herd which uses lands in and around Prudhoe Bay has nearly doubled in size since 1996, while the Porcupine Herd that uses no lands (in Alaska) where oil and gas activity is under way has been reduced considerably. Researchers from the University of Alaska, Texas A&M University and the U.S. Dept. Of Agriculture report, “with 30 years of contact with oil development to go by, the industry has shown that caribou and oil fields can successfully co-exist. The Central Arctic Herd, which calves in the vicinity of the Prudhoe Bay, Kuparuk, and Milne Point oil fields, has increased 900% from an estimated 3,000 animals in the early 1970s to 32,000 in 2002.And, how many have had their vacations ruined because of the pipeline?  Only those who chose to cancel them based on unproven “statistics”.

Ultimately, we need to move away from our dependence on oil and gasoline by developing renewable and efficient energy technologies.

This is one statement that I agree with completely, but what do you propose for the next five to ten years while America’s wealth is transferred to the middle east? Your political persuasion has ALWAYS been to tax someone to solve a problem. How many historical lessons does it take to persuade Congress of the folly of that action. We both know that even the U.S. Congress will not defeat big oil, and frankly shouldn’t. I make that statement without owning a single oil stock.  If Congress could defeat big oil in America that would ultimately be a defeat for America. Big oil will come from somewhere and if it doesn’t you can expect a major war. We may be close to that today.

Right now, we need to go after the big oil companies that are holding Americans hostage with their exorbitantly high prices. 

Americans deserve better than oil companies that gouge consumers in order to make huge profits, and Congress needs to take action to help alleviate this crisis.  Rest assured, I will continue working for the passage of S.3044, and I will keep fighting to help Americans enjoy fair and reasonable energy prices.

Again, thank you for writing to me.  Please do not hesitate to contact me in the future on this or other issues that concern you.

Barbara Boxer

United States Senator

Please visit my website at http://boxer.senate.gov

 Now, please read my understanding of the problem and suggestions for solutions below!

Senator Boxer, I beg your indulgence to see what Americans see clearly. It’s a bit like Rome burning while Nero plays. I know, I know, the violin didn’t come along until long after Nero, but you get the point. The following points we all need to get!

• Friday the 13th marked the biggest one-day surge in oil price history. It increased by $11 dollars in a single day to $138 on the New York Mercantile Exchange. In just two days the price of oil increased 13%.

• Americans are being forced to transfer financial resources to the middle east, funds which the middle east now is using to buy up Wall Street and Main Street America. As a result,

• Americans have fewer dollars for food, homes, medical care, savings, normal business expenses and recreation.

•  We have more proven reserves in shale oil located in Colorado, Utah, Montana and Wyoming, than all of the Middle East (800 billion barrels), yet those of your political persuasion and “environmentalists” trusting unsupported, politically correct “research” have made it illegal to touch those fields. While America suffers, your arguments are no longer accurate or legitimate.

• For the moment, it is illegal to drill in the Atlantic or Pacific Oceans for oil.

• For the moment, it is illegal to drill in ANWAR.

• Our oil companies are unable to secure leases to drill in the Gulf of Mexico, while Cuba, Venezuela and China are doing just that.

• We have not built an oil refinery in more than 30 years and have reduced by one half those we have.

• We haven’t built a nuclear energy producing facility in more than 30 years. The IAEA reports that as of 2007 there are 439 nuclear power reactors in operation in the world, operating in 31 countries. France and Japan account for 56.5% of nuclear generated electricity. As of 2005, 15% of the world’s electricity is generated by nuclear power.

• Several American airlines have either gone out of business or have merged with others.

• Independent America truckers are going out of business by the thousands.

• Americans are no longer able to compete for jobs that require commuter travel.

• America has more than 406 trillion cubic feet of natural gas, enough to heat every home in America for the next 150 years, but environmentalists and your party say “no” to mining. 

• America has the largest supply of coal in the world, but it’s Germany who plans to build 27 coal-fired power plants by 2020.

• I don’t think you can imagine or appreciate the anger level that is rising in American voters. You and your colleagues (on both sides of the aisle) have failed to pass one significant national energy policy, which means you have failed in your responsibility to protect America. You are crushing the very thing that has made America the greatest nation in history by eliminating the will of our creative minds to find solutions, and you do this hypocritically by suggesting that you are saving the planet for our children and future generations. Let’s get real. There won’t be any future for Americans if Congress doesn’t demonstrate thoughtful leadership quickly. Frankly, I fear for our children and their children.

