Judge Holds Obama Administration in Contempt

Well, why should he be any different than any of the rest of us?

The federal judge who struck down the Obama administration's moratorium on deepwater drilling after the gulf oil spill held the Interior Department in contempt Wednesday, and ordered it to pay attorneys' fees for several offshore oil companies. U.S. District Judge Martin Feldman chided the agency for its "dismissive conduct" after he overturned its decision to halt new permits for deepwater projects and suspend drilling on 33 exploratory wells after the Deepwater Horizon blast, which killed 11 workers and triggered the massive spill. After he overturned the moratorium in June, the agency issued a second nearly identical suspension.

To this day not a single new permit for offshore drilling has been issued, and gas prices continue to rise.

Still No Permits Issued for Offshore Drilling

The announcement that the drilling moratorium in the Gulf had been lifted was nothing more than kabuki theater to fool the voters:

More than two months after the Obama administration lifted its ban on drilling in the deep-water Gulf of Mexico, oil companies are still waiting for approval to drill the first new oil well there. Experts now expect the wait to continue until the second half of 2011, and perhaps into 2012.

The administration says it is simply trying to enforce new safety rules adopted in the wake of the April 20 explosion of the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig, which killed 11 workers and set off the worst offshore oil spill in U.S. history. Environmental groups say the administration is right to take its time because the Gulf disaster exposed the risks of offshore drilling.

Yes, there are risks, but there are also tremendous rewards in terms of helping America towards energy independence. However, Obama is not interested in energy independence, he's interested in keeping Americans dependent on foreign oil at ever increasing prices. All that bowing to the Saudi king wasn't just for show.

And where'd all that oil from spill go?  It's pretty much gone now.  Between the efforts of the clean-up crews and the natural oil-eating microbes and properties of seawater, the devastation that we were promised by the activists never happened.  It's clear that even the worst oil spill in Gulf history is no match for Mother Gaia's natural clean-up ability.

There are going to spills from time-to-time and some sea life will be affected.  However, the rewards far outweigh the risks and it's time to get back to drilling.

White House Returns Science to Its Rightful Place

At least that's what Obama promised, but their actions indicate that their vision of the rightful place for science is something that can be molded to meet whatever the Administration's desires demand:

The White House rewrote crucial sections of an Interior Department report to suggest an independent group of scientists and engineers supported a six-month ban on offshore oil drilling, the Interior inspector general says in a new report.

In the wee hours of the morning of May 27, a staff member to White House energy adviser Carol Browner sent two edited versions of the department report’s executive summary back to Interior. The language had been changed to insinuate the seven-member panel of outside experts – who reviewed a draft of various safety recommendations – endorsed the moratorium, according to the IG report obtained by POLITICO.

“The White House edit of the original DOI draft executive summary led to the implication that the moratorium recommendation had been peer-reviewed by the experts,” the IG report states, without judgment on whether the change was an intentional attempt to mislead the public.

The six-month ban on offshore drilling installed in the wake of the Gulf of Mexico oil spill became a major political issue over the summer, as Gulf State lawmakers and industry groups charged the White House with unfairly threatening thousands of jobs. House Republicans have said they plan on investigating the circumstances surrounding the moratorium when they take power next year.

There was never a good scientific reason to ban drilling in the Gulf because of problems at one well. All they accomplished was the end of thousands of jobs in the Gulf region and the repositioning of a number of drilling rigs to other parts of the world. Those rigs won't be coming back anytime soon...and neither will those jobs.

Oh, and it looks like the fishing closures that occurred when it was feared that fisherman would be pulling in contaminated critters has resulted in a tripling of fish stocks in the area.  The devastation that was forecast for the area because of oil and dispersants just didn't happen.

Deepwater Drilling Moratorium Ended

Big deal:

Interior Secretary Ken Salazar announced Tuesday afternoon that deepwater oil and gas drilling could resume. Salazar said in a statement that the drilling could go on with some conditions, including "compliance with all existing rules and requirements, including those that recently went into effect, and that members of industry demonstrate the availability of adequate blowout containment resources."

This decision had nothing to do with drilling safety and everything to do with the midterm elections that come up in three weeks. In fact, there probably won't be much of any new drilling because of this change since many of the rigs that would have been drilling all along have been moved to other parts of the world. The ones that remain are under such tight regulation it may not be worthwhile for the companies to restart them.

As it turns out the moratorium was completely unnecessary and the oil spill, as big as it was, did little of the damage the administration had forecast.  As it turns out Mother Nature is pretty good at cleaning up messes like this.

San Fran Nan Now as Popular as BP

She hasn't fouled the Gulf of Mexico, but she has fouled America's political waters:

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's negative ratings have hit an all-time high in the new Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll. A full 50 percent of those surveyed have a somewhat or very negative impression of Pelosi, while just 22 percent have a somewhat or very positive impression of her.

