Parting Shot on McCain

We're packing our bags, getting read to head to Austin for Netroots Nation, but I had to add a parting shot about McCain's visit to Albuquerque. Amidst all the hoopla and often fawning coverage of McCain, I wish someone would have thought to ask him why he flew in on a plane and then got into his massive, Straight Talk Express-decorated bus to go to the Hilton.

Talk about a double whammy of gas guzzling. Think about it -- McCain was flying here while his bus was driving here from wherever it was last used to hawk his alleged "straight talk" on the campaign trail. No wonder McCain wants to drill everywhere regardless of the consequences. He'd better start encouraging the oil companies to start using all those leases they've left undrilled while they lobby for Congress to open up even more land and water to drilling.

Using Interior Department data for its analysis, The Wilderness Society reports:

More than 44 million acres of public lands are leased for oil and gas development, according to a new Wilderness Society analysis of Interior Department data. The analysis points to an explosion of drilling on federal lands, with 7,124 drilling permits (APDs) issued in 2007, a new record for the Bush Administration. Nationwide, the leasing is outstripping the oil and gas industry’s capacity to drill, as industry is drilling on only a quarter of the leases they hold.

And we've seen the price of gas come down magically after all that increased drilling, haven't we? Of course not. Thanks in large part to the hedge fund cronies and other poorly regulated speculators in the oil market who are artificially driving prices up. And don't forget all those interest rate drops in response to mortgage and bank failures that are effectively driving down the value of the dollar so everything costs more. What a racket. And remember, McCain is getting campaign money from many of the very people perpetrating the racket. Straight talk indeed.

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