Americans overwhelmingly support opening the outer continental shelf to drilling. Majorities in California and Florida now support such drilling, a radical change from recent years.

But there is one immovable object in the way of drilling -- Queen 9% of the House of Representatives.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi on Sunday ruled out a vote on new offshore oil drilling even as Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama said he might be open to a compromise that included it.

The scramble over expanded drilling off America's coasts — ammunition for a weekend of rat-a-tat-tat by the presidential campaigns — underscores the political power of $4-a-gallon gas. Though President Bush and other backers of new drilling acknowledge it wouldn't directly affect gas prices for years, they have pounded Democrats for opposing the measure, which is now supported by most Americans.

Pelosi called proposals to allow more offshore drilling a deceptive "decoy" rather than a solution and indicated she would bar a vote on any bill that included it. "I'm not giving the gavel away to a tactic … that supports the oil (companies), big oil at the cost and the expense of the consumer," she said on ABC's This Week.

The House started a five-week summer recess Friday despite Republican demands for a vote on lifting the federal ban on offshore drilling. House Republican Leader John Boehner of Ohio said GOP representatives would be on the House floor today to protest the lack of action.

Commisar Pelosi (D-Sodom and Gomorrah) has decided -- no new drilling. Screw teh President. Screw the rest of the House. Screw the American people. We may as well rip up the Constitution and concede the reality that we live in the People's Republic of Nancy, where the only vote that counts is hers.