Editorial - Pump that oil out of Alaska

Interior Secretary Gail Norton recently spoke the obvious when she said the U.S. needs to boost its domestic energy production to battle a threatened oil embargo by Iraq. She said we need to begin drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.

"There are energy implications for national security," Norton told nationally syndicated radio host Sean Hannity. "We need to have more American oil production so that we are immunized from these kinds of things."

Norton listed the steps she said the U.S. needed to take:

-- We need to have energy conservation.

-- We need to have alternative sources of energy and renewable energy.

-- But for right now, what we need to have is a strong source of traditional oil and gas.

One of the things that's obviously on the table is production in ANWR. Norton said ANWR oil reserves would be enough to offset any Iraqi oil boycott, though it would take five to seven years for production to get up to speed.

"If we'd done it a few years back, we wouldn't quite have the same concern we have today, since we anticipate that ANWR would produce for a 35- or 40-year period as much oil as we get from Saddam Hussein's Iraq every day," said Norton.

Norton's remarks were the latest effort by a Bush administration official to fashion the debate over drilling in ANWR in national security terms, and within the context of the war on terrorism.

Congressional Democrats suckling to the radical Greens have so far thwarted administration efforts to tap into ANWR's vast reserves, claiming drilling would jumble the Alaskan tundra's ecosystem -- as frozen as it is.

Polls show Alaska residents overwhelmingly support ANWR drilling. Of the 19 million acres there, drilling would only occur on about 2,200 acres.

Because dated domestic sources have been sapped and demand continues to rise, Norton said U.S. dependence on foreign oil has expanded from 40 percent in 1991 to 57 percent now. Studies predict foreign dependence is projected to increase to 67 percent by the year 2020.

The U.S. currently imports 800,000 barrels of oil per day from Iraq on top of 6 million barrels per day from Saudi Arabia.

Iraq has called for an OPEC oil boycott against Israel and any nation that supports it until the Israeli army withdraws from the Palestinian territories. So far only Iran has said it would back Iraq.

It is long overdue that the Democrats and their enviro-wacko constituents climb aboard the Patriot Express. We need greater independence from foreign oil -- especially Mideast oil -- and we need it sooner rather than later.