Larry, I’m with McCain at a town hall meeting in Philadelphia today where the senator was asked for his position on drilling in ANWR and elsewhere. He wasn’t happy the subject came up. “I knew I should have ended this [before that question],” he said.
He said that he opposed drilling in ANWR for the same reason that he “would not drill in the Grand Canyon… I believe this area should be kept pristine.” (Proposed oil and gas exploration in ANWR would only affect 2,000 of its 19 million acres, or 0.01 percent.)
On off-shore drilling, McCain said, “I respect the rights of the states to control the waters off their coasts, but I think we should tell states like California and Florida that we will drastically increase the revenues they would receive [if they opened up those waters for exploration].”