Bush advisor: Power crisis a ‘wake up call’

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Bush advisor: Power crisis a ‘wake up call’ State’s woes point to need for national policy, Rove says

By Ron Fournier AP White House Correspondent April 19th, 2001

WASHINGTON -- California’s power woes are "a wake up call" to the rest of America that should bolster the White House push for a new, long-term energy plan, senior White House adviser Karl Rove said Wednesday.

President Bush’s top political strategist said his own family has been affected by electricity shortages in the nation’s largest state. His father, 72-year-old Louis Rove, suffers from emphysema and relies on a machine for oxygen-enhanced air.

"I’ve been on the telephone with my siblings wondering how we’re going to keep the oxygenator running when and if the power in Palm Springs goes out," Rove said in an interview with The Associated Press.

The solution for Rove is a backup power supply that would keep his father’s machine working if Palm Springs goes dark from a blackout. Millions face hardships in California, where power shortages could get worse this summer.

"This has got a very human dimension to it," Rove said. "It’s one thing to talk about power supplies. It’s another thing when you talk about how it affects their jobs, how it’s affecting their livelihoods, how it’s affecting the safety of their communities and the health of their families. This is a tough issue and it ought to be a wake up call for the entire country."

A White House task force headed by Vice President Dick Cheney is working on recommendations to address both short-term problems of soaring electricity and natural gas prices and longer-term energy supply problems, focusing on producing more domestic oil and gas and building more electric power plants.

Cheney was telling a high-tech audience that the United States needs 65 to 90 new power plants every year for the next two decades "to keep up with our growing economy." Some of those plants should be nuclear powered, he said in a speech prepared for delivery Wednesday night to the Northern Virginia Technology Council.

Rove is on the telephone a lot these days crafting strategies to pass the White House legislative agenda, maintain GOP control of Congress in 2002 and position the president for a re-election bid in 2004.

Bush narrowly won the White House without California’s 54 electoral votes, and Rove said the president could win re-election without the state "but it’s always nicer to carry the Golden State."

Dismissing suggestions that the energy crisis has hurt Bush in California, Rove said the administration has done "virtually everything" Gov. Gray Davis has requested.

He suggested that the state caused its own problems by not building enough power plants and failing to follow the lead of other states, such as Bush’s Texas, to establish sound energy policies before a crisis struck.

"This is a very tough problem for which there are no easy short-term" solutions, Rove said. "You wish there was some gigantic storage battery hidden away in the Rocky Mountains that you could plug in. But there isn’t."

He said the administration will soon unveil new conservation measures aimed at helping California ease its shortages

http://www.thedesertsun.com/news/stories/local/987639840.shtml

-- Martin Thompson (mthom1927@aol.com), April 19, 2001


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