Greenwire has also published ($ub. req’d) a detailed list of who is advising McCain on energy and environment policies, which I am reprinting below the fold.
By contrast, McCain’s campaign relies on a small group of longtime friends and advisers. Campaign staff would not comment on why their advisory team isn’t as large as Obama’s, but sources say the staff’s size reflects how frequently the Arizona senator departs from the Republican Party line on environment and energy issues.
I know Woolsey, and he is certainly very solid on energy security issues. But he is the exception. Doug Holtz-Eakin is much more typical of the conservatives McCain is likely to find available to fill his administration. Like his boss, he doesn’t believe in clean technologies and he doesn’t believe in government efforts to promote them.
“I’m not sure a McCain EPA would look any different than an Obama EPA,” quipped Brian Kennedy, a former House Republican leadership aide. “He might even bring Carol Browner back.”
That last quote would be laughable if it weren’t part of a targeted campaign of disinformation. Conservatives — including McCain himself — want the media and independents to believe McCain is liberal on the environment. But his voting record makes clear that he is a hard-core conservative, who happens to believe that global warming is almost as serious as scientists.
The GOP bench is exceedingly thin on genuine green Republicans — and none of them are conservatives. Anyway, here is his team:
| McCain’s team | |
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Doug Holtz-Eakin, the campaign’s economic policy adviser, handles all energy and environmental matters. Holtz-Eakin, 50, met McCain during the senator’s unsuccessful 2000 run for president. Holtz-Eakin was then an economics professor and associate director of the Center for Policy Research in the Maxwell School at Syracuse University. Holtz-Eakin had several roles in the Bush administration during President Bush’s first term. He was chief economist in the White House Council of Economic Advisers from 2001 to 2002. He then became director of the Congressional Budget Office from 2003 to 2005. Holtz-Eakin also served under former President George H.W. Bush as a senior staff economist in the Council of Economic Advisers. |
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John Raidt is one of McCain’s longest-serving aides and was policy coordinator for McCain’s 2000 presidential campaign. On Capitol Hill, Raidt was McCain’s legislative director from 1993 to 1997 and was staff director for the Senate Commerce Committee. Raidt also worked as a staff member on the 9-11 Commission, which investigated the 2001 terrorist attacks in Washington and New York. Click here to watch Raidt at a panel discussion covered by E&ETV. |
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James Woolsey, 66, a former CIA director, has been advising McCain on environmental and energy issues since the primary campaign. “I just do what I’m asked,” he said in an April interview. Woolsey said he has known McCain for more than 30 years, dating back to McCain’s job as Senate legislative affairs director for the Navy. Woolsey has served under Democratic and Republican presidents, including Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton. Out of government, his roles include serving as a senior vice president at Booz Allen Hamilton and as a co-author of the National Commission on Energy Policy report. He has a bachelor’s degree from Stanford University, a master’s from Oxford University and a law degree from Yale Law School. Click here and here to watch Woolsey’s appearances on OnPoint. |
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Floyd DesChamps, 45, is a longtime McCain aide for energy and environmental issues on Capitol Hill. “No one else would claim it,” DesChamps joked in a recent interview. DesChamps first joined McCain in 1995 as a fellow and returned two years later for a full-time job on the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee. DesChamps helped write the global warming cap-and-trade bill McCain introduced with Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) in 2001. He updated the bill in 2005 and 2007. DesChamps also handles technology and space issues for McCain. A design engineer by training, DesChamps started his career working on nuclear submarines for Westinghouse Electric Corp. He would later join the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to review the use of radioactive materials in medical and industrial devices. DesChamps also worked on nuclear engineering at the Energy Department. He has a bachelor of science degree in mechanical engineering from the University of South Carolina and a master’s degree in engineering management from the University of Maryland. |
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Rebecca Jensen Tallent is at the center of outreach from the McCain campaign with other informal energy and environmental advisers. Based in Arlington, Va., Tallent, 29, began her Capitol Hill career in 2001 as a legislative assistant in McCain’s Senate office. She moved to Arizona Republican Rep. Jim Kolbe’s office and then returned to McCain in August 2005 to handle immigration issues and reform of the Army Corps of Engineers. Tallent has a political science degree from Carleton College in Northfield, Minn. |
This post was created for ClimateProgress.org, a project of the Center for American Progress Action Fund.
