McCain Energy Conference Call: The Narratives Form

Today's McCain campaign blogger conference call focused on Energy and provided an opportunity to perceive some meta-narratives the McCain camp may be attempting to form and exploit against Jr. Illinois Senator, Barack Obama; as well as insight into what could be a pivotal political debate in the Fall: what to do about drastically rising energy costs across America.

That Nancy Pfotenhauer of the McCain campaign pointed out some experts predict the price of oil could rise to as much as $200 a barrel by next year suggests they will tossing around numbers designed to draw even more attention to an issue already well-fixed in voter's minds.

Briefly on the narrative front, we see McCain as the principled leader making decisions, popular or not, because he absolutely believes they are the right choices for the nation at a given point in time. And they don't change for political expediency - witness his continued opposition to drilling in ANWR, suggesting it's unnecessary, given other proposed steps to increase domestic production. And there's also his on going support for a form of Cap-and-Trade the campaign is quick to delineate from Obama's own more economically dangerous plan. And this to bloggers, many of whom were Right-leaning in this case. Of course, his support for the Iraq War and the "surge" as another example of a principled consistency is already well-known.

Contrast the consistent, if sometimes seemingly incorrigible, McCain above with an Obama who is already developing at least something of a reputation as, more than a flip-flopper, an ambitious egotist willing to take or abandon a position, church, pastor, priest, friend, policy, and even a war purely for political advantage and you get the larger picture. Call it, sell-out versus no sale, perhaps?

Below the above narrative was a more traditional Republican narrative on the energy issue - less government versus more, or at least one that doesn't act heavy-handedly to resolve problems leading to unforeseen consequences often harming our free market economy. I followed up with the campaign after the call to ask about this as a theme and while they did not claim to be beating the small government drum as a key narrative, they did issue the following in email: "Sen. McCain is a conservative Republican who believes more government is rarely the solution to a set of challenges."

Some might argue that McCain's willingness to empower government over people could be even a bit more rare for their tastes.

On the tactical front regarding Energy issues, Pfotenhauer emphasized incentives, competition and allowing the market to pick winners and losers, not government, or government regulations, as Obama would be sure to do.  Clearly stated, the goals are not much in disagreement. More efficient, less expensive and cleaner energy, including for automobiles, is hardly something to be arguing about. It is in the getting there that the two campaigns probably differ most.

Finally, it also seems clear that McCain will be stressing Nuclear Energy as a viable and much needed alternative, as well as Clean Coal technology.

Also see Ed Morrissey at Hot Air for more.

Comments

[SacTownMan]

What's wrong with you don't you know "we can't drill our way out of this" and that it "won't do anything to the price of oil in the short term". Don't forget that "it will be 10 to 15 years before we see a drop of oil from those fields", blah, blah,blah!!

Nuclear bad! Wind good! Corn good! People Bad!

[BobInStamford]

Wow, John McCain is apparently aware of energy. For a guy who was around before teh lightbulb that's pretty significant. He's surging to victory!

[seekeronos]

Russians can start producing oil from three months of touching a drill bit to the dirt.

Certainly we could do something similar if we let our oil explorations of ANWR and our coasts get to work.

And nuclear power is good, as is wind, solar, hydro, clean coal, methane hydrates, and any other exploitable energy we can bring to the market.

[IslamoLlama]

"-- Russians can start producing oil from three months of touching a drill bit to the dirt. --"

I don't think you want to use Russian Oil Companies as a model for doing business, Seek.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yukos
What with Putin's habit of throwing CEOs in jail and nationalizing the assets. That's not change we can believe in.

But seriously, it's not an issue of drilling individual new wells and you know it. It's about producing enough supply to outstrip demand. And that's not going to happen if we were to sink a hundred wells in three weeks. This, even, excluding exploration or equipment production / set up or the fact that 9 wells in 10 statistically come up dry, doesn't fix our oil problem because the market has set the price at $120 / barrel and that number isn't coming down so long as gas stations can continue to sell oil at inflated rates. Oil is an inelastic good. Companies can price it however they like.

As SacTownMan pointed out, "we can't drill our way out of this".

[seekeronos]

That Putin (the Russian government) bundled off the CEO of Yukos off to the gulag is sad.

However, We should attempt to reduce our development curves with free market incentives, where possible.

"--- This, even, excluding exploration or equipment production / set up or the fact that 9 wells in 10 statistically come up dry, doesn't fix our oil problem because the market has set the price at $120 / barrel and that number isn't coming down so long as gas stations can continue to sell oil at inflated rates. ---"

High oil prices recently are a muddy combination of factors, some stemming from a lack of refining capacity, some from regulatory issues, some from hedge funds manipulations. Price-gouging at the station (or even station-cartel level) does occur, but is probably the least of our worries: most of the station/station cartel owners' money is made at the C-stores attached to the stations.

I do not advocate nationalisation of the oil industry, but I certainly would not object to a great deal more transparency and regulation of the oil industry, to include oversight toward developing our domestic resources.

There are times and places for such regimes of regulation, and even while I generally would prefer free market solutions to things, there are times when greed gets in the way of principle and proper stewardship of resources; the ongoing energy crisis is one of those things that would do well to be regulated for a certain time.

