Remember Sarah Palin’s rallying cry during the 2008 election on the GOP’s Energy Policy? Drill, Baby, Drill!. Who knew less than 2 years later her “ideas” would be adopted by President Obama as part of his new “green energy policy” :
The Obama administration will approve significant oil and gas exploration off America’s coasts, including a possible sale two years from now of leases off Virginia’s coast, administration officials said Wednesday. […]
The strategy that Obama and Salazar will announce will guide both the current 2007-2012 offshore oil and gas leasing program authored by George W. Bush’s administration, as well as the new 2012-2017 program that will be crafted by the current administration. […]
The Sierra Club’s executive director, Michael Brune, said last week that his group remained opposed to offshore oil drilling, even in the context of an overall climate bill that places a price on carbon.
“It is not a mechanism that actually fights climate change,” Brune said in an interview. “You don’t make the problem worse in order to solve it.” […]
Last week 10 senators from coastal states — including Delaware, Florida, Maryland, New Jersey, Oregon and Rhode Island — wrote a letter to Sens. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.), Lindsey O. Graham (R-S.C.) and Joseph I. Lieberman (I-Conn.), saying that the latest push to drill offshore is “of great concern to us,” in part because the exploration and hazards associated with such activities could threaten their states’ fishery and tourism industries.
I’m all for a pragmatic progressive movement, but this just seems like a sell out to Big Oil in my opinion. Especially from a man who campaigned on revitalizing America’s economy through investments in Green Energy” back when he was candidate Obama. Here’s what he said about opening up coastal area to new drilling back in 2008:
[W]e could save all the oil they’re talking about getting off drilling, if everybody was just inflating their tires, and getting regular tune-ups. You could actually save just as much.
Here’s what he did right after his inauguration in February, 2009 to suspend Bush’s plans for offshore coastal drilling:
Washington – — President Obama is shelving a plan announced in the final days of the Bush presidency to open much of the U.S. coast to oil and gas drilling, including 130 million acres off California’s shores from Mendocino to San Diego.
So, what happened in the 13 months since Obama put offshore drilling on hold to change his mind and open up vast areas of US coastal waters to oil drilling, a plan surely to be welcomed by Exxon and it’s friends? What happened to his plan to invest in America’s Green Revolution and instead return to the plans proposed by President Bush? The same drilling program that would not see any benefits from increased domestic production for many years?:
Bush’s Plan To Allow Drilling Offshore Would Take, According To Experts, At Least Seven And Probably 10 Years “Before Any Benefits Were Apparent.” “President Bush proposed Wednesday to allow drilling off U.S. coastlines as part of a plan to boost oil supplies … Even if U.S. coastal waters were opened to exploration, experts agree that it would take at least seven and probably 10 years before any benefits were apparent.” [McClatchy, 6/18/08] …
Los Angeles Times: […] Plan To End The Moratorium On Offshore Drilling Is A “Worthless Suggestion” And “The Destruction Of Our Coasts Is Too High A Price To Pay For A Negligible Decrease In Gas Prices That’s 20 Years Down The Road.” […] .” The U.S. Energy Information Administration says that even if oil companies are allowed to tap the 18 billion barrels under coastal waters that are currently off-limits, oil prices wouldn’t be expected to fall until 2030. […] That’s because drilling in these waters benefits oil companies but causes direct economic harm to everyone else by trashing beaches, poisoning marine life and ruining views. … The destruction of our coasts is too high a price to pay for a negligible decrease in gas prices that’s 20 years down the road.” [Editorial, Los Angeles Times, 6/21/08]
In short, why did Obama give up so quickly on his proposals to fund alternative sources of energy and cut energy usage, thus cutting back carbon emissions that fuel global warming and make our country dependent on foreign oil for the foreseeable future? Good question. Here’s one possible answer:
In his first year in office, Obama released White House visitor records, banned most lobbyists from working in his Administration and passed up campaign contributions from registered influence brokers. But as Obama has charted a new energy policy that moves away from the fossil fuels favored by George W. Bush, the White House has retained some of the traditional practices for courting politically important industries and interests. […] Obama’s energy gurus rely on advice from campaign donors, lobbyists, corporations, think tanks, unions and environmentalists to help shape policies. Once again, there are questions about whether a new President’s approach to energy is a product of Washington’s unchanged, pay-to-play culture in which political supporters are offered special access to the policymaking process. “When you have campaign donors on these advisory boards,” says Bob Edgar, president of Common Cause, “it has the appearance of being an inside special-interest opportunity.”
In other words, instead of taking the initiative and using scientists and other experts with knowledge of what needs to be done to shape our clean energy future and placing them in positions of power to shape that policy, the Obama administration has all too often taken the Beltway status quo approach to major issues: let K Street lobbyists and insider political advisers — and most significantly major campaign contributor — drive the discussion on what needs to be done.
ome of the heaviest hitters were on the President’s Economic Recovery Advisory Board, a committee of corporate leaders and economists whom Obama brought inside the White House to advise on everything from regulatory reform to global warming. Formed during the transition, it included top fundraisers such as Hyatt family scion Penny Pritzker, Obama’s Silicon Valley ally Doerr and two ambassadors from Wall Street, UBS’s Robert Wolf and private-equity investor Mark Gallogly. This foursome and their spouses had collectively given roughly $2.4 million to Democrats since 2000. Doerr’s venture-capital firm, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, made more than $1 million in donations to Democrats since 2005, and Ellen Pao, one of Doerr’s clean-energy partners at Kleiner Perkins, gave $50,000 to Obama’s Inauguration committee, according to the Center for Responsive Politics. Gallogly, Wolf and Pritzker hosted a series of meals with business leaders and White House officials last year, blurring the lines between policy outreach and a potential donor-recruitment operation. Though having campaign donors on advisory boards is not without precedent, Democratic influence brokers took notice.
Thus we see the paradox of Obama adopting the Palin solution to energy policy, a policy we know will benefit Big Oil but leave the rest of us with little if any benefits (assuming we’re still alive in 20 years). Maybe Obama will still implement a dramatic change in our energy policy, one that promotes the development of cleaner alternative sources of energy, develops a “smart grid” infrastructure and helps cut energy usage through conservation.
Maybe. But opening up offshore coastal areas to drilling isn’t the path to that promised land. It’s a detour and a distraction, at best, one that we, as a country, don’t need.
