ASPEN, Colo. - Republican presidential contender Sen. John McCain said on Thursday the recent sharp fall in the price of oil had been helped by the end of the U.S. federal offshore drilling moratorium.

“I think several factors have contributed to the recent drop in the price of a barrel of oil. I think the practice of conservation and the reduction in our demand has probably been a major factor,” he told the Aspen Institute.

“I also don’t think it was entirely accidental that the day that the president announced lifting the federal moratorium on offshore drilling, the price of a barrel of oil dropped.”

Despite the decline in oil prices from record highs above $140 a barrel in July to around $115, gasoline prices remain a crucial issue in the election campaign, pinching Americans as they cope with falling house prices.

McCain’s call for offshore drilling to boost domestic oil supplies, which he says will provide a bridge to a time when new, greener, energy technology is in place, has been slammed by critics who say it would be a disaster for the environment and not make any difference to oil prices.

The Arizona senator rejects this view, and on Thursday he reiterated his position that it could help straight away.

“I met with a group of independent petroleum producers in Bakersfield, California. They said, using existing facilities, you could have an immediate impact on our supply of oil. With exploration of known areas … within a year or two, they could increase our oil supply,” McCain said.

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HUNTINGTON, W. Va - Republican John McCain appeared to back down on Tuesday in his dispute with his opponent Barack Obama over tire pressure.
    
Last week in St. Louis, Obama told an audience that steps such as inflating tires to the correct levels could make a difference when it comes to conserving fuel.
    
Cue gleeful mockery from McCain. Obama was naive, inexperienced and not talking straight to the American people about energy, he said.
    
His campaign went further, distributing to reporters tire gauges engraved with the words “Obama’s energy plan.”
    
Predictably, Obama hit back calling McCain’s mockery “ignorant,” arguing his plans were being misrepresented and saying that experts backed his call over tire pressure. Equally predictably, McCain’s camp hit back.
    
The surprise came during a telephone town hall meeting McCain held on Tuesday with voters in Pennsylvania.
    
“Obama said a couple of days ago says we all should inflate our tires. I don’t disagree with that. The American Automobile Association strongly recommends it,” McCain said.
    
But he kept up his broad criticism of Obama on energy: “I … don’t think that that (inflating tires) is a way to become energy independent.”
    
The United States’ energy challenges will be a central factor in the months leading up to the election. But when it comes to how far to inflate your tires, the air seems to have gone out of the dispute.

Photo credit Reuters/Mike Blake (Gas station near San Diego)

CHICAGO - New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg has said he’s not running for president, but on Wednesday night he revved up to full campaigning mode when accepting an award from CME Group, the big futures exchanges.  

“We are desperately in need of leadership to deal with a much more competitive world,” said Bloomberg, stopping just short of announcing his candidacy for — anything.  
        
Riffing on the theme of “innovation as the essence of leadership” upon receiving CME’s Fred Arditti Innovation Award, Bloomberg electrified the well-heeled audience at the swanky Peninsula Hotel with a call for action on everything from climate change to education to immigration reform.  
    
“Choices made now will determine what kind of future our children will have. At a national level we’re working as hard as we can to stop innovation,” the Democrat-turned Republican-turned Independent said.  

Energy independence and efficiency led Bloomberg’s list of underfunded programs. “We spend one-third on that of what members of Congress spend on earmarks every year. It’s up to all of us to hold our elected officials’ feet to the fire,” Bloomberg said.  
    
Restrictions on H-1B work visas mean the United States risks losing out in a much more competitive world, Bloomberg said, adding that American capitalist success stories like Sun Microsystems, Yahoo and Google were all founded in part by immigrants.  
    
“Medicine is going overseas. Science is going overseas. We are exporting our intellectual capital, and we can’t keep doing it,” Bloomberg said “If we don’t find ways to get around that, then we really are in trouble.”  
    
Bloomberg, whose term as New York mayor ends on Dec 31, 2009, also hailed the concept of term limits — raising a few eyebrows within an audience that included Chicago’s “Mayor for Life” Richard M. Daley. 

Click here for more Reuters 2008 campaign coverage. 

- Photo credit: Reuters/Shannon Stapleton (Bloomberg earlier this month with Republican presumptive presidential nominee Sen. John McCain.)