FactCheck: McCain's Wind-Power Puffery | Newsweek Politics: Campaign 2008

FACTCHECK.ORG
Waste Worries
Viveca Novak 8/14/2008 12:00:00 AM
The McCain campaign objects, saying the Republican candidate's response was taken out of context. McCain also said, "I think it can be made safe," and that waste is "not well protected" where it is now, and the Obama ad doesn't include those statements.
The Great Energy Confusion
Robert J. Samuelson 8/9/2008 12:00:00 AM
Forget about a candid national conversation on energy. As John McCain and Barack Obama campaigned last week, that much seemed clear. To lower oil prices (which were already dropping), Obama proposed releasing 10 percent of the Strategic Petroleum Reserve. This is an atrocious idea. The SPR was intended as insurance against a catastrophic loss of oil from wars, embargoes, terrorism or natural disasters. It should not be manipulated cynically for political advantage. Earlier, McCain suggested suspending the 18.4 cent-a-gallon federal gasoline tax; that was another bad and expedient idea.
BUSINESS
The Pickens Profile You Haven’t Read
Karen Breslau 8/9/2008 12:00:00 AM
T. Boone Pickens can't read his lines. Squinting at his teleprompter, he is posing in front of a mile-long ribbon of wind turbines, churning against an endless Texas sky. Pickens is in Sweetwater, a town of 12,000 that bills itself as the nation's wind-energy capital, to shoot a commercial urging Americans to put themselves on a new energy diet: cutting out imported oil—which costs $700 billion a year—in favor of domestically produced sources such as wind and natural gas. "Our dependence on foreign oil means that we are buying from our enemies," he drawls into the camera, veering from the script. At this, the director walks onto the set, frowning his disapproval. "Don't want me to say 'enemies', huh?" Pickens deadpans as he drops his head in mock shame and scuffs his cowboy boot in the dirt. "How 'bout 'Some friends and a few a––holes?' That better?"
You Say You Want a Revolution
Evan Thomas 8/4/2008 12:00:00 AM
Jane and Michael Hoffman are not exactly your average, everyday couple. Jane was New York City consumer affairs commissioner in the Giuliani administration and Michael is a wealthy investor whose holdings, at one point, included a coal-fired power plant. One day, Jane served her husband, Michael, his favorite, tuna fish, for lunch. "The tuna looked too fresh at the market to pass up," she said. "Too bad we can't have it more than once a week. I guess we have you to thank for that."
PROJECT GREEN
The Lure of Black Gold
Jamie Reno 8/1/2008 12:00:00 AM
Offshore oil drilling is at the center of an intensifying national debate over how the government should address the current energy crisis, and it's lately become a front-burner issue on the presidential campaign trail. Presumptive nominees Barack Obama and John McCain have been divided on the issue—Obama was against more drilling, McCain has lately come out in favor of it—but just today, Obama qualified his position, telling a Florida newspaper he'd be open to allowing limited offshore drilling if that's what it takes to pass a more comprehensive energy plan, including support for alternative energy and more fuel-efficient cars. Until recently, coastal states had taken a "not in my backyard" approach to offshore drilling. But that's beginning to change, now that gas prices are hovering at or above $4 per gallon. In Florida, 60 percent of voters now support drilling off their coasts. Perhaps more surprising, a majority in eco-conscious California is also willing to tap waters off the state's shorelines. Ever since the devastating Unocal oil spill in the waters off Santa Barbara in 1969, there was a relatively unified opposition to new drilling in the state. But a just-released survey by the Public Policy Institute of California (PPIC), a nonprofit, nonpartisan research organization, shows a slim but surprising majority (51 percent) of Californians now favoring more offshore drilling, while 45 percent now oppose it.
All Umbrage All the Time
Jonathan Alter 7/19/2008 12:00:00 AM
A reader logging on as KellyB last week posted a comment on a Politico.com story covering the funeral of former White House spokesman Tony Snow: "Rest in peace, Tony. You were a kind, decent soul on this earth for too short a time. May God always watch over your family." But KellyB couldn't resist amending the gracious condolence with this: "Politico.com—The Official Water Carrier of Barack H. Obama's Campaign."