I would hope Andrew Leonard could give it a better shot than this. He, like most of the far left, phrase the issue on drilling offshore as a zero sum game, as if the minute we start drilling offshore we stop investing in alternative fuel sources? For that to happen, the price of oil would have to come down significantly, and the far left is already telling us this will not happen - so why worry? This is a similar tactic used with regard to drilling and the fuzzy Polar Bear, as if drilling meant imminent doom for the Bear, instead of both being able to thrive side by side. Take Brazil for instance, they are held up as one of the standard bearers of alternative energy sources, and yet the minute they discovered 55 Billion barrels of crude off their coast, they didn't fret about ruining their beautiful beaches and tourism, they planned to stick a giant vacuum in that deposit and pump away, regardless of their success with biofuels. So why is it the likes of Mr. Leonard think the U.S. is the only country who would be smart not to tap their own resources? Why is he comfortable to let China drill 50 miles off the coast of Florida, providing good jobs to Chinese and Cuban workers, but not the U.S.? Does he believe the Chinese will be better at protecting our environment? What about Canada and Europe, who drill everytime they find a source, in addition to looking for alternative sources? Why is it Mr. Leonard thinks the U.S. should be the ONLY country in the world who shouldn't develop a short term (more drilling & exploration), and a long term solution (nuclear and alternatives)concurrently? What is he afraid of and not saying?

It appears the lefts argument in this is that they dont see this as a short term or silver bullet solution to our current energy problem - they are correct, but only slightly. No one is saying this is the magic formula, just why would you limit your own energy strategy to something as unproven and inefficient as alternative sources like solar or wind, when they have been around for decades and have not produced any evidence of becoming a baseload source? Why do you phrase the question, intellectually dishonestly I might add, as a zero sum game? Why would you not acknowledge that our economy will run on fossil fuels for several decades more before we can turn alternatives into viable options? Lastly, why would you not opt for a solution that said any new oil produced from these efforts have a per barrel tax that could go into a lock box (Al Gore favorite) for alternative energy R&D? The left has put all their eggs in the alternative basket, unlike the rest of the Kyoto loving world, without embracing proven technologies like nuclear and yet tout wind which has been around for decades and produced nearly nothing? You lefties should embrace exploration and drilling, but try to extract your pound of flesh and tie some strings to new oil and be seen as part of the solution, instead of being against everything thats parctical in the next ten years, while being for something that has yet to make itself a reasonable alternative.

I love how all the nutter lefties in here abhor the poor wolve, while having no problem yanking a fetus from the womb at 7 months. You just dont get it!

In reading these comments, its like I've entered a parallel universe, where up is down, left is right, etc. Are you telling me that this many Salon readers are this clueless (I guess rhetorical on my part)? Do you honestly believe that the likes of Olbermann and what's been taking place at MSNBC is either good for the network or good for political discourse? I mean come on, any objective individual (maybe that's my problem) could see that having Olbermann and Mattews do hard news or debate analysis would be like Fox having BillO do the same? That is ridiculous, yet the minions here cant seem to understand the decision by MSNBC? MSNBC became an embarassment, how many fights did the anchors have with each other on air over the past 2 weeks? And you guys thought that was good either for the network or its parent company? And you think it was the righties who got them off the air? Its one thing to have Olbermann do his little show that no one watches - but its entirely another to use him as some sort of unbiased news anchor. And to blame this on Corp media, that is too funny. From reading most of these lefty posts, I just hope you guys keep the sharp objects away from yourselves tonight, you are a gloom and doom bunch - but that's what makes you lefties in the first place.

cargocult - Uh, what youre advocating is what Mccain challenged Obama to, 10 town hall debates. One on Nat'l security, one on economy, etc., with no moderator, just the two of them taking questions or talking about their policies. They would invite all the networks access to the coverage together. However, Obama didnt accept, too bad. I think this would have been great for democracy, and the electorate to hear directly from the candidates without the soundbites, etc. So, the republican candidate was the one who wanted to take their message directly to the people, but the dem apparently had concerns. I too am concerned that the debates format will squash any real good debates. Both candidates should be sitting at a table, no moderators (unless to get the ball rolling maybe), and just have discussions on their principles and values on each subject at hand. You can have 5 of them, or 5 hours, I don't care, but we should demand from Obama what McCain has proposed.