Don’t Feel Sorry for Drillers
THERE IS AN arrogance that comes with being the biggest bully on the block. Chuck Moran, president of the Independent Petroleum Association of New Mexico, plays that bully perfectly in his recent commentary, “Otero Mesa Drilling No Longer Economical.”
Moran writes that pressure to preserve Otero Mesa, and subsequent dissatisfaction with BLM’s final decision to permanently protect less than 10 percent of the arena from drilling, comes from “they (grassroots environmental organizations) and their yacht and caviar foundations.”
Underhandedly, he suggests nonprofit environmental groups are rolling in cash, while the oil and gas firms he represents deserve the sympathy usually reserved for those down on their luck.
It reminds you of the bully that would push and push, and then run crying for a teacher when they were finally pushed back. Moran represents an incredibly powerful and rich lobby in New Mexico. They are required to pay the $1.3 billion in taxes that Moran mentions, and yet recently still cleared record profits.
Groups working to protect Otero Mesa operate with limited budgets, rely on volunteers and receive significant funding from members throughout New Mexico. Implying otherwise is doing a disservice to the real issue? whether a few days of energy from lands like Otero Mesa is worth the drilling of oil and gas wells all over that land.
NATHAN SMALL
Los Lunas
Drilling Debate Is All Talk
I HAVE TOURED several major oil and gas fields in New Mexico and have seen the industry’s standards and practices firsthand.
I challenge Chuck Moran and representatives from the Independent Petroleum Association of New Mexico to tour these existing (oil and gas) fields with the “self-indulgent, perverted,” environmentalists and with reporters from the Journal. Wouldn’t it be ideal for Moran to confront his foes on the battlefield, to prove their dishonesty, right in front of journalists?
The Journal seems satisfied doing nothing at all, while presenting a stream of neverending, point-counterpoint editorial rhetoric on the drilling issue. The Journal seems completely incurious about the truth, which is most un-journalistic. Isn’t it time to report on drilling and production standards and impacts in New Mexico firsthand, with the opposing sides there to defend their positions?
JOE ADAIR
Albuquerque
mjh’s Blog: We Pay Taxes, So You Shut Up!
mjh’s Blog: anti-environmentalists