Democrats convene in Denver, McCain surprises with VP choice — week of 24 August 2008

It was supposed to be the Democrats’ week, as Barack Obama and vice presidential nominee Senator Joe Biden headed off to the Democratic National Convention in Denver (see our earlier coverage for day 1 , day 2 , day 3 , and day 4 of the convention). But Republican John McCain was not about to be drowned out by all the hoopla at what he derisively labeled the “temple of Obama” in the Mile High City. Less than a day after Obama’s acceptance speech, McCain introduced his surprise choice of Alaska Governor Sarah Palin for his running mate. According to a McCain press release , Palin “has challenged the influence of the big oil companies while fighting for the development of new energy resources,” and “has been a leader in the fight to make America energy independent.” During her successful campaign against former governor Tony Knowles in 2006, Palin, a conservative Christian, supported the teaching of creationism and intelligent design, though she later backpedaled some, saying only that they be discussed if they came up during the teaching of evolution .Full of energy

During his acceptance speech, Obama reiterated his pledge to free the country from dependence on Mideast and Venezuelan oil within 10 years , through a combination of higher fuel economy standards, tax credits for hybrid and other advanced vehicles, low-carbon fuels and “responsible” domestic and offshore oil exploration.

Biden’s views on energy and global warming mirror Obama’s, emphasizing expanded use of renewable energy and conservation, a qualified endorsement of more nuclear power -provided the nuclear waste storage can be resolved- and a cap-and-trade system for carbon emissions. The exception is on their roles for coal; Obama, from coal-state Illinois, calls for greater use of “zero-carbon coal” power plants employing CO₂ capture and storage technologies. while Biden has backed the export of US clean-coal technologies for use in China and elsewhere, but has argued that the US has better alternatives to meet its energy needs .

Earlier in the week, and with the convention already into its third day, Obama was talking energy in Montana, telling veterans and military families that McCain has been “asleep at the switch” in promoting renewable energy. He hit McCain on his support for the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository in Nevada, saying “Not surprisingly, a whole bunch of people in Nevada were like ‘Hold on a second, John McCain is in favor of Yucca Mountain’ except it turned out he didn’t want the stuff shipped through Arizona to get to Nevada.” He continued, “Somebody said we could have used some of his houses as - that wasn’t my joke, that was this gentleman right here, so I’m not gonna take credit for that one.”

The McCain campaign has said Obama was against nuclear power, but the Democrat sought to make it clear that was not the case. “I do think that nuclear power’s going to have to be part of the overall mix. We can’t take anything off the shelf ,” he said.

Yucca Mountain unimportant?But while the Obama campaign has been running TV ads stoking up residents’ opposition to Yucca Mountain, Nevadans were telling pollsters that the issue isn’t as important to their votes as believed . In a statewide survey, 38% of voters said the candidates’ views on the waste dump would not sway their decision; but 28% said that it would and 37% said it would have some influence.McCain, meanwhile, popped onto the media’s radar screen by calling for a delay of the retirement date for the space shuttles. McCain’s position came about as a response to heightened tensions with Russia. The GOP nominee-in-waiting was joined by fellow GOP senators Kay Bailey Hutchison and David Vitter in asking NASA to take no action over the next year that precludes the shuttles from flying past 2010, the date the agency has established for their permanent grounding. In their letter to NASA Administrator Michael Griffin, the three lawmakers fretted over NASA’s dependence on Russia for delivering crew to and from the International Space Station until a new US crew exploration vehicle and rocket are ready to fly in 2015.

Griffin has been adamant that extending the lifetime of the space shuttle will cause massive disruption to NASA’s proposed replacement, which suffered a significant failure in testing earlier this week .

However, an internal NASA email leaked to the Orlando Florida Sentinel yesterday highlights a request from Griffin to NASA employees to carry out a feasibility study of extending the shuttle program lifetime beyond 2010. McCain’s letter, and Obama’s space policy plan released some weeks ago that calls for one extra flight to the space station to deliver the Alpha Mass Spectrometer is clearly having some effect on the agency.