It Takes Two Hands To Eat A Whopper

Yet another whopper in the attempt to boost Palin's foreign policy creds (like living in close proximity to Russia isn't enough!). Amazingly, I'd heard Palin claim this but I never would have thought to question it if this hadn't been pointed out to me. From Factcheck.org:

Palin claims Alaska "produces nearly 20 percent of the U.S. domestic supply of energy." That's not true.

Alaska did produce 14 percent of all the oil from U.S. wells last year, but that's a far cry from all the "energy" produced in the U.S.

Alaska's share of domestic energy production was 3.5 percent, according to the official figures kept by the U.S. Energy Information Administration.

And if by "supply" Palin meant all the energy consumed in the U.S., and not just produced here, then Alaska's production accounted for only 2.4 percent.

Shameless.

BTW, I'd be for increased US drilling if I thought the benefit outweighed the risks. I haven't seen anything to indicate that's the case. Since I'm REAL big on not giving terrorists and despots our oil dollars, I really wish US drilling was the boon people think it is. Oil is finite resource and it's time to deal with that.