Trillions Go Missing Thanks to Obama

The Obama administration's "permitorium" on drilling in the Gulf (today's approval of a Shell drilling program remains to be seen as either a change of policy or a begrudging concession to mounting legal pressure) is decimating the economy of the Gulf Coast region and driving up gas prices. This we know, but what is less known is the other negative ripple effects throughout the economy. A recent study gives us some insight into the dollars that flow to other parts of the country from oil and gas drilling activity in the Gulf region. From 2008-2010, $1.8 billion dollars was spent by member companies of the Shallow Water Energy Security Coalition on vendors located outside of the Gulf region, or $600 billion dollars per year. That is money that won't get spent if there is no drilling activity. Think about it, the government passed the supposedly crucial and then undeniably awesome $800 billion stimulus spending bill to putatively save the economy and yet the administration's current policy is demonstrably choking off a minimum of $600 billion in places outside of the Gulf Coast region. So what amount of spending is the Obama Permitorium Policy choking off in total? Alot more. Hundreds of billions. By the logic of the stimulus, this reduction in vendor spending should severely contract the economy, and it is. Now add on the hundreds of billions more in capital expenditures in other industries that have been driven to the sidelines (corporations have enormous cash balances currently) either from punitive policies or the poisonous anti-business rhetoric of Obama's first two years. So the government doled out $800 billion with one hand and removed trillions through dangerous rhetoric and awful policy on the other hand; and, people wonder why the economy is doing so poorly. The Pelosi/Reid era in the Congress and the Obama administration have written a case study in how to hold back a juggernaut $13 trillion economy.

UPDATE: Whaddya know, great minds think alike...the good folks over at Say Anything have more...