Resolution: Allowing deep water offshore oil drilling is in the best interest of the United States

========== Contention 1 ========== Sub point A My opponent defends by saying that it wouldn't make sense for the companies to drill underwater and risk being sued if there were such a large oil field in the US. Well until recently, being sued wasn't a large risk. Companies had deep-water oil plants running all over with few malfunctions at all. "It's the year 2010, and behold, we have an oil spill on our hands." Precisely. SO WHY SHOULD WE KEEP DOING THE ACT THAT LED TO THE OIL SPILL? Sub point B "But regardless of whether clean energy helps the environment, there is no reason to believe that a reliance on oil will slow our progress towards clean energy. There are new, "clean" vehicles being developed, and they will soon be mass produced. Everyone knows that oil is a finite resource and that we will soon need to find a new fuel. The sooner the better." I would agree with most of what my opponent has stated. However, the more of the "finite" resource that we have, the less of a rush we are put in to develop new technologies. My opponent later contradicts his reasoning when he says that we should advance technology in deep-water drilling. If that kind of technology should be researched quickly, why not this kind? If you accept his attack against my case, you have to drop his defense here. Sub point C "My argument has nothing to o[sic] with domestic capitalism." I know, I was showing how capitalism and supply-and-demand have helped shape one of the greatest economies ever. While your capitalism is on an international level, the same principles apply. When many parties are trying to sell the same thing, the PRICE GOES DOWN. If only one company had access to all of the oil in the world, prices would skyrocket. Why? Because no one is there to compete with them, to offer the consumer a lower price. Basically, competition=lower prices, domestic or not. =========== Contention 2 =========== "In response to my second contention, my opponent refers to the fact that there is a massive oil field under North Dakota. This doesn't mean that offshore drilling doesn't increase the supply of usable oil." This is not all that I said, but I do agree with your statement. Its not really an argument so much as a fact. If you drill for more oil, you will bring in more oil. (duh) However, we have dumped that extra oil into the ocean's of the world and onto the shores of our nation. Neither of which are beneficial to the United States' interests. =========== Contention 3 =========== (Please note that I was only offering an example of a better way to employ people. I was not suggesting that we take them out of the oil industry and put them in apple factories.) Note also that he DROPS my attack on the employment issue completely. He concedes that it provides safer jobs, but says that its ok to drill because it would give us better technology which would benefit society as a whole. In addition to bringing up a new argument, he contradicts his earlier attack on my technology issue. You cannot give him both points because they contradict. I believe that there is a healthy medium, that involves not dumping billions of gallons of oil into the Gulf of Mexico. I don't really see why you should get to ask questions now since I can't ask you any, but whatever. 1 - Hopefully we would have either found another safe field or developed clean energy technologies. I could ask you that same question about your offshore oil fields. 2 - We use it for several reasons. A few are the difficulty of converting ALL gasoline engines to alternative energy consuming engines, huge costs, and the fact that we simply don't have a better alternative right now. Thats why I want to speed up the improvement of alternative energy technologies. 3 - The fact that we are allowed to freely trade across the states...its in your history book. 4 - Thats really not my problem, you can bring up your own evidence if you wish. 5 - It has nothing to do with the ocean, it was just an example. Coastal areas usually fish though. 6 - I don't think that last question was intended for me. Thanks for your time, and for the good debate. Cheers. http://energy.er.usgs.gov...