Kudlow on McCain on Oil

I just caught this over at The Corner...

Then Mr. McCain lashes out at oil companies: “I am very angry, frankly, at the oil companies. Not only because of the obscene profits they’ve made, but at their failure to invest in alternative energy to help us eliminate our dependence on foreign oil.”

Well, Senator, my response is drill, drill, drill. Why aren’t you working to deregulate offshore drilling, ANWR drilling, and oil-shale drilling? By some estimates there are nearly two trillion barrels of oil to be lifted. And American oil companies can do it better than anyone in the world. Not only would so-called speculators take a look at this new drilling, they would start selling oil futures contracts immediately and pretty soon the spot-market price would come down.

And by the way, the drill-drill-drill strategy would create hundreds of thousands of high-paying jobs. Think of it. Plus, the oil companies are already paying a bloody fortune in record taxes to the federal Treasury. This is all free-market capitalism. Why not let it work, senator?

My response is that it isn't an oil company's responsibility to do anything other than the oil business. If said company wanted to diversify in to alternative energy, that's up to the shareholders. But my gut reaction is that if there was money to be made in alternative energy, companies would be doing it.