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The argument for offshore oil drilling has focused, wrongly, on current gasoline prices.

It's been well established that increased offshore oil drilling would make, at best, a few cents of difference on pump prices in about 10 years, assuming that the world's insatiable thirst for oil doesn't continue to increase, which is about as likely as Dick Cheney giving up hunting.

The argument against oil drilling has, also wrongly, focused on the potential environmental disasters in store from offshore drilling. Congress and past presidents restricted offshore oil drilling because of catastrophic spills that turned public opinion, particularly the opinion of beach-goers and wealthy coastal landowners, soundly against the idea of energy exploration near their ocean views.

At least, I thought the environmental disaster argument was wrong -- because it misses a larger point: Investing in oil now is like deciding it's a good time to get into the subprime mortgage business. The game ending, and you've already lost. Better to invest in alternatives now, while we still have enough oil to run the economy, than to postpone the inevitable and invite a future of persistent scarcity and high costs that dwarf those we've endured recently. (This is the pragmatic argument, ignoring completely for a moment that weaning ourselves off oil and coal will be essential to solve the global warming crisis.)

But maybe the offshore oil-environmental catastrophe argument is right after all.

Exhibit A: Exxon-Mobil. ...

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The Environmental Protection Agency is at it again.

Career scientists with real knowledge about the state of the nation's environment, its effect on our health and what we might do about it are being sidelined in favor of political appointees.

The political news today is dominated by the political interference that dominated hiring at the Justice Department under former AG Alberto Gonzalez. But the Washington Post also uncovers another example of political interference at another federal agency. The EPA is no stranger to this type of political interference, as a pattern of intimidation against speaking out or discussing scientific conclusions has been well documented by the Union of Concerned Scientists and others.

According to the Post:

"A senior official in the Environmental Protection Agency's enforcement office has warned managers they should direct inquiries from reporters, congressional investigators and the agency's inspector general to designated officials rather than answering the questions themselves, according to an e-mail obtained by The Washington Post.

"The June 16 e-mail from Robbi Farrell, who heads the agency's Office of Enforcement and Compliance Assurance, instructs managers to remind employees "at your next staff meeting" that if they "are contacted directly by the IG's office or GAO requesting information of any kind . . . Please do not respond to questions or make any statements." Farrell issued the same instructions for media inquiries, saying rank-and-file agency officials should "forward the call or e-mail" to one of two press officers and copy her on the exchange."

Next to vetting immigration attorneys based on their views on abortion this may seem minor. But having been a reporter trying to get information from government agencies, I know how critical ...

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A new Environmental Protection Agency report states that global warming is likely to increase unhealthy smog pollution that damages lungs.

At the same time, the EPA has determined that the value of a human life is worth about $900,000 less than it had estimated just five years earlier. That means, at $6.9 million per life, the cost-benefit analysis associated with new pollution regulations is likely to weigh the costs more heavily than the benefits.

The findings about smog, "quietly published," according to Reuters, suggest parts of the Mid-Atlantic, Northeast and lower Midwest could experience more concentrated ozone, and a longer duration of smog season, due to higher temperatures. That's no surprise, really, since ozone, the main component of smog, forms when pollution fro tailpipes and smokestacks reacts in heat and sunlight.

The findings about the declining value of a human life in the eyes of the EPA weren't publicized at all ...

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In a political tactic that seems more appropriate in an elementary school than in the hallowed halls of government, Bush Administration officials allegedly ignored an important email about global warming because they didn't like the looks of the subject line, the New York Times reports today.

Picture a kid with his hands over his ears yelling "Nah Nah Nah Nah! I can't hear you!"

The e-mail in question was the Environmental Protection Agency's response to a Supreme Court decision that deemed carbon dioxide a pollutant because of its role causing global warming. As such, it can be regulated by the EPA today under the authority it has under the Clean Air Act.

The EPA concluded that the landmark 2007 Supreme Court decision compelled the EPA to regulate carbon dioxide emissions from the likes of power plants, factories and automobiles. But when it tried to tell the White House, it was ignored, according to EPA officials who spoke to the Times ...

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