Sunday Political Talk Show interviews during 2013-2015: on Energy & Oil

Donald Trump: Fracking will lead to American energy independence

Trump writes, "The natural gas reserves we have in the United States could power America's energy needs for the next 110 years," and there is enough crude oil to last for decades. He supports a dramatic escalation of domestic drilling to provide jobs and minimize dependency on foreign cartels. "Fracking will lead to American energy independence. With price of natural gas continuing to drop, we can be at a tremendous advantage."

Clinton's State Department took steps to try and facilitate the export of hydraulic fracturing technology, to enable allies with promising shale geologies to replicate the U.S. oil and gas production boom; referred to natural gas as a "bridge fuel" as part of the transition from coal to renewable energy; Her energy diplomacy platform included vocal concern about geopolitical and economic risks driven by climate change. Source

Hillary Clinton: Natural gas is a "bridge fuel"

Clinton: Senate Voting Record Snapshot: YES on the CLEAN Energy Act of 2007, YES on the amendment to prevent export of oil and gas produced in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in 2005, YES on an amendment to ban drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, NO on the Energy Policy Act of 2003, YES on the Cantwell amendment to the Energy Policy Act of 2003 to reduce U.S. dependence on foreign oil imports by 40 percent by 2025; Energy Policy as Secretary of State: Clinton's State Department took steps to try and facilitate the export of hydraulic fracturing technology, to enable allies with promising shale geologies to replicate the U.S. oil and gas production boom; referred to natural gas as a "bridge fuel" as part of the transition from coal to renewable energy; Her energy diplomacy platform included vocal concern about geopolitical and economic risks driven by climate change.

Evan McMullin: Yes to nuclear power, but no wind power subsidy

Evan McMullin's answer: No

Mike Pence's answer: Yes

Tim Kaine's answer: Yes

Darrell Castle's answer (Constitution Party): No, end all tax credits and subsidies to the energy industry

Gary Johnson's answer (Libertarian Party): No

Donald Trump's answer: No, and the government should never support unproven technologies

Q: Do you support the use of nuclear energy?

Evan McMullin's answer: Yes

Mike Pence's answer: Yes

Tim Kaine's answer: Yes

Evan McMullin: Supports fracking & offshore drilling

Evan McMullin's answer: Yes

Mike Pence's answer: Yes

Tim Kaine's answer: Yes

Darrell Castle's answer (Constitution Party): Yes, energy independence is absolutely critical to the United States

Gary Johnson's answer (Libertarian Party): Yes, but increase oversight

Donald Trump's answer: Yes

Q: Should the U.S. expand offshore oil drilling?

Evan McMullin's answer: Yes

Mike Pence's answer: Yes

Tim Kaine's answer: Yes

Darrell Castle's answer (Constitution Party): Yes

Gary Johnson's answer (Libertarian Party): Yes, and deregulate the energy sector

Donald Trump's answer: Yes

Evan McMullin: Opposes federal regulation to prevent climate change

Evan McMullin's answer: No

Tim Kaine's answer: Yes

Mike Pence's answer: No

Donald Trump's answer: No, and global warming is a natural occurrence Darrell Castle's answer (Constitution Party): No

Gary Johnson's answer (Libertarian Party): No

Mike Pence: Support wind, nuclear, fracking, and offshore drilling

Mike Pence's answer: Yes

Evan McMullin's answer: No

Tim Kaine's answer: Yes

Donald Trump's answer: No, and the government should never support unproven technologies

Gary Johnson's answer: No

Q: Do you support the use of hydraulic fracking to extract oil and natural gas resources?

Mike Pence's answer: Yes

Evan McMullin's answer: Yes

Tim Kaine's answer: Yes

Gary Johnson's answer: Yes, but increase oversight

Donald Trump's answer: Yes

Q: Should the U.S. expand offshore oil drilling?

Mike Pence's answer: Yes

Evan McMullin's answer: Yes

Tim Kaine's answer: Yes

Donald Trump's answer: Yes

Gary Johnson's answer: Yes, and deregulate the energy sector

Q: Do you support the use of nuclear energy?