Pelosi's negative rating is precisely the same as oil giant BP, which has taken a public relations beating in the aftermath of the Gulf oil spill. 

It'll be a lot easier to clean up the mess BP made than the mess Pelosi has made.

Texas Sues Obama Over Offshore Drilling Ban

The rapid break-up of the Gulf Oil Spill should have been a sign to the Obama administration that continuing the offshore drilling ban was a bad idea.  However, they preferred not to learn anything from the experience, so Texas is acting on their own to remedy the situation:

The Texas attorney general sued the Obama administration Wendesday over its new deep-water offshore drilling moratorium, claiming it is unjustified and federal officials did not contact the state before issuing the ban.

Attorney General Greg Abbott filed the 18-page suit in federal court in Houston against Department of the Interior Secretary Ken Salazar. The ban halted the approval of any new permits for deep-water projects and shut down drilling at 33 exploratory ocean wells in the wake of the BP spill in the Gulf of Mexico.

In his lawsuit, Abbott called the ban "an unjustified, arbitrary and capricious policy that will inflict harm upon coastal communities."

Challenges to Obama will start coming fast and furious. The same day Texas filed their suit Florida announced plans for a new immigration law that promises to be tougher than Arizona's law. This could make for some interesting times for Obama, because if this law passes you have to wonder if he'll be willing to sue Florida like he did Arizona. Arizona was not going to vote for him in 2012 no matter what, but he really needs to win Florida to win another term in office. Is he willing to take on a state he needs so badly? We'll see.

Energy Headline of the Day

From Drudge:

BP may drill again in oil spill reservoir...

Of course they will. If there's anything the last several months have shown us is there's a heckuva lot of oil down there and somebody should go get it.

75% of Gulf Oil Spill is Gone

Mother Gaia is on the job:

The government is expected to announce on Wednesday that three-quarters of the oil from the Deepwater Horizon leak has already evaporated, dispersed, been captured or otherwise eliminated — and that much of the rest is so diluted that it does not seem to pose much additional risk of harm.

The end of the world will have to wait for another day.

Now somebody explain why the drilling moratorium is still in place until the end of November?

The Gulf Recovery is Coming Along Nicely

Good news from Louisiana:

Louisiana has reopened key commercial fishing areas that were closed as a result of the catastrophic BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, according to a statement released by Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal.
The news will be taken very well by local fishermen who have been sidelined as a result of the spill.

The Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries opened up specific areas to allow the fishing of shrimp and finfish east of the Mississippi in New Orleans, St. Tammany, St. Bernard and Plaquemines parishes yesterday the statement read.

I guess it won't be 50 years until the Gulf recovers after all.

The Great Gulf Exaggeration

Once again the environwackos have tried to scare us into making draconian changes in our national energy policy, and Democrat politicians prayed for enough damage to justify cap-and-trade:

President Obama has called the BP oil spill "the worst environmental disaster America has ever faced," and so has just about everyone else. Green groups are sounding alarms about the "Catastrophe Along the Gulf Coast," while CBS, Fox and MSNBC slap "Disaster in the Gulf" chryons on all their spill-related news. Even BP fall guy Tony Hayward, after some early happy talk, admitted the spill was an "environmental catastrophe." The obnoxious anti-environmentalist Rush Limbaugh has been a rare voice arguing that the spill — he calls it "the leak" — is anything less than an ecological calamity, scoffing at the avalanche of end-is-nigh eco-hype.

Well, Rush has a point. The Deepwater explosion was an awful tragedy for the 11 workers who died on the rig, and it's no leak; it's the biggest oil spill in U.S. history. It's also inflicting serious economic and psychological damage on coastal communities that depend on tourism, fishing and drilling. But so far — while it's important to acknowledge that the long-term potential danger is simply unknowable for an underwater event that took place just three months ago — it does not seem to be inflicting severe environmental damage. "The impacts have been much, much less than everyone feared," says geochemist Jacqueline Michel, a federal contractor who is coordinating shoreline assessments in Louisiana.

Yes, the spill killed birds — but so far, less than 1% of the birds killed by the Exxon Valdez. Yes, we've heard horror stories about oiled dolphins — but, so far, wildlife response teams have collected only three visibly oiled carcasses of any mammals. Yes, the spill prompted harsh restrictions on fishing and shrimping, but so far, the region's fish and shrimp have tested clean, and the restrictions are gradually being lifted. And, yes, scientists have warned that the oil could accelerate the destruction of Louisiana's disintegrating coastal marshes — a real slow-motion ecological calamity — but, so far, shorelines assessment teams have only found about 350 acres of oiled marshes, when Louisiana was already losing about 15,000 acres of wetlands every year.

