Oil Companies

When I was a teenager, my dad would rail at length about how a ton of alternative-fuel technology had been invented, but every time a new development came along, Big Oil would buy the patent and "put it on the shelf. " That was 30 years ago. A patent expires after 20 years. So if anyone would just think to go back and look up all these old patents that the oil companies put on the shelf, we'd all be saved. I'm surprised nobody else has thought of this. When there are surges in the price of a nation's most important commodity, financially disastrous wars with bad results and poor harvests that spark economic strife, things are bound to get emotional.

CHAMBERSBURG, Pa. -- The answer to the crisis of high energy prices facing the nation cannot be solved by drilling for oil alone, but U.S. Rep. Bill Shuster said it is a good place to start. With a Sheetz sign for gas at $3.99 per gallon as a backdrop, Shuster, R-Pa., announced Tuesday that he has introduced legislation titled the Energy Independence Act that would allow drilling on the continental shelf and the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR), along with programs to develop alternative energy such as nuclear and wind power and coal liquefaction.

The oil is there, if we'd only drill To the editor: The average price for regular gas recently hit $4 a gallon. Gas prices have risen 75 percent since Nancy Pelosi took over as House Speaker. Where's the energy independence Democrats promised two years ago? Now they are again promising they will fix the gas prices, if you will just vote more of them into office. Of course, their fix for gas prices is a windfall profits tax, which didn't work for Jimmy Carter.

"There's a lesson to be learned from the Ed McMahon property foreclosure. An 85-year-old shouldn't have a $4.8 million mortgage. Rather risky, I'd say. " - Greencastle, Pa. "Did I miss it? Has our Congress done anything yet to help with the oil crisis, besides threatening the oil companies, which are not allowed to drill for more oil or build any more refineries because Congress said so?" "The yard sale is over and you have made your small fortune. Is it asking too much for you to remove your yard sale signs from the poles?

Whatever happened to that good old American attitude? Remember, "Can Do," "The Land of Opportunity," "The American Dream" and "Yankee Ingenuity"? I think political correctness has forced us to put aside the characteristics that made America great. We can no longer brag about the greatness of this nation, nor celebrate our successes. We can't even just use English anymore (have you noticed the bi-lingual signs in Lowe's lately?). Isn't it about time that we Americans put aside our petty differences and name calling and go "back to the future," pull together to make America the "land of the free and the home of the brave" again?

Nick Gavrilov, in a letter to the editor, questioned a statement that I made in an earlier article in The Herald-Mail. I said that we (the U.S.) are sitting on an ocean of oil. He asked where this ocean of oil is. That's a reasonable question. The answer is, this oil is located in various oil-shale formations inside the lower 48 states. We have known about oil shale for more than 50 years. Until recently, however, it was unavailable for extraction at a reasonable cost per barrel.