Mike Pence's answer: Yes

Evan McMullin's answer: Yes

Tim Kaine's answer: Yes

Tim Kaine: Support wind, nuclear, fracking, and offshore drilling

Tim Kaine's answer: Yes

Mike Pence's answer: Yes

Donald Trump's answer: No, and the government should never support unproven technologies

Gary Johnson's answer: No

Q: Do you support the use of hydraulic fracking to extract oil and natural gas resources?

Tim Kaine's answer: Yes

Mike Pence's answer: Yes

Gary Johnson's answer: Yes, but increase oversight

Donald Trump's answer: Yes

Q: Should the U.S. expand offshore oil drilling?

Tim Kaine's answer: Yes

Mike Pence's answer: Yes

Donald Trump's answer: Yes

Gary Johnson's answer: Yes, and deregulate the energy sector

Q: Do you support the use of nuclear energy?

Tim Kaine's answer: Yes

Mike Pence's answer: Yes

Evan McMullin's answer: Yes

Evan McMullin: Expand offshore oil drilling

A: Yes

Darrell Castle: No government action on climate change, and fracking ok

Darrell Castle's answer: No

Gary Johnson's answer: No

Donald Trump's answer: No, and global warming is a natural occurrence

Q: Should the government give tax credits and subsidies to the wind power industry?

Darrell Castle's answer: No, end all tax credits and subsidies to the energy industry

Gary Johnson's answer: No

Donald Trump's answer: No, and the government should never support unproven technologies

Q: Do you support the use of hydraulic fracking to extract oil and natural gas resources?

Darrell Castle's answer: Yes, energy independence is absolutely critical to the United States

Gary Johnson's answer: Yes, but increase oversight

Donald Trump's answer: Yes

Q: Should the U.S. expand offshore oil drilling?

Darrell Castle's answer: Yes

Gary Johnson's answer: Yes, and deregulate the energy sector

Donald Trump's answer: Yes

Jill Stein: Declare a climate emergency & get to 100% renewables by 2030

STEIN: 2030 is doable--it is a political problem. It cannot be done unless we have essentially declared a climate emergency. And I would cite, for example, the bombing of Pearl Harbor, where we converted our economy from essentially zero percent of GDP focused on wartime production to 25% of GDP within the course of six months. It was a massive national mobilization predicated on the understanding that this was a national emergency.

Q: So are you saying that we should be spending 25% of GDP on this energy transition?

STEIN: No, what I'm saying is that we have done remarkable things when we understand that we have a true national emergency. And I think Pearl Harbor and the Second World War was a national emergency. I think what we're facing right now is an equivalent national emergency.

Darrell Castle: Buying Saudi oil forces US to deals with oppressive monarchs

A: I think that the United States should start trying desperately to produce its own energy. We're doing that to some extent. We say we don't like fracking and we don't like the Keystone pipeline but we don't mind doing it in other countries. In other words, if we buy our energy from Saudi Arabia, we don't really care what happens to their environment. It's kind of a silly argument to me. It causes a lot of violence in the world when we don't produce our own energy because we have to humble ourselves. Saudi Arabia, one of the most oppressive regimes in the world according to our friends at the U.N., they beheaded 150 people last year, we have to go to those people and do deals with them as the President just did when he flew over there. He told them that we would guarantee their security, them and the other Gulf monarchies. I'm completely flabbergasted and opposed to that sort of thing, and if we produced our own energy, we wouldn't have to do it.

Darrell Castle: Develop our own petroleum first; then green technology

A: We could produce our own oil, and what we can't produce, we can buy from friendly countries like Canada. And if there's green energy available to be produced, I mean, there's technologies out there that I don't have the technical experience to understand. I think there's new technologies. I would start with trying to develop our own petroleum energy and see where that took me.

