Save Oil for When It's Really Needed

Perhaps Americans could spare some domestic oil for the descendants they plan to saddle with a heavy federal debt, New Orleans-based author Jed Horne writes in the Boston Globe. Offshore oil reserves are "not something that should be plundered to keep all-American SUVs running," he says. Horne says the oil won't make a "whit of a difference" in current prices but could be invaluable years from now.

"It's a resource that needs to be husbanded and preserved, to keep America running in decades to come," Horne writes of the country's offshore oil. "Right now—but perhaps not for long—we have options." And the currently accessible supply is "too valuable to squander on an economy as wasteful as ours." (More offshore oil stories.)