Bennett Hedges on Offshore Drilling

Just two weeks ago, LV Congressional candidate Sam Bennett told me she opposes offshore drilling. "I feel that that would be a misguided, short-term benefit effort. To be honest with you, if we drilled in those places, if we started tomorrow, we would not see a drop of oil from those places for years." She added, "I think it's a short-term mistake."

That was then.

In yesterday's interview, she had changed course.

Morning Call (Darryl Isherwood): Are you in favor now of this new proposal to allow offshore drilling more than 50 miles off shore?

Bennett: "What I would say, Darryl, is clearly, in order to move legislation forward, which is what we need to do, we need to start acting, if we are going to compromise on both sides of the aisle. And I felt that this bill was an effective compromise. We need to roll up our sleeves and get something done. We need to move this argument off the political tables. We have a job that Congress has to get done here. So if there's a compromise to make, we will make them. But I would have voted Yes to this particular bill."

LVRamblings (Bernie O'Hare): Charlie Dent called the legislation passed yesterday a cynical effort by Speaker Pelosi to appear as though Congress supports offshore drilling, but making it impossible for it to ever occur. For example, it denies revenue sharing among the states, 88% of the most promising areas will never be explored, the legislation also says no to clean coal, it says no to nuclear, and Dent says he's from Pennsylvania, so why would he support legislation that vetoes the use of all types of energy sources to solve our energy crisis? He pointed to another piece of legislation that has 135 cosponsors that does permit these things, and suggested that Congress should adopt that. Also, I've been told this legislation is DOA in the Senate. So what's your take on Charlie Dent's position?

Bennett: "My take on his position, and this is a pattern I've seen in his voting record, he consistently will vote against strong pieces of legislation and pick some sort of minor issue. The issue here isn't drilling. The issue here is moving our nation to a new way of getting our energy . . . "

O'Hare: Well, I think that's his point. His point is that it denies diversification. It says no to clean coal, no to nuclear, there's no diversification. it actually makes it impossible for offshore drilling the way it's written.

Bennett: "I would have to beg to differ with you. It's not against diversification at all. We're talking about solar, we're talking about wind, we're talking about geothermal. Quite frankly, Bernie, we're talking about a methodology for generating energy that may not have been invented yet, and that's why we need to heavily invest in R&D.

"I think strongly that what Charlie Dent is doing again is distracting from the true issue at hand because we need to move forward. We need to move forward with strong bipartisan legislation. I am in support of this particular piece of legislation and stop the equivocating. That's what Charlie Dent is doing . He's doing it in the same way that he says he won't debate, right?"

O'Hare: You have five debates with him, correct?

Bennett: "We have four that are on the docket. most of those are candidates' forums. And there are three traditional major ones we traditionally do that he doesn't want to do. And you know why? Because he does not want to be attached to this vote."

(Blogger's Note: I will post more of this interview tomorrow.)