Jill Stein: COP 21 is symbolic victory, but we need to go much further

STEIN: It was, perhaps, a symbolic victory to have all these countries signing on, but the time for symbolism is long gone. We have a world that is going up in flames right now, and we need real emergency action. COP 21 is voluntary and, even if completely fulfilled, would still lead to a temperature rise of well over 2 degrees Celsius [the point at which irreversible climate change will take place, say scientists], perhaps somewhere in the neighborhood of 3.5 to 4 degrees. Worse, there's no enforcement mechanism. We need to go far beyond COP 21, but we see our government's actions as just another example of how it has been hijacked in the interest of the fossil-fuel industry. So while the Democrats pay lip service to the climate crisis, what they actually do is something entirely different.

Chris Christie: Keystone pipeline would have minimal environmental impact

CHRISTIE: Interesting, the president is interested in global leadership, and the only thing he's interested in global leadership on is a radical environmental liberal policy, which is what he's doing. Did anybody think for the last seven years he was ever going to approve it? Despite the fact that the State Department said it won't have a big environmental impact, and so does the EPA administrator. This president is a radical environmental liberal. And when I'm president, we'll build the Keystone pipeline if the Canadians are still interested.

Lawrence Lessig: Stop subsidizing oil companies & their pollution

Jeb Bush: Create a North American energy strategy

BUSH: I think we ought to be all in on energy. We need to create a North American energy strategy, which means approve the XL Pipeline, allow for the export of crude oil and dramatically improve the licensing of LNG plants (liquefied natural gas). But it's more difficult to do. Expand the possibilities of leasing on federal lands and waters, particularly where states have an interest in doing so. There's a lot that we can do to create high growth for our economy, lower utility prices and I'm total

Donald Trump: Windmills are destroying shorelines all over the world

Trump's opinion of windpower stems from an unsuccessful legal battle he has fought against an off-shore windpower project near one of his golf resorts in Scotland. Just last month, Scottish courts found that Trump had no grounds for accusing Scottish ministers of illegally agreeing to license the 100MW experimental wind farm.

Donald Trump: Solar hasn't caught on because it has a 32-year payback

Trump has simply dismissed solar as an "unproven technology" despite solar's decades of rock-solid reliability. His 32 year payback assessment, even in 2012, did not take into account any of the tax incentives or rebates available to most Americans. One can only assume that his criticisms of the government tax breaks for solar are strictly political in motivation, since his real estate empire is built on the hundred of millions of dollars of taxpayer subsidies his projects receive.

John Kasich: Climate change is a real issue, but the extent is unproven

Donald Trump: Maybe some climate change is manmade, but not all

A: Well, there could be some manmade, too. I mean, I'm not saying there's zero, but not nearly to the extent [others say]. When Obama gets up and said it's the number one problem of our country--and, if it is, why is it that we have to clean up our factories now, and China doesn't have to do it for another 30 or 35 years in their wonderful agreement, you know, our wonderful negotiators?

Rick Perry: Defend Keystone XL and other oil & gas exploration

During Perry's last five years as governor, Texas led the nation in job growth. He attributed that success to his focus on keeping taxes low and slashing spending, which included curbing regulations and expediting coal-fired power plant projects.

Carly Fiorina: Regulation won't stop climate change

Rick Santorum: Nothing the US could do will affect global warming

SANTORUM: Is the climate warming? Clearly over the past 15 or 20 years the answer is yes. The question is, number one, "does man having a significant impact on that?" And number two, and this is even more important than the first, "is there anything the United States can do about it?" And the answer is clearly, no. Even folks who accept all of the science by the alarmists on the other side, recognize that everything that's being considered by the US will have almost--well, not almost, will have zero--impact on it given what's going on in the rest of the world.

Q: So, is your answer do nothing?

SANTORUM: Well, if it has no impact, of course do nothing. Why would you do something and with people admitting that even if you do something, it won't make a difference?

