© Gurumurthy Kalyanaram (2007)
Gurumurthy Kalyanaram is a management consultant and a professor. He can be reached at gurumurthy.kalyanaram@gmail.com.
John McCain has reversed his stance against off-shore drilling, and now advocates it. Barack Obama continues to oppose this. The U.S. Congress currently has a statutory ban on off-shore drilling. What are the pros and cons?
With the high gas prices and improved technologies, voters are open to this idea -- all public polls show that 55-60 percent of Americans support off-shore drilling. It is estimated that there may be about 21 billion barrels of proven oil reserves that are left untouched because of a federal moratorium on offshore exploration and production.
So that should help McCain, right? Not much for two reasons. One, the voters will always be reminded that McCain might be opportunistic and runs counter to McCain's tough-it-out but do the right thing image. Two, the blue-collar, working class, lower income voters who are most affected by high gas prices are also surprisingly principled and tough (they would rather tough it), so McCain may gain no traction with this most plausible demographic group.
The principled-stubbornness of the working class demographic group came to most vivid demonstration when Clinton's advocacy of temporary suspension of gas tax (and Obama's opposition) did not fetch her any favors with this group in the Democratic primaries.
Finally, even if the federal ban on the off-shore drilling was removed it would be a long time before there can be any potential oil production because the individual states such as California and Florida have to make their own determination and then the business of drilling oil has to begin.
The energy debate will go and must go on but off-shore drilling, apart from its impact on the coastal environment, may not be a political asset for John McCain.
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