To ignore and deny the development of those resources is to seriously handicap ourselves, especially when a programme to string up a bunch of wind turbine farms throughout Tornado Alley to be done in a similarly foolish manner as has been done with the corn-based ethanol programme, which may not produce a reliable or consistent output of energy.

We must proceed with a programme that has multiple prongs of attack, multiple solution tiers, and one that allows us to grow an economy around energy development which we could potentially export to developing nations as well once we have established it well here in the USA.

With Red China standing up a couple of coal-fired powerplants each week, it creates a market for us to export clean coal burning or CO2 sequestration technology that will benefit the Red Chinese as well as the environment, and displace some of our significant trade debt.

[Fred Beloit]

Moe: "Oil is an inelastic good. Companies can price it however they like."

Moe, do the words "gasoline war" strike a familiar note? Your statement is preposterous.

[Fred Beloit]

Ah, Sac, that's good:
"Does anybody even remember who this chick [Hillary] is. She has disappeared faster than Rev. Wright did. Most likely having some quality time with the loving husband sipping Mai Tai's. They are such a happy couple aren't they? Not anything like those other bitter, clingy, bible thumper, gun toting white folks!"

I can see those two love birds now through the palmetto leaves with the emerald green waters lapping at their bare toes. But me? I'm cleaning my pistola with one hand and clutching a copy of Gargantua and Pantagruel (my Bible) in the other, and I'm clinging to the notion that conservatism will make a comeback. One must confess though to having some bitterness about why, in this great country full of great people, we must be forced to choose between McC and Obie.

[Mr DeBakey]

"Contrast the consistent, if sometimes seemingly incorrigible, McCain"

C'mon now, McCain changes his positions all the time, on a wide variety of issues

-McCain supported the moratorium on coastal drilling ; now he’s against it.
-McCain recently announced his strong opposition to a windfall-tax on oil company profits. Three weeks earlier, he was perfectly comfortable with the idea.
-McCain explained his belief that a temporary suspension of the federal gas tax would provide an immediate economic stimulus. Shortly thereafter, he argued the exact opposite.
-McCain supported the Lieberman/Warner legislation to combat global warming. Now he doesn’t.
-McCain was for national auto emissions standards before he was against them.
-McCain thought Bush’s warrantless-wiretap program circumvented the law; now he believes the opposite.
- When Barack Obama talked about going after terrorists in Pakistani mountains with predators, McCain criticized him for it. He’s since come to the opposite conclusion.
-McCain supported moving “towards normalization of relations” with Cuba. Now he believes the opposite.
-McCain recently claimed that he was the “greatest critic” of Rumsfeld’s failed Iraq policy. In December 2003, McCain praised the same strategy as “a mission accomplished.” In March 2004, he said, “I’m confident we’re on the right course.” In December 2005, he said, “Overall, I think a year from now, we will have made a fair amount of progress if we stay the course.”
-McCain defended “privatizing” Social Security. Now he says he’s against privatization (though he actually still supports it.)
-McCain said in 2005 that he opposed the tax cuts because they were “too tilted to the wealthy.” By 2007, he denied ever having said this, and falsely argued that he opposed the cuts because of increased government spending.
-McCain was a co-sponsor of the DREAM Act, which would grant legal status to illegal immigrants’ kids who graduate from high school. Now he’s against it.
-On immigration policy in general, McCain announced in February 2008 that he would vote against his own bill.
-McCain went from saying he would not support repeal of Roe v. Wade to saying the exact opposite.
-In June, McCain rejected the idea of a trial for Osama bin Laden, and thought Obama’s reference to Nuremberg was a misread of history. A month later, McCain argued the exact opposite position.
- In 2006, McCain sponsored legislation to require grassroots lobbying coalitions to reveal their financial donors. In 2007, after receiving “feedback” on the proposal, McCain told far-right activist groups that he opposes his own measure.
-McCain wanted political support from radical televangelist John Hagee. Now he doesn’t. (He also believes his endorsement from Hagee was both a good and bad idea.)
-McCain criticized TV preacher Jerry Falwell as “an agent of intolerance” in 2002, but then decided to cozy up to the man who said Americans “deserved” the 9/11 attacks.
- McCain was for presidential candidates giving speeches in foreign countries before he was against it.

I didn't write these.
Would you like me to throw a dozen or two more?

[Fred Beloit]

Of course you did't write these, DaBookie. You copied them from some Lefty propaganda blog, which, either through laziness or a feeling of shame because you know they probably provided no sources for these comments either, you chose not to share with us. I wonder if you would be able to list some important BO accomplishments while in the Senate for us.

[tally]

i've been saying for a long time that we should do it all. gee, most of us can walk and chew gum at the same time.

[ajacksonian]

You know, that ANWR 'natural beauty' bit is really a bit strange considering that we got uranium out of the Orphan Coppermine in the Grand Canyon for over 20 years.... ruined the place, didn't it? All radioactive and such? Blight to the landscape?

http://ajacksonian.blogspot.com/2008/07/resources-and-wilderness-can-go.html

[Mr DeBakey]

"either through laziness or a feeling of shame because you know they probably provided no sources for these comments either"

I could've provided links
But I know you're the type who wants to find this stuff for himself
and refute all the incorrect ones!