Sep
1
Hundreds of thousands flee coastal Louisiana ahead of Gustav
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CNN) — Hurricane Gustav began to lash the southern Louisiana coastline early Monday as it moved closer to an expected midday landfall, according to the National Hurricane Center in Miami.
The streets of the French Quarter in New Orleans clear out as residents evacuate in anticipation of Hurricane Gustav.
1 of 3 more photos » While forecasters said it could intensify a bit before moving inland, it will not likely be the Category 4 storm that had been predicted — a possibility that added urgency to mass evacuation orders in recent days.
Nearly all of the roughly 2 million people in coastal Louisiana and the New Orleans area had cleared out ahead of Hurricane Gustav on Sunday night.
Road, rail and air links out of New Orleans began to close as the first storm bands began to strike the city. But more than 1.9 million people had fled New Orleans and its surrounding parishes by Sunday night, and fewer than 10,000 people were thought to remain in New Orleans, Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal said, citing the city’s police chief.
New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin had demanded an evacuation of the city, which still is recovering from 2005’s Hurricane Katrina. Forecasters warned Gustav — a Category 3 storm similar to Katrina — could hit Louisiana with devastating effect by early Monday afternoon.
Jindal said New Orleans’ levees should “barely hold or barely be overtopped” if the storm, as predicted Sunday evening, hit southwest of the city.
But even a slight shift to the east could bring “very significant flooding in these areas,” he said. iReport.com: Did you stay? Share your story
A leading researcher said the hurricane probably would test New Orleans’ western levees, which, unlike levees in other parts of the city, didn’t receive the brunt of Katrina’s force in 2005. The western levees are low in some sections, he said.
“From the west bank of New Orleans all the way across to Morgan City … we’re going to see communities potentially go under water from levee overtopping and potential breaching,” said Louisiana State University Professor Ivor van Heerden, who warned long before Katrina that a major hurricane would be catastrophic for New Orleans.
At 2 a.m. ET, forecasters said Gustav was a Category 3 storm and was centered about 170 miles (275 km) south-southeast of New Orleans and it was moving northwest across the central Gulf of Mexico at 16 mph — the same speed and track reported late Sunday.
The storm had sustained winds of 115 mph (184 kph), the National Hurricane Center in Miami, Florida, said. Category 3 hurricanes have sustained winds from 111 mph to 130 mph (178 kph to 209 kph).
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Hurricane-force winds could hit Louisiana’s southern coast by sunrise Monday, and the storm’s center could hit southwest of New Orleans by early Monday afternoon, CNN meteorologists said. Watch residents leaving »
Storm surges of 10 to 14 feet above normal tides are expected near and to the east of Gustav’s center, forecasters said. Rain accumulations between 6 to 12 inches are possible over parts of Louisiana, Mississippi and Arkansas, with isolated amounts of up to 20 inches, through Wednesday morning, according to forecasters.
Gustav killed at least 51 people in southwestern Haiti and eight in the neighboring Dominican Republic last week before moving to Cuba, which said it evacuated 250,000 people from the storm’s path. No storm-related deaths in Cuba were immediately reported; a Cuban official said many people were injured on Cuba’s Isle of Youth. Watch residents talk about damage in Cuba »
In New Orleans, Lt. Col. Jerry Sneed, the city’s emergency operations chief, said government agencies had evacuated 18,000 residents who were without transportation.
Jindal said the New Orleans area had finished evacuating homebound and nursing home patients by 7 p.m. ET Sunday, and 73 critical-care patients deemed OK to move still were in the process of being moved out of the area. Watch why one New Orleans man refuses to leave »
Some critical-care patients had to stay at medical facilities. Eighty patients remained Sunday evening at New Orleans Children’s Hospital, more than half of them in a critical care unit. Nurse Crystal Mayeaux said she will not leave them.
“We are attached to all the babies here,” Mayeaux said. “They know us.”
Highways out of town were packed all day with evacuees from Louisiana and Mississippi.
“It was bumper-to-bumper for about 10 hours trying to get out,” said Roberto Ascencio of the New Orleans suburb of Gretna.
Charter flights, paid for with federal funds, carried thousands of evacuees to other Southern cities. The air evacuation was part of a detailed plan developed in response to criticism after Katrina, a Category 3 storm, flooded most of New Orleans, flattened beach towns in Mississippi and killed more than 1,800 people.
