When it comes to drilling off North Carolina’s coast, Bev Perdue is like the Scarlet Pimpernel: She’s here, she’s there, she’s everywhere, that damned elusive Pimpernel.

She’s gone from being 100% against drilling off North Carolina’s coast to saying (at the WRAL debate) that she wanted oil companies to start drilling – on sixty-eight million acres under lease, thirty-three million offshore – “tomorrow morning.”

Moderator David Crabtree asked the obvious question: “What changed your mind?”

Perdue shot back: “I’ve always been for offshore drilling…always.”

Then, of course, Perdue put on the TV ad I saw saying she was all for drilling on 33 million acres.

So it sounded like Bev Perdue had taken a rock-solid stand for drilling off North Carolina’s coast – but she hadn’t.

Because it turns out the key words are “sixty-eight million acres” and “thirty-three million acres” – because not one of those acres Perdue wants to drill on immediately are anywhere near North Carolina. For instance, the thirty-three million acres she says she wants to drill on now are in the Gulf of Mexico.

So even if it sounded to voters (as it did to David Crabtree during the WRAL debate) that Perdue was saying loud and clear she was for drilling off North Carolina’s coast – she wasn’t saying that at all. Instead, she was saying she’s for drilling in the Gulf of Mexico – in other words, she’s running for governor of North Carolina on a platform of drilling for oil off Texas.

So what is Mrs. Perdue’s real position?

Well, maybe, possibly, it might be conceivable she’d go along with drilling off North Carolina’s coast, but first, she says, she’d have to be 100% certain it’s safe and then she’d still have to think about it.

Now, I guess Perdue saying she wants to be sure drilling off North Carolina’s coast is safe sounds reasonable. But think about that a minute too. They’ve been drilling for oil in the Gulf of Mexico for years – through Hurricanes Ivan, Gustav, Ike, and Katrina. And it’s turned out to be pretty safe. So, what’s Bev waiting for?

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