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U.S. should get oil from Iraq

On June 3, page A7, a report on a World page discussed bringing Iraqi oil exports back to prewar production levels.

My question is: Who gets the oil?

The U.S. is footing the bill for stability in Iraq. Our soldiers are there giving their lives to accomplish that.

Shouldn’t we receive oil as payment to cover some of our costs. If we already do, why are the oil prices so high?

Who is getting the oil?

Ans Schot
Mount Vernon


Government asleep at the drill

Is our government asleep?

The U.S. is in the middle of a huge economic downfall that most of the senators, governors and even the president are looking past. Natural resources, such as oil, are a concern. We have the resources to drill within our own borders. Oil companies are getting huge tax breaks for what?

Someone please wake them up before it is to late.

Chad Wemple
Sedro-Woolley


The history of appeasers

Is it the truth politicians think they know or the truth as it really is? There’s a wee bit of difference between the two.

Exposure to parents, schools, churches and certain people may leave us ground and frayed, polished and shaped, or misshaped by those we love, mentor or listen to.

Past is always present because knowledge and character are drawn from it daily. Accumulation of past events forms character, however, it is the doing or use of knowledge that will be judged.

Prior to WWII, Chamberlain and Hitler met, and much of Britain reacted as Democrats are doing today — fearing nothing more than war, and their current president.

Chamberlain was cheered when returning with “peace in our time.” History shows that many appeasers are good and well-meaning, though naive.

“An appeaser is someone who feeds the crocodiles, hoping they will eat him last,” Churchill said. An appeaser is one who is willing to compromise his nation’s interest without equal or any concessions. Experienced diplomats buy and sell, appeasers just continue to give away.

Former President Carter today shuttles worldwide meeting with terrorists and any America-hating dictator. We are aware of accomplishments that relegated him to one term.

Facts support beliefs that Obama will be the farthest-left presidential candidate ever representing a political party. He is articulate, majoring in oratory, as he experiences his first term as a junior senator. America is offered from the liberal left a fresh and different face voicing a changeable, unpredictable course.

No past on Earth can teach love of country like trees and grasses, colorful flowers, and companionable people. America is not the current problem, but one of the credible solutions.

John Wilkinson
Anacortes


Of oil exploration, habeas corpus

The week of June 8 provides two fine examples of why who you elect and what his or her political philosophy is really counts for something.

On June 11, the House Appropriations Committee had an opportunity to revisit and approve, subject to state veto, the ability of oil companies to explore and produce oil offshore — between 50 and 100 miles from the American coast. This distance would put these oil rigs beyond the view of observers from even the tallest of buildings shore side.

At a time when we are shipping billions of dollars a month to buy oil from countries that wish us ill and are paying $4.50 per gallon of gas, developing domestic oil supplies would seem like a relatively smart call. One hundred percent of Democrats on the committee thought otherwise, so we will continue to have the privilege of buying oil from the Saudis, the Venezuelans, the Iranians and the Russians at whatever price they wish to charge.

Think $4.50 a gallon is good for us? These committee members apparently would like you to pay more. Perhaps they think it will be even better for you.

Not to be outdone in making decisions that threaten our nation, on June 12, five liberal Supreme Court justices decided to extend habeas corpus protection to battlefield combatants for the first time in history, allowing jihadists held at the Guantanamo Bay facility to seek redress in U.S. district courts. In the dissenting opinion of the chief justice, this decision will result in the deaths of Americans. It may well.

I respect that some reading this will heartily approve of preventing domestic oil exploration and the release of jihadists into the U.S. court system, and this illustrates why votes do matter. We are reaping the effects of those votes. I suspect there are more such effects to come.

Carl Loeb
Mount Vernon