Posted on 07/16/2008 11:20:37 AM PDT by mnehring
It was a Friday, the last day of October and four days before the presidential election of 1992 when ignominious special prosecutor Lawrence Walsh handed down a scurrilous indictment of Cap Weinberger, former Secretary of Defense. The ensuing media explosion dominated the news until election day and was a final humiliation of the beleaguered Bush administration enmeshed in a campaign grossly mismanaged by James Baker, undermined by Ross Perot and outsmarted by Bill Clinton. When it happens to your own father, you don’t easily forget the value of timing.
Hence the White House announcement yesterday concerning drilling on government controlled property. The annual renewal of the ban on offshore drilling was in no small irony the product of the President’s father’s administration and hailed by his younger brother, Jeb. Crude oil hovered around $20/bbl. and Saddam had yet to roll his tanks into Kuwait City.
President Bush has put the Democrats in Congress on the hotseat with this move and the deadline to annually renew their own ban expires exactly 36 days before the election. They will be forced to vote within the ever-shrinking short term memory of the electorate and their attempts to justify their actions, however they vote, are going to be vastly entertaining and most likely publicly embarassing.
John Hinderaker, of Power Line, quotes the President of the Institute for Energy Research, Thomas Pyle, who writes, ” Most Americans understand the law of supply and demand, but they may not know that America is the only developed nation in the world that restricts access to its own offshore energy resources, or that an annual vote in Congress is required to continue that policy. ”
I agree with Hinderaker the Democrats will probably cave to not renewing the ban in hopes their fallback strategy of encouraging and abetting the obstruction of exploration and drilling will be successfully fought by the formidable establishment of environmentalists and their lawyers in the courts of the United States. But the pressure is on to change the legal landscape and put the anti-drilling factions on the defense. It was a very shrewd and calculated political move on the part of George Bush and he deserves the credit he is due.
When gas is $1.50/gal there is no pressure to sign an EO, which is purely symbolic. At $5/gal it becomes significant and puts the Rats in a Trap. Still no reason for you to stop hating GW though. It gives your empty life meaning.
Pray for W and Our Troops
You’re right, it’s purely symbolic, but it is a bad EO and that was reason enough to whack it from the Federal Register back in 2001. I’ll pray for the troops, and I’ll pray that W retires early to Mexico and stops damaging our country and the GOP.
Hating President Bush on FR is so cutting edge. About as cutting edge as SoddomWood hating him and being against the war. What courage!
Pray for W and Our Troops
Too bad, he's not head of the "conservative movement"
It was a very shrewd and calculated political move on the part of George Bush and he deserves the credit he is due.
Kudo's to Bush, it just makes me wonder why he passed up so many other political moves that would be just as powerful as this over the years?
now that is a great idea with teleconferencing and online voting all of them could face the daily music of voters rather than the problem of figuring out which soirée to attend. Almost like really working for a living.
I did. I used spell checker on ‘precident’. It recommended up ‘president’. I was into another application, and didn’t give any attention to the inference. My bad.
These things can get ya sometimes.
I don't know; do you?
Back in 2001 oil was a lot less than it was now. So were incomes, but oil was affordable. Today it's a different story. As for the other EO'S, again, ask him.
New supply, yes. But prices aren't dependent only on new supply. As for Congress, it'll do what is necessary to win elections. And if it believes the public wants change, it'll react. Perhaps not the way you want, but it'll react. As for the price move being something else; what are you referring to?
W's plan all along was to boost commodity prices, especially oil. At least that's what I got from his economic speeches, actions and inactions.
I've been on W's case since he started giving his horrible economic speeches in 2001. I guess I was ahead of the curve. I voted for him in 2000.
What? You got from his speeches, actions and inactions that he wanted the price of crude to be around $4.13 (or thereabouts) currently? Do you really believe that?
Due to McCain's campaign finance reform bill, Republicans will not be allowed to air any ads informing the ignorant masses about this fact and how congress reacts.
Therefore the DNC propaganda machine is once again controlled by the MSM.........
I got hung up on the spell check. I typed Precident and spell check gave me “president”. “Precedent” wasn’t an option. “President” didn’t look right but I was involved elsewhere so I OK’d it. Sheesh!
McCain isn’t my choice. I’ll be frank (no, not Frank...Do be do be doo). But Obamanation isn’t a choice at all. This guy scares me to death. I’m still not voting for McCain come November, but depending on the situation, I just might hold my nose and vote out of fear. But don’t count on it... :)
Concur!
As much as I admire G. W. Bush, history will probably record that his administration fumbled the last chance America had to remain "The Land of the Free".
>LOL
Well, I just finished listening to Frank on my Sansa. I had to throw that in... :)
I don't like it, but I don't like the prospect of an Obama presidency even more.
I hear ya. I'm keeping my options open. I'm beginning to suspect the bloom is off the rose regarding Obama, but we'll see. If that's true, my Illinois vote won't mean too much.
I'll definitely check that out. Thanks!!
Sinatra, Fitzgerald, Basie, Armstrong... That's my music. Oh, man, I'm aging myself... :O
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