More Oil, More Roads

How many decades have we heard presidents say that we need to be investing in those highways, roads, bridges? President Obama is no different in that respect. I’d argue that creating permanent private-sector jobs ought to take precedence over road building right now. But that’s beside the point.

When I think about building roads, asphalt comes to mind. I’m not a chemist or anything but my guess is that asphalt requires hydrocarbons (oil) to produce.

For as long as President Obama has been talking about building and rebuilding road and highway infrastructure, the number of road miles ought to be right on the tip of his tongue. He’s just that smart.

Since he knows that, he ought to also know how much it would cost to do whatever it is he plans on doing, if he got everything he wanted.

I wonder how much money could be saved in the very same project if the price of oil were as low as it would be if we ever got serious at developing our own energy production, becoming an oil-producing country, a seller of oil, like those countries who we currently buy from, instead of an oil buyer.

My guess is that the saving would be substantial. And why on earth, especially in todays economic climate, wouldn’t we want to reduce the cost of oil and save. It would be a big saving for ‘working people,’ to borrow the Left’s class warfare term. Actually, everybody would save. What a novel idea.

 

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