If anyone is tired of $3.60+ gas prices, why don't we ask Obama why only 1/3 of the Federal lands that are fairly certain to contain recoverable quantities of oil and gas producing tar sands and shale have been opened to exploration?  This administration has an agenda - keep conventional energy prices painfully high so they can continue to convince us that we need to switch to stupid "green" sources.
And forget this nonsense of fracking polluting ground water.  Fracking around here takes place at depths of around 5,000 feet - that's right, a mile underground.  My well on my farm bottoms out at 100 feet.

Fracking is occurring in my state nad has created a mini boon. However, I disagree that fracking always occurs at such depths and with zero ramifications... especially for those that suffer through it with no compensation.

My mother ( age 78) had them setting off explosions all around her urban neighborhood for weeks on end. It was enough to get her to go to the doctor for sleep aids.

I don't really think Obama cares one way or the other. The laws are already there...To be sure he could choose not to enforce them and be beat up for another "executive order". While I would love cheaper gas, I don't think the price rests on the hands of one president.

Of course living in MS.. I could be a bit over sensitive to oil company claims of love and good will to all. See there was this oil spill .......

Pine -
The Administration is in charge of leases of these Federal lands.  They can make it reasonable to get a lease, or so darn complicated and full of roadblocks that it's near impossible.  And, they are ones who choose where to grant the exploration leases.

I know a number of people in the oil business and they all tell me we hundreds of years of oil in the states.  Enough to run this country for 300 + years of oil and natural gas from reserves that we know of.

As wells have been drilled & used, new ways have been developed.
What wasnt viable, is, due to technology. not JUst as a function of price,
Price drives a lot of production methods, but with directional drilling
& very accurate well logging, the ability to drill along a narrow production zone has created wells today where 40 years ago wouldnt have even been a well.,.

Yep, it was $4.50 BEFORE the fracking boom.  Now that technology has caught up, we have the potential to supply ourselves.  Why aren't we doing it?  Because this administration doesn't want to see it happen.

Strange bedfellows, but all three, environmentalist, government, and oil like higher prices. It is a cash crop via taxes collected on it, and it leaves room to "reason" only a few cents per gallon increase at the retail level seems like chump change when you're looking at a 100 bucks to fill up. Also, the fuel efficient cars have led to tax revenue decreases, as the need to tank up is less, so a higher price per recoups some of it. But soon we will be taxed on an odometer reading....and those who tamper with theirs will go to prison with those who neglect to get health insurance    

Midnight -
Don't paint all elected officials with the same brush - that's another thing that bothers me.
Most, well over 90%, are good people trying to serve the public.  Very, very few are dishonest.  Some, yes, but a very small minority, just like any other occupation.
Maybe people are tired of hearing me brag about my son-in-law.  A graduate of the Fisher School of Business at Ohio State University with a double major in finance and economics.  A really bright guy.
He's a state representative from our county, and he unabashedly has aspirations for higher political office.
He is presently paid about $63K, give or take a couple of thousand.  That's about 1/3 of what he could earn in the finance world.  He has a dream to reform gov't - make it simpler, less complicated, and more responsive.  Worthy goals.  He's making a huge personal financial sacrifice to try to make it happen.
Most of the other representatives I've met are just like him - bright people, many working another job part-time to bolster their incomes.  There is a black man from the northern part of the state, and while he's a Dem, he's one of my son-in-law's best friends in the House, and they have co-sponsored a couple of bills together, since both serve on the education committee of the House.
So, please don't refer to all politicians as crooks, thieves, whatever.  You don't really know what you're talking about.