America's Energy Independence

What are your thought on the growing dominance of the U.S. in the oil industry? U.S. drillers haven't pumped 10 million barrels a day since Nixon's presidency. I guess it means we're taking big steps towards energy independence. Growing production should probably drive prices lower, but it seems the U.S. has so much supply that that won't be a problem. I read we had over 12 billion barrels that we could tap into in Alaska alone.