Obama, Lord of the Rigs

[Geee]

TownHall:

Obama, Lord of the Rigs
EMAIL DAVID HARSANYI

Your moral bearings obviously have been corrupted by high concentrations of carbon dioxide.

You've gotten past that scandalous word -- "oil" -- for a moment and begun to wonder who gave the administration the authority to shut down a vital regional industry without a shred of scientific evidence or tangible safety concern.

Perhaps it's just that unshakable affection you have for BP (Exxon is also dreamy), but you wonder aloud how the administration has the power to extract $20 billion from a corporate partner -- without congressional or independent oversight or even an executive order -- and then name a political appointee to head up the fund and allow him to mete out the money any way he sees fit.

You're pretty sure, judging from the administration's track record -- from "stimulus" to the health care legislation to fiscal reform and so on -- that it would be patently absurd to trust it could divvy out billions without attaching political considerations.

Then again, you're a coal-lovin' shill. No, it doesn't matter that Barack Obama was the top recipient of BP's political action committee and individual bucks over the past 20 years. It is irrelevant that BP was a founding member of the U.S. Climate Action Partnership and lobbies for cap-and-trade schemes.

According to The Wall Street Journal, in fact, the administration's compensation fund has a little something for BP, as well. "In the end," the piece states, "one aim of the fund -- and a prime reason BP agreed to it -- will be to minimize lawsuits against the company."
To minimize lawsuits against the company is the function of Kenneth Feinberg -- with imperial experience as auto bailout "compensation czar" -- who went on to say that he "will have to make an offer -- 'You take this amount in full satisfaction of your claim, but only if you waive your right to future litigation.'"

If BP had independently begun to offer similar ultimatums to Gulf-area citizens, rest assured Interior Secretary Ken Salazar would have unleashed one of his boot-to-the-throat smackdowns as he faced off against imaginary enemies near and far.
Salazar was the one who told Congress that experts backed his plan for a blanket moratorium on further deep-water drilling, when experts had said nearly the opposite. (Salazar later apologized.) Many engineers, in fact, warn that shutting down wells and then restarting drilling -- with the migration of drill rigs, technology and human capital -- would only increase risk in the long run.
And on Tuesday, some nitrous oxide-loving federal judge in New Orleans blocked the executive overreach, saying the administration "simply cannot justify the immeasurable effect on the plaintiffs, the local economy, the Gulf region, and the critical present-day aspect of the availability of domestic energy in this country."

Nor can the administration justify the escrow fund. BP already had pledged to waive the $75 million liability cap Congress had bequeathed the company. It had written 31,000 checks totaling more than $100 million before the compensation fund was established. There were very few complaints -- other than political ones aimed at Barack Obama.

Surely The American Trial Lawyers Association could enlighten the White House to the benefit and fairness of class action suits. If the arrangement is broken or too slow, shouldn't we have some tort reformed? Is it really "mediation" when the administration and an oil company collude to decide what's best for the victims?

As many on the left have argued for years, simply because we have an emergency or threat -- the war on terror, for example -- is no excuse to abuse executive power or ignore our excellent legal system.

Or does all that change because oil is involved?

[Pepper]

Federal Gov't Halts Sand Berm Dredging

 

Nungesser Pleads With President To Allow Work To Continue

 

POSTED: 5:37 pm CDT June 22, 2010

UPDATED: 12:13 pm CDT June 23, 2010

 

NEW ORLEANS --

 

The federal government is shutting down the dredging that was being done to create protective sand berms in the Gulf of Mexico.

 

The berms are meant to protect the Louisiana coastline from oil. But the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Department has concerns about where the dredging is being done.

 

Plaquemines Parish President Billy Nungesser, who was one of the most vocal advocates of the dredging plan, has sent a letter to President Barack Obama, pleading for the work to continue.

Nungesser said the government has asked crews to move the dredging site two more miles farther off the coastline.

"Once again, our government resource agencies, which are intended to protect us, are now leaving us vulnerable to the destruction of our coastline and marshes by the impending oil," Nungesser wrote to Obama.

 

http://www.wdsu.com/news/23997498/detail.html

 

 

All Hail Obama, Lord of The Rigged Rigs

[Argyle58]

One has to wonder at what looks like attempts to make the situation worse. What started out as "Obama's Katrina" has turned into a prime example of an administration that is being run by the special interest groups and managed by bureacracies. The Jones Act is being invoked at the behest of the maritime unions, turning away much needed help in controlling and salvaging the oil, suction barges are docked because the Coast Guard cannot contact the manufacturers to find out if the barges have adequate fire extinguishers and floatation devices (forget the fact that the barges are available for inspection), and the berms that were being put into place to keep the oil from reaching the wetlands have been halted because it might stop fish from reaching the same areas (ignoring the fact that the fish face certain death if they reach the oil soaked wetlands).

 

When ideology meets reality, reality wins.....and the ideologues demonstrate the fallacies of their positions.