Does anyone think that this pro oil argument is insanely childish and weak?

because oil is such a big part of our daily life, in terms of manufacturing and in terms of automobile usage, we cannot simply stop drilling. It seems as though you are taking this argument to extremes; people who are trying to stop drilling are hoping to limit it severely, which will have a serious impact on our economy. we can search for new methods, but we can't stop drilling before we have new, reliable methods of fueling our system, and still expect daily life to continue smoothly. it would cause turmoil, lost jobs, unemployment, skyrocketing prices on the things that need this fuel, and chaos. so, while I am strongly in favor of finding alternative methods of harnessing energy, I do not believe stopping our current source will be in any way good until the right time arises. also, this counterargument can still apply even if you don't claim to be zero impact, because many people rely on fuel to get to work, or to produce things where they work, and losing this would cause them to lose their job and their ability to support their families. if you say they can get new jobs, look at our economy. we don't have money to create the jobs as it is, and we would have less after dissolving all these jobs.

and finally, no, these two opinions you pose are extremely different. there's no comparison. the first states that we are relying on something, so we can't take it away. the second one states that we don't have a cure for something (though we are looking for a cure, by the way), so we'll stop curing something completely different, which people who will never get cancer may get. there's no way you can even argue that these opinions are related, unless you give more information as to how.

Some day the technology will exist to completely replace petroleum with a renewable, environmentaly friendly alternative. But, today, it does not. Oil is the fuel that gives us the standard of living we enjoy. Not just in this country, but the entire developed world. In most cases, you couldn't replace petroleum with today's alternatives without either raising cost or reducint quality of life.

The oil lobby is exaggerating for effect and hoping that nobody notices. You want to cut dependence on petroleum. They make it sound as if you want to eliminate petroleum from our lives completely. That's akin to saying that if you go on a weight-loss diet, you will starve to death.