President Barack Obama is fighting criticism on his energy policies in Oklahoma, aiming at plans to fast-track an oil pipeline that emerged after he delayed the larger Keystone XL project earlier this year. On Thursday, the president was directing federal agencies to accelerate a 485-mile line from Oklahoma to refineries on the Gulf Coast of Texas that would remove a critical bottleneck in the country’s oil transportation system. The command would also apply to other pipelines that lessen choke points.
While in Maljamar, N.M., on Wednesday, the president said, “We’re drilling all over the place.” Amid the acres of the solar panels and the oil fields, Obama fought charges that he has muffled domestic energy production and been too eager to spend government money on renewable energy projects, as well as allowing gas to climb to more than the average $3.86 a gallon. The president’s advisers believe that rising gas prices stand a threat to his 2012 re-election bid because they could undermine the benefits of Obama’s payroll tax cut, which was the center of his jobs agenda last fall. Republicans hope to keep the blame of rising oil prices on Obama, even though no president has much control over prices at the pump. The standoff over Iran’s nuclear program, which has threatened to disrupt the Middle East oil supplies, has caused gas prices to rise by more than 50 cents a gallon since January.
