I'll see your executive order, and raise you one

As the Obama administration prepares to takes office, there has been much ballyhoo regarding the speculated decision on the part of the President-Elect to overturn roughly 200 of President Bush's executive orders.

Rulings on these executive orders tend to large be the spoils of war. There has been a long tradition of incoming President of a different party reversing policies of the prior administration. President Reagan enacted a ban on incidental funding of abortion programs overseas through foreign aid restrictions. President Clinton overturned this when he came into office, and President G.W. Bush responded in kind.

On the energy front, the big prize is the 18-year executive order banning offshore drilling in certain areas of the coast of the United States. Both Congress and the President have the authority to enact this ban, and environmental groups are pushing hard for Obama to renege on an election promise to allow these coastal regions to be explored.

Two orders that conservationists are hoping to kill without too much controversy:
1. Order directing agencies to remove some restrictions and regulation regarding distribution of exploration permits to oil and gas companies
2. Order requiring agencies to issue "impact statements" if they adversely affect energy development

The huge irony here is that any action the Obama administration does or does not take is largely symbolic in nature. Any areas of the country that are opened up to exploration as a result of refusing to reinstitute the drilling ban are years away from being able to yield oil and gas. Since the price of oil has dropped dramatically in recent weeks, the impetus to explore and find proven reserves with a high extraction cost has also waned. Therefore, resolving this issue will not help the price at the pump, nor will it make a dent in the US’s dependence on foreign sources of oil.

Any debate on this issue is a total waste of time. Spending time on this debate will only detract from the real problem, which is to put a solution in place that will curb the long-term domestic demand for petroleum.