Candidate Bachmann finishes a corn dog then promises cheap gas.
How, she’s not ready to disclose, but with her campaign suddenly gaining strength, presidential candidate Michelle Bachmann is amping up her populist message by promising to cut gas prices in half.
The Minnesota Republican insists that if she lands in the White House U.S. gas prices will fall back below $2 a gallon. Bachmann has long been a proponent of ramping up domestic drilling, though few experts believe that this will come close to delivering the price cuts she’s offering weary American motorists.
“The day that the president became president gasoline was $1.79 a gallon. Look at where it is today,” Bachmann said during a stump speech. “Under President Bachmann, you will see gasoline come down below $2 a gallon again. That will happen.”
There’s no argument that fuel prices have risen sharply since Barack Obama became president. The numbers peaked in early summer at a national average of just over $4 a gallon – and just short of the $4.17 peak set in July 2008 during the waning days of the Bush Administration.
Exactly why oil has surged remains a matter of debate. Turmoil in the Mideast hasn’t helped, with much of Libya’s production off-line and output from other suppliers, such as Syria, also dropping due to ongoing political turmoil.
Some skeptics complain it is the result of market manipulation, traders driving the numbers up well beyond what actual supply-and-demand would normally support. Others insist the recent run-up simply reflected global demand, noting that the U.S. alone is no longer in the driver’s seat, fast-industrializing India and China competing for oil supplies.
That has been reflected in the sudden downturn in petroleum prices as the global economy weakens and the U.S. borders on a double-dip recession.
But Bachmann – like semi-candidate Sarah Palin – has frequently criticized the Obama Administration for failing to open up Arctic waters and other sites for drilling. But how much – or how soon – such moves would pay off at the pump remains uncertain, notes Autoblog.com, which quotes the Energy Information Administration:
“Additional oil production resulting from the opening of ANWR (ed: the Alaska National Wildlife Reserve) would be only a small portion of total world oil production, and would likely be offset in part by somewhat lower production outside the United States,” said an EIA document. “The opening of ANWR is projected to have its largest oil price reduction impacts as follows: a reduction in low-sulfur, light crude oil prices of $0.41 per barrel (2006 dollars) in 2026 for the low oil resource case, $0.75 per barrel in 2025 for the mean oil resource case, and $1.44 per barrel in 2027 for the high oil resource case, relative to the reference case.”
Other critics contend that the only way to drive oil prices down to the levels Bachmann proposes would be to drive the U.S. – and most of the rest of the world into a deep economic collapse. The $1.79 figure the candidate quoted came in the wake of the Lehman Brothers stock market meltdown.
That part of the story might not be something a presidential candidate would want to discuss.
Posting this photo is in very poor taste. You would have never posted a similar photo of any female democrat and you know it.
Duke:
If Hillary Clinton made some of the wild and exaggerated comments, claims and promises during her run … And if fit the context of an automotive site (and if I had a pic like this one of Bachman ) I would have readily used it.
I’ve been reporting for over 3 decades, including for some very conservative publications, ie Investor’s Business Daily for 17 years. So, puh1leez don’t play the Republican victim card on us.
Paul A. Eisenstein
Publisher, TheDetroitBureau.com
I wish people running for office would have to sign a contract with the American people every time they made a campaign promises. Then if they break these promises they would have to leave office. That would really stop a lot of these lies that they tell us just to get elected.
This photo has been posted elsewhere; I actually think the caption should have said “sucks on a corn dog and passes cheap gas.” I just think Bachmann herself is in poor taste, because even as she runs for office as a Christian conservative, no other candidate has been caught in as many distortions, mistakes and outright lies as the representative from Minnesota. If one checks with Politifact.com., which is a very reputable fact-checking site, and who has “fact-checked” and brought to light distortions from a diverse crowd such as Bill Maher and Nancy Pelosi to Rush Limbaugh and Bachmann, not one individual has been caught making as many “False” statements and “Pants on Fire” false and misleading statements. And as far as the price of gasoline, we could drill holes all over the place, but when 1.5 billion Chinese and 1 billion Indians start demanding their share of the gas, I’m a-thinkin’ that the price per gallon of gas is sure not going to go down. Yeah, the picture makes her look crazy, but I think that is accurate.$1.79? Not in my lifetime, no more than it will go to 33 cents again.
Why would anyone even consider posting a photo like this. I’m done with this website and will take my comments to another site. Pathetic! This woman has taken in over 25 foster kids and the media, such as this, ridicules her for making simple gaffes from time to time. Big deal! The only reason the media writes this stuff is because she is a conservative woman trying to make it in a man’s political world. Hey Paul, get a life and tell Chevy their product is going down the tubes in your next article. Bye!
http://autos.yahoo.com/news/is-chevy-volt-running-out-of-juice-.html
Good luck, Tater. We’ll miss your extreme point of view. By the way, since you are always posting links, check out the site that follows politicians and holds their feet to the fire, pointing out errors and misstatements. They have not been necessarily kind to Obama, I should note. But Bachmann’s record is awe-inspiring, drawing a record number of “Wrong” checks, and an amazing number of “Pants on Fire” checks. The woman says whatever is on her mind without any interest in verifying what she says. The idea that she thinks she can simply declare that gas prices will plunge to $2 a day is as absurd as her wishing Elvis a happy birthday on the anniversary of his death.
Paul A. Eisenstein
Publisher, TheDetroitBureau.com
I couldn’t help but notice today the latest Bachmann flub. I was about to let all of these Bachmann comments die a natural death, but Michele is the gift that just keeps on giving. To wit, and thanks to Think Progress, a liberal site for sure but hey, Michele ma belle said it: ” But today, on the right-wing Christian attorney Jay Sekulow’s radio show, the congresswoman evinced a far more disturbing lack of basic knowledge about world history. Specifically, Bachmann said the American people are worried about “the rise of the Soviet Union.”
Apparently no one’s told her that America’s one-time Cold War nemesis has not existed for 20 years:
BACHMANN: What people recognize is that there’s a fear that the United States is in an unstoppable decline. They see the rise of China, the rise of India, the rise of the Soviet Union and our loss militarily going forward. And especially with this very bad debt ceiling bill, what we have done is given a favor to President Obama and the first thing he’ll whack is five hundred billion out of the military defense at a time when we’re fighting three wars. People recognize that.”
I was not defending Bachmann one way or the other, only that I thought a reputable online publication would not exhibit such poor taste. It was demeaning—not only to Bachmann—but to women as well. You could have simply posted a PR head shot of Bachmann with the same story line and been done with it. I will say however, that I’d take her in a heartbeat any day over my Marxist California 6th District congresswoman “Red” Lynn Woolsey—gaffes or not.
There is an irony to have you fret about the way a picture — to him — demeans a
Candidate who has, firstly, espoused some rather extreme, off-the-wall and often demeaning comments, and then use such nasty and partisan language about another fmale Congresswoman. Have a feeling you wouldn’t use a neutral headshot to accompany an article about ‘Red,’ especially were she to make comments along the lines of what we heard from Bachmann.
PUl E.