Obama's shift on issue undercuts push for coal-to-liquid subsidies

"After co-sponsoring legislation earlier this year for billions of dollars in subsidies for liquefied coal," which would help his home state of Illinois but could cause trouble for his presidential campaign, U.S. Sen. Barack Obama "began qualifying his support in ways that have left both environmentalists and coal industry officials unsure where he stands," The Washington Post reports. "His shift has helped shape this month's Senate debate over how to reduce both dependence on foreign oil and carbon dioxide emissions; on Tuesday, he voted against one proposal to boost liquefied coal and for a more narrowly worded one. Both failed." (Associated Press photo from 2004, via Post, shows Obama touring a pilot plant in Illinois.)

Post reporters Alec McGillis and Steven Mufson observe: "Obama's contortions on coal point to the limits of the role he likes to assume, that of a unifier who can appeal across traditional lines and employ a "new kind of politics" to solve problems. In reaching out to the coal industry, some observers say, he may have been trying to show that he is a different sort of Democrat, but the gesture had the look of old-style politicking and put him in a corner, where he wound up alienating some on both sides of the issue."

Obama's change of position, first reported June 13 by the Los Angeles Times and mentioned in The Rural Blog on June 15, calls for new coal field to "emit at least 20 percent less life-cycle carbon than conventional fuels," he said in a statement. "The statement dismayed those pushing coal-to-liquid, who noted this would require technological leaps even beyond perfecting carbon storage," Mufson and McGillis report. They trace what they call "Obama's winding path on coal," starting in his days as a state legislator. (Read more)