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The Song Remains the Same
By David Glenn Cox (author)
The President appeared on NBC’s “Today” show yesterday, the fluffiest of all fluffy news shows. The President has his claws out and he’s going to give those oil company executives what for. He’s merely looking for “whose ass to kick.”
“And if I'm elected governor, I will lower taxes whether those bureaucrats in the state capital like it or not!” (Montgomery Burns)
"I was down there a month ago, before most of these talking heads were even paying attention to the Gulf," Obama said. "A month ago I was meeting with fishermen down there, standing in the rain talking about what a potential crisis this could be."
“Some voters respond to my integrity, others are more impressed with my incorruptibility. Still others buy my determination to lower taxes. And the bureaucrats in the state capital can put that in their pipes and smoke it!”
(Montgomery Burns)
I feel for the President, I do. Republicans have been trying to pin the label on Obama that this is his Katrina, but it's not his Katrina. This is more closely related to the Iranian hostage crisis. It is a crisis that just goes on and on and there is very little in actual fact that the President can do about it except act engaged, look presidential and hope for the best.
If Obama wants to kick someone’s ass he has the staff available to appoint a committee to decide who should kick the President square in the seat of his own pants. Deep water drilling in the Gulf has been the oil companies' wet dream for a generation. The oil company executives look at pictures of drilling platforms in pristine waters and stroke themselves. The oil companies have spent untold tens of millions of dollars lobbying for expanded drilling in coastal waters.
It has long been a favorite talking point of Republican demagoguery that Democrats want America to be held hostage by blood-thirsty Arab sheiks; that if we just had more coastal oil drilling, prices would fall, the economy would prosper and all God’s children would love one another. George W. Bush ran on this platform like his father before him. It was John McCain’s favorite talking point that all we need are more nuclear power plants and coastal drilling and everything would be okay! Sarah Palin built her career on “Drill, baby, drill.” But who was it that made this particular oil company's wet dream come true? That’s the guy that needs a good swift kick in the ass.
It has only been public pressure that has held the oil companies at bay. The current blowout in the Gulf isn’t the first disaster; it is just one more in a series of disasters. In 1969 on the California coast near Santa Barbara a Union Oil platform suffered a blowout identical to the one we now face. For eleven days it spewed oil and left an oil slick eight hundred miles long. Dead sea birds, turtles, it was identical to the current spill in every way.
March 2, 1992 - UZBEKISTAN - An estimated 88 million gallons of oil spilled from an oil well at Fergana Valley.
January 12,1998 -- NIGERIA - 40,000 barrels of oil spilled from a ruptured pipeline to one of Mobil's storage tanks
December 27, 1999 - ANGOLA - An offshore oil spill is approaching the Angolan coast, posing a threat to the fishing industry.
January 18, 2000 - BRASIL - At least 130,000 gallons of crude oil spewed out of a broken pipeline, polluting beaches and endangering plant and animal life in what authorities called the worst ecological disaster to hit Rio de Janeiro state in a decade.
February 2, 2000 - BOLIVIA - A flash flood broke a crude oil pipeline, spilling hundreds of barrels of oil into the Desaguadero River that flows into Lake Poopo, the government reported. The pipeline is operated by Transredes, which sent several experts to help contain the oil and assess the damage it is causing to a river inhabited by pink flamingoes and other birds.
April 7, 2000 - UNITED STATES - Some 111,000 gallons of oil spilled near Pepco's Chalk Point Generating Station, affecting shorelines of the Patuxent River in southern Maryland. Some 6 1/2 miles of oil containment booms were positioned in the river and at the entrance to several creeks, and an estimated 80,000 gallons of spilled oil were recovered in 24-hour-a-day operations since the leak occurred.
August 1, 2000 - CANADA - Residents of the town of Chetwynd were told to conserve water, as officials surveyed the damage from a massive oil spill into a pristine river in northern British Columbia. Chetwynd stopped pumping water from the Pine River as the first traces of the estimated 264,600 gallons of crude oil spilled in a pipeline break on Tuesday reached the community of about 3,000 people.
