Obama displays new flexibility on offshore drilling
Posted: 02 August 2008 2007 hrs

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	Related News • McCain mocks 'anointed' Obama in new broadside • Americans want presidential hopefuls to state clear positions on impt issues • Obama-McCain race turns toxic • McCain savages Obama for playing "race card" Special Report • US presidential election

WASHINGTON: Faced with a national outcry over skyrocketing gas prices, Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama said, in an interview published on Saturday, that he might be willing to open the state of Florida to offshore drilling.

"If, in order to get that passed, we have to compromise in terms of a careful, well thought-out drilling strategy that was carefully circumscribed to avoid significant environmental damage – I don't want to be so rigid that we can't get something done," Obama said in an interview with The Palm Beach Post.

He added that he was interested in developing a "comprehensive energy policy that can bring down gas prices".

The comments represented a policy adjustment for the Illinois senator, who in the past has opposed exposing more coastline to drilling.

Oil prices jumped higher on Friday on renewed jitters over Iran's disputed nuclear program.

New York's main contract, light sweet crude for September delivery, leapt as high as 128.60 dollars per barrel, before retreating to close at 125.10 dollars, marking a gain of 1.02 dollars from Thursday's finish.

In London, Brent North Sea crude for September delivery soared as high as 127.94 on Friday. It subsequently settled up 20 cents at 124.18 dollars.

Meanwhile, Republican John McCain ratcheted up his attacks on Obama on Friday, debuting a new web ad mocking the Democrat as a quasi-divine figure who had anointed himself to rule the world.

The Arizona senator sharpened his newly negative tone on a day when Obama was heckled by African American protestors in Florida, and denied McCain campaign claims he had injected race into the increasingly testy battle.

"Can you see the light?" McCain's sarcastic web video sent to supporters asked, arguing that Obama, who wowed Europeans on a foreign tour last week, is arrogant, consumed by his own celebrity and not yet ready to lead.

"It shall be known, that in 2008, the world will be blessed," says the narrator of the minute-long web video, replete with religious imagery.

"They will call him, 'The One,'" the advertisement said, using a sarcastic tone which includes footage of Charlton Heston as Moses in the movie "Ten Commandments".

The ad played into the evolving McCain campaign narrative that Obama may be a talented orator and popular abroad, but is not yet ready to lead the United States in a time of war.

The latest McCain video was released as a furore raged over the previous McCain attack ad, which compared Obama to troubled popular culture divas Paris Hilton and Britney Spears and mocked his global celebrity.

Obama campaign spokesman Hari Sevugan branded Friday's assault "juvenile".

"Senator McCain can keep telling everyone how 'proud' he is of these political stunts which even his Republican friends and advisors have called 'childish', but Barack Obama will continue talking about his plan to jumpstart our economy by giving working families 1,000 dollars of immediate relief."

Labor Department figures on Friday showed US employers shed 51,000 non-farm jobs in July marking a seventh straight month of job cuts.

Obama, meanwhile, proposed giving American families 1,000 dollars in emergency tax rebates financed by a windfall profits tax on big oil companies.

Earlier, on the latest frenetic day on the campaign trail, several African American hecklers accused Obama of ignoring "oppressed" black voters.

"What about the black community?" the protestors shouted, prompting Obama's supporters to chant his slogan "Yes We Can" to drown them out.

"Excuse me, young man, this is going to be a question and answer session, so you can ask a question later," Obama, who is vying to be the first African American president, told one of the protestors in a rare interruption to one of his campaign events.

The unidentified protestor was later given a microphone and accused Obama of neglecting the African American community. Obama said the remarks were an example of "democracy at work", adding that the heckler was "misinformed".

The Democratic candidate also dismissed claims by the McCain campaign that he had played the 'race card' by saying in Missouri on Wednesday that Republicans would point out he does not look like presidents pictured on dollar bills.

"What I said was what I think everybody knows, which is that I don't look like I came out of central casting when it comes to presidential candidates," Obama told the St Petersburg Times.


- AFP/so