Well, we all know that Barack Obama has ceased all domestic oil production. I'm pretty sure that is what the Right Wing Noise Machine wants their audience to hear.
The truth is quite different and for the wingnuts, this is probably bad news.
We are within shooting distance of being the world's biggest producer of petroleum in the world.
More after the slick squiggle.
Now, I'm not a fan of oil and I'm sure most Kossacks would agree. We should be moving in giant leaps and bounds to cleaner, renewable sources of energy. Regardless, this story takes away one of the great Republican bullshit stories this year- that American oil production is falling and it's the President's fault.
Research out todayshows that US crude production is set for its biggest one year gain since 1951.
The Energy Department forecasts that we will produce an average of 11.4 million barrels of liquid hydrocarbon fuels per day this year. That is just short of the amount the number one producer, Saudi Arabia put out each day. The forecast says, that in five years, the US could be an exporter of crude oil.
Of course, the down side is a lot of the growth comes from fracking, and other terribly polluting ways of producing crude oil. With the increase in automobile fuel efficiency, our need for crude oil should drop somewhat as production continues to increase.
Hopefully this story gets some loud mainstream news play. Not because reliance of oil from any source is good news for the environment, but because this massive rise in domestic production is good news for the President and it kills yet another bullshit Republican talking point.