Tapping Oil Reserves for politics

The Bush administration is considering releasing oil from the nations emergency stockpile. Considering the instability of all of the areas that are the source of the world's oil this is extremely irresponsible. This is a political move to attempt to stop the increase in oil prices before the election. Unfortunately Kerry and the Democrats have not taken the high road on this issue either, suggesting several weeks ago that the reserves should be tapped. I have been surprised that an administration that seems to do everything based on politics has resisted the irresponsible clamor for tapping the reserves up to this point.

In the past, President Bush has resisted calls to tap into the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, located in Texas and Louisiana, in an effort to counter soaring prices. Bush had criticized President Clinton's move in the fall of 2000 to tap the reserve, saying it was a political effort to help Democrat Al Gore, Bush's opponent in the 2000 election.

``We've always said the Strategic Petroleum Reserve was set up to protect against physical disruptions of oil supplies such as national emergencies or natural disasters, and not to manipulate prices or for political purposes,'' McClellan told a White House briefing.

McClellan confirmed reports that several U.S. refineries had asked to borrow for short periods of time small quantities of oil from the reserve supply. His comments appeared to suggest that such a move by the administration was likely.