Cuba Bidding Oil Leases in The Gulf

The Cuban government is bidding oil leases off the coast of Florida - only it's our oil that he is leasing out. But of course we can't drill for it because we might damage the environment and we sure don't want to take that chance even if it means our way of life in this country is threatened by high gas prices for our cars and heating fuel for our homes.

This is a direct result of the Socialist Progressives, liberal Democrats, making deals with tyrants like Chevez and Castro and the environmental terrorists in this country. How is it possible that so few can control so many? Why do keep voting these people back into office? Why do we allow the environmental community to dictate the terms of our survival? Why???

This is really going to be a problem in the very near future, like in the next two years - go ahead and vote for the NSPP and watch what happens to energy costs.


INVESTOR'S BUSINESS DAILY Posted Wednesday, March 19, 2008

*Energy Policy:* Cuba invites bids to develop oil reserves 45 miles off the coast of South Florida that are as large as those in ANWR. So why are the United States and its Navy buying oil from a state sponsor of terror?------------------------------------------------------------------------Read More: *Energy <*" target=_BLANK>http://www.ibdeditorials.com/FeaturedCategories.aspx?sid=1812>* *Latin America & Caribbean <*" target=_BLANK>http://www.ibdeditorials.com/FeaturedCategories.aspx?sid=1821&cid=1807>*------------------------------------------------------------------------

The Heritage Foundation reports that when U.S. Navy and Marine personnel fill up at their local Navy Base Exchange, they're buying their gasoline from a company owned by Venezuelan dictator Hugo Chavez. Citgo has a $60-million-a-year contract to supply the Navy Exchange with gas through 2010.

Formerly an American company, Citgo was sold in 1990 and is now owned by PDV America Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of the state-owned oil company, Petroleos de Venezuela S.A. But don't expect to see its signs: After Chavez's September 2006 speech at the U.N., where he called President Bush "the devil," the Navy changed the signs to "NEX."

Venezuela is using money from its oil exports to the U.S. to buy $3.4 billion worth of Russian weaponry, including 100,000 AK-103 and AK-104 assault rifles, a dozen Mi-17 military helicopters and 24 SU-30MK fighter jets.

The irony is that it's also negotiating a multibillion-dollar, multiyear contract to buy four Kilo-class diesel submarines and four state-of-the-art Amur submarines. They're intended to confront the U.S. Navy in the Caribbean and try to sink the ships those sailors and Marines sail on.

As we have reported, Venezuela is a state sponsor of terror, although it hasn't been officially designated as such. A recently captured laptop belonging to Raul Reyes, second-in-command of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), showed a Venezuelan commitment of $300 million to the FARC — $50 million of which, the computer indicated, has been paid out.The FARC has been formally designated as a state sponsor of terror by Canada, the European Union and the Latin American Parliament. But it hasn't been by the U.S., at least not yet. The Bush administration has launched a preliminary legal inquiry into the obvious that could land Venezuela on the list.

Rhonda Shore, spokeswoman for the State Department's Office of the Coordinator for Counterterrorism, says that in order to qualify, a government must have "repeatedly provided support for acts of international terrorism." That shouldn't be hard. Designating Venezuela as a state sponsor of terror would shut off its oil exports to the U.S., where its Citgo refineries are among the few in the world that can handle its heavy crude. This would make it hard for Chavez to export his tyranny and even stay in power.

Venezuela is the fourth-largest supplier of petroleum to the U.S., after Canada, Mexico and Saudi Arabia. The question is whether cutting it off would hurt us more than them. A better question is whether it makes sense to buy oil from this thug at $100 a barrel.I

f ever tapping our Strategic Petroleum Reserve made sense, this would be the occasion. At least it would be a bridge until we developed our own untapped oil reserves, a natural strategic oil reserve, if we had a mind to.

Soon there will be rigs 45 miles off the coast of Florida tapping into oil and gas reserves nearly as large as those contained in a tiny frozen part of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. But the rigs will belong to Hugo's friend and ally, the Cuba of Fidel and Raul Castro.

The U.S. Geological Survey estimates that the North Cuban Basin contains as many as 9.3 billion barrels of oil (multiply by $100 plus) and almost 1 trillion cubic feet of natural gas.Thanks to an agreement negotiated by Jimmy Carter that splits the 90 miles of water between the U.S. and Cuba for economic purposes, it will not be exploited by us.

Since pools of oil do not respect international boundaries, Cuban rigs will be sucking dry oil that rightfully should be ours. With vast amounts of oil off our shores, why are we still buying oil from Hugo Chavez, and why is the U.S. Navy?