Obama uses Gulf oil disaster to promote climate bill that boosts offshore drilling

In a speech on the economy delivered yesterday at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, President Obama used the occasion of the ongoing BP oil spill catastrophe in the Gulf of Mexico to talk about the nation's energy future.

"We have to acknowledge that there are inherent risks to drilling four miles beneath the surface of the Earth, and these are risks that are bound to increase the harder oil extraction becomes," he said. "We also have to acknowledge that an America run solely on fossil fuels should not be the vision we have for our children and our grandchildren."

Noting that the House of Representatives has already passed a comprehensive energy and climate bill, President Obama pointed out that climate legislation has also been introduced in the Senate. While acknowledging that "the votes may not be there right now," he said that he does "intend to find them in the coming months."

The President is referring to the American Power Act of 2010 introduced last month by Sens. John Kerry (D-Mass.) and Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.). The legislation aims to cut carbon pollution by 17% from 2005 levels by 2020, and by over 80% by 2050, by putting a price tag on carbon.

An analysis of the legislation by the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace points out that it differs from the House-approved Waxman-Markey legislation in four main ways:

It calls for the phasing in of the carbon cap to buffer the impact on the manufacturing sector; it has a greater focus on nuclear power and offshore oil drilling; it allocates more revenues to rebates and deficit reduction, and it has a different mix of recipients for the revenues generated by carbon pricing (for example; it allocates more for green transportation and less for habitat protection).

That's right: It "has a greater focus" on offshore oil drilling, which raises the question: Why would the U.S. want to boost offshore drilling given the obvious safety failures and the catastrophic consequences they have for the ecology and economy?

Indeed, the Kerry-Lieberman plan has been criticized by environmental and public-interest organizations as a giveaway to industrial polluters -- not only because it promotes dirty energy sources like oil and nuclear power, but also because it takes away the Environmental Protection Agency's ability to regulate greenhouse gas pollution under the federal Clean Air Act.

Among the groups opposing the Senate bill are Friends of the Earth, Public Citizen and the Center for Biological Diversity, which called the measure a "disaster for our climate and planet."

"The senators' proposal would entrench our addiction to fossil fuels by offering incentives for increased oil and gas drilling just days after what appears to be the worst offshore oil disaster in American history," the Center said. "Large domes, small domes, golf balls, garbage, chemical dispersants, fire -- none have succeeded in stopping the enormous flow of oil into the Gulf of Mexico. Clearly, there are no 'safeguards' Senators Lieberman and Kerry could put into this bill to make offshore oil safe."

But the Kerry-Lieberman bill has some very powerful supporters. Among those who have endorsed it? BP, ConocoPhillips and Royal Dutch Shell.

All of those oil companies are major campaign contributors, with the top recipient of BP's campaign cash during the 2008 election cycle none other than the President himself.

(Photo of President Obama speaking at Carnegie Mellon University on June 2, 2010 by White House Photographer Pete Souza)