A Seething Miasma Just Below The Surface

Look, I know she's not ever going to be president but sometimes you have to listen to Michele Bachmann because she is the standard-bearer for a significant segment of the American right. That's why this stupid thing she said matters.

TAMPA, Fla. -- Republican Presidential candidate Michele Bachmann wants oil drilling in Florida's Everglades. That's not sitting well with many Floridians. Bachmann told the Associated Press: "The United States needs to be less dependent on foreign sources of energy and more dependent upon American resourcefulness. Whether that is in the Everglades... we need to go where the energy is. Of course it needs to be done responsibly. If we can't responsibly access energy in the Everglades then we shouldn't do it." However, geologists believe there's not much oil under the Everglades anyway. Collier County's Sunniland Field, the only significant oil field nearby, doesn't produce large quantities of oil, and a former employee tells 10News the oil is difficult to refine. ...Bachmann hasn't been deterred by any naysayers, telling 10News, "The radical environmentalists put up one road block after another to prevent accessing American energy. We also have oil in the Eastern Gulf region."

I say we keep after her until she insists that we need to drill into the side of Lincoln's face on Mt. Rushmore, in case there's some oil there.

But the larger point is now these guys are starting to insist on drilling for oil even where it will never be profitable to do it! Is there any clearer sign that the right values their own talking points over what's best for the country?