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PrintJune 12, 2008
Obama: I was for high gas prices before I was against them
Jim Geraghty reports on an interview Obama gave CNBC on the gas crisis where the candidate came out four square - for higher gas prices:
Barack Obama: I think that... we have been slow to move in a better direction when it comes to energy usage. And the president, frankly, hasn't had an energy policy.* And as a consequence we've been consuming energy as if it's infinite. We now know that our demand is badly outstripping supply with China and India growing as rapidly as they are.
CNBC's John Harwood: So could the (high) oil prices help us?
Barack Obama: I think that I would have preferred a gradual adjustment. The fact that this is such a shock to American pocketbooks is not a good thing. But if we take some steps right now to help people make the adjustment, first of all by putting more money in their pockets, but also by encouraging the market to adapt to these new circumstances more rapidly, particularly U.S. automakers...
Geraghty translates:
The obvious inference is that Obama doesn't object to $4 a gallon gas per se, just how rapidly the price increased. Most Americans hate it and want gas prices to go down as rapidly as possible. Obama wants to "help people to make the adjustment" to "new circumstances."Is reducing the price of a gallon of gas a policy priority for Obama? Or does he, like Thomas Friedman, believe that the president should "guarantee people a high price of gasoline - forever."
It's no secret that liberals believe gas prices have always been too low. But you might notice that they are having much more fun recently skewering Republicans and wailing about the high price of fuel.
Some Democrats in the past have advocated as much as a $5 a gallon increase in the gas tax to punish Americans for driving. Funny, we don't hear much about those proposals now. And here's Barack Obama telling us "tough sh*t America, get used to it."
Something else that's kind of strange; it's funny how statements like this by Obama never make it on any other newscasts...
