The intellectually barren offshore drilling debate
June 23, 2008 at 11:30 AM EDT
At least one of Matt Simmons’s forecasts is not yet bearing fruit — his 2006 prediction that Peak Oil would come to dominate the 2008 campaign. For the debate over offshore drilling that’s erupted this week has shed absolutely no light on the real issues. For starters, there’s a highly disingenuous calculus behind the flip-flops of John McCain and Florida Governor Charlie Crist , who now favor offshore drilling: They’re sending a message, implicit but unmistakable [Update: Actually, it's completely explicit] , that allowing more offshore drilling will somehow put a voter’s Labor Day getaway this year, heretofore unaffordable, within reach. It will, of…