Obama: Drilling ban will hurt Louisiana economy, might lift moratorium "sooner"

WASHINGTON, DC, June 7 -- US President Barack Obama acknowledged during a June 4 meeting in New Orleans that a 6-month deepwater drilling moratorium would have adverse economic impacts on Louisiana. The president also said he would be willing to listen sooner if engineers and scientists develop methods and procedures that would effectively prevent another deepwater well blowout and rig explosion.

“When I made the decision to issue the moratorium, we knew that that would have an economic impact,” Obama said following a meeting with parish presidents and other government and business leaders. “But what I also knew is that there was no way that we can go about business as usual when we discovered that companies like BP, who had provided assurances that they had fail-safe backup, redundant systems, in fact, not only didn't have fail-safe systems, but had no idea what to do when those fail-safe systems broke down.”

Omaba’s remarks came as he began his third US Gulf Coast visit since a BP PLC deepwater well blew out on Apr. 20, killing 11 people, destroying the Deepwater Horizon semisubmersible drilling rig, and setting off a massive oil spill. US Interior Sec. Ken Salazar ordered immediate inspections of other deepwater rigs as he prepared an initial report for the president which he submitted on May 27. It recommended that drilling in water deeper than 500 ft stop until the accident and spill could be fully investigated and new regulations developed.

Obama also formed an independent commission to investigate US offshore resource development policies and regulation as well as the accident and spill, cochaired by former Florida Gov. Bob Graham and former US Environmental Protection Agency Administrator William K. Reilly.

http://www.ogj.com/index/article-display/7262503906/articles/oil-gas-journal/general-interest-2/government/2010/06/obama_-drilling_ban.html

I never liked plastic etc but it shows how much this country depends on the stuff.

and the increasingly dismal outlook for containing it, they would probably get more if they used giant sponges to soak it up out of the water - why drill more holes?

*sigh*

Your superiors tell you to jump, and you ask them "how high?" :eyes:

Lovin' all this change. :(

And anything that comes to mind to post is against the rules, if you defend the Democratic President.

Paid or unpaid, doesn't matter. Goodbye.

The title from the article: Obama: Drilling ban will hurt Louisiana economy

From the first paragraph: US President Barack Obama acknowledged during a June 4 meeting in New Orleans that a 6-month deepwater drilling moratorium would have adverse economic impacts on Louisiana. The president also said he would be willing to listen sooner if engineers and scientists develop methods and procedures that would effectively prevent another deepwater well blowout and rig explosion.

After reading the article, I think the title for the OP is pretty mild.

Look at this, for example:



That is awful. I have a problem with BP fulfilling its legal obligations to shareholders. Who would not? That is why they need to be taken out of command and control. And then, the President doesn't want to "hear" that they are "spending money on their shareholders and spending money on TV advertising" - fulfilling their legal obligations, in other words, to protect shareholders? And he doesn't want to "hear" that fishermen or small businesses are getting screwed? He is the President of the United States.

Or this:



This is a nightmare. Just awful. By "this" I mean the federal response, such as it is.

It comes right out of his mouth and it's "miselading", or they need to interpret it. Disgusting.

His comments in there are just hideous - really disturbing. The article puts a very bad situation in the best possible light for the President.

The people in the White House must be very determined not to jostle BP's elbows or step on their toes. Clearly they are spending most of their time on spinning this for political purposes. I know that saying that causes some here to get apoplectic, but I don't know how else to interpret what is happening. People are repeating the spin here ad nauseum, and most don't deny that it is spin, don't deny that the first priority is partisan politics. A little while ago someone posted here that they hoped the seafood being distributed from the Gulf was not contaminated because it would make the President look bad.

Many have been working feverishly to prevent people from even seeing, let alone considering, that a federalized response could even exist. When that failed, they claimed that the response already was federalized. When that failed, they moved on to "nothing can be done anyway." When that failed they started claiming that people were asking the President to throw a temper tantrum. Very strange. The really sad thing is that they are getting those talking points from the White House, which suggests that there is a lot of confusion right now in the administration and that they are reacting and on the defensive, have lost control of the message and of the situation. The President's comments about the Gulf bouncing back, and about looking over BP's shoulder, and about what he does or does not want to "hear" reinforce that impression of an administration floundering and unable to cope with the crisis.

As the appointees to the administration were announced and the administration was formed, with industry insider after industry insider being selected to oversee those industries and yet somehow supposedly turn things around from the direction the Bush administration had been taking us, the natural conclusion was that this would be yet another administration wholly captured and controlled by corporate interests.

Are they so captured by corporate interests that they cannot act in the public interest, cannot even see the public interest or imagine how to protect it? What other explanation is there? They cannot be this incompetent.

and get it over with. :crazy:

I'll have to refrain from voting for POTUS in 2012. Sad. I've never missed an election since becoming eligible to vote. Everyone has an issue that they care about above all others - mine is the environment and our oceans. I cannot vote for someone who just doesn't give a shit about either.

Just vote for someone who represents you, whoever that is. If it isn't Obama, then write someone in, something. I'm with ya Island Blue. Scary times we're in.

There isn't going to be a Louisiana economy thanks to this disaster, plus Katrina.

Disingenuous.