The point of drilling offshore is to drill offshore.
The point is to settle old scores, to clean up a few loose ends in the long Republican battle against Democrats and the environment. The point is to score cheap political points in an election year and pretend to be "doing something" about the economy and the dire problem of the cost of oil.
We're in this mess because Republicans have substantially succeeded in blocking or watering-down any government action that might have made the transition to alternate energy painless and a done deal by now. Finally getting to plant oil rigs in ANWR and off the coast just wraps up the "victory" in a bow.
Republicans made high-minded noises about how anything done by the government is bad, and that if we wait for the free market to fix the problem, it'll be a gazillion times better.
How'd that work out for us?
This is what it looks like when you put your faith in laissez-faire free market capitalism. This is the market fixing the problem. Are we having fun yet?