John McCain isn't a psychologist, but he's playing one on TV. Again. For the second time in two months, the supposed maverick turned modern day Freud has diagnosed Americans' economic ills and concluded that it's all in our heads. And to be sure, his recommended therapy - offshore oil drilling and a gas tax holiday - are the equivalent of "take two aspirin and call me in the morning."
Just like McCain's absurd "gas tax holiday" proposal (which all economists agree would save Americans either nothing or $28 on average), McCain's recent proposal to open up America's coastal waters to offshore oil drilling operations (which is, to boot, a 180-degree flip-flop from his earlier position) is a shameless, useless sop to voters that assumes that Americans are too stupid or ill-informed to realize what crap it is (according to recent polls, Americans may indeed be just that stupid ill-informed).
My husband and I tried our hand at a new and exploding genre tonight - the political chain letter. We picked a random topic (in this case the gas tax holiday) and ran with it. Our guidelines were that we couldn't technically lie about anything that had happened in the past, but we could make things as dramatic as we liked. Here's the result...
For the holiday weekend, I grappled with the decision of whether to go to Grand Junction, CO, known as the 'heart of Colorado wine country,' or to let the gloom and doom of the rising gas prices win, which would mean staying home and watching TV. Since wine tasting is, fortunately, a free activity, I decided to let the opportunity to get my drink on for free justify spending the ninety bucks to fill up my tank both ways to get there.
Truckers have been some of the hardest hit by the rising price of gas, which has doubled in the last 12 months. I suggest Obama start thinking hard about a plan to give relief to small business truck drivers. Why? It's Obama's road to the heart of Appalachia.
I got a MoveOn email asking me to call John McCain's campaign headquarters (I'm sure many of you did as well). I prefer to send emails, so I went to the McCain website and used their Contact Us link to submit a "general question". Here is the text (below the fold):
Americans speak of the divide within this country. Most accept the labels. We are a nation of Red states and Blue regions. People define themselves as Conservatives or Liberals.
A Siegel posted an informative diary on Tuesday, but it was lost amidst the North Carolina/Indiana primary results. 28 members of the House have banded together to oppose the Clinton/McCain plan for a gas tax holiday. A 29th, Rep. Mark Udall (running for Senate in Colorado) has issued his own statement:
Senator Clinton claimed yesterday that I either stand with her on this proposal or stand with the oil companies. To that I say: I stand with the families of Colorado, who aren't looking for bumper sticker fixes that don't fix anything, but for meaningful change that brings real relief and a new direction for our energy policy. We can't afford more Washington-style pandering while families keep getting squeezed.
Since Hillary's still campaigning on this hare-brained scheme, it's worth looking into related energy policy a little. There's some Clinton-era oil revenue issues worth revisiting. We might find better sources for revenue from the oil companies there than the "windfall profits" tax Hillary has put forth.
While the call by Hillary Clinton and John McCain to suspend the gasoline tax is unquestionably a crass pander to working class swing voters more concerned about rising energy prices than global warming, it is also a warning to Democrats that dealing with global warming by raising energy prices is not a sustainable political strategy.
In talking to people about the election, many people believe that it willy likely boil down to little more than one issue. Some think it will be Iraq. Others believe it will be the economy. Still others think it will be race, gender (if Obama or McCain picks a female VP), age or the omnipresent geography ("Chicago" versus "the west").
I agree with these people about the nature of the election. I truly don't think it will be a broad issues-based election. In fact, I think high-profile elections are rarely that way. (Putin in Russia, Merkel in Germany, Yushchenko and Timoshenko in the Ukraine and Tusk in Poland are all obvious examples of one issue/idea being the deciding factor.)
I'd like to tell you what I think this election is all about:
If you asked Al Gore what he considers the most pressing world issue, he would respond global warming. He would be right but misdirected. If you asked John Edwards, he would say poverty. He would be correct but unfocused. McCain, probably terrorism and Iraq war. Right, but not quite on the money.
Something momentous occurred and the news media said nothing. The press spoke of North Carolinian voters, and those in the Hoosier State. Citizens in these regions would cast their ballots today. The results, undoubtedly, would be significant. While no one, and nothing can lessen the impact of what is expected to ensue, before the polls closed, another event quietly occupied the attention of many. The occurrence is meaningful, noteworthy and will effect the election. A prominent person, one who had long remained neutral in regards to the Democratic primary race finally expressed his opinion.
Ever since McCain and Clinton proposed and Obama opposed a Gas Tax Holiday, a proposal to repeal the 18.4 cent Federal tax on gasoline for the summer months, there has been near universal condemnation of the idea from a policy standpoint. There is another aspect though that is arguably worse. If enacted, the "holiday" would become a political football in the general election and runs the risk of becoming a permanent vacation.
Before getting into that, here is a little discussion of the policy debate. It can be skipped by those who have been following this issue closely..
First we must solicit your confidence in this issue. This is by virtue as being utterly confidential and "top secret".
We are SENATOR HILLARY CLINTON, the wife of the former United States head of state, PRESIDENT BILL CLINTON, and also SENATOR JOHN MCCAIN, friend and associate of current head of state PRESIDENT GEORGE W BUSH. We got your contact through business inquiries as we were searching for contacts of a citizen who can help save our and our family's political careers since our country has been frustrating us.
We are top officials of the United States Senate Government who are interested in importation of oil into our country with funds that are presently trapped in the FEDERAL TRANSPORTATION TRUST FUND dedicated to improving transportation. We wish to send this money to overseas accounts in the MIDDLE EAST but cannot due to restrictions in Congress Transportation Equity Act requiring that this money must be spent to build roads, bridges and high speed trains.
