Posted on 08/04/2008 9:35:11 AM PDT by Between the Lines
WASHINGTON — U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham said Friday he’s leading a new, bipartisan “Gang of 10” senators who’ve drafted a comprehensive energy bill that would lift decades-old bans on offshore drilling and nuclear-waste reprocessing.
The New Energy Reform Act of 2008 is a bid to bridge the divide between Democrats and Republicans who spent July accusing each other of neglecting the impact of record gasoline prices on their constituents.
“There is no greater problem facing average Americans and small businesses today than high fuel costs and our nation’s dependency on foreign oil,” Graham said. “Our proposal is not perfect, but it is a bipartisan start on the road to a comprehensive energy strategy leading to independence from foreign oil.”
For Graham, a Seneca Republican running for re-election, the new initiative reprises his controversial role in the “Gang of 14” two years ago. Then, he and a baker’s dozen other senators from both parties reached a compromise on President Bush’s judicial nominations.
Many conservative activists have never forgiven Graham for moving to block a bid by some Republicans, who then controlled the Senate, to require only 51 votes to break Democratic filibusters of the Bush nominees instead of the traditional 60 votes.
Graham says the 2006 compromise enabled Bush to choose, and the Senate to confirm, Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Samuel Alito, along with other conservative federal judges.
The draft energy package would partially lift the congressional ban on offshore oil and gas drilling, which has been limited since 1982 to the western two-thirds of the Gulf of Mexico off the coasts of Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama.
Under the new bill, such exploration would be limited in other coastal regions to areas at least 50 miles offshore, and state governments would have to approve it.
President Bush last month lifted the executive drilling ban his father imposed in 1990. Congress must end its moratorium in order for all coastal states to have the option of permitting offshore gas and oil exploration.
The new energy measure would also remove the prohibition President Gerald Ford placed on reprocessing spent nuclear fuel in October 1976.
President Jimmy Carter, citing the threat of nuclear weapons proliferation, continued the ban in 1977, and no subsequent president has lifted it.
In exchange for allowing offshore drilling sought by Republicans, the “Gang of 10” package would promote alternative energy sources and repeal big oil companies’ tax breaks as Democrats want.
“It is irrational to be allocating around $1 billion per year in tax dollars to assist in production at a time when oil is $124 a barrel and companies are recording record profits,” Graham said.
Graham and U.S. Sen. Jim DeMint, a Greenville Republican, had opposed oil drilling off the South Carolina coast, but they switched their stance in June as gasoline prices reached $4 a gallon. U.S. Rep. Joe Wilson, a Springdale Republican, also changed his position to back oil exploration.
If American nuclear plants were allowed to reprocess and burn spent fuel again, the Savannah River Site would likely reap major contracts.
Rosen covers Washington for McClatchy newspapers in South Carolina.
Shove it, Lindsey. As promised, I will be voting for whoever runs against you, for as long as it is necessary.
I don’t think your numbers are right, but the basic idea is true.
The fuel starts out with 5% fissionable uranium. They told me in license class that the spent fuel still has 60% of the original fissionable uranium in it. So a little reprocessing will still go a long way.
IIRC, Chem-Nuclear had a reprocessing plant ready to be licensed in the 70s. They abandoned it and took a write-off after Carter’s ban on reprocessing.
The Gang of Pu$$ies really want a 200 seat Democrat Majority in the House and a filibuster-proof Senate. It’s a lot easier that way for them.
Somebody like Rush was calling these five Republicans “the Obama Republicans.”
This should be their title from now on. Not only have they sold out, they have sold out on the one issue that could bring conservative victory this fall and solve major problems for the American people.
Bob Corker, Johnny Isakson, Saxby Chambliss, Lindsay Graham and John Thune:
The Obama Republicans.
Bob Corker, Johnny Isakson, Saxby Chambliss, Lindsay Graham and John Thune: The Obama Republicans.
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I never voted for Corker...
He is not my fault...
In the primary I voted for Ed Bryant (a House Manager against Clinton )
and wrote in Bryant in Nov..
I tried to talk to Corker during the primary...he lives in Chattanooga...
But he wouldnt discuss his hiring of illegal aliens or anything else that was questionable...
Got quite prigish...
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