Last week the Santa Barbara city council voted 5 – 1 to affirm its opposition to offshore oil drilling. The measure was passed to counter an August 26th Santa Barbara county supervisor’s vote in favor offshore oil drilling. While both votes were completely symbolic, they do point to a clear fault line in the energy debate. As blue as the entire state of California is, many of its counties, like Santa Barbara, actually reflect the voting patterns of the nation as a whole. The city of Santa Barbara is urban, …
The left traces their current opposition to offshore oil drilling all the way back to 1969 when a Union Oil platform spilled 3.4 million gallons of oil of the coast near Santa Barbara, California. Marty Blum, Santa Barbara’s Democratic mayor, recently told Newsweek: “I still don’t know anyone here who wants more platforms in the [Santa Barbara] channel. Just about everyone who lives here is an environmentalist.” Well, Marty might want to stop by the August 26, Santa Barbara County Board of Supervisors meeting, because a growing coalition of labor, …
