Rising Gas Prices in Mideast Crisis

In response to “Help the Soviets Pump the Oil We Need,” Commentary, Aug. 26:

We will do well to work with the Soviets to reduce our dependence on Mideast oil, but we seem to be missing a key factor in our efforts to fuel our cars. If we pump out the oil reserves of the Soviets and ourselves to reduce our dependence on Mideast oil, what happens 10 to 15 years down the line when our collective reserves are gone and the Mideast still has all the oil? What we should be doing is buying Mideast oil and pumping it into our wells and cutting our oil consumption to the minimum as insurance for tomorrow.

Are we not living in a fool’s paradise, drilling oil wells like a bunch of jerks, using up our resources only to have the hammer fall later on the heads of our children? If we are dependent on Mideast oil now, what will happen in the future if we do not change our oil-consumption habits.

We need to get our elected officials off their collective dead bottoms and move the priorities of our alternative energy programs to that of a national emergency, which it is if we plan to retain our standard of living into the future. We should be consider a national goal for energy independence by the end of this century or sooner.

FRED M. ROBERT

Dana Point