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I have had it with the Republicans conveniently forgetting the actual numbers of oil production in the first term of President George W Bush. I have written many time about this but, I once again have to fight back against the complete misinformation that is being promoted by people on the right, like Senator Jim DeMint.

Let’s look at real number of the Bush vs. Obama administration and specifically federal land numbers.

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According to the Bureau of Land Management, the agency tasked with reporting oil drilling permits, etc. on federal lands has reported that in 2001, the Bush administration approved only 3,439 permits increasing slightly to 3,802 by 2003. It wasn’t until 2004 that Bush doubled the permits approved, but by they dropped dramatically back down to 4,579 in 2005.

In 2009 under President Obama, there were 4,487 oil drilling permits approved to drill on federal land and in 2010 there were 4,090 permits issued and finally by 2011 there were 4,244.

Now, let’s look at new wells started.

In 2001,under President Bush, 3,448 wells were started dropping dramatically down to 2,871 in 2002, then only 2,957 new wells in 2003, and only 2,702 in 2004 and finally dropping to 1,742 in 2005. In comparison in 2009 under Obama there were 3,267 new wells started, in 2010 there were 3,166 and 2011 there were 3,260.

Now we will look at new leases on federal land. In 2001 Bush issued 3,289 new leases, only 2,384 in 2002, and 2,022, in 2003 and finally 2,699 in 2004. Now let’s compare Obama’s actions, in 2009 there were 2,072 new leases, in 2010 there were 1,308, and finally in 2011 there 2,188.

So when we compare two Presidents and the first term, Obama is NOT halting any production any more than George W Bush. In fact in some areas he exceeded President Bush. This needs to be explained by the Republicans, because it looks like Obama is more of an oil president than Bush.