Nagin said New Orleans would impose a “dusk-to-dawn” curfew for anyone left. Watch Nagin voice concern about storm’s potential effect on the city »
The city-wide curfew will continue until the threat of the storm passes, Nagin said, warning looters would be dealt with harshly. Watch Nagin warn would-be looters »
“Anybody who’s caught looting in the city of New Orleans will go directly to Angola [Louisiana State Penitentiary]. You will not have a temporary stay in the city. You go directly to the big house, in general population,” he said.
The storm altered plans for the Republican National Convention, which is scheduled to run from Monday through Thursday in Minnesota.
Rick Davis, campaign manager for presumptive GOP presidential nominee John McCain, said Monday’s session would run only from 3 to 5:30 p.m. CT, and will include only activities necessary to launch the event. Watch report on Republicans’ altered plans »
Convention plans for the rest of the week will be made as the storm is assessed, he said.
Earlier Sunday, President Bush said he would forgo an appearance at the convention to meet with emergency workers and evacuees in Texas.
Also Sunday, a federally supported computer projection says Gustav could cause up to $32.8 billion in property damage when it hits the Gulf Coast.
The software, developed by FEMA and the National Institute of Building Sciences, also projected Sunday that about 75,000 structures will be destroyed. The path also ensnares about 180 hospitals and more than 1,100 police and fire stations.
Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour said government agencies were “10 times better prepared” than before — but “that doesn’t mean everything is going to go right,” he said.
“Anybody who thinks everything is going to go perfect just doesn’t know what they’re talking about,” Barbour said.
Meanwhile, Tropical Storm Hanna was churning in the Atlantic Ocean on Sunday night and was expected to be near or over the southeastern Bahamas during the next day or two, the hurricane center said. It had maximum sustained winds of 50 mph, the center said
Sep
1
Students pitch in with sandbagging as Gustav nears
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BATON ROUGE, Louisiana (CNN) — It was dark and hot and everyone was bone tired on Sunday night in Baton Rouge. But they still came, many in truck after truck, to a parking lot on the edge of the edge of the city, all armed with shovels.
Dwayne Nickles, center, loads sandbags into the trunk of his car with Harsha Dissanayake, left.
“Sandbagging — gotta do it,” said Dwayne Nickles, his T-shirt soaked through, grunting as he dug into a massive pile of sand left for those who needed to guard their homes against potential Hurricane Gustav flooding.
Squatting next to Nickles, Louisiana State University student Harsha Dissanayake had too much energy for someone who had spent much of the day at the school medical school helping officials take care of patients.
The 20-year-old moved 10 days ago from Sri Lanka to Baton Rouge, the state capital about 80 miles northwest of New Orleans. When he heard of the impending hurricane, he thought about the miserable experience his country endured during the 2004 tsunami.
“Southern hospitality is real,” he said. “People are so, so nice to me, and they ask me, ‘Did you lose your relatives? What was it like during the tsunami?’ and I feel like they really care. iReport.com: How did you prepare for Gustav?
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“I knew I had to volunteer and do my part to help,” he said.
Dissanayake was, in part, also helping his friend Kenneth De Abrew, also an LSU student. De Abrew had a remarkably cheerful disposition considering he lives on a first floor apartment complex that often floods. See and hear De Abrew talk about his hurricane plans »
“You just have to be ready for it,” he said, laughing. “It’s nature. Actually, it’s kind of exciting!”
He heaved a few bags toward their pile and paused, surveying the dozen sweating people working hard to dig, stuff and seal bags.
“Sandbags actually remind me of bad stuff,” De Abrew said. “They use them in wars to make bunkers.”
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Aug
6
Tibet activists protest near Olympics venue
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BEIJING, China (CNN) – Four Tibet activists unfurled Tibetan flags and pro-independence banners near National Stadium in Beijing early Wednesday, just two days ahead of the start of the Summer Olympic Games.
This photo from Students for a Free Tibet shows a protester on alamp post in Beijing on Wednesday.
Two men in the group scaled electric poles just before 6 a.m. (6 p.m. ET Tuesday) to display the banners, police said, according to the state-run Xinhua news agency. Police rushed to the scene and took away “four foreigners” — three men and a woman.
Students for a Free Tibet, a Tibetan activist group, said in a statement that those involved in the demonstration were from the United States and Britain.
According to the group, one of the signs read, “One World, One Dream: Free Tibet” in English, while the second read, “Tibet Will Be Free” in English and “Free Tibet” in Chinese.
