McCain flip-flopped on offsore drilling for oil company campaign donations

Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

McCain had long supported the ban on offshore oil drilling in environmentally sensitive coastal areas, protected by an executive order signed by President George H. W. Bush, and regularly renewed by Congress.  McCain’s reputation as a "maverick" and an "environmentalist" with his McMedia "base" was premised upon his opposition to the Republican Party’s position on this issue.  In fairness, oil companies have not been big campaign contributors to McCain in past campaigns.

Well, those "maverick" principles went by the board when McCain was in need of campaign cash.  McCain reversed his long-standing opposition to the federal ban on offshore drilling (but continues to oppose drilling in ANWR, no doubt an attempt to maintain a bit of "maverick" by opposing his party’s position while trying to have it both ways). The Washington Post reported on Sunday that Industry Gushed Money After Reversal on Drilling: 

Campaign contributions from oil industry executives to Sen. John McCain rose dramatically in the last half of June, after the senator from Arizona made a high-profile split with environmentalists and reversed his opposition to the federal ban on offshore drilling.

Oil and gas industry executives and employees donated $1.1 million to McCain last month — three-quarters of which came after his June 16 speech calling for an end to the ban — compared with $116,000 in March, $283,000 in April and $208,000 in May.

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"The timing was significant," said David Donnelly, the national campaigns director of the Public Campaign Action Fund, a nonpartisan campaign finance reform group that conducted the analysis of McCain’s oil industry contributions. "This is a case study of how a candidate can change a policy position in the interest of raising money."

Greg Sargent and Eric Kleefeld reported on August 4th at Talking Points Memo TPM Election Central | Talking Points Memo | Multiple Oil Company Executives Gave Huge Contributions To Electing McCain Just that:

Ten senior Hess Corporation executives and/or members of the Hess family each gave $28,500 to the joint RNC-McCain fundraising committee, just days after McCain reversed himself to favor offshore drilling, according to Federal Election Commission reports.

Nine of these contributions, seven from Hess executives and two from members of the Hess family, came on the same day, June 24th, the records show. The total collected in the wake of McCain’s reversal for the fund, called McCain Victory 2008, from Hess execs and family is $285,000.

McClatchy News reported McClatchy Washington Bureau | 08/06/2008 | Did New York couple give $61,600 to McCain, GOP? that:

Alice Rocchio is an office manager at the New York headquarters of the Hess Corp., drives a 1993 Chevy Cavalier and lives in an apartment in Queens, N.Y., with her husband, Pasquale, an Amtrak foreman.

Despite what appears to be a middle-class lifestyle, the couple has written $61,600 in checks to John McCain’s presidential campaign and the Republican National Committee, most of it within days of McCain’s decision to endorse offshore oil drilling.

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Hess, among the nation’s five biggest oil companies, conducts deepwater drilling in the Gulf of Mexico as well as off the coasts of Europe, Africa and Asia.

The Rocchios donated $4,600 to McCain’s campaign in February and another $57,000 at the June fundraiser.

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A former FEC official said that it’s possible that the Rocchios had the means to make those hefty contributions — their first reported donations to a federal campaign. But the official, who declined to be identified because of the sensitivity of the matter, said that their donations also could trigger a complaint or otherwise catch the eyes of the agency’s enforcement staff, tasked to ensure that companies or wealthy individuals don’t illegally circumvent contribution limits by using employees or other third parties as "conduits” for cash.

The staff might wish to determine whether the couple is too "under-employed” to be making donations that large, the official said.

Greg Sargent and Eric Kleefeld reported today at Talking Points Memo TPM Election Central | Talking Points Memo | High-Ranking McCain Campaign Officials Were Paid Lobbyists For Hess:

It turns out that two high-ranking McCain campaign officials, one of whom is also one of McCain’s more prolific bundlers, were both were paid lobbyists for Hess for roughly three years, according to disclosure forms.

The two lobbyists are Wayne Berman, McCain’s national finance co-chairman, and John Green, who’s been the McCain campaign’s chief Congressional liaison since March. Both men worked for a firm called Ogilvy Government Relations. The firm has been paid $800,000 by Hess from 2005 up to the present, including $720,000 during the period that both of the two lobbied for the company, the forms say.

Berman, a prolific fundraiser and bundler for McCain, appears to still be lobbying for Hess.  The most recently filed form shows that he was lobbying for the company as late as mid-July. Green took a leave of absence from Ogilvy to join the campaign, but was still on the Hess account up through the first quarter of 2008, the forms show.

There’s no suggestion of any wrongdoing here. And it’s unclear precisely how the two lobbyists’ work is linked to the recent Hess fundraising for McCain, or even whether there’s any connection at all.

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"That John McCain’s campaign also has Hess lobbyists as two of its top advisers raises additional questions about how McCain and the RNC came to raise $300,000 from Hess employees, including the controversial contribution reported earlier this week," said David Donnelly of Campaign Money Watch.

"Hess oil would stand to make a killing from offshore drilling," Donnelly continued. "Berman and Green were their lobbyists. Did they play any role in lining up these contributions?"

Which brings us back to the ongoing problem of lobbyists working for the McCain campaign who are drafting his policies for him, while benefiting either personally or benefiting their clients. In this case Hess Oil, a major offshore oil developer who will directly benefit from this policy.  (It’s not about "Joe Sixpack" having to pay $4 gallon for gas). There is also the possibility that companies and wealthy individuals are illegally circumventing contribution limits by using employees or other third parties as "conduits” for cash to the McCain campaign.

Something is definitely rotten in Denmark (and I don’t mean Shell Oil).  But is anyone in the McMedia reporting on this potentially explosive scandal?  Of course not!

The McMedia instead distracts you with the repetition of the Republican talking points mocking Obama for his statement about maintaining proper air pressure in tires and regular tune-ups.  Keeping your tires properly inflated is at least the equivalent of new offshore drilling in terms of how much money you’ll spend on gas. In fact, as Time reported the other day, it is potentially better than new drilling — if everyone actually did it Americans would consume three percent less gasoline, while drilling would only meet one percent of our overall oil needs.  "In other words," Time said, "Obama is right."

In fact, John McCain has already conceded the point.  “Obama said a couple of days ago, says we all should inflate our tires. I don’t disagree with that. The American Automobile Association strongly recommends it,” McCain said.  And yet, McCain is continuing to use this line on the stump to mock Obama, falsely asserting this is his energy policy. 

Barack Obama, out of exasperation, responded "It’s like these guys take pride in being ignorant.  They think it’s funny that they’re making fun of something that is actually true."

It’s worse than that, Barack.  The professionals who run Republican campaigns are making fun of and mocking the voters and our democratic process. They see voters as uninformed and ignorant yahoos, lemmings who can easily be led over the cliff to vote against their own self-interests by manipulating their emotions and prejudices with simple bumper-sticker slogans and gimmicks.  This is Madison Avenue marketing.  They are selling McCain to you like they sell you cars. 

And you the voters too often have allowed yourselves to be played by these evil bastards and prove them right.  So they continue to do this election after election, and you the voters complain about it. Well, now is your opportunity to take a stand and say "enough is enough!"