UPDATE! UPDATE! on Senate Hearing

Just a quick update for those of you who may have missed it. The Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources held a hearing to discuss ANWR. Although the hearing was mostly a rehashing of the major arguments for and against, there were a couple moments worth pointing out. One of those moments was when Senator Al Franken spoke up against the ridiculous assertion that had been made several times, namely that in order to better combat climate change, Alaska needs to drill for more oil: "We are trying to drill more, create more pollutants, to then address climate change? Do you not see the irony in that?" The second notable moment was the testimony by Samuel Alexander, a member of the Gwichyaa Zhee Gwich'in tribal government: "To what end will you destroy our way of life?...You aren't addressing climate change, which has been stressing our other food sources as well as stressing the caribou. You aren't addressing our nation's growing deficit; in fact, opening the refuge represents a drop in the bucket of our budget ills. You aren't even addressing energy security...I fail to see how opening the refuge at a time when we are already a net exporter of energy provides us any geopolitical advantage. We are hard pressed to understand your reasoning behind opening the refuge."