Democrat drilling phonies

Wall Street Journal:

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As gasoline prices have become a focal point for voters' economic concerns, Democratic candidates across the country are rewriting the party line on the issue. Mrs. Titus and many other Democrats new to the national stage were citing their support for more drilling in June, well before recent talk of compromise by a bipartisan Senate coalition and Democratic leadership in the House.

More than a third of the 45 candidates in House Democrats' so-called Red-to-Blue program aimed at capturing seats now held by Republicans have supported lifting the drilling moratorium. The Democratic candidates' support for new drilling spans land-locked and coastal districts alike, though many of them include caveats that further offshore exploration must be environmentally sensitive, or that royalties from the drilling should be invested in researching alternative energy. Several sitting Democrats facing tough races support new drilling, too, including all three representatives elected from conservative districts in special elections this year.

Recent polls show as many as two-thirds of Americans support expanded offshore drilling. In July, President George W. Bush lifted the executive ban on new coastal drilling, a move now supported by Republican presidential candidate Sen. McCain, reversing an earlier position.

Elected Democrats are coming around, too. On Aug. 1, presidential candidate Sen. Obama suggested he would be open to expanded coastal drilling under the proper conditions. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D., Calif.) suggested Friday that Democrats would for the first time consider a vote to open some portions of the Outer Continental Shelf to new oil exploration.

In Mrs. Titus's southern Nevada district, hundreds of miles from a coast, the local economy hinges on the affordability of a plane ticket or road trip to Las Vegas. Fuel costs have cut into tourist spending as the once-booming housing market in the Las Vegas suburbs is turning to bust: Nevada has held the nation's highest home-foreclosure rate for 18 consecutive months.

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Cory Van Aken, a homeowner on the southernmost fringe of the sprawling suburbs, hasn't taken out his economic frustration on his congressman. He bought his home last year, when houses in his neighborhood were selling for more than $700,000. Now the homes on his half-vacant street are worth less than half a million dollars and he finds himself "upside down" on his mortgage, owing more than his house is worth. Mr. Van Aken has kept up with payments, but half a dozen properties on his block are in foreclosure.

"I'd like to throw them all out of Congress. They've done a terrible job," Mr. Van Aken says. "But I hate voting for a Democrat. I don't trust her on the drilling. Absolutely not."

Van Aken gets it. Any vote for a Democrat is a vote for Pelosi who no matter what she says is an opponent of energy in all forms and particularly in the form of drilling for oil and gas. No one should trust Democrats on this issue. The Democrats are the problem. They are why there has been no offshore drilling and no drilling in ANWR. If they had not blocked drilling for decades we would have more oil at lower prices. The Democrats are the party that favors higher prices to make you use less and buy into their drilling for conservation. We cannot conserve our way out of this shortage nor can we inflate our tires out of it.