Obama's change on offshore drilling follows donor meeting in Houston

Washington Times:

Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama Friday withdrew his opposition to additional offshore oil drilling, essentially embracing his rival's energy stance, which is credited in part with pumping up Sen. John McCain's poll numbers.

Mr. Obama also called for a windfall profits tax on oil companies to fund $1,000 emergency rebate checks for Americans besieged by high energy costs after Congress left town Friday for a five-week vacation without passing energy legislation.

The Illinois senator, while campaigning in Florida, said he would accept limited additional offshore oil drilling if that's what it takes to overcome gridlock and enact a comprehensive energy policy to foster fuel-efficient autos and develop alternate energy sources.

"My interest is in making sure we've got the kind of comprehensive energy policy that can bring down gas prices," Mr. Obama said in an interview with the Palm Beach Post.

"If, in order to get that passed, we have to compromise in terms of a careful, well-thought-out drilling strategy that was carefully circumscribed to avoid significant environmental damage - I don't want to be so rigid that we can't get something done."

...

The "change" came only a few days after he raised over a million dollars at a Houston fundraiser sponsored by some people in the gas business. But this offer of "change" is accompanied with a poison pill of a windfall profits tax, which is a really bad idea.

It takes the money needed for the new exploration and puts it into the dry hole of rebates to consumers that will produce no energy, but will increase demand. It appears to me that his "change" on drilling is one that is not made in good faith. It is a poll driven "change." Once again we see the Obama who will say and do anything to get elected.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Should Republicans go ahead and add Supreme Court Justices to head off Democrats

Washington Post: Some Democrats eye adding more justices to the Supreme Court to change its ideological bent The once-remote idea has gained the attention of liberals angered by the GOP push to remake the federal courts. Probably the easy way to defeat this court-packing scheme is for Trump to propose doing the same thing now.  It would lead to Democrat denunciations and claims that it would be wrong, thereby blowing up any attempt by them in the unfortunate event of Democrats winning a presidential election.
Read more

29 % of companies say they are unlikely to keep insurance after Obamacare

Conn Carroll: A new survey of 368 midsize to large companies found that 29% of them are considering terminating their active employee health care plans when Obamacare is full implemented in 2014. Only 71% of employers surveyed said they did not expect to drop their health coverage, while 20% said they did not know and 9% said they were planning to exit. The latest survey, conducted by Towers Watson, echoes an ealier survey by McKinsey & Co. finding that 30% of private-sector employers were planning to drop their employee health insurance coverage by 2014. When the Congressional Budget Office crunched Obamacare's spending numbers, they estimated that only 7% of employees currently covered by employer-sponsored plans would lose their plans. ... This means the cost of the health care fiasco will be hundreds of billions more than estimated by the CBO and Congressional Democrat. It is also clear that Obama's pledge that you could keep your health care plan if you wanted t
Read more

Bin Laden's concern about Zarqawi's remains

James Robbins: ... Bin Laden suggests that President Bush should allow Zarqawi’s body to be returned to his family in Jordan, but this is a matter that is up to the Jordanian government, which so far has not shown much interest in facilitating a homecoming. Bin Laden mocks King Abdullah II, calling him a Coalition minion, and asking “w hat scares you about Abu Musab after he’s dead? You know that his funeral, if allowed to happen, would be a huge funeral showing the extent of sympathy with the mujahedin.” A large crowd would definitely turn out, though most people would be on hand to demonstrate their anger and disgust. Last November’s hotel bombings in Amman , masterminded by Zarqawi, are still fresh in people’s memory, and mentioning them to Jordanians has the same visceral impact as memory of the 9/11 attacks does here. Jordan has adopted a zero-tolerance policy towards those who choose to mourn the country’s least favorite son, and four opposition members of parliament who paid con
Read more