On Oil, Terrorism and Iraq

Protecting energy sources

Monday’s opinion pages contained several letters and an article related to oil, terrorism and Iraq. The frustrations of the writers are real but ignore important facts.

One letter stated: “You are trying to fight a people who believe they are right in killing everyone in sight … Mr. President, please bring all our people home.”

A columnist, quoting a retired Navy diver, wrote: “It’s basically about oil, basically about money. It’s an economic war.”

Another letter stated that offshore drilling benefits would “go to oil companies and their supporters” while just “four or five windmills would provide enough electricity for all of Accomack County.”

All of the above are correct to an extent but they ignore the consequences of their proposals.

For 20 years, Muslim extremists have been killing Americans. Should we allow them to continue killing us unimpeded?

The war is partially about oil. Should we allow Shiite Iran to take over Shiite-dominated Iraq and then move on to conquer the hated Sunnis in Saudi Arabia? Iran would then control half the world’s oil.

Supply and demand determine price. Iran’s profits could fund religious wars to convert all of us around the world to the Quran.

We favor windmills, but what do we do when the wind is not blowing? We also believe in clean, safe nuclear power, which does not pollute and runs 24/7 at low cost. But oil and gas are important.

Cheap energy powers the machines and computers that allow us to compete favorably with cheap labor in this global economy.

Perhaps it is not a bad idea that we are fighting those who want to kill us and that we are protecting the sources of energy that make our modern life so much more comfortable and healthy than the lives not only of those who settled Jamestown 400 years ago but of those living in many other countries today.

Bob and Petra Armour

Virginia Beach

The economics of drilling

The matter of offshore oil drilling will come down to economics, not to spotted owls or what Rep. Thelma Drake or environmentalists want.

Reading The Pilot’s Business section recently, I found something interesting that points to why drilling probably won’t take place: Richmond-based Dominion Resources has sold its offshore oil and natural gas business.

Why sell that if drilling would be taking place in its backyard? The answer is that it is uneconomical.

Barney Fedele

Onley

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