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McCain Makes False Promises With New Oil-Drilling Stand

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The Tampa Tribune

Published: June 19, 2008

Sen. John McCain's reversal of his position on offshore oil drilling diminishes his reputation as a straight-talking maverick. On this issue, he is offering a false promise of quick fixes to today's high gas prices.

But if McCain disappoints, Florida Gov. Charlie Crist's gee-whiz endorsement of the stand dismays.

Crist has been a vigorous opponent of drilling off Florida's coast, but now labels McCain's idea as "brilliant" and says he might even support drilling off Florida's coast - if the public wants it.

It makes one wonder if there any issue on which Crist, who always seems to be testing the political winds, will show some spine.

McCain on Tuesday delighted an audience of oil executives in Houston by calling for an end to the federal ban on offshore oil drilling. He said individual states should be allowed to vote on whether to permit drilling. This allows him to wash his hands of the actual decision, but he knows ending the moratorium now, when the public is eager for relief at the pump, makes it more likely the industry's drill-everywhere propaganda will succeed.

McCain had previously supported the moratorium.

"With gasoline running at more than four bucks a gallon, many do not have the luxury of waiting on the far-off plans of futurists and politicians," McCain said.

"We have proven oil reserves of at least 21 billion barrels in the United States. But a broad federal moratorium stands in the way of energy exploration and production, and I believe it is time for the federal government to lift these restrictions and to put our own reserves to use."

This is utter nonsense. It would be about 10 years before any of that oil could be brought online - longer than it would take for smart conservation measures, new technologies or even alternative fuel development to make an impact on the nation's energy status. Not surprisingly, President George Bush, an oil industry champion, now also is pushing to end the moratorium.

Bush and McCain don't mention that federal figures show that about 80 percent of the nation's offshore gas and oil reserves already can be leased for drilling.

Moreover, the government has been opening up public lands to oil companies with such alacrity the industry can't keep up. More than 44 million acres of public lands are leased for oil and gas development. Only a quarter of the leases are being drilled.

Just last year Congress approved legislation that opened up an additional 8 million acres in the Gulf of Mexico to new oil and gas drilling. The industry has yet to start drilling.

So the claim that the nation would be floating in oil were it not for environmental restraints is a myth.

Moreover, opening up all these new areas to drilling has done nothing to lower gas prices, which have been driven up by world demand and commodities speculation.

This doesn't mean that all the protected offshore areas should be locked away forever. While drilling does present an environmental threat - there have been at least 117 spills in outer continental shelf waters since 2000 - it may be appropriate to expand drilling boundaries in some places.

But this should not be done as knee-jerk reaction to high worldwide gas prices but as part of a larger strategy to make the nation more energy independent and less dependent on fossil fuels.

The United States already is the world's third-largest oil producer, in contrast to industrial powers Japan and Germany, which import almost all of theirs and get by on half the energy per capita we Americans use.

Oil is going to be a valuable commodity traded on world markets for the foreseeable future. It makes little sense to exhaust remaining reserves now before the country has developed a coherent strategy for maximizing its resources.

Rushing to lease offshore areas won't do much to lower world prices, but it will provide oil companies a valuable entitlement to the public resource. Once the areas are leased, there will be no way to halt drilling - regardless of how dangerous to the shoreline - without compensating the lease holder.

McCain, who prides himself on being brutally honest, is misleading voters by suggesting ending the moratorium will save them money or ease the nation's energy needs.

It's too bad that Crist, instead of jumping on the bandwagon, didn't provide the straight talk McCain badly needed on his unfortunate policy.

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