The group said the signs were on display for about an hour, but police said it was only about 12 minutes.
The demonstrators entered China on tourist visas, police said, according to Xinhua.
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Aug
6
Death toll rises in latest Sichuan earthquake
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BEIJING, China (CNN) – The death toll from a 6.2-magnitude earthquake that struck central China’s battered Sichuan province climbed to two Wednesday, with another 22 injured, local emergency officials reported.
Sichuan province is still recovering from the devastating May 12 earthquake and its aftershocks.
1 of 2 A light, 4.8-magnitude quake rattled the same area on Wednesday.
Sichuan is still recovering from a devastating 7.9-magnitude temblor in May.
The U.S. Geological Survey said the epicenter of Tuesday’s strong quake was about 50 kilometers (30 miles) north-northwest of Guangyuan, near Sichuan’s border with neighboring Gansu province.
Hours before the quake struck, the Olympic torch had made its way through parts of Sichuan, on its way to the Summer Games, which get under way Friday in Beijing, some 1,200 kilometers (745 miles) away.
Tuesday’s quake disrupted communications in Yaodu Township, Xinhua said.
It was felt in the cities of Hanzhong and Xi’an, both in neighboring Shaanxi province, as well as Chongqing. Many people rushed out of buildings in those cities, Xinhua reported.
The May 12 quake killed nearly 70,000 people and more than 18,000 others are still listed as missing. That quake’s epicenter was about 290 kilometers (180 miles) southwest of Tuesday’s epicenter.
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Aug
6
Bush praises South Korea, rebukes North
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SEOUL, South Korea (CNN) — U.S. President George W. Bush praised the U.S. relationship with South Korea on Wednesday and said the two nations should continue to work together to eliminate threats from North Korea.
President George W. Bush and South Korean President Lee Myung-Bak attend a joint press conference in Seoul.
1 of 3 Bush spoke during a news conference with South Korean President Lee Myung-bak. The stop in South Korea is part of Bush’s weeklong Asian tour.
“Our relationship is important vital and I believe it is strong,” Bush said.
Bush said he was still concerned about North Korea and said the country has a long way to go before it is taken off his “axis of evil list” as well as removing it from a list of countries that sponsor terrorism.
“I am concerned about North Korea’s human rights record,” Bush said “I am concerned about the uranium enrichment…”
He spoke hours after thousands of protesters packed the streets of the South Korean capital Tuesday.
While some demonstrations were peaceful, violence erupted at other protest sites. In one instance, riot police fired a water cannon to keep the crowds at bay.
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Police said they detained about 80 protesters. They estimated about 2,700 people were participating in the protests, which included a candlelight march and a sit-in. But the organizers said some 10,000 were taking part in the demonstrations.
Bush’s weeklong trip to the region is his ninth visit as president. See a map of Bush’s itinerary »
His stop in Seoul comes just a few months after violent street protests erupted over worries about the safety of U.S. beef imports.
While those tensions seem to have eased, the United States’ nuclear disarmament deal with North Korea is also a concern.
Michael Green, a former Bush adviser on Asian affairs, and now with the Center for Strategic and International Studies, says Seoul’s proximity to North Korea contributes to an ongoing unease.
“The North Koreans have 11,000 artillery tubes and rockets aimed at the South Korean capital, so any little thing that we do with North Korea makes the South Koreans very jittery,” Green said.
He added, “On the other hand, the U.S. has to worry a great deal about where terrorists might get nuclear weapons or nuclear material.”
Jul
18
Violence erupts as Pakistan stocks drop
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KARACHI, Pakistan (AP) — Violent protests erupted at Pakistan’s main stock market, as growing economic and political uncertainty pushed Pakistani shares to a new 18-month low.
Angry Pakistani stockbrokers ransack furniture at the Karachi Stock Exchange on Thursday.
The exchange’s main index dropped more than 4 percent on Thursday before recovering slightly to close 2.7 percent lower at 10,213 points. The index is at its lowest since January 2007 and has fallen about 36 percent from an April peak.
With share values dropping for 15 straight sessions, officials said more than 200 small investors, some of whom rent small offices in the exchange building, gathered in its main hall to demand a halt in trading.
When the exchange administration declined, some protesters smashed windows in the exchange and nearby banks, said Mohammed Aslam, the exchange’s security chief.
An Associated Press reporter saw broken lights and window panes littering the floor of the exchange. Television footage saw police shooing the demonstrators away from the building.
