Bumper Sticker Alert: Drill, Daby, Drill.

Bumper stickers just might be evil.

Of course I see some with which I agree, and many that make me laugh. But we can never let ourselves forget that putting a slogan on our car is NOT the same thing as communicating. What bumper stickers do, in effect, is identify you as part of a team -- which draws a line between you and their team. There are times for teams, and public dialogue is not really one of them. Once that line is drawn, something funny happens in our brains: we choose sides. It's automatic and unconscious. Again, there are times for sides, but finding understanding isn't one of them.

I'm starting a recurring segment: Bumper Sticker Alert. I'll try to tackle BSs from both sides, as both sides are equally likely to be foolish. But don't be surprised if most are on the "conservative" side, for the simplistic reason that conservatives are more likely to argue against change.

Anyway, today's BS:

Drill Here, Drill Now, Pay Less.

First, my emotional response which largely mirrors the greenies' response: if we know oil is ultimately a big part of the problem we face in the world -- why should we work so hard to get more of it out to pollute the world?

Of course, the economic reality is that oil runs our machines and non-oil machines are not yet near. The sad fact is that we'll need to keep drilling and burning oil while we work to turn this ship around (let's just try to systematically reduce our usage and increase our efficiency as we work on those green machines).

So, as time rushes us forward we'll probably eventually get at that approximately 19 billion barrels underneath the arctic and off the U.S. shores. I don't like it, and I'll drag my feet, but I suspect it will happen.

The reason I would yield -- that is, raise my dragging feet, is NOT because of the argument behind this idiotic sticker. The simple fact is that drilling here anytime will not effect our prices one bit. Understand this -- global oil consumption is currently running somewhere around 80 billion barrels a day. Every day. So, if we get jiggy and drill baby drill right now, we'll add 19 billion barrels of oil to the global market over the next 25 years.

Do you understand the idea of supply and demand and how it determines price? Does it make sense that if the current quantities demanded and supplied net out to 80 billion barrels per day at a given price, then adding some fraction of 19 billion of oil to that supply, the prices will not go down.

Do you think you can grow a bushel of tomatoes for sale and expect them to drop the price that grocery stores charge?

Consider the oil companies who will invest whatever they invest to get at that oil. When it starts pumping out of their refineries, do you think they will check out the current global prices and charge less for their oil? Why, because they love America? Get real.

My suggestion for drilling in ANWR and other sensitive areas: sell extraction leases (for a bazillion dollars) and place environmental restrictions to protect the local environment that are so rigorous, and therefore expensive, that no oil company can sell it for less than triple the current global price of oil. Don't worry, oil company -- as global oil reserves dwindle, that oil will become more and more valuable, and can therefore be priced high enough to cover the high costs.

Eventually, it will make economic sense to drill.