Editor, Gazette-Journal:

In their editorial "Things are happening" (April 5, 2012) the Gazette-Journal editors cheer a Cape Charles wind project and hope for more. They cheer the Obama government’s proceeding with "studies" that may or may not lead to approval of offshore oil retrieval. They cheer a State Corporation Commission’s look at "solar power" that will likely inject some taxpayer money into some scheme that panders to the wishful thinkers in D.C. and Richmond and their cozy allies in Norfolk and Newport News. Meanwhile, a drive through Williamsburg reveals "no coal plant" placards in the yards surrounding William and Mary’s campus. All the while, the editors bemoan rising oil and gasoline prices and wonder why that could happen when we are supposedly producing more oil than ever before.

The answer on the oil price item is this: Oil is traded in worldwide markets in dollars, at least for now. And the fact is that t...