" Andy -- that's a really long "as long as" -- regulations do not get enforced, corporations find ways to get around them legally as well as illegally, and there's always the drunk or drugged up oil ship captain or rigger or whatever. Once you open the door, everything floods through: regulations don't work. I WISH they did, but they don't. "

" Everyone on here that has paid attention to my post knows that I'm all for treating our environment better and a huge proponent fo green technology. That being said we should be drilling for oil in Alaska. As long as the drillers follow the very strict industry regulations and Alaskan laws. "

" Thanks, brew! ;-)

Oil-centric may be forced to change, sooner than we'd like.... "

" The caribou can't vote but they have more common sense than you. I am making these brief comments to save space on the forums taken up by FGs long posts LOL. "

" There is no proof that oil exploration in Alaska has done any damage to the caribou population there... in fact, the caribou are thriving. I also don't believe anyone can single out a particular species of animal that has been brought to the brink of extinction or even a decline in number attributable to oil exploration/drilling in Alaska. If there is, I haven't heard of it.

We live in an oil-centric world and that isn't going to change any time soon, so we should use whatever means necessary to reduce our dependance on foreign oil. "

" So, you think the primary motivation for politicians when they make decisions about our world should be fear of not getting re-elected rather than right and wrong, or what's good for our world?

I'm sure it happens all the time, but that doesn't make it roght or a good basis for decision-making in your life, especially if you are responsible for making laws that effect everyone -- people, animals and our whole world.

The price thing is short-term -- we WILL run out of gas and it won't matter what it cost us to do so, not in the larger scheme of things. But species need not die out and soil, air and water need not be polluted as we rush to use up what oil is left in the world a little faster with slightly lower prices. Death of a species is not short-term; it's permanent, as is much of the destruction of the environment.

I still can't get over the ethics of promoting making decisions based on what others think of you rather than on what's right or wrong.

Farmer's Gal, Aurora "