Beyond the Dome

Here’s a little drama to watch closely in the coming weeks: Could John McCain’s selection of Sarah Palin as his running mate turn out to be the pretext for McCain to drop his longstanding opposition to drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge?

Up until now, the Arizona senator has held out pretty firmly against drilling for oil in ANWR. Even in the June speech where he announced he would drop his opposition to offshore drilling, McCain declared that “When America set aside the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, we called it a ‘refuge’ for a reason.”

But he did hint in June that he would listen to people who want to change his mind: “People have said to me, ‘I’m going to bring you new information about ANWR, how environmentally we can make it safe.’ I’ll be glad to accept new information but my position has not changed.”

It wouldn’t be the first time McCain has changed positions on an issue based on changing circumstances, or because people simply changed his mind. He has said he embraced offshore drilling because the skyrocketing price of oil made it necessary to try new things. And he became an advocate of measures to address climate change after he got numerous questions about the topic during his 2000 presidential race.

And Palin, as it turns out, is an outspoken supporter of the idea. In an interview with CNBC that took place before she became McCain’s running mate, the governor of Alaska spent most of her time making the case for drilling in ANWR. “When you ask Alaskans, “Are you ready to allow drilling to take place to a greater degree up on the North Slope, specifically here we’re talking about ANWR, do you want to see that happen?” … Alaskans are saying, “Yes, because we believe that it can be done safely, it can be done prudently, and it had better be done ethically, also. Yes, we want to see that drilling,” Palin said.

Palin also said much of the opposition to drilling was based on “a lot of misperceptions and misconceptions” about what drilling in ANWR would actually mean. “You see pictures, you see visuals from the naysayers, the critics of the idea of opening ANWR, and the pictures that they’re showing are mountains and … polar bears, lots of different wildlife. They’ll show moose in a stream with mountains in the background. That’s not ANWR.”

The Republican Party platform, which was adopted as part of Monday’s hurricane-shortened opening day agenda, carefully straddles the differences between McCain and the rest of the party, saying only that “We oppose any efforts that would permanently block access to the coastal plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.”

But House Minority Leader John A. Boehner of Ohio, the chairman of the convention and one of McCain’s closest congressional allies, is hinting in a not-so-subtle way that he’d like to see Palin’s views win out. “Let’s do everything we can to take a big step toward energy independence. And that, in my view, would include drilling on the coastal plain of Alaska,” Boehner said Monday on the “Brian and The Judge” radio show. “We can do it in a safe, environmentally safe and sound way, and she is an expert on this.”

And remember, McCain has described Palin as “a partner and a soul-mate.” If someone like that is making the case to start drilling in ANWR, it’s worth watching to see if McCain will listen.