Green group Friends of the Earth Action endorsed Barack Obama for president on Saturday, citing his principled stand against a temporary suspension of the gasoline tax. "The 'gas tax holiday' debate is a defining moment in the presidential race," said Friends of the Earth Action President Brent Blackwelder. "The two other candidates responded with sham solutions that won't ease pain at the pump, but Sen. Obama refused to play that typical Washington game. Instead, Obama called for real solutions that would make transportation more affordable and curb global warming."
Obama and Hillary Clinton continue to spar over the issue. Clinton is trying to paint Obama as out of touch with the economic woes of ordinary Americans; she told an audience in Indiana that Obama is "attacking my plan to try to get you some kind of break this summer." Obama is defending his position in a TV ad and in campaign speeches. Of Clinton's support for the gas-tax holiday, he said, "This is what passes for leadership in Washington -- phony ideas, calculated to win elections instead of actually solving problems."
Meanwhile, Democrats in Congress are preparing to release a plan to counter rising gas prices, but it's unlikely to include a gas-tax holiday, Grist's Kate Sheppard reports. A Republican plan unveiled last week also omits a tax holiday; it does include a plan to open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil drilling.
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Comments
View as Flat
human power Posted 3:27 pm
03 May 2008
I live in a small city (130,000) with no mass transit and a very hostile attitude towards cyclists/pedestrians. If my family can give up our fossil-fool powered wheelchair, I would imagine most able-bodied folks could reduce their driving by at least the percentage that gasoline costs have risen. Let's stop whining and start living the future.
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Wolverine Posted 3:25 am
04 May 2008
Re Barak Obama, he's on the right side on the gas tax holiday issue, seemingly for the wrong reasons, he supports coal and nuclear power and is a big supporter of the military industrial complex and U.S. imperialism, albeit a softer version of the latter. He's less offensive than Clinton or McCain, but he's not worthy of support of any real environmentalists or progressives.
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Tasermons Partner Posted 4:35 am
04 May 2008
'Specially when most analysts agree that it won't pass even if all the candidates endorsed it.
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dotcommodity Posted 6:03 am
04 May 2008
Surely any non profit cannot endorse pres candidates or they lose their nonprofit status, in any case.
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Lisa Hymas Posted 1:24 pm
04 May 2008
FoE Action didn't endorse Obama solely because of the "gas tax holiday" issue. In their press release, they cite "Obama's strong pro-environment record, his policy proposals, the profile he has given global warming in his campaign, and the broad mandate he is building for change as other reasons for the endorsement. Obama earned a 96 percent rating from the League of Conservation Voters during his first two years in the Senate." But the gas-tax issue is really the only big environmental policy difference to emerge between Obama and Clinton, so it looks like that's what ultimately pushed them in his favor.
Note that the main group Friends of the Earth didn't endorse Obama; it was the group's "political arm," Friends of the Earth Action, which has a different tax status.
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Wolverine Posted 2:41 pm
04 May 2008
If a Senator who supports the coal and nuclear industries can earn a 96% rating, that means that the LCV rating is to be used only for a floor, not a ceiling. In other words, anyone who doesn't have a high rating is a major anti-environmentalist, but a high rating is no guarantee of being a good environmentalist. Keep in mind that LCV is a very conservative environmental group, well to the right of Sierra Club.
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Tasermons Partner Posted 3:38 pm
04 May 2008
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guade00 Posted 12:47 am
05 May 2008
http://www.sanfranciscosentinel.com/?p=7742
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Nick Berning Posted 4:24 am
05 May 2008
Given that no candidate will ever be perfect, we're faced with the question of which candidate, on balance, is likely to be the best when it comes to environmental issues. When added to Obama's already strong (though admittedly not perfect) environmental record and policy proposals, his courage in this gas tax debate demonstrates that he's the best candidate in the race. This is the highest-profile environmental and energy debate of the campaign, and Obama is the only one taking the right position. That's telling, and it's earned him Friend of the Earth Action's endorsement.
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Wolverine Posted 6:44 am
05 May 2008
Has he supported greatly increasing the size and number of wilderness areas and increasing their protection against all human disturbances? Has he supported removing cattle from public lands in the West due to the immense ecological damage they've caused and are still causing, or in order to save the Yellowstone bison from being killed at the behest of ranchers? Has he supported prohibitions on logging in the West in order to protect endangered and threatened species and their habitats? Has he supported a ban on longline and commercial gillnet fishing in order to protect our oceans? Has he supported moving people from cars to other, less harmful modes of transportation? Has he supported lowering the birth rate in order to reduce human population to an ecologically harmless level? Has he supported lowering consumption of non-necessary goods in order to lessen the harms done by their consumption?
This list is both long and incomplete. Its point is that these are positions that a "good" environmentalist candidate would take. I don't see Obama or any major candidate taking them. What you're talking about is supporting a lesser of evils, something I never do and which has been toxic to the political process in the U.S., because it has been part of the cause of the major shift away from environmental concerns and to the right. Not only is Obama not perfect, he's not even good.
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