Connect the dots.
From a San Francisco Chronicle article published yesterday, written by the estimable Jane Kay.
The context:
The federal government is taking steps that may open California’s fabled coast to oil drilling in as few as three years, an action that could place dozens of platforms off the Sonoma, Mendocino and Humboldt coasts, and raises the specter of spills, air pollution and increased ship traffic into San Francisco Bay.
The nut graf:
President-elect Barack Obama hasn’t said whether he would overturn President Bush’s lifting last summer of the ban on drilling, as gas prices reached a historic high. Sen. Ken Salazar, D-Col., Obama’s pick as interior secretary and head of the nation’s ocean-drilling agency, hasn’t said what he would do in coastal waters.
Foreshadowing:
In Congress earlier this year, Salazar, Obama’s nominee for interior secretary, supported a bipartisan bill allowing exploration and production 50 miles out from the southern Atlantic coast with state approval.
The reveal:
“We’ve been encouraged that the president-elect has chosen Sen. Salazar,” said Dan Naatz, vice president for federal resources with the Independent Petroleum Association of America, a group with 5,000 members that drill 90 percent of the oil and natural gas wells in the United States. “He’s from the West, and he understands federal land policy, which is really key.”
The cliffhanger:
[Obama] reiterated his campaign position that he was open to the idea of offshore drilling if it was part of a comprehensive package, adding that he would turn over the question to his team.
Here’s the change.gov “Contact Us” page. Let them know what you think.
Thanks for the heads up - you can also sign in at http://change.gov/newsroom/entry/open_for_questions_round_two
and contribute your own question and comment for the public to vote up or down and the transition team to answer and tabulate.
Happy New Year in spite of it all.
But, you know, it’s like, so much safer now. At least that is what the oil companies are saying. Of course that is from the same people that said that the leaks from Katrina and other hurricanes didn’t really happen. We live in a wonderful world, where reality is forcibly denied by fiat of the neo-feudal lords of capital.