The American Cause: Much Ado About ANWR

Much Ado About ANWR
5/18/01

Listen to the liberal histrionics du jour and you might believe ANWR is a place on par with heaven and that the President's energy plan is really a plot to snuff out caribou and soak baby seals in Valdez-style oil slicks.

Here are the facts: The Arctic National Wildlife Refuge -- which is layered in ice most of the year -- is, in the words of the scarcely conservative Washington Post, "one of the bleakest, most remote places on earth." Within this 19-million acre wilderness, a 2000-acre sliver of the costal plain - 0.01% of the total land mass - is oil rich. So rich in fact that the 16 billion barrels the U.S. Geological Survey estimates lie beneath its frozen surface could replace our Saudi Arabian imports for three decades.

Still the love bead legionnaires are up in arms. Perhaps they didn't notice that 192 million acres of Alaska are already protected parks and refuges. Maybe they missed the report that 78% of natives support drilling. Could be they were out buying new Birkenstocks when the news broke that annual oil imports have topped $100 billion.

Truth is, most liberals will never visit the ANWR because a trip would ruin their vision of a nirvana that isn't there. But logic isn't the strong suit of the crowd that claims Tipton kangaroo rats are oppressed, global warming has us all on slow-cook, and Republicans like lacing drinking water with arsenic.

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