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Who knew that the US is currently exporting 1.8 million barrels of oil a day?

To make sure everybody does, Rep. Edward J. Markey (D-Mass.), Chairman of the Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming, sent a public letter to President Bush, asking him to "keep our oil at home."

The letter didn't specify how, but it didn't miss the opportunity to take a shot at the GOP plan to open up protected offshore waters to oil drilling.

.....at the current export rate, by the time the first barrel of oil could be produced from increased offshore drilling, America would have already exported the equivalent of nearly 40 percent of the oil that is projected to lie beneath protected areas offshore.

It was no coincidence that Markey's letter was released just as John McCain paid a visit to an offshore rig off the coast of Louisiana -- in order to highlight his support for increased domestic offshore drilling.

As the public battle over access to oil in protected US waters continues, Jad Mouawad in the New York Times explains why the stakes have gotten so high: it turns out the major oil companies, desperate for new sources of supply, have almost nowhere else to turn.

And after reading this story on Think Progress, it will also become clear why a McCain election victory would deliver what the oil companies want more than anything else: a clear path to an endless fossil future.