[HM2Viking]

WASHINGTON — As Congress has debated energy policy over the past several days, an unusual argument keeps surfacing in support of drilling off the U.S. coastline and in Alaska's Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
Why, ask some Republicans, should the United States be thwarted from drilling in its own territory when just 50 miles off the Florida coastline the Chinese government is drilling for oil under Cuban leases?
Yet no one can prove that the Chinese are drilling anywhere off Cuba's shoreline. The China-Cuba connection is "akin to urban legend," said Sen. Mel Martinez, a Republican from Florida who opposes drilling off the coast of his state but who backs exploration in ANWR.

"China is not drilling in Cuba's Gulf of Mexico waters, period," said Jorge Pinon, an energy fellow with the Center for Hemispheric Policy at the University of Miami and an expert in oil exploration in the Gulf of Mexico. Martinez cited Pinon's research when he took to the Senate floor Wednesday to set the record straight.

http://www.mcclatchydc.com/congress/story/40776.html

[HM2Viking]

Vice President Dick Cheney's office has acknowledged that he erred when telling an audience this week that China is drilling off the coast of Cuba.
Citing columnist George Will, Cheney on Wednesday told the U.S. Chamber of Commerce that "oil is being drilled right now 60 miles off the coast of Florida. We're not doing it. The Chinese are in cooperation with the Cuban government."
''Even the communists have figured out that a good answer to high prices is more supply,'' he added. "Yet Congress has said . . . 'no' to drilling off Florida.''

The claim was immediately repudiated by U.S. Sen. Mel Martinez, R-Fla., an independent congressional report, industry experts and other observers, who said there is zero evidence that China is drilling in Cuban waters. China doesn't even hold a lease to drill offshore.
Cheney's office has since backtracked, issuing a statement that says "It is our understanding that, although Cuba has leased out exploration blocks 60 miles off the coast of southern Florida, which is closer than American firms are allowed to operate in that area, no Chinese firm is drilling there."

Cheney admits error (lie) about Chinese oil drilling at http://www.mcclatchydc.com/251/story/40994.html.

[Stanley-RN2B]

Originally Posted by HM2Viking

Cheney admits error (lie) about Chinese oil drilling at http://www.mcclatchydc.com/251/story/40994.html.

Another lie... big surprise.

[Roy Fokker]

Sen. Mel Martinez, a Republican from Florida who opposes drilling off the coast of his state but who backs exploration in ANWR.

Interesting.

NIMBY, anyone?

cheers,

[HM2Viking]

I have been thinking about this issue a lot. I really think that we can aggressively support recovery efforts from old oil wells and oilfields. Some of the new advanced recovery technologies are becoming feasible with high prices.

[CHATSDALE]

i believe that the vietnamese are in talks with cuban government about the drilling but as far as i know there has not been an onset of drilling yet