Yesterday on his show Rush played an interview with an environwacko who promised that it would take 50 years to clean up the damage from the Gulf Oil Spill. Three months later the clean-up crews are having trouble finding any oil.

 Another interview played on Rush's show from an expert in cleaning up oil suggested that the Gulf had ramped up its own natural defenses as the oil gushed and once the flow stopped the bacteria and other critters that eat and dissolve that stuff were in high gear and are rapidly degrading what's left of the slick.

 The Chicken Little crowd just can't get it right.

Can't Find the Oil Spill? No Problem, More Oil is On the Way

I wonder who was driving the boat?

Fox News is being told by the Homeland Security director for Jefferson Parish, La., that a new oil leak has sprung up in the Gulf of Mexico after a boat struck an oil well in the early morning hours on Tuesday.

A tugboat or other workboat collided with the well near Bayou St. Dennis, La., shearing off its valve structure and releasing pressurized natural gas and light oil, DHS official Deano Bonano told Fox News.

Cleanup workers are currently booming off the area and the scene at sea has been taken over by federal agents. The U.S. Coast Guard, Jefferson Parish police and fire officials, as well as Vessels of Opportunity boats have all been dispatched to the scene.

Federal officials do not know who owns the well, but a contractor who handles wild wells is also on the way, Bonano said.

There's hope for cap-and-trade yet.

Oil Spill Quote of the Day

From Chuck Dizzle:

Want to make a lib's head explode? Tell them every barrel of oil spilled into the gulf is 100% organic.

Can it be organic and still be evil?

BP Gets an American Boss

I guess the American contracts are pretty important to BP, but don't feel bad for former CEO Tony Hayward:

BP's embattled Chief Executive Officer Tony Hayward will be replaced by American Robert Dudley on Oct. 1, the company said Tuesday, as it reported a record quarterly loss and set aside $32.2 billion to cover the costs of the devastating Gulf of Mexico oil spill.

BP said the decision to replace Hayward, 53, with the company's first ever non-British CEO was made by mutual agreement. In a mark of faith in its outgoing leader, BP said it planned to recommend him for a non-executive board position at its Russian joint venture and will pay him $1.6 million, a year's salary, in lieu of notice.

Britain's The Sun newspaper reported Tuesday Hayward will also receive a massive payout worth more than $20 million.

Hayward's problem was his tone-deafness with the press, not his ability as CEO. He's made BP a lot of money and will continue to do so in the Russian deal. Retaining him in a new capacity shows his value to the company and reassures the stockholders that his talents won't be just thrown away.

Though the environmentalists want him tossed out on his ear as a symbolic gesture, big business doesn't work that way.

Mother Gaia is Sucking Up the Oil

This is not going to help Obama get cap-and-trade passed (h/t Say Anything):

For 86 days, oil spewed into the Gulf of Mexico from BP’s damaged well, dumping some 200 million gallons of crude into sensitive ecosystems. BP and the federal government have amassed an army to clean the oil up, but there’s one problem — they’re having trouble finding it.

At its peak last month, the oil slick was the size of Kansas, but it has been rapidly shrinking, now down to the size of New Hampshire.

Today, ABC News surveyed a marsh area and found none, and even on a flight out to the rig site Sunday with the Coast Guard, there was no oil to be seen.

“That oil is somewhere. It didn’t just disappear,” said Plaquemines Parish President Billy Nungesser. …

Still, it doesn’t mean that all the oil that gushed for weeks is gone. Thousands of small oil patches remain below the surface, but experts say an astonishing amount has disappeared, reabsorbed into the environment.

“[It's] mother nature doing her job,” said Ed Overton, a professor of environmental studies at Louisiana State University.

Fortunately there will still be enough oily pelicans for the photo ops.

Political Quote of the Day

From Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal, talking about the idiotic decisions that have come out of Washington regarding the Gulf Oil Spill:

They don't understand in Washington, DC. They literally said to us, the administration said to us, 'The rigs will just come back.' The rigs will just comeback, like you could turn off and on a switch. They don't understand, once these rigs go they're gone for years. In Louisiana alone, we'll lose 20,000 jobs. Across the Gulf Coast tens of thousands of additional jobs. That's why today is so important.

We need our voices to be heard. We need them to understand if they hear nothing
else from us today, they need to hear us say this: let us go back to work. We don't
want a BP check. We don't want an unemployment check. We want to go back to work
powering the American economy.

They really don't understand. Most come from academia where your theories always work because they're never tested in real life situations.

Joe the Plumber Stops the Oil Leak

Not THAT Joe the Plumber, but a different plumber named Joe (from Michael Barone):

As amazing as it may seem, there’s considerable evidence that Joe Caldert, a plumber from St. Francis, Kan., submitted the design which was the basis for BP’s at least temporarily successful effort to stop the flow of oil.