Ben Carson: EPA must work with business; warming or cooling not relevant

Carly Fiorina: Pass the Keystone Pipeline even if Obama vetoes it

FIORINA: Well, first, just on Keystone Pipeline, perhaps the president will veto this. But on what basis would he do so? The American people support it by wide majorities. What we are doing today is actually worse for global greenhouse gas emissions than the Keystone Pipeline would be. It would create jobs despite his bizarre statement that it wouldn't.

Q: There have been some mixed studies on this: there are temporary jobs and then there's full-time jobs.

FIORINA: Two and a half years of a process, that's either purposeful foot dragging or it's incompetence. And the American people know that. I think what the Republicans should do is soberly and systematically pass bills that make sense, that have bipartisan support. And Keystone XL Pipeline is one of them. They should pass it.

Bobby Jindal: The left loves energy to be expensive and scarce

Because of what he views as a lack of consensus on the gravity of the environmental threat, Jindal felt free to try to turn the science argument against the Obama administration. The president, the Environmental Protection Agency and other agencies are "science deniers," he argued, because they impose limits on carbon dioxide and other pollutants from "job-creating" businesses without really knowing how well those restrictions work.

He accused the administration of being on the wrong side of the faith divide in this area. "The left loves energy to be expensive and scarce," he said. "It's almost a religious approach." Jindal has a detailed energy plan full of specific, thoughtful (and largely deregulatory) proposals.

Marco Rubio: Climate is always changing; it's not from human activity

After receiving backlash for his remarks, Rubio sought in another interview to clarify his position: "I've never disputed that the climate is changing, and I've pointed out that climate to some extent is always changing, it's never static," Rubio said. "There are things that we can do to become more efficient in our use of energies, there are things we can do to develop alternative sources of energy."

Rubio defended those remarks during a third interview: "I think the scientific certainty that some claimed isn't necessarily there," he said.

Marco Rubio: Human activity is not causing climate change

RUBIO: I don't agree with the notion that somehow there are actions we can take today that would actually have an impact on what's happening in our climate. Our climate is always changing. And what they have chosen to do is take a handful of decades of research and say that this is now evidence of a longer-term trend that's directly and almost solely attributable to manmade activity, I do not agree with that.

Q: You don't buy it?

RUBIO: I don't know of any era in world history where the climate has been stable. Climate is always evolving, & natural disasters have always existed.

Q: You do not think that human activity, its production of CO2, has caused warming to our planet?

RUBIO: I do not believe that human activity is causing these dramatic changes to our climate the way these scientists are portraying it. And I do not believe that the laws that they propose we pass will do anything about it. Except it will destroy our economy.

Bobby Jindal: Keystone pipeline creates jobs without environmental damage

Bobby Jindal: Cheap, affordable domestic energy is economically critical

JINDAL: Absolutely not, unless it's just purely ideological reasons. You know, the reality is that the Canadians, one of our closest allies, want to help us become more energy independent. And this goes to an absolutely critical issue: cheap, affordable domestic energy is an absolute critical component for us reviving our manufacturing-based economy. Here in Louisiana, we've got tens of billions of dollars capital investment coming in to our state, thanks to the fracking and thanks to the natural gas boom we see going on in our state and across other states. We can see the same kind of investment across the country, in the steel industry, the fertilizer industry, the plastics industry. We can make things and we can bring investment and jobs--good paying jobs home from other countries.

Jeb Bush: A "patriotic energy policy" will yield far more revenue

BUSH: I wouldn't say "no, heck, no," and that's it. What I would do is advocate policies that would create high growth because the revenue collected by government when you're growing at 3.5% instead of 1.5% is exponentially more. And high growth over a sustained period of time by having a patriotic energy policy, bringing regulation to the 21st Century, immigration reform would be a good one, reforming our education system, tax policy--all those things would yield, I think, far more revenue. That should be where there's the common ground. And in return, there should be some give and take as it relates to entitlement reform. You could get to a place where our fiscal house would be in order if we achieved that. The president has not been willing to discuss that but in the last week, he's begun to at least reach out to Republicans which is quite encouraging.