Another Bogus GOP Claim: Obama refuses to use skimmers!

[ThoughtCriminal]

Last week Senator LeMieux (R-BP/FL) made the charge on the Senate floor that there are "Over 2000 Skimmers Available In US That Obama Refuses To Use! Only 20 skimmers are working off the Florida coast". The story has gained widespread attention the right-wing blog universe, but as far as I can tell, very little scrutiny.

A bit of real journalism here would be a big help. Why ask questions when outrage is all you need?

- "Obama told me we can’t deploy oil skimmers because they might be needed elsewhere". The implication to the wing-nut mind is that these skimmers are dry docked somewhere just in case somebody pours a can of oil into Walden Pond. But none of these genius amateur pundit sleuths think to ask where "elsewhere" is. Could it be the coast of Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama or Texas? Or perhaps at the spill site or wherever they can be most effective?

- Do any unused skimmers have crews, are they seaworthy? Do they float? What their capacity?

- What is the capacity of the 20 skimmers off the Florida coast vs skimmers "needed elsewhere"?

- None of the outraged "small government" blogs ask who owns these skimmers or why BP has not hired them? The Senator is also incurious as to why BP has not hired more skimmers. Given his family ties to BP and his role in advising a secretive oil industry group that was trying to push a pro-drilling bill through the Florida Legislature, that lack of interest should not be a surprise:
http://blogs.tampabay.com/buzz/2010/06/sen-lemieuxs-office-has-family-ties-to-bp.html

- How has BP's heavy use of toxic dispersants affected the use of skimmers?

- Senator Drill-Baby-Drill Lemieux has not credibility on this issue:

http://www.politifact.com/florida/statements/2010/jun/16/george-lemieux/white-house-refused-international-oil-spill-aid-fl/

Earlier this month, he claimed that LeMieux claims that offers of assistance from foreign governments are going ignored by President Obama and his administration. As it turned out, the United States and BP had accepted several offers of aid, but for the most part, they were offers to SELL supplies, and in determining whether to accept these offers, we had look at the availability of domestic sources and also compare pricing on the open market.

- Senator Lemieux asked the Coast Guard for an inventory of available skimmers last week. Was it provided and what did it reveal? Once the Senator put the outrage in motion, he does not seem as interested in letting us know what he has learned.

[BlueIdaho]

1. What ever happened to fact checking?

Shouldn't there be some real world penalty for elected officials who knowing lie on the floor of the House or Senate?

[Curmudgeoness]

2. Of course there should be penalties for knowingly lying on the Senate floor.

Good luck with that though, since the lying sacks of shit are the ones who would have to enact that and enforce that. Wish we had a strong free press, with investigative abilities.

[BlueIdaho]

3. True!

Americans lost big when news organizations became corporate entertainment divisions.

[ThoughtCriminal]

4. RW bloggers have multiplied the distortion

As it passed from blog to blog, it morphed from "Only 20 skimmers sent to FLORIDA coast" to "Obama only ALLOWING 20 skimmers in GULF". It gets more warped with each telling.

Just google "2000 skimmers" to see what I mean.

You just know that if more skimmers had been sent to the Florida coast , the spin would have been that Obama is diverting skimmers from "Red States" to Florida because it is a battleground state for 2010 and 2012.

[FBI_Un_Sub]

5. The Coast Guard

is pulling skimmers and booms from its Reserve and sending them to the Gulf.

[Kringle]

6. are there Idle skimmers in the Atlantic?

if so, why?