Two Competing Visions On Energy

I do not know how long the Democrats can keep selling their snake oil on gas prices -blaming it all on Republicans and Big Oil while they appease the radical environmental lobby, preventing the exploitation of our own oil and coal resources while blocking new refiniries and nuclear plants. This is thrown into stark relief today by Rep. Roy Blunt (R-Mo) via Powerline:

Explanation: Methodology: Retail gasoline prices are the result of literally hundreds of factors including crude oil supply, global demand, refinery capacity, regulation, taxes, weather, the value of the dollar, etc. Therefore it is impossible to say with certainty what one individual action will do to the overall price. However, based on what we know about the impact of crude oil supply and prices it is possible to develop some potential ranges of impact on gasoline prices for certain policy changes. For example, using the methodology employed by Speaker Pelosi and House Democrats that suspending shipments into the Strategic Petroleum Reserve (between 40-77,000 barrels of oil a day) would reduce gas prices by at least 5 cents, bringing ANWR online (at least one million barrels of oil a day) could impact gasoline prices by between 70 cents and $1.60.

As I wrote in Republicans Ponder the Abyss, one of the four keys to Republican survival and resurgence is effectively communicating. Hats off to Rep. Blunt who is doing precisely that. I wonder if he would loan that chart to McCain?

Update: Soccer Dad has an exceptional post on these issues.