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The Greening Of The White House

Posted on: Friday, 5 September 2008, 12:15 CDT

Who will be the leading “green” candidate: Obama or McCain? Both presidential hopefuls have made energy and environmental issues part of their presidential crusades.

Both are in favor of regulating the climate change crisis caused by gas emissions. Obama and McCain both say they want to decrease the U.S.’s dependence on foreign oil.

Early in the campaign, both candidates were seen by the public and several environmental groups as being progressive versus the Bush Administration’s stance. McCain's views on global warming led most Republicans to expect they could grab independent voters favoring environmental issues.

McCain has tried to separate himself from the environmental record of President George W. Bush.

"The Bush administration frankly has been a series of disappointments, chiefly, most specifically on energy and climate policy, but with a new guy at the top who has very different views and very different experiences on these issues, he can start moving the party back where it needs to be," said Jim DiPeso, policy director of Republicans for Environmental Protection. DiPeso continues that McCain is "exactly the kind of leader that the Republican party needs to get right with the American people on environmental issues."

The similarities of the two men ended quickly when the Arizona senator promoted more drilling for oil and chose conservative Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin as vice president.

As a result, most U.S. environmental groups are backing Obama.

"Unfortunately it's becoming more and more clear that the McCain-Palin ticket will continue the failed policies of the Bush administration and their Big Oil friends," said Gene Karpinski, president of the League of Conservation Voters.

Palin, a controversial candidate, supports offshore and onshore drilling for oil and gas, opposes the listing of the polar bear as threatened under the Endangered Species Act and has doubted whether or not human activities cause climate change.

"Our position is that Sarah Palin really was not put on the ticket to be a policy advisor to John McCain on these issues," DiPeso said, "She will be a McCain administration spear-carrier on reform in (Washington) DC."

In his acceptance speech Thursday at the Republican National Convention, McCain spoke about the environment in regards to his plan to stop the United States dependence on foreign oil: "We must use all resources and develop all technologies necessary to rescue our economy from the damage caused by rising oil prices and restore the health of our planet."

That was spoken soon after McCain said, "We will drill new wells off-shore, and we'll drill them now. We'll drill them now."

Contrasting McCain’s environmental comments, during Obama's speech at the Democratic convention, he is determined to end "dependence on oil from the Middle East" in 10 years and remarked that offshore drilling was a "stop-gap measure, not a long-term solution."

Obama's running mate is Delaware Sen. Joe Biden, whose rating according to the League of Conservation Voters is indistinguishable from Sen. Obama's. Together the senators voted for the environment 67 percent of the time in 2007. McCain's rating was zero for last year.

Source: redOrbit Staff & Wire Reports

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