PDA

View Full Version : Governor Palin - Oil Connections


Harry
09-09-2008, 12:34 AM
http://www.platts.com/Oil/News/6944702.xml

Alaska Governor Sarah Palin, the newly minted vice presidential pick for Senator John McCain, said Friday that her track record as a reformer would bolster the Republican presidential ticket by providing the US with a new direction.

"The people of America expect us to seek public office and to serve for the right reasons," she said in Dayton, Ohio. "The right reason is to challenge the status quo and to serve the common good."

The selection is designed to counter Democratic attacks that McCain, the presumptive Republican nominee, is in lock step with the unpopular President Bush by voting with him 90% of the time.

McCain will seek to counter that suggestion and also go after Democratic nominee Senator Barack Obama at the Republican National Convention, which starts on Monday.

McCain said Palin would "best help me shake up Washington" in light of its many problems. "She's exactly who I need, she's exactly who this country needs to help me fight the same old Washington politics of me first and country second," the four-term Arizona senator said.

Palin was elected governor of Alaska in November 2006 after defeating incumbent Republican Governor Frank Murkowski in a primary and a Democratic challenger, former governor Tony Knowles, in the subsequent election.

While a proponent of developing Alaska's oil and natural gas reserves and drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, Palin is not viewed as an ally of the industry and, in fact, has taken public positions stressing her independence on that front.

Viewed as a reformer by some in the Republican Party, Palin is credited with jump-starting long-stalled plans to build an estimated $30-billion natural gas pipeline from Alaska's North Slope to the lower 48 states.

One of her first acts as governor was to scrap a producer-driven plan to build and operate the pipeline, which was backed by Murkowski. When Palin came into office, she opened the bidding to competition via her Alaska Gasoline Inducement Act.

On Wednesday, Palin signed a bill granting a license for Canadian pipeline company TransCanada to construct the pipeline and receive up to $500 million in state incentives -- raising the ire of major producers BP and ConocoPhillips, who are planning their own pipeline outside the AGIA process.

However, Palin also sued the US Department of Interior earlier in August for protecting the polar bear under the Endangered Species Act as a "threatened" species, saying the move is scientifically unjustified and would lead to restrictions on oil and natural gas development in the region.

Palin also serves as the chairwoman of the Interstate Oil and Gas Compact Commission and served as the chairwoman of the Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission in 2003 and 2004.

The main reason she's talked about as NOT being an industry insider is that she's pissed off the big boys by letting outsiders bid on the processes. NOT because she's against big oil.

Radu
09-09-2008, 01:30 AM
:blink: A Republican in favor of drilling? Are you suggesting, sir, that she may be sympathetic to the petroleum industry? I'm shocked at the very idea! Why, next you'll be slandering her in some other horrific way, like suggesting that she can't keep religion and political philosophy separate!

Eliezer
09-09-2008, 09:31 AM
Let's see...

1. Opened up competition on a gas pipeline, despite objections of big oil
2. Promoted measures to increase natural gas availability and decrease costs to consumers
3. Took pre-emptive steps to prevent eco-nazi's from challenging more natural gas and oil production by suing over polar bear "threatened" species listing. (And let's be frank about this, once it is listed as such less moderate environmentalists have huge leverage to threaten economic development in the area.)


That's just the highlighted portions. Heck yeah, vpilf for consumers over big business.