Pakistani shares are tumbling amid doubts about the three-month-old government’s ability to survive economic problems including runaway inflation and wide trade and budget deficits.
The uncertainty is compounded by growing U.S. pressure to clamp down on militants launching attacks into Afghanistan, casting doubt on the government’s hopes of negotiating peace deals to curb rising Islamic militancy also threatening Pakistan
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Jul
18
Tropical storm kills 6 in Taiwan
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(CNN) — A tropical storm lashed Taiwan on Friday, killing at least six people, an emergency official told CNN.
A woman in Taipei rides a bicycle in heavy rain on Friday.
Another six were hurt and six more were missing, according to the official at the island’s Central Response Center.
Tropical Storm Kalmaegi dumped heavy rain on central and southern Taiwan, causing problems in places such as Taichung, a city in central Taiwan.
Flooding was reported in many low-lying areas, particularly in southern Taiwan, according to the island’s Central News Agency. It published a photo of knee-deep water on a highway in Kaohsiung County.
Officials said that water was cut off from more than 650,000 households because of flooding in Tainan county, also in southern Taiwan, The Associated Press reported. Forecasters expect the storm to hit coastal areas of southeastern China late Friday, prompting authorities to plan for possible flooding in Zhejiang and Fujian provinces, according to China’s state-run Xinhua news agency.
Boats and ships from those provinces have been ordered back to port, the agency said.
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Jul
18
Obama Faces His Overseas Audition
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Even though the details remain sketchy, it’s clear that Barack Obama’s upcoming trip to the Middle East and Europe is an audition on the world stage. But the most important critics will not be the foreign leaders who will be sizing him up as a potential member of their ranks or the cheering throngs that are likely to greet him at every stop. The audience that matters most will be the voters back home, where many Americans have yet to be convinced that this young man of relatively little experience is the right person to fill the role of their Commander in Chief. “This,” says Ken Duberstein, who was Ronald Reagan’s White House chief of staff, “is an absolute opportunity to get over the acceptability threshold.”
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Polling suggests that Obama still has a way to go in that regard. In the latest Washington Post/ABC News survey, only 48% of registered voters said Obama would make a good Commander in Chief, with an equal percentage saying he wouldn’t. By comparison, 72% said John McCain would be a good one.
The campaign has thus far provided only the barest outline of his itinerary. On Monday, Obama will be in Amman, Jordan; on Tuesday and Wednesday, Israel and the Palestinian territory of the West Bank. Thursday, Friday and Saturday will be a sprint across Europe, with stops planned for Berlin, Paris and London. And somewhere in all this, Obama plans to make a much-anticipated visit to Iraq and Afghanistan with two Senate colleagues, Democrat Jack Reed of Rhode Island and Republican Chuck Hagel of Nebraska.
Every step of Obama’s trip will be as fraught with symbolism as it will with substance. The biggest public event will be a speech in Berlin, though the Obama campaign has yet to say whether he will give it at the historic Brandenburg Gate, near the former site of the Berlin Wall. (Campaign staffers reportedly were looking for alternate sites after Chancellor Angela Merkel expressed her displeasure about the prospect of a presidential candidate speaking where Ronald Reagan in 1987 demanded, “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!”) Campaign officials are not even divulging which officials Obama plans to meet with, though some details have begun to leak. A diplomatic source tells TIME that King Abdullah II of Jordan plans to press Obama to promise that, if elected, he would place a higher priority than Bush has on the Arab-Israeli peace talks. (The presence in Obama’s entourage of Dennis Ross, the lead negotiator in those talks for Bill Clinton and George H.W. Bush, is a signal that Obama is thinking along the same lines.) In Israel, the New York Times has reported, he will meet with President Shimon Peres, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, Defense Minister Ehud Barak, Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni and the head of the opposition, Likud Party leader Benjamin Netanyahu. He is also expected to see Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas in the West Bank city of Ramallah.
All indications are that Obama can expect an exuberant welcome wherever he goes, but that can be a double-edged sword. It didn’t help John Kerry that Europeans seemed so eager to embrace him. In a famous put-down, then Commerce Secretary Don Evans declared that Kerry “looks French.” For his part, Obama has already been portrayed by opponents as an out-of-touch élitist (see “Bittergate”), and recently McCain surrogates such as Mitt Romney and Rudy Giuliani have suggested that the Democrat has more of a European worldview than the Arizona Senator does.
