I wanted to learn more about what drives Sarah Palin, so what better way to learn about her than to watch a bunch of interviews with her prior to becoming John McCain’s right hand hockey-Mom.
I think it’s borderline comical that some Americans really think that the key to energy independence is to “tap” every inch of oil reserve they can find in order to gain “independence from Saudi Arabia”. It reminds me of those “eat hamburgers and lose weight at the same time” commercials. Five years ago, all the hype in America was about losing weight without changing your eating habits and without having to exercise. Similarly, today’s hype is about becoming “energy independent” without having to change your oil consumption habits.
When responding to Larry Kudlow’s question regarding both McCain and Obama’s stance on preventing Alaska from being tapped, she conceded that McCain is wrong on that issue but he’s “right on a whole lot of other issues thankfully”. “Obama is way off-base on all that. I think uh, those politicians who don’t understand that we need more domestic supply of energy flown into our hungry markets. You know they are living in la-la land and we’re in a world of hurt if their agenda continues to be to lock up these safe, secure, domestic supplies of energy.” [1]
Kudlow points out the criticism from both parties is that: “There’s not enough to matter, it’ll take too long and it won’t impact the price of oil internationally or gas at the pump, how do you respond to that?” Palin responds, “Well it will impact in a positive sense the price of fuel eventually. We’ve gotta start somewhere. Again, we’ve got a domestic supply sitting there underground. The reserves are ready to be tapped. And here in Alaska, our constituents the people who live here want it drilled. So that tells you you know that we have confidence in the safety and responsibility that we’ll see there in the development of ANWR.”
When asked how long it will take to start pulling oil, she replied “Yeah, it’s going to take at least 5 years. You know, and there are other areas in Alaska too that have the reserves that need to be tapped. Certainly offshore there’s trillions of cubic feet of natural gas and billions of barrels of oil there too that needs to be tapped.”
Larry Kudlow then suggested, “Why don’t we just liberate and decontrol and deregulate the whole bloody energy business, whether it’s oil, gas, shale, nuclear, coal, natural gas, as well as wind and solar. Why don’t we just de-control, de-regulate, go for and American-first energy policy. Get independent of Saudi Arabia.. America first; create all these millions of high-paying jobs.” Palin responds “Yeah absolutely, you’re hitting the nail right on the head. That’s what so many of us normal Americans are asking, same thing. Why aren’t our candidates talking like that. Where we can secure America and we can be more independent when we talk about energy sources if we could drill domestically. Here we sent Secretary Bodman overseas the other day, and our President had to visit the Saudi’s a few weeks ago to ask them to ramp up development. That’s nonsense. Not when you know that we have the supplies here. You have the supplies in your sister state called Alaska. Where we’re ready, willing and we’re able to pump these supplies of energy, flow them into hungry markets across the US. We want it to happen. It’s congress holding us back.”
As much Glenn Beck annoys me, I made it through this interview [2] to hear what Sarah Palin had to say. Beck was speaking to Palin about her lawsuit against the Federal Government relating to adding Polar Bears to the Endangered Species Act, which she sees as an impediment to oil exploration in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) Palin says: “Our fear being that extreme environmentalists will use this tool, the ESA (Endangered Species Act), to eventually just curtail or halt, or slow production of very rich resources that America needs. We need that oil, we need that gas, I’m glad you’re fired up about it Glenn”.
When Beck commented that Alaskans pay the most in the USA for fuel at the pumps, Palin responds: “Yeah isn’t that ridiculous. We are. And Alaskans collectively, we own these resources underground. We want them to be tapped. And again, we’re ready to contribute more to the US in terms of resources that can lead to a safer nation. And I say this you know while our nation is at war, while we’re fighting in some sense over energy supplies. It’s ridiculous; we do have the resources here.”
Beck then said, “We brought Alaska into the union, if I’m not mistaken, with an eye to the future of its reserves. Why would we not tap the Alaskan reserves right now.” Palin responds, “That is exactly why we became a state 50 years ago. We struck deals with the Federal government saying that we wanted to be let into the union and we’d be as self-sufficient as possible. We’d do that developing our god-given resources up there. And we would contribute to the federal government. And now though, we’re not allowed to do that. The Federal Government and again the extreme environmentalists are not allowing us to uphold our end of the bargain when we became a state. We are so rich, with millions and millions and millions of barrels of oil still sitting underground. Trillions and trillions of cubic feet of natural gas, clean stable supply that’s not allowed to be tapped.”
When pressed about whether she would accept an invitation from McCain to be his running-mate, she responds: “As for VP talk all the time, I tell ya, I still can’t answer that question until somebody answers for me, what is it exactly that the VP does every day? I’m used to umm being very productive and working real hard and in administration. We want to make sure that VP slot would be a fruitful type of position. Especially for Alaskans and for the things we’re trying to accomplish up here for the rest of the US before I can even start addressing that question.” [3]
[1] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ys4HGbiONY&feature=related
[2] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X3jnbiHAMuY
[3] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pak-rH0dCeA&NR=1