High gas costs fuel energy debate

Candidates spar over remedies

With gas prices hitting record highs nearly every day, the major presidential candidates tangled yesterday over energy policy.

Barack Obama said that Democratic rival Hillary Clinton and presumptive Republican nominee John McCain are part of a Washington establishment that has failed to stand up to oil companies. McCain and the Republican National Committee are accusing Obama of flip-flopping on the idea of suspending the federal gas tax to help consumers. And Clinton is bashing Obama for voting for an energy bill that included tax breaks for oil companies.


Obama stoked the back-and-forth by appearing at a gas station in Indianapolis to say that gas prices are “bordering on a crisis” and to press his argument that he is the only candidate who can bring meaningful change because he is not beholden to lobbyists and special interests.

“The candidates with the Washington experience – my opponents – are good people,” he said. “They mean well. But they’ve been in Washington for a long time, and even with all that experience they talk about, nothing has happened. . . . So what have we got for all that experience? Gas that’s approaching $4 a gallon.”

“It’s time to free ourselves from the tyranny of oil,” he added.

The Illinois senator cautioned that “there’s no easy answer to our energy crisis” and that it wouldn’t come overnight, but rather from long-term changes and investments in clean energy and energy efficiency.

Republicans, however, say Obama is ignoring soaring gas prices and his own record by not backing a quicker solution: McCain’s proposal this month for a gas tax holiday that would suspend the 18.4-cent-per-gallon federal levy between Memorial Day and Labor Day.

Boston Globe