After eight years of go-it-alone foreign policy, however, that line of attack may not be successful. In a June poll by the Pew Research Center, 71% of respondents said they believe the U.S. is less respected in the world than it used to be; for the first time since Pew began asking that question in 2004, a majority said they view this loss of international respect as a major problem.
Regaining some of that international respect (and admiration) is one thing. But just as crucial for Obama is whether all the diplomatic theater can persuade American voters that he is capable of taking the helm of a superpower. That depends, to some degree, on how comfortable Obama seems standing shoulder-to-shoulder among those he would be dealing with as this country’s President. “It’s not a knowledge quiz. It’s more visceral than that,” says Council of Foreign Relations president Richard Haass, who was director of policy planning at the State Department during the early years of George W. Bush’s presidency, and also served as a top official on his father’s National Security Council staff. “Americans need to have a sense that this person can hold his own.”
And doing that means showing, in his words and interactions overseas, that he is no pushover. “We would like to demonstrate in this trip his comfort and his capacity to deal with the serious challenges that face this country - that he’s comfortable and he’s sure-footed, and he knows what he is doing,” says one of Obama’s foreign policy advisers.
But that is, in many ways, little more than stage management. What will be far harder to discern will be what Obama himself is getting out of his trip. As Haass notes, “The real question is what he learns and ultimately incorporates into his thinking.”
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Jul
15
Bernanke gloomy on housing, economy
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NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) — The housing finance crisis and spiraling energy costs will remain a drag on the U.S. economy for the rest of the year, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke told lawmakers in a gloomy presentation about the economic outlook.
“The economy continues to face numerous difficulties, including ongoing strains in financial markets, declining house prices, a softening labor market, and rising prices of oil, food, and some other commodities,” Bernanke told the Senate Banking Committee early Tuesday.
The nation’s top central banker warned “many financial markets and institutions remain under considerable stress, in part because the outlook for the economy, and thus for credit quality, remains uncertain.”
The Senate panel was meeting to hear from Bernanke about the economy and to consider the crisis at mortgage finance giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, as well as growing fears about bank failures.
Shares of Fannie and Freddie on Tuesday continued the recent slide that has prompted the Treasury Department and Fed to step in and offer support. Shares of Fannie (FNM, Fortune 500) plunged 18%, on top of a 48% decline in the last six trading days. Freddie (FRE, Fortune 500) shares tumbled 18% on top of its 51% slide in the last six days.
Bernanke: “Financial headwinds’
Bernanke said the financial sector’s problems are not the only problems facing the economy. “The financial headwinds on spending and economic activity have been compounded by rapid increases in the prices of energy and other commodities,” he warned.
The combination of rising commodity prices and tighter credit “has sapped household purchasing power even as they have boosted inflation,” Bernanke said.
Bernanke added that spending has held up better than expected, helped by the Treasury’s economic stimulus program, which has so far pumped $92 billion into the economy. At the same time, he warned that spending by consumers “seems likely to be restrained over coming quarters” and that businesses also are likely to be cautious with spending plans.
He also expressed concerns about rising inflation risks due to high commodity prices, suggesting that the Fed might not be able to take steps to support economic growth because of the risk that they would feed inflation pressures.
Despite Bernanke’s gloomy outlook - his most pessimistic since he took office in 2006 - he said the Fed had raised its forecast for overall economic growth. It is now looking for 1% to 1.6% growth for all of 2008, up from its April forecast of 0.3% to 1.2% growth.
While the forecast did not break down the growth by quarter, he said he did not expect any robust growth over the next six months. Bernanke said the revision in the full-year forecast was caused by stronger-than-expected growth in the first two quarters of 2008, helped by the stimulus checks that goosed spending in the second quarter.
Three weeks ago, the Fed left interest rates unchanged for the first time in nine months as it said the risks of an economic slowdown appear to have diminished.
But his comments about the economy in the second half of the year seemed much more bearish than suggested in that Fed statement. Bernanke said that while he believed there would be second-half economic growth, he thought it would be weak.
His comments helped feed a sell-off in oil prices Tuesday, as traders started pricing in lower U.S. consumption of oil in the second half of the year.
Bernanke’s testimony came as part of his regularly-scheduled semi-annual testimony on the state of the economy. The committee was set to joined by Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and Christopher Cox, chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission, for a second hearing Tuesday about Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.
