McCain probably won't volunteer Sarah Palin for the Buffalo Chip dance, so let's consider her seriously:

Gov. Palin has 80% approval ratings stemming from her tough dealings with oil companies. Disgruntled Alaskan bloggers call her Sarah Palin-Chavez or even Chavez in drag. Even Newsweek mentioned the comparisons:

Beginning this week, the Alaska State Legislature will debate how to usher in a natural-gas boom. Two pipeline proposals are on the table. One hails from a Canadian pipeline builder and is endorsed by Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, a Republican who has drawn surprising comparisons with Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez for her tough stance against Big Oil. The other proposal comes from BP and ConocoPhillips, two oil behemoths that hold leases on much of the state's natural gas.

But only one giant pipeline is needed, and Palin has set the stage so that only the Canadian proposal will be considered. State lawmakers must decide whether or not to give a $500 million state subsidy to TransCanada Corp. to lay a $26 billion, 1,700-mile-long pipeline from the Alaskan Arctic to Alberta, Canada, where other lines would transport the natural gas to American markets.

Note that back in June she was already touted as a running mate for McCain.

The 44-year-old governor embodies a growing anti-oil sentiment among Alaskans frustrated by the industry's lack of progress in building a natural-gas pipeline. She's enjoyed some of the highest approval ratings of any governor in the country since taking office in December 2006, with some grass-roots Republicans suggesting her as running mate for presidential candidate John McCain.

Yet, her dealings with Big Oil sometimes seem utterly un-Republican. Palin may not command an army to seize the people's oil fields like Hugo Chávez does, but that hasn't stopped her administration from trying to revoke lucrative leases at one giant oil and gas reservoir, alleging Exxon and its partners have dragged their feet for decades to develop it.

Her rhetoric can be blunt, too. Displaying no love for Exxon (a popular punching bag for Alaskans still irked over the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil tanker spill), Palin recently scolded the company for not showing enough interest in the natural-gas pipe dream. "The sentiment shared by a lot of Alaskans," she told reporters at a news conference, "is that Exxon, 'Don't let the door hit you in the stern on the way out if you choose not to participate in progressing development of Alaska's resources'."

Recent articles call her pro-life, but the Alaska ProChoice/Alliance for Reproductive Justice website shows a photo of Palin with 2000 Women's Summit participants. (I'm guessing that's her just right of center.)

And this is hardly authoritative, but a comment on Stop the ACLU quoted her on abortion…

“I’m going to respect the sensitivity and the privacy aspects of this issue and as governor, I will abide by the laws that have been interpreted by the Supreme Court.”

When asked if the opportunity arose as governor for her to ban abortion, would she?
Her response: “Theoretical, hypothetical questions that have to do with a subject like this, that are being led by a campaign in order to divide, it’s unfortunate. That’s my final comment on it.”

Which will raise gas prices first?

Russia may cut off oil flow to the West

Fears are mounting that Russia may restrict oil deliveries to Western Europe over coming days, in response to the threat of EU sanctions and Nato naval actions in the Black Sea.

Any such move would be a dramatic escalation of the Georgia crisis and play havoc with the oil markets.

Reports have begun to circulate in Moscow that Russian oil companies are under orders from the Kremlin to prepare for a supply cut to Germany and Poland through the Druzhba (Friendship) pipeline. It is believed that executives from lead-producer LUKoil have been put on weekend alert.

"They have been told to be ready to cut off supplies as soon as Monday," claimed a high-level business source, speaking to The Daily Telegraph. Any move would be timed to coincide with an emergency EU summit in Brussels, where possible sanctions against Russia are on the agenda.

Summer's End

Should it look as if the current hurricane is going to tear up the Gulf oil fields and the coastal refineries, it might not be a bad time to go out and fill your tank for U.S. gasoline stocks are unusually low. Any supply or refining disruptions in the next week or so have a good chance of resulting in spot shortages of gasoline.

These shortages in turn just might lead to the fabled "run of the pumps" in which 230 million drivers rush to their gas stations and start topping off tanks. In a matter of hours millions and millions of gallons would be transferred into consumer's tanks and it likely would take weeks to sort out the ensuing mess. At a minimum it would give those people running for President or Congress in November something to talk about. If it happens, it will be fascinating to watch.

On the Daily Dish, Andrew Sullivan responds to Ross Douthat's criticism of Obama's speech as predictably liberal:

... Obama is not promising a return to the Great Society. Sure, he is nonetheless a liberal. But sometimes, a re-balancing of the polity after a period of over-reach from one side is not so bad an idea.

I'd like to support a conservative not beholden to the religious right, not indifferent to fiscal degeneracy, respectful of the constitution, hostile to torture, tough with foreign enemies but eager for new and old allies, and intent on making government smaller and leaner and more effective. Such a conservative is not available, and unless the GOP is reformed root and branch by a new generation, there won't be one available for a long while.

A letter posted by Andrew Sullivan at the Daily Dish compares Obama's campaign to a rigorous, team-oriented game plan. Fans complain:

    "Why all of the passing?  Why not just let X player take over?  They're taking too long to take a shot.  Don't listen to the coach, son, listen to me, I know better."  But what those fans fail to appreciate is the overall strategy of the coach and the ability of the players to execute against it.

...

    What we're losing sight of is the best thing we can do right now is CHEER.

If only McCain did more than rhyme with train. Treehugger writes:

When he still rode the Straight Talk Express it had a banner on the front: "Get on Board the McCain Train" and alas, that may be as close to a train as John McCain ever gets. He is not fond of trains; according to Derrick Jackson of the Boston Globe:

In 2000, when he was chairman of the Senate Science, Commerce and Transportation committee, McCain killed $10 billion in capital funding for Amtrak. He denounced Amtrak as a symbol of government waste, claiming, "There's only two parts of the country that can support a viable rail system - the Northeast and the far West."

In 2002, McCain said "Amtrak needs to make more progress before any further funding schemes are enacted," while at the same time calling any money for progress a "multibillion-dollar blank check." In 2002, McCain declared that "Amtrak should be restructured to eliminate its reliance on the American taxpayers and to allow for its privatization."

On PBS, David Brooks opined that the Dems had so effectively and relentlessly connected McCain to Bush that he would almost have to choose Lieberman as his running mate just to break out of the mold.

Attention clever posters. McClatchy's latest cartoon contest features McCain as the Monopoly guy standing in front of seven house tokens. They just need a worthy caption.

The Biden choice looks better and better. With Pakistan crumbling from within, our next President will have even more on his foreign policy plate than two wars and the Caucasus region conflict.

Tom Whipple has noted that Pakistan's textile industry, their primary export, has been crippled by persistent electrical shortages. They cannot afford the oil needed to power their economy and are at the mercy of the Saudi government, which has recently forgiven roughly half of Pakistan's oil debts.

Now Bloomberg notes that investors are shunning Pakistan and throwing the Pakistani rupee into turmoil:

    The ouster of Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf was hailed by the government as a chance to turn around a crumbling economy that has left half the 168 million population short on food. Investors aren't convinced, and that means more declines for the rupee.

 ...

    "Inflation can only be beat by a cut in government spending, which means turning off the currency printing press," Mark Mobius, executive chairman of Templeton in Singapore, who has about $200 million invested in Pakistan, said in an interview. "Stop spending. Stop wasting through corruption."

    The cost to protect the nation's sovereign bonds from default has almost tripled since October to the highest for government debt after Argentina. Foreign-exchange reserves have declined by more than half to $6.6 billion, enough to cover just three months of imports, according to Standard & Poor's. The United Nations World Food Programme said on June 11 that half the population was at risk of running short of food.