RealClearPolitics - Interview with Secretary Salazar

KING: The flip side of the argument has come from some Republicans who say this is too timid, that you should not have taken Bristol Bay out of play up in Alaska, for example. You should not have taken out of play the Pacific Coast. Why those decisions?

SALAZAR: Well, those decisions are based on the fact that there are some natural ecological wildlife values up there that are just absolutely the greatest. Bristol Bay provides about 40 percent of the fish for the United States. It is a place where presidents from the past, Republicans and Democrats, wanted to protect that place. The same thing is true with the Pacific, and the National Wildlife Refuges of the Marine areas there are absolutely at the very top of the line.

So, we're going to protect those environments because they are very special places. On the other hand, if you summed this up, John, I would say this, you know, in the Gulf of Mexico we say let's go for it, and we're going to do it surgically to protect the Florida coast. In the Atlantic, it's a look-and-see. In the Pacific and in some places in Alaska like Bristol Bay, they're too special to drill, so we're going to conserve, and so this is a balanced plan. It represents a new direction for us and this administration based on what had happened in the past; we're not just thoughtlessly going and rushing to lease everywhere in America.

1. Why isn't the Gulf of Mexico special?

2. If we can drill "surgically" in the Gulf of Mexico, why can't we drill "surgically" in those other places?

Scrappleface: Obama Policy Barrage Combats Dem Reelection Threat

The White House calendar calls for a five-month series of daily news conferences during which the president will announce that his agenda is “completely focused on one thing.” The following day, he’ll use the same words, but substitute a different issue.

Here’s a draft outline of the president’s daily news conference topics between now and election day.

Monday: greed, greed, greed
Tuesday: grads, grads, grads
Wednesday: carbon, carbon, carbon
Thursday: jobs, jobs, jobs
Friday: batter, batter, batter