With Drilling Stopped, Losses Could Multiply

Source: NY Times

Chett Chiasson, the executive director of Port Fourchon in Louisiana, has a message for President Obama — and any Americans who have applauded the administration’s decision to halt deep-water drilling in the Gulf of Mexico: You just don’t get it.

“I don’t know that this country realizes the cascading impacts of this moratorium,” said Mr. Chiasson, whose estimates that his port handles 90 percent of the traffic servicing the deep-water oil and gas industry in the gulf. “It’s going to have an impact for years to come.”

* * *

One oil industry group, the Louisiana Mid-Continent Oil and Gas Association, has estimated that each exploration and production job represents four supporting jobs in and around the region. If that is the case, thousands of jobs — and millions of dollars in wages — could be affected by the work stoppage, the group said.

With that in mind, a growing chorus of residents, business owners and local politicians in the gulf region are imploring the Obama administration to reconsider the deep-water drilling ban.

Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/05/us/05gulfecon.html?hp

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Well, that was fast. The corporate media narrative is shifting from the oil spill being President Obama's fault because he's a friend of big oil (ignoring that McCain got twice as much oil industry contributions as Obama and Republicans getting 70% of such contributions in this election season) to President Obama once again being the one to blame for high gas prices because he is overregulating the oil industry.

The question once again is the degree to which DUers once again buy into the corporate media narrative. Heck, some folks were hailing Bobby Jindal as a hero because he showed up in a marsh with a shovel even though he was the chief advocate for deregulation, and is even now quietly demanding that President Obama lift the moratorium on deep water drilling.

shut down 33 rigs operating in the gulf oil prices will rise. If your livelihood depends on the oil supply chain that's generally not so good.

we can destroy the Earth. But dammit we will have cheap gas while we do. Woo hoo!!! All the more reason to get our asses in gear to begin to escape our mid-20th century economy. Hindsight is 20-20. However, I can't help but think this: If only we'd actually listened to Jimmy Carter (and Gerald Ford, truth be told).

The options are not use oil or destroy the earth. The reality is it will take decades if not longer to move our needs away from oil. (if we ever can). Nearly everything we consume starts it's life with crude oil.

It's as dysfunctional as the Irish; whether by choice, force or necessity relying on the potato as their virtual sole source of sustenance and it's a dead end street.

The question is, Are we going to stop or turn off this street or wait until it ends?

most people like modern life to a certain extent.

that I like, but I also recognize the dysfunctional, immoral, illogic of society remaining addicted to a substance; which poses a growing threat on multiple levels to life as we know it.

The irony is if we don't get this monkey off our back, we'll lose "modern life" regardless, we can adapt our way of living to the world via sustainable, green technologies but we're rapidly running out of time in adapting the world to us.

... however, Obama is going to do a damned good job of finishing off whatever semblance of an economy exists in coastal Louisiana if these moratoriums continue for any length of time... you know, what BP ISN'T killing. Not only are the people who are in the oil industry going to be affected, but also the people who supply them and support them, and on and on through the economic chain. The fishermen haven't been overly critical of the oil and gas industry, not because of a fear of BP, but because for every one of them, there's a dozen of their relatives who work in a capacity to support that industry.

I see a bunch of complete tools here and elsewhere totally alright with harming these people, because they will share NONE of the pain.

Heckuva job, Barry!

exploration be desirable to a company involved in alternative energy as well? If we promote alternative energy companies they will need to expand and hire more workers. Would it not be better to have those workers working on something not detrimental to the environment?

That's all the gawd damn oil industry ever does, is bitch. Do they f'n care what has happened to the rest of America around the gulf? Hell no. If they did they shut their yaps and get working to clean it up.

The oil companies are a dying breed anyway. After this, if America has any courage left, the use of oil will drop dramatically and the work force will be building solar and other alternatives.

Establish a trust fund for those dependent upon the oil industry for their livelihood. BP and all other oil companies would fund it with $10 billion each. That should be a start for an "insurance policy" for the lives and environmental damages these companies destroy.

its darn time

and increase taxes on oil companies.

"Hey BP, not only do we want you to pay for all of the mess that
you (and Transocean and Halliburton) created, we want you to pay
for a bunch of half-assed decisions made by our politicians!"

Way to put an immediate "REJECT" notice on a claim ...

if some here are descended from either Norfolk or Suffolk.

... "You've got Norfolk in Chance of that happening"? :evilgrin:

and put the oil riggers to work cleaning up

THAT is the 'impact that is going to last for years to come'. God, I hate these people. They should literally be dropped into the oil spill to drown in it.

And that damage to the enviroment will cost 10X the jobs that a stoppage of deep water exploration will!!

However, the right wing media will run with this without reporting the facts!

This country is doomed if sothing like the BP disaster does not change enough minds to do what is correct from here on out.

Really, what has depending on oil done for Louisiana? Are they going to stick with this till the whole state is under four feet of sludge and then move somewhere else with their genes poisoned by hydro-carbons?

like driving at a lower speed.

That's just not fair.