At the very least, Caldert’s proposal, which he relayed through a University of California at Berkeley professor, closely resembles the technique BP is using. This is an interesting example of how knowledge widely distributed through society can be brought to bear on difficult problems—and how credentialed experts inside or outside government and the academy do not have a monopoly on useful knowledge.

Next time I need some plumbing done, or need a socialist called out in front of the TV camera's, I'm looking for a guy named Joe.

Bonus Political Cartoon of the Day

From Michael Ramirez:

85 Days

After 85 days oil has stopped pouring into the Gulf of Mexico:

A tightly fitted cap was successfully keeping oil from gushing into the Gulf of Mexico for the first time in three months, BP said Thursday. The victory — long awaited by weary residents along the coast — is the most significant milestone yet in BP's effort to control one of the worst environmental disasters in U.S. history.

The news elicited joy mixed with skepticism from wary Gulf Coast residents following months of false starts, setbacks and failed attempts. Alabama Gov. Bob Riley's face lit up when he heard the oil flow had stopped.

"That's great. I think a lot of prayers were answered today," said Riley.

The stoppage came 85 days, 16 hours and 25 minutes after the first report April 20 of an explosion on the BP-leased Deepwater Horizon oil rig that killed 11 workers and triggered the spill....

Now begins a waiting period to see if the cap can hold the oil without blowing a new leak in the well. Engineers will monitor pressure readings incrementally for up to 48 hours before reopening the cap while they decide what to do.

It's far from over for Gulf residents as oil is expected to continue coming ashore for months.  And there's still a chance that this cap could result in a pressure increase that could blow out a leak elsewhere in the ocean floor.  It's cross your fingers time.

U.S. Doesn't Change Its Evil Oil Ways, Environmentalists Hardest Hit

Looks like environmental disasters occurring during Democrat presidencies just don't get the attention the environmentalists want:

For environmentalists, the BP oil spill may be disproving the maxim that great tragedies produce great change.

Traditionally, American environmentalism wins its biggest victories after some important piece of American environment is poisoned, exterminated or set on fire. An oil spill and a burning river in 1969 led to new anti-pollution laws in the 1970s. The Exxon Valdez disaster helped create an Earth Day revival in 1990 and sparked a landmark clean-air law.

But this year, the worst oil spill in U.S. history -- and, before that, the worst coal-mining disaster in 40 years -- haven't put the same kind of drive into the debate over climate change and fossil-fuel energy.

The Senate is still gridlocked. Opinion polls haven't budged much. Gasoline demand is going up, not down.

Environmentalists say they're trying to turn public outrage over oil-smeared pelicans into action against more abstract things, such as oil dependence and climate change. But historians say they're facing a political moment deadened by a bad economy, suspicious politics and lingering doubts after a scandal over climate scientists' e-mails.

The difference between now and the awakenings that followed past disasters is as stark as "on versus off," said Anthony Leiserowitz, a researcher at Yale University who tracks public opinion on climate change.

"People's outrage is focused on BP," Leiserowitz said. The spill "hasn't been automatically connected to some sense that there's something more fundamental wrong with our relationship with the natural world," he said.

The story of 2010 is not that nothing happened after the BP spill, or after the coal-mine explosion that killed 29 in West Virginia on April 5. It's that much of the reaction has focused on preventing accidents -- on tighter scrutiny of rigs and mines -- rather than broader changes in the use of oil and coal.

Right now America wants more oil exploration, not less. We know it can be done safely because until the current problem there were very few major oil spills involving offshore rigs (most major spills have involved tankers transporting oil from other parts of the world).

Americans are not focused on BP - they're focused on BO, the guy who can't seem to fix anything, whether it be the oil leak, the leaking border, or the leaking economy.  We don't have time for environmental nonsense.

The Oil Business is Sailing Away

Obama's six month moratorium is not about saving our beaches, it's about killing the offshore oil industry in U.S. waters.  The first of the rigs to leave the area is now headed to Egypt:

And the Ocean Endeavor's exodus probably won't be the last, according to oil industry officials and Gulf Coast leaders who warn that other companies eager to find work for the now-idled rigs are considering moving them outside the U.S.

Devon Energy Corp. had been leasing the Endeavor to drill in the same region of the Gulf as BP's leaking Macondo well, which has been gushing crude since a lethal blowout April 20.

But Diamond announced Friday it will lease the rig through June 30, 2011, to Cairo-based Burullus Gas Co., which plans to send the Endeavor to Egyptian waters immediately.

Larry Dickerson, CEO of Houston-based Diamond, signaled that other of his company's rigs could be relocated, too.

The long-term impact to our energy security and costs will be dramatic.