Many people believe we dont drill at all in the US anymore which is just wrong. Look along the Southern California Coast, the Gulf of Mexico, Alaska, hell even downtown Long Beach. The oil companies have leases they arent even drilling on by there choice.There are 68 million offshore acres (the size of Illinois and Georgia combined) are already available to the oil companies for oil exploration. The Republican governors of Florida and California are opposed to offshore drilling and they stand in the way of expansion mostly because the states dont recieve royalties. And as far as oil prices go, in 2001, the Republican-led congress passed the "Enron loophole" which "exempts the energy trading market from the oversight of the commodities" regulators. This is how the speculators are artifically sending the prices into the stratosphere, pure greed that the Goverment facilitates. As for refineries its popular to blame the Enviros but the reality is the oil companies want the limited capacity to maintain high prices. No new refineries have been built but massive remodels have occured that increase capacity (Such as the Tesoro Plant 5 miles from me). Shell even closed there Bakersfield refinery a few years ago. There was a plant approved in Arizonaaround 5 years ago that went thorogh the permit process realitivly eeasy and waas not opposed by the enviros because it would be replacing an older dirier plant. By choice it hasnt been started.