Whirled News - President, Candidates Address Gasoline, Climate Crisis

A determined President Bush challenged Congress to deal with the soaring price of gasoline by insisting they approve drilling in Alaska and the construction of a string of new oil refineries across the country.

After a series of irrelevant questions, a Whirled News reporter asked the President whether these new initiatives weren’t in direct contradiction to his State of the Union speech in which he said that “America is addicted to oil.”

Several reporters stared in disbelief, and one was heard to mutter, “What kind of reporter does he think he is, asking questions like that?”

The President replied that his new proposals actually supported his warning that America was addicted to oil.

“We’ve got to make sure things get worse with our addiction first,” he said. “Only after our addicted nation touches the bottom will it seek the help it so desperately needs.”

In response to a follow-up question about how building new refineries would address the President’s environmental initiatives he proposed two weeks ago, reporters were heard asking each other, “What environmental initiatives? How are we supposed to remember what he said two weeks ago?”

The President, speaking over the confused murmurs, responded that the environmental initiatives he proposed were long-range proposals to be phased in decades from now when global warming becomes a serious problem, while the gasoline crisis was “as immediate and clear a present danger as another terrorist attack. The American people want their President to act boldly in times of crisis,” he insisted.

Meanwhile, Senators Hillary Clinton and John McCain pushed their proposals for a temporary roll-back of the federal tax on gasoline this summer to help make gas more affordable.

Reiterating his campaign theme of straight, honest talk, McCain insisted, “As a candidate for President of the United States, I can do no less to address global warming and our energy crises.”

Senator Clinton, in supporting the temporary tax rollback, pointed out that, “This proves that I can make the tough decisions. It’s not easy to keep pandering for votes while you’re insisting that America needs a change from politics as usual,” she said.

She pointed out that by supporting her proposal, her opponent Barack Obama could “prove he was on the side of working Americans.”

Obama campaign officials responded that the temporary tax roll-back was merely a cosmetic sop, would accomplish nothing in the long-run, and in fact merely helped fuel the deeper global climate and energy crises. Ms. Clinton responded by announcing that she was considering Monica Lewinsky as her running mate. “We both know how to whore in order to get close to power,” she said.