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And when I interviewed her again in late July, she was justifiably furious that Congress was going on summer recess without a vote on rolling back its drilling moratorium. "Well," she said, "with all due respect to Congress, it's pretty pathetic." Meanwhile, she was taking action: Palin had just gotten the Alaska legislature to agree to a new natural-gas pipeline that was 30 years in the works.

The U.S. Geological Survey estimates that there are nearly 100 billion barrels of oil in the Arctic, with roughly one-third under sovereign U.S. territory in Alaska. There are at least 10 billion (and perhaps close to 20 billion) barrels of oil in ANWR, while old estimates suggest between 800 billion and 2 trillion barrels of oil in the Rocky Mountain shale formations.

It's also worth noting that 1.8 billion acres of the Outer Continental Shelf -- with roughly 100 billion barrels of recoverable oil and 400 trillion feet of natural gas -- are off-limits because of the congressional moratorium.

Palin grasps the strategic importance of all these domestic reserves. She's also a governor who fully understands the energy- and foreign-policy designs of Putin, who sits right across the pond from her native Alaska.

Meanwhile, Obama railed against drilling in his Denver convention speech. He is opposed to ANWR. And shale. And nuclear power. He's constantly bashing oil companies. And all he talks about is a windfall profits tax. That's why he has no real economic recovery plan. He has no interest in reducing gasoline prices at the pump. He even sponsored legislation to prevent 3-D seismic technology and other research efforts to correctly measure our undersea oil deposits.

In other words, he just doesn't get it.

That's why the pro-life, tax-cutting, drill, drill, drill, family-centered, corruption reformer Sarah Palin will be a powerful weapon in this election. Don't tell me she won't make a difference this November.

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COPYRIGHT 2008 CREATORS SYNDICATE INC.

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Note -- The opinions expressed in this column are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions, views, and/or philosophy of GOPUSA.

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