Presumptive Republican presidential nominee John McCain's recent announcement that he is now open to drilling for oil off the nation's coasts prompted a predictable backlash from environmentalists who said this proved the Arizona senator had only been posing as a green true believer all along.

But it should also prompt a backlash from non-zealots who understand increasing oil supply is key to ending the run-up in fuel prices. Why? Because the logic McCain uses to explain his shift on offshore drilling — that tough decisions have to be made, given U.S. economic security interests — should also support drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, or ANWR.

Instead, McCain offered up this nonsense in defending his continued opposition to oil exploration in a tiny slice of ANWR: It "is a pristine place and if they found oil in the Grand Canyon, I don't think I'd drill in the Grand Canyon."

This argument borders on the flippant. The Grand Canyon is a national treasure that draws millions of Americans a year. ANWR is in a truly desolate, remote area of northern Alaska that draws perhaps dozens of Americans a year. The actual size of the proposed drilling operation would be smaller than a typical metropolitan airport.

Yet McCain somehow has the spine to suggest offshore drilling near coastal areas where most Americans live but balks at drilling for oil reserves estimated at 10 billion barrels in a frozen, barely habitable place that most Alaskans are eager to develop.

This is baffling — and impossible to reconcile with McCain's claim to worry abut America's economic security.

REPRINTED FROM THE SAN DIEGO UNION-TRIBUNE.