If You Are One of Hundreds of Millions of Americans That Believe We Will Never Run Out of Natural Resources...
...you are most certainly one of a hundred and fifty thousand men and women who have a job and feed their families directly or indirectly from producing, then exporting the last of our nation's hydrocarbons to foreign countries. Good for you, bad for our country's oil retirement account.
Exporting our countries last remaining affordable oil and gas is a disaster in the making. The people that tell you how good exports are for our nation's long term energy security are lying to you. It's a good thing to save for the future, to make sure that as you grow old you can take of yourself, and your children.
Etta Hume (1923-2014) was born in Summerville, Texas. She graduated from the University of Texas and worked for Walt Disney before becoming an award winning political cartoonist where she spent several decades with the Fort Worth Star Telegram. She aligned herself with liberal idealism and often drove conservatives in Texas nuts, particularly with regard to resource waste and disregard for energy conservation. Oil and gas, and Texas regulators, were always a good target for her cartoons.
This one above, from 1979 and the tail end of the OPEC's oil embargo years, is one of our favorites at OSB and we believe still very much applicable today. This cartoon was drawn just three years after the National Energy Conservation Act and the banning of oil exports. I ask you, what is different today than 47 years ago except there are now more people trying to make ends meet with fewer natural resources, that cost more than ever to extract, and with regard to shale oil...decline 70-90% the first three years of production life? Etta, I suspect, would be having a field day with current American energy policies.