Former Georgia Congressman Bob Barr has published an op-ed in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution titled, “Boone Pickens’ recipe for Energy Independence is a Winner.” He writes about our importing seventy percent of the oil we need and the amount of money we send overseas to pay for it.

Overdependence on imported oil tethers America to unstable and hostile regimes, and requires the U.S. to stretch and plant its military presence across the globe. Obtaining oil from mercurial suppliers such as Venezuela, or extracting it from states like Iraq by means of occupation, represents neither fiscally sustainable nor wise policies.

Barr correctly points out:

There’s nothing inherently wrong with allowing the free market to work in this regard; other countries have what we need, so they sell and we buy.

Free-market competition, however, should not dictate we put our heads in the sand and continue importing oil with no thought to the future. What makes sense in the short term and the long term is for the U.S. to develop domestic natural gas reserves as a supplement and as an alternative to oil.

While we should allow the free market to operate, we should also use a little common sense; which would tell us it’s irresponsible to empower our adversaries, tie our country’s hands diplomatically and financially, and seriously hamper our economic recovery.

Barr then goes on to discuss the domestic natural gas alternative:

What makes sense in the short term and the long term is for the U.S. to develop domestic natural gas reserves as a supplement and as an alternative to oil. We have sufficient known natural gas reserves spread across the lower 48 states to supply America with energy from natural gas for the next 90 years.”

Bob Barr concludes his essay with:

Doing business with countries hostile to American interests is not smart – investing in our own industry and creating jobs is smart economics, smart politics, and smart foreign relations. And T. Boone Pickens is showing us the way.

To read the entire essay by Bob Barr in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, click HERE.

— The Pickens Team