Fuel crisis potentially volatile for Bush

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Published Saturday, April 28, 2001, in the Akron Beacon Journal.

Fuel crisis potentially volatile for Bush

Summer price hike could spell trouble if president can't win public support

BY STEVEN THOMMA Knight Ridder Newspapers

WASHINGTON: As energy woes threaten to spread across the country this summer, President Bush is facing a growing domestic crisis that will test his ability to convince Americans that he's on their side in the face of hardship.

That kind of empathetic link to everyday people is a political lifeline for a president in stormy seas. Bush's father lacked it and quickly lost the public's support when economic times turned bad late in his one-term presidency. Bill Clinton had it and held that support through all kinds of political storms, including impeachment.

Bush, a son of wealth and privilege who is often accused of catering to the wealthy with his proposed tax cuts, is having mixed success convincing Americans that they have a friend in the White House. Three in 10 believe he is better than Clinton at understanding the concerns of average people, according to a new poll for NBC and the Wall Street Journal. But four in 10 think he's worse.

If gasoline bills skyrocket and brownouts spread, Americans will look to Bush even more.

In California, electricity shortages are continuing. In New York City, power shortages could lead to blackouts this summer. And everywhere, the price of gas could soar past $2 a gallon. Heading into the fall and winter, the Northeast and Midwest again could face rising prices for heating oil and natural gas.

Bush can likely escape lasting political damage if he can convince the country that he is working hard to help Americans fill their gas tanks, keep their lights on and cool their homes.

If his policy ultimately fails to ease a crisis, his presidency could go the way of Jimmy Carter, the man in the Oval Office the last time Americans faced soaring fuel costs and energy shortages. That was a major factor in Carter's re-election defeat in 1980.

Yet, if Bush appears to be too much against the environment and too much on the side of the oil industry at a time it is enjoying record profits, he risks losing touch with the people.

``People are going to be looking to the Oval Office,'' said independent pollster John Zogby. ``Symbols are important. Even if it means a president just saying, `I understand and I care.' He could turn down his own thermostat.''

Bush also could point to the energy-saving designs, such as geothermal water heating and passive solar room heating, at his recently built ranch home in Crawford, Texas.

Bush agrees that the country should be more efficient.

``We've got to do a better job of developing new technologies, more mileage for cars,'' he said in a recent interview with CNN. But he did not suggest that he would propose requiring higher gas mileage in popular but gas-guzzling sport utility vehicles.

Bush also appears reluctant to force Americans to conserve.

But conservation as sacrifice is a view more in line with the 1970s than the 2000s, argued David Nemtzow, president of the Alliance to Save Energy, a Washington-based coalition that promotes energy efficiency.

After 20 years of technological advances, Nemtzow said, people know they can get the same services out of appliances or cars with less energy.

Nemtzow said Bush could call for increases in efficiency ``without the specter of Jimmy Carter telling Americans they had to make do with less.''

A White House panel headed by Vice President Dick Cheney will recommend a comprehensive new energy-policy plan to Bush in mid-May; it's expected to tilt heavily toward boosting energy supplies. Already, Bush has urged opening the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to drill for oil and gas.

That is particularly risky for a president and vice president who worked in the oil industry.

``What he doesn't want to do is conjure up an image that he and Cheney represent Big Oil,'' said Zogby. ``He doesn't want people to start saying, `Gosh, I wish Bill Clinton were here; he cared about us.' As soon as he starts hearing that, he has a real problem.''

http://www.ohio.com/bj/business/docs/024497.htm

-- Martin Thompson (mthom1927@aol.com), April 29, 2001


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