Oil From The Frozen Tundra

The Senate moved one step closer today to allowing drilling for oil in ANWR. With oil prices jumping to new highs every day, Dem votes against drilling just seem silly. It's almost as though they want us to continue to be subservient to Arab oil interests...which of course they do because they think we'll then decide to invent the solar car that runs on water and sounds like birds chirping in the forest when it runs, or some other environmentally wacky and completely impractical design like that.

Amid the backdrop of soaring oil and gasoline prices, a sharply divided Senate on Wednesday voted to open the ecologically rich Alaska wildlife refuge to oil drilling, delivering a major energy policy win for President Bush.

The Senate, by a 51-49 vote, rejected an attempt by Democrats and GOP moderates to remove a refuge drilling provision from next year's budget, preventing opponents from using a filibuster - a tactic that has blocked repeated past attempts to open the Alaska refuge to oil companies.

The action, assuming Congress agrees on a budget, clears the way for approving drilling in the refuge later this year, drilling supporters said. The House has not included a similar provision in its budget, so the issue is still subject to negotiations later this year to resolve the difference.