November 28, 2000 - UNITED STATES - A tanker spilled half a million gallons of crude oil into the Mississippi River, closing a busy shipping route for 26 miles and threatening wildlife. No injuries were reported, but some pelicans and other animals were found covered with oil. The area is home to pelicans, shorebirds, seabirds, crabs, shrimp and sport fish, as well as more than 100,000 wintering waterfowl. The 567,000-gallon spill is the largest in U.S. waters since the Exxon Valdez in March 1989.
April 6, 2001 - USA - Strong wind hampered cleanup efforts as workers tried to contain a 90,000-gallon crude oil spill off the southeast Louisiana coast. Four-foot waves made it difficult for skimmers to collect the oil, but the Coast Guard said about 6,720 gallons had been recovered.
February 14, 2003 - USA - Clean up operations are underway at Midway Atoll National Wildlife Refuge after an underground corroded pipeline fitting released as many as 100,000 gallons of fuel in the fuel farm area last week. The atoll provides nesting and resting habitat for almost two million seabirds, as well as important habitat for migratory shorebirds,
October 14, 2004 - USA - Emergency crews scrambled to control a massive south Sound oil spill that soiled portions of Tacoma's Commencement Bay and stretched for miles in a bluish-black sheen, threatening pristine beaches and wildlife on Maury and Vashon islands.
November 21,2004 - CANADA - Scientists warn the 44,000 gallon oil spill at an oil platform off Canada's Newfoundland province could kill up to 100,000 seabirds. The spill, coming at a bad time for the birds, occurred at the Terra Nova offshore oil platform as a result of a malfunction. A few days later, the slick covered at least 14 square miles.
It goes on and on and I omitted most of the shipping accidents, which account for the majority of all oil spills. This is an industry that incurs great costs but also reaps huge rewards so their answer is always the same, cut costs wherever possible.
It was only back in March when Barack Obama said, "The bottom line is this: Given our energy needs, in order to sustain economic growth and produce jobs and keep our businesses competitive, we are going to need to harness traditional sources of fuel even as we ramp up production of new sources of renewable, homegrown energy."
Candidate Obama said this, “...we could save all the oil they're talking about getting off drilling, if everybody was just inflating their tires, and getting regular tune-ups. You could actually save just as much.”
Then there was: "When you first hear the idea 'let's allow offshore drilling and it will cut gas prices,' it sounds like it makes sense, especially when gas is more than $4 a gallon. But the facts say otherwise. The only way we can achieve energy and climate security in this country is to reduce our dependence on oil.
"Unfortunately, President Bush and Sen. John McCain are trying to sell us on the oil companies' old argument that repealing the 27-year old moratorium on drilling in protected areas offshore will lower gas prices. Americans need to put this tired debate to rest." Joe Biden, 2008
After Hurricane Katrina in 2005, 130 wells in the gulf were damaged and leaked nine million gallons of oil into the Gulf. There were also 146 small oil spills so what is going on in the Gulf today is business as usual. The President went into this with eyes wide shut; he’s an intelligent man and he had to know that lifting the moratorium was a calculated risk. He took the risk and now he's looking for someone to kick in the ass.
Using their best Nixonian talents the federal government at first banned more drilling and then contradicted themselves and then contradicted themselves again so that the American public has no idea what is going on. BP, for over a month and with government backing, insisted that the spill was no more than five thousand barrels per day. Other experts in the field said it was more like twelve to twenty-five thousand barrels a day. BP crowed the other day that their new-fangled what's it captured eleven thousand barrels in a day. The non-governmental scientists added that cutting off the riser for the oil company's new gizmo increased the flow by another 20 percent or more, upping twenty-five to perhaps thirty-one thousand barrels, but they’re picking up eleven thousand barrels thereby leaving the blowout at twenty thousand barrels per day.
The President has very few options at this point other than act engaged, look presidential and hope for the best or…?
“Obama to Reopen Oil Drilling”
WSJ June 8, 2010- "The new drilling regulations are expected to require drillers to have independent operators certify that the blowout preventers work as designed to shut off the flow of oil; that independent operators certify the well design plan is adequate, including proper casing, or cement lining; that the driller certifies it is in compliance with all regulations and have done all needed tests.
“Mr. Obama defended the deep-water moratorium on Friday, and administration officials said Monday that it wasn't being reconsidered. A repeat of the BP Deepwater Horizon spill would have grave economic consequences for regional commerce and do further damage to the environment."
The President looks so forceful when he’s angry. It's almost like he’s going to do something.
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