by Sanford Horn

Created on: June 26, 2008   Last Updated: October 22, 2011

Domestic Oil Everywhere, but Not a Drop to Drill

Raise your hands if you know Yemen sold 13,000 barrels of crude oil and products each and every day during 2007 to the United States. OK, just raise your hands if you heard of Yemen in the first place. Yemen? Yes, Yemen. "Oh, good one! And Yemen,' that actually sounds like a real country!," said the ubiquitously clueless Joey Tribiani from the NBC comedy Friends.

Now, Yemen is not exactly one of our BFFs, as the teens say, yet we are helping to support their economy. And Yemen is just the tip of the oil-berg. Of the top 20 nations from which the United States imports oil, nine are part of the 13-member OPEC (Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries). And the total amount of oil the U.S. purchases from OPEC nations as a whole equals 5,983,000 barrels per day, every day, just in 2007 alone, according to the Energy Information Administration, the organization that provides official energy statistics from the United States government. That figure equals 44.5 percent of the total U.S. crude oil imports of 13,439,000 barrels each and every day during 2007.

So, while we are not drilling here in the United States, nor opening new refineries, something that hasn't been done in more than 30 years, we continue to grow the economies of countries that wish us harm, failure and ultimate destruction. This is not just deleterious to the economy of the United States, but its national security as well. From Saudi Arabia alone the U.S. procured 1,489,000 barrels per day last year; that country ranks number four on the list. At number five is Venezuela, led by the despotic Hugo Chavez. That country sold the U.S. 1,362,000 barrels per day last year. Again, the question must be asked why do we continue to do business with countries diametrically opposed to the goals and mission of the United States?

Angola, one of the few remaining communist countries in the world, ranks number seven, selling us more than a half million barrels per day last year. Iraq ranks number eight, selling us just under a half million barrels per day in 2007 and Libya, under its dictator Moammar al-Gadafi, ranks 19th and sold the U.S. 116,000 barrels per day last year.

First, the United States, in an effort to begin weaning itself off of foreign oil, should cease conducting business with countries seeking to do us harm. After all, the figures quoted above are far from diaphanous. As long as we need to procure foreign crude oil and products, the United

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