Mortgage market in cross-hairs
Mortgage finance giants Fannie and Freddie are a key source of funding for banks and other home lenders. Their ability to provide that funding is seen as a key to any recovery in housing and the economy as a whole.
The companies were set up by Congress, but they are owned by shareholders, who have fled the firms’ stock recently on fears that continued problems in housing and rising mortgage defaults will force them to seek significantly more capital, a move that would dilute the value of existing shares.
Problems in the banking and home lending sectors were further highlighted by the failure of IndyMac, a California bank that was taken over by the federal government Friday evening in what could end up being the most costly bank failure in U.S. history. Stocks of many major regional banks plunged Monday on concerns over further failures and several were down again in pre-market trading Tuesday.
IndyMac had been a major provider of mortgage loans that did not demand lenders to provide full or any documentation of their income. There are likely to be questions about the state of banking and the risk of more failures at Tuesday’s hearings.
Sunday evening Paulson announced a proposal by Treasury to have Congress raise the $2.25 billion it is allowed to loan the two firms, and even open the door for the federal government to buy shares in the two companies if needed. The Fed announced it stood ready to loan money to the firms if they needed access to funds ahead of congressional actions.
Bernanke, in response to a question from Sen. Richard Shelby, R-Ala., said he felt that IndyMac “was particularly weighed down with low-quality mortgages. In that respect its failure, barring acquisition by another firm that didn’t occur, was inevitable.”
But he added that the banking system is well capitalized. “My concerns have turned less on the solvency of the institutions and more on their ability to provide credit necessary to keep the economy growing.”
Bernanke said he believed that home building was likely to finally end its slide later this year or early next year, but that the decline in housing prices could continue longer than that, although he said he couldn’t predict when, or at what level, they will find a bottom.
Jul
15
Bush touts mortgage plans, offshore drilling
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NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) — Under the backdrop of a deteriorating economic picture, President Bush said Tuesday he is taking action to help people with falling home values and high gas prices.
Bush highlighted plans to stabilize the mortgage lenders Fannie Mae (FNM, Fortune 500) and Freddie Mac (FRE, Fortune 500) and lift the ban on offshore oil drilling as two steps his administration is taking to address some of the nation’s economic ills.
‘It’s been a difficult time for American families,” Bush said at a press conference. “We must ensure we can continue providing credit during this time of stress.”
On Sunday, the administration said it would provide capital and maybe buy stock in Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the country’s two giant mortgage financing companies.
Stocks in the two firms plummeted last week on fears they were holding billions of dollars in bad loans. The turmoil at Fannie and Freddie raised fears the home lending market may dry up, sending home prices into a tailspin.
“I don’t think it’s a bailout,” said Bush, deflecting some criticism that the government should not rescue a private firm. “The shareholders still own the company.”
On the gas price front, Bush reiterated his call for more drilling off the East and West Coasts and in Alaska.
“The only thing standing between these vast resources and the American people is action from Congress,” he said. “The sooner Congress lifts the ban, the sooner we can get these resources from the ocean floor to the refineries to the gas pump.”
There were two bans restricting drilling off most of the U.S. coast - one from the President and one from Congress.
On Monday Bush lifted the executive ban, putting pressure on the Democratic-controlled Congress to do the same.
So far, the Democrats have resisted calls for more drilling, arguing the amount of oil it would bring to market would have little effect on prices, and the nation’s efforts would be better spent developing alternatives to oil and focusing on conservation.
Bush agreed with one main argument for restricting drilling - that it would take years for the new supplies to come online. But still, he said that’s no reason to not act.
“There’s a psychology in the market that says supplies will stay stagnant while demand rises,” he said. “It seems to make sense to say to the world that we’re going to explore for oil and gas, to send a message that supplies will increase.”
Bush rebuffed calls by some Democrats to release some oil from the nation’s Strategic Petroleum Reserve in an attempt to lower gas prices.
“The SPR is for emergencies,” he said. “That doesn’t address the fundamental issue.”
Bush’s speech comes at a time when the nation is focused on economic issues. While the economy is not technically in a recession, news on the economic front has not been good.
Home prices are down about 15% nationwide over the last year, according to a recent numbers from the Case/Shiller home price index. The economy has lost jobs for the last six months in a row. And Wall Street has moved into a bear market, with stocks trading 20% below recent highs.
“When will the economy turn around? I’m not an economist,” said Bush, responding to a reporter’s question. “But I do believe we’re growing. I’m an optimist, and there are a lot of positive things about our economy.”
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