Crossposted from MY LEFT WING
House Adopts Plan to Ease Offshore Drilling Ban
Like Rachel Maddow, I am frequently disgusted beyond belief at congressional Democrats’ seeming perennial willingness to cravenly cave on issues that cause them electoral fear.
However, though it appears yet another of those cowardly Democratic crumbles in the face of political intimidation, today’s vote on offshore drilling is actually one of the most brilliant pieces of political jujitsu I’ve ever seen from a Democratic House of Representatives.
I know! Whodathunkit!
Rachel Maddow, in the “Talk Me Down” segment of her MSNBC show last night, actually missed an opportunity to more thoroughly explain this to her audience with the help of the charming and intelligent New York Democratic House Representative, Louise Slaughter. Too intent on focusing on the Democrats’ “cave,” Maddow overlooked Slaughter’s incisive explanation, which the New York Times also distilled easily:
Under the Democratic legislation, adopted by a vote of 236 to 189, oil companies would lose some tax benefits, utilities would be required to produce 15 percent of their electricity from renewable sources by 2020 and a ban on developing fuel from Rocky Mountain shale would be lifted.
The legislation, which faces significant hurdles to becoming law before Congress breaks at the end of the month, would allow drilling as close as 50 miles from the coastline if adjacent states agree and 100 miles out no matter a state’s position. It would impose stricter oversight on the agency that handles oil leasing and royalty payments after recent disclosures of improper relationships between its employees and oil industry representatives.
“We are opening up to 400 million acres off the Atlantic and Pacific coasts to drilling and expanding the availability of oil by at least 2 billion barrels,” said Representative Nick J. Rahall II, the West Virginia Democrat who leads the Natural Resources Committee. “And we have done so in a balanced, reasonable and responsible manner.”
Republicans, who have made political gains by portraying Democrats as flatly opposed to new drilling, said the measure was a sham intended to provide Democrats cover from voters furious over gas prices. They faulted it for failing to add incentives for coal and nuclear power and for not limiting environmental suits against drilling proposals. They also criticized Democrats for not negotiating with Republicans in writing the bill.
“We are engaged in exactly what the American people are sick of, and that is political games here in Washington that are intended to be political games and have no outcome,” said Representative John A. Boehner of Ohio, the Republican leader.
A Republican effort to sidetrack the measure with a procedural tactic was rebuffed on a vote that generally adhered to party lines. That cleared the way for approval of the proposal, which drew strong support from Democrats including conservatives from states with strong oil and gas industries. On the final vote, 221 Democrats and 15 Republicans supported it; 176 Republicans and 13 Democrats were opposed.
“It represents a critical turning point,” said Representative Dan Boren, Democrat of Oklahoma, who praised the bill for provisions that would encourage greater use of natural gas. “Today is the day we begin to open our domestic opportunities.”
Though Republicans derided the measure, saying it kept too much of the Outer Continental Shelf and the underlying reserves off limits to drilling, the decision to entertain expanded offshore drilling was a stark reversal for Democrats, who have supported a coastal drilling ban since 1982. They were motivated by the Republican attacks and by the view that keeping the stricter ban would be unrealistic this year. Relaxing the ban became the party’s fall-back position.
Democrats said Republicans were left frustrated because the bill robbed them of a chief line of attack in allowing Democrats to vote for new drilling in conjunction with clean energy initiatives.
“This is a classic case where in the interests of doing good politics, we also did good policy,” said Representative Rahm Emanuel of Illinois, chairman of the House Democratic Caucus.
But Republicans called the entire exercise political, saying Democrats were willing to consider new offshore drilling only because they were certain the bill would not become law.
“It is a Peter Pan story,” said Representative Don Young of Alaska, who led the Republican opposition to the measure. “It is a figment of the imagination. It is a political gimmick.”
Slaughter on Maddow’s show claimed she would be willing to bet her “… house and lot” that no new drilling would actually occur.
In other words, the Democrats, by allowing this bill to be voted on and to pass, get to have their cake and eat it, too.
Sometimes, it’s not caving. Sometimes, it’s winning.
