After McCain Flip-Flop, Oil Money Floods Campaign

I recently received a comment on my "Obama vs. McCain on the Environment" post that corrected one of my facts. In the post, dated February 13th, I said that John McCain did not support further drilling for oil in the United States, specifically in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. Of course since that time, McCain has flipped on the issue of domestic oil drilling, even in ANWR.

As I thought about correcting my old post, I wondered what McCain had to gain in completely changing his mind on such a controversial issue. Apparently, he had lots of campaign contributions to gain.

The Washington Post is reporting today that during the last half of June, campaign contributions to McCain from oil executives rose from $208,000 in May to $1.1 million in June. The majority of that money rolled in when McCain began supporting additional domestic oil production on June 16.

Immediately after giving his speech on the 16th supporting additional oil production, McCain met with oil company executives and attended a fund raiser at the San Antonio Country Club. That event yielded $1.3 million in campaign contributions to McCain.

The Washington Post interviewed David Donnelly, the national campaign director of the Public Campaign Action Fund, a nonpartisan campaign finance reform group that conducted an analysis of McCain's oil industry contributions. In his interview, Donnelly said, "This is a case study of how a candidate can change a policy position in the interest of raising money."

To read the full Post article, go HERE.