Drilling Bit Players

Further proving that otherwise politically conservative Newport Beach has an environmental streak when it comes to its own shores (but no one else's): Rep. John Campbell (R-The Arches) joined Rep. Loretta Sanchez (D-Garden Grove) as the only members of the Orange County congressional delegation to vote against lifting the 25-year ban on oil and natural gas drilling off most of the Pacific and Atlantic coasts and the eastern part of the Gulf of Mexico.

The legislation, which passed by a vote of 232-187, controversially offers states billions of dollars in federal revenues if they allow drilling off their coasts. Campbell's OC coastal congressional colleagues Dana Rohrbacher (R-Huntington Beach) and Ken Calvert (R-Riverside, but part of his gerrymandered district takes in the South County coast) voted for oilying up our shores. They were joined by OC inlanders Ed Royce (R-Fullerton) and Gary Miller (R-Diamond Bar, but part of his gerrymandered district takes in chunks of North County).