Is off-shore drilling really about coal?

While I wasn’t really that surprised that Obama is looking at off-shore drilling (but somewhat disappointed), I was surprised that he announced it unilaterally, without any sort of related concession from other interested parties.

But here is an interesting take on the situation. The announcement isn’t so much about increasing domestic oil per se, but rather setting the stage for the conversation to get US off coal.

At its core, the president’s energy vision calls for switching our transportation system from oil to plug-in electricity. But 45 percent of all electricity in the country is still generated by coal-fired power plants. In other words, we run the real risk of merely replacing one polluting and increasingly scarce fuel, petroleum, with an abundant but even more environmentally troublesome one, coal.

Fineman: Forget oil, coal is Obama’s thorn – White House- msnbc.com.