The people in Louisiana deserve it.

At least that seems to be the popular opinion of so-called "progressives" here, who buy into every anti-Democrat media theme that comes around.

solar, and wind and other new sources yet discovered and stop shoving money at old worn out ways and stop destroying the planet for greed or STOCKHOLDERS - get rid of stocks and their evil ways of clogging the money supply into vapor money that is like a blood clot

are gone now because of the oil industries incompetence? Don't they matter? The fishing and tourist industries are taking a pretty big hit because of this. Oil has only themselves to blame. They brought this on themselves.

billion$ in dividends for investors, and salaries and perks for their higher ups. FUCK them, this industry is not going again until safety measures can be proven.

These people are nuts to think the deep water drilling should continue. :puke: :crazy:

a huge source of lost mileage is very common. Only when gas jumped to 4 bucks a gallon did I see driving habits change. And I suspect that is the only thing that will change them again.

Two giant SUVs in my family and one of them was just purchased. If gas had stayed at $4.50 a gallon that decision would have been different..

And as you said, 90% of the vehicles are driver only, no passenger.

year after year.

Insecure morons with no sense of "need" vs "want".

one per car and clog the roads---the highways around here got massive money for "improvements" i.e. tearing down acres and acres of trees for more lanes, instead of public transportation dollars to update Metrorail, the lifeblood of the city.

World economy is tanking. Many countries (including the US) took on too much debt and now will be putting "austerity" into effect. "Austerity" will slow already anemic growth. Shutting down deepwater drilling off the US coasts probably won't drive oil prices up, but it will cost tens of thousands of jobs. And no, you can't just take someone working in the oil industry and dump them in a solar panel plant and expect them to know what to do.

There are no good options here. This day by day oil leak is going to be like an albatross around Obama's neck if he can't figure out a way to really get out in front of it. Obama is doing about as good as he can under the circumstances. I really don't see any major politicians out there whom could do better in the situation we've found ourselves in.

It may be time for Obama to quote Clinton:

"According to the media, everything that happens which is bad is because of me, and everything which happens which is good is in spite of me."

The Goldilocks MSM seems to have only the 2 negative options for Obama: he is not doing enough, or he is doing too much.

He wants Obama to lift the moratorium now. He complains in front of camera about oil companies, but when the cameras are off, he carries their water.

"tough shit," you fucking coward.

We are simply wasting the oil on fuel for vehicles when there are other ways to move those vehicles.
Oil is in everything plastic, rubber, neoprene, nylon, tons of items are made from oil basically... The future will need that oil for uses other than fuel. We are wasting it big time by simply burning it up.
Ideally small cars would be powered by electricity generated from the sun. Park, plug in, go about your business, unplug, drive away.
Bigger vehicles would use bio-fuels and propane and such.
Everything has its limitation and it will not be cheap or immediate, but it must be done. Ironically the "conservatives" who always scream about saving our way of life do not get the "conservation" ethic. Want to preserve our way of life? Conserve all resources. It is anti-ethical to consume, consume, consume until it is all gone.
We Americans can change, we have before and can again.

GM lays off that many workers in a week and no one complains about it. We're still paying corporations tax credits to fire US workers and move their operations offshore. We eliminate jobs in this country like it's going out of style and for no greater purpose than to maximize the profits of some already obscenely wealthy corporation. But now, this is different. Now profits for rich fuckers are imperiled so we have to be all worried about losing jobs. Hypocrisy, thy name is corporatism.

issue. Oil depletion will bring this change eventually. What are they going to do then? We needed to start making that change way back in the 1970s when my religious school professor talked about the difference between finite and infinite using oil as his example. If we do not start changing now then it is going to be real hell to change after it is all gone.

either learn new skills or they migrate to a different part of the country.

In this case thousands will probably migrate because the area will be toxic for a long time.

Someone said it best, "It's like a cockroach on a pizza box, you don't just have 1 cockroach you have thousands". This rig was one raggedy rig out of 30,000. Now imagine two or more going down with the same issues as this one. The arguments that are being discussed now would be of no value.

The moratorium should continue and this event is the catalyst to widen our opportunities for other energy sources.

It's high time we rid ourselves of the true terrorists and start ramping up the green economy and energy alternatives. We continue on this road to our own peril, time to wise up and wake up. Having said that, I want some backbone behind this decision and true incentives and fast tracking....WTF? What don't we get about what has happened? Time for the masses to be educated, drill baby drill translates die baby die.

Like the oil gusher doesn't?????????

Corporate myopia. Gotta love it. :sarcasm:

But jobs lost to prudent environmental policies are a disaster.

It doesn't make sense.

Amazingly high, I've found. The lame$tream media peddles ignorance. The country and the world swallows it whole pretty much - no matter what side of any political isle or religion they're on. The ignorance is pervasive and insidious.

Is that you, Sarah?

Talk about buying into corporate media narrative

:eyes:

state a nickel.

Of course, I know Jindal is a big part of the problem, giving the foxes the run of the henhouse and trusting them with permits the foxes themselves devised.