We are being held hostage by foreign dictators, the cartels and tycoons who have become wealthy beyond anything any of us can imagine. This simply is not acceptable. Every branch of our government has failed us; the courts, the White House, Congress, and both political parties. Because of a failed energy policy, we are now bowing to international powers who seek to destroy us. It is clear that both political parties are far more concerned about elections and power than solving what is the greatest threat to our country. Can you and your colleagues, just for the moment, forget about the White House, WMD, Rev. Wright and Valerie Plame Wilson long enough to save America? God help us if you don’t.

I have noted some of the problems. What are the solutions? Let me suggest four. These are predicated on using our own oil reserves and creating other energy resources.

1. Put a national energy plan in place.

It should set a goal to be energy independent of foreign oil by 2020. Back in the sixties President Kennedy provided the kind of leadership that enabled us to put a man on the moon. It was a major achievement, and we can do the same with a comprehensive energy plan, providing we have leadership from both parties in Congress. This plan will have far greater consequence to America than Kennedy’s plan to set foot on the moon.           

2.  Identify allies to help us with this plan.

 Iraq should be our number one candidate. Iraq has approximately 9% of the proven oil reserves. Iraq owes us, not only for the freedom achieved, but for the lives of our young men and women, and for the two trillion dollars paid by our tax payers. Yes, we are in a war and the important thing is to finish the task. Congress must get beyond the very tired complaints about WMD, and who said what when, and who is responsible for the war. Don’t forget that Congress had all the same reports on WMD as did the President, France, Germany, England and all our other allies. This criticism is really a lame one for the American public. We need to get this war finished, not only for the people in Iraq, but to demonstrate respect for our commitment, word and policies. It will also be good for the American people, because of my third suggestion,                

3.  Make Iraq responsible for the war debt.

Make it be mandatory, payable through a discount for market price over the years of our national energy plan. That will reduce the cost of energy to our homes and businesses below world market price. This will likely increase our business competitiveness, and strengthen the dollar. Now let’s look at number four.                 

4.  Establish Iraq as our preferred energy provider and ally.

We will no longer buy energy from any nation hostile to our interests. OPEC in 2007 provided the U.S. 5,983,000 barrels per day. Of that amount the Persian Gulf Countries provided only 2,170,000 barrels per day. OPEC currently provides us with approximately one-third of our need. This is not an impossible difference to make up providing we have a realistic National Energy Policy. By using our own energy reserves along with supplies from Iraq, we will no longer need oil from OPEC.  If we develop and buy U.S. crude from ourselves, even at 40% less current market price, we could then invest about 30 billion each week on oil alternative research, development and infrastructure. Right now we are sending that money oversees to crude oil suppliers who build enormous palaces, hotels and mega developments that challenges imagination. Financial resources that should stay in America are now supporting madras’s and a variety of terrorist activities around the world. These resources are being used to train masses about the evil west, specifically the United States.                

Of greater concern, Muslims, Arab interests, and some we regard as enemies, are beginning to buy into our major banks and brokerage houses here in America. In addition they are also beginning to buy up Main Street America. If the money we are now sending overseas was spent in America, it would secure our future, create jobs, stabilize our debt, and perhaps fund health insurance for every American, all while paying less at the pump. As our ally and trading partner, Iraq’s economy will be reborn through this plan to become a post world power, much like Germany and Japan following WWII. Now consider this:  If the number one oil consumer/buyer (America) was taken out of the market, what do you think it would do to the amount of money supporting terrorism around the world? As long as China and India are in the world market for oil, it won’t completely eliminate funds for terrorism, but it will significantly reduce it. In the mean time our energy plan will be perfected and roll out the alternative energy sources like hydrogen, nuclear power plants, wind, solar, and others that will replace the need to burn oil. We can create profitable new industries that will eliminate the threat of global warming. This is a win-win plan. First America wins, and second, members of Congress will be recognized as statesmen rather than seeking their own partisan agendas.

In the minds of many, this current Congress has accomplished very little of significance. Forget your dislike for the President and his administration! That battle is over. Think about the people who placed you in a privileged position of leadership and support them and what is right for America! This is your chance to change the course of history.

I await your reply.

Sincerely 

Dan G Myers

ACT! for America – Palm Springs

mpm@dc.rr.com