By Zachary Coile
House Republicans, who’ve been hounding Speaker Nancy Pelosi for weeks over her refusal to allow a vote on new domestic oil drilling, are plotting a high-stakes confrontation this fall that could spark a shutdown of the federal government.
Republicans see an opportunity when Congress returns Sept. 8 and will have to pass a temporary measure to keep the government funded beyond Sept. 30. Democrats are likely to include in the measure an extension of the congressional moratorium on offshore drilling, which would otherwise expire at the end of September.
GOP lawmakers warn they may try to block the measure - or pressure President Bush to veto it - if Democrats won’t relent and allow the drilling ban to lapse. If neither side gives in, it would force at least a temporary shutdown of the government.
Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, who led Republicans during the last government shutdown in 1995 that ended up bruising his party’s image, said he thinks Republicans should force the showdown. He believes that the public, frustrated with high gas prices, would side with Republicans in demanding more oil exploration.
"Are (Democrats) really prepared to close the government in order to stop drilling?" Gingrich said during an appearance at the House last week, where Republicans are still protesting Pelosi’s decision to adjourn for the August break without a vote on a GOP energy plan. "I think the American people would find that a suicidal strategy."
Democrats are skeptical that GOP leaders really want to risk a shutdown which, if it’s anything like the weeks-long closure in 1995, could lead to the furloughs of hundreds of thousands of federal workers, close national parks and passport offices, disrupt benefit checks to veterans and delay homeowners’ efforts to get government-backed home loans.
"So Republicans are going to tell seniors, ’You’re being squeezed by high gas prices and high grocery prices and now we’re going to cut off your Social Security checks?’ " said Jennifer Crider, a spokeswoman for the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, the House Democrats’ campaign arm. "It doesn’t make sense."
It would be a particularly risky strategy for lawmakers just weeks before the November election. While polls suggest a strong majority of Americans now back more domestic drilling - bolstering the GOP’s position - Democrats believe a government shutdown could play to their advantage. In 1995, the public blamed Republicans for provoking the shutdown over a budget dispute with Democratic President Bill Clinton.
Republicans argue that this time around it would be easier to pin the blame on Democrats. For one thing, Democrats now control both chambers of Congress. The GOP would portray Democrats as having sparked the face-off by including the ban on offshore drilling - and a similar ban on oil shale development, which is also set to expire - into the spending measure.
Asked if the GOP plans to shut down the government, House Minority Whip Roy Blunt, R-Mo., replied, "That’s going to be up to the Democrats." He said the easy way for Democrats to avoid the showdown is to drop the drilling bans. "As far as I’m concerned, those bans end Sept. 30. And if they end on Sept. 30, fuel prices will head back down on Oct. 1," he said.
Blocking the bill may be easier said than done. In the House, Democrats have the numbers to pass the spending measure easily, unless a big group of pro-drilling Democrats breaks ranks. The GOP might have better luck in the Senate, where Democrats have a 51-49 advantage - although a vote to shutter the government could be a tough one for senators in tight races.
Bush could also provoke the shutdown by vetoing the bill if it included the two drilling bans. The White House is, for now, staying mum on the idea.
Some lawmakers hold out hope that a deal on energy could be reached between the two parties this fall. The so-called "Gang of 10" senators, a group of five Democrats and five Republicans, is pushing legislation that would allow some new offshore drilling, but also increase incentives for renewable energy and electric vehicles.
The Senate’s top Democratic and Republican leaders have agreed to an energy summit when Congress returns for a three-week session, but the two sides have yet to agree on a list of which senators would speak or even a date and location. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., has expressed concern the summit could be used as an excuse to delay action, said his spokesman Don Stewart.
Pelosi is holding firm to her view that more drilling won’t have any short-term impact on gas prices and would only lower prices by pennies a gallon 10 years from now, citing government figures. She’s plotting a vote on a bill to rein in speculators in energy markets when Congress returns next month.
Pelosi and other top Democrats see little reason to compromise. They expect to pick up seats in the House and Senate in November - and perhaps the White House, too - which would allow them to craft a more environmentally friendly energy policy next year. In the meantime, they plan to use their fundraising advantage to bash GOP candidates with ads linking them to oil companies.
But in a shift, some Democrats are expressing more openness to drilling. Presidential candidate Barack Obama has said some new drilling could be part of a broader energy plan.
Rep. Anna Eshoo, D-Palo Alto, a member of the Energy and Commerce Committee and a close ally of Pelosi, said this week she is willing to back a deal to allow states to choose whether to drill off their coast - an idea Democrats have strongly opposed in the past - but only if Republicans agree to embrace policies that quickly shift the country toward wind, solar and other renewable sources.
"I want to see the most forward-looking energy policy for alternatives," Eshoo said. "If, in order to get that, you have to compromise and have the states sign off on whether they want drilling or not, maybe that’s the price we are going to pay to get it. But to have an up-or-down vote on drilling, where does that leave us? It leaves us in the same place Republicans have put us in after eight years of their policies."
Competing energy visions
House Democrats and Republicans have sharply different proposals to address high gas prices, while a bipartisan group of senators are offering their own plan:
Democratic plan
-- Release oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve
-- Require oil companies to drill on 68 million acres they already lease before they can bid on new ones
-- Repeal tax breaks for oil companies
-- Curb speculation in energy futures markets
-- Allow "responsible drilling" in Alaska’s National Petroleum Reserve
-- Require 15 percent of electricity to come from renewables by 2020
-- Renew tax incentives for wind, solar as well and offer tax credits for electric vehicles
Republican plan
-- Repeal the moratorium on offshore drilling along the East and West coasts
-- Allow drilling in Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge
-- Allow oil shale extraction across the Rocky Mountains
-- Increase incentives for nuclear power
-- Extend tax credits for wind, solar and hydrogen power
-- New tax breaks for coal-to-liquid fuels
-- Tax breaks for electric cars and a monetary prize for the first 100-mile-per-gallon vehicle
-- Speed up permits for new refineries
Gang of 10 senators’ bipartisan plan
-- Allow offshore drilling in eastern Gulf of Mexico
-- Allow four states - Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina and Georgia - to choose whether to allow drilling off their coasts
-- Repeal billions in tax breaks for oil companies
-- Speed up permitting process for nuclear plants
-- New loan guarantees for coal-to-liquid fuels plants
-- $2.5 billion to research advanced biofuels, and loans to build ethanol pipelines and biofuels, electric and hydrogen fueling stations
-- $15 billion for research on advanced batteries for electric cars and to help U.S. automakers retool to produce them
-- $7,500 tax credit for buying an electric vehicle, and $2,500 to convert old car into a plug-in
Source: Chronicle staff report
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