Let's save the debates about whether Obama is a Republicrat for the other threads on that. I thought we could have a thread on the smear campaign tactics that happen between now and the election that are too "fly by night" to merit their own threads.So...starting with the latest McCain smear against Obama...
Obama's energy plan consists of inflating tires.
Obama's plan is, of course, much more comprehensive than that, but he was answering a question from the audience about what individuals can do to help with the energy crisis. Obama suggested that people do things to improve the efficiency of their vehicles, like inflating their tires to the proper level.
McCain, of course, latched onto this and lied to all his supporters and the country by claiming that inflating your tires constitutes Obama's entire energy plan, and his campaign has been handing out tire pressure gauges with "Obama's Energy Plan" printed on them.
Looks like it's backfiring, though. I'm watching CNN news right now, and they featured Obama's response:
quote:
"Let me make a point about efficiency, because my Republican opponents - they don’t like to talk about efficiency," Obama said. "You know the other day I was in a town hall meeting and I laid out my plans for investing $15 billion a year in energy efficient cars and a new electricity grid and somebody said, 'well, what can I do? what can individuals do?' Obama recalled.
"So I told them something simple," Obama said. "I said, 'You know what? You can inflate your tires to the proper levels and that if everybody in America inflated their tires to the proper level, we would actually probably save more oil than all the oil we'd get from John McCain drilling right below his feet there, or wherever he was going to drill.'"
(Note: that's not accurate, as we fact-checked last week. But the larger point about energy savings is correct.)
"So now the Republicans are going around - this is the kind of thing they do. I don't understand it! They’re going around, they're sending like little tire gauges, making fun of this idea as if this is 'Barack Obama's energy plan.'"
BTW, the jury isn't in on whether it's accurate or not.
An argument that Obama actually was correct.
quote:
The Bush administration estimates that expanded offshore drilling could increase oil production by 200,000 barrels per day by 2030. We use about 20 million barrels per day, so that would meet about 1% of our demand two decades from now. Meanwhile, efficiency experts say that keeping tires inflated can improve gas mileage by 3%, and regular maintenance can add another 4%. Many drivers already follow their advice, but if everyone else did, we could reduce demand several percentage points immediately. In other words: Obama is right.
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posted 06 August 2008 03:04 AM
