Kerry evokes Scoop Jackson as energy crisis deepens

Sen. John Kerry: An administration that is "of oil, for oil, and by oil" will only dig America deeper into addictive dependence on an unstable Middle East.

"We are not going to drill our way out of this problem. We will have to invent our way out of it," the Democrats' presidential nominee-in-waiting said in an interview on the eve of today's Seattle appearances.

As author of the Bush administration's dig-coal, drill-for-oil energy program, currently stalled in Congress, Vice President Dick Cheney would call that fuzzy thinking.

In the early 1970s, and again after the Arab oil embargo in the 1973 Yom Kippur War, Washington Sen. Henry "Scoop" Jackson gave long speeches about growing U.S. dependence on Persian Gulf oil. He predicted an America vulnerable to blackmail by, using Jackson's syntax, "A-rab potentates."

As co-leader of the Senate talkathon that blocked oil drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, Kerry uses words like "embarrassing" and "an insult to our democratic process" to describe private White House meetings at which Cheney's task force hammered out the energy plan.

"My energy deliberations would be completely open. C-Span can put a camera in the room. I would not be embarrassed by the people I bring to the table," Kerry said.

Cheney has gone to the mat -- and the U.S. Supreme Court -- to keep a veil of secrecy over who had input into the administration's plan.

Choices on energy in 2004 are clear. The question is whether a vital issue will hold public attention.