Is there nothing that Obama can’t do?
In sharp contrast to Dutch preparedness before the fact and the Dutch instinct to dive into action once an emergency becomes apparent, witness the American reaction to the Dutch offer of help. The U.S. government responded with “Thanks but no thanks,” remarked Visser, despite BP’s desire to bring in the Dutch equipment and despite the no-lose nature of the Dutch offer –the Dutch government offered the use of its equipment at no charge. Even after the U.S. refused, the Dutch kept their vessels on standby, hoping the Americans would come round. By May 5, the U.S. had not come round. To the contrary, the U.S. had also turned down offers of help from 12 other governments, most of them with superior expertise and equipment –unlike the U.S., Europe has robust fleets of Oil Spill Response Vessels that sail circles around their make-shift U.S. counterparts.
Why does neither the U.S. government nor U.S. energy companies have on hand the cleanup technology available in Europe? Ironically, the superior European technology runs afoul of U.S. environmental rules. The voracious Dutch vessels, for example, continuously suck up vast quantities of oily water, extract most of the oil and then spit overboard vast quantities of nearly oil-free water. Nearly oil-free isn’t good enough for the U.S. regulators, who have a standard of 15 parts per million — if water isn’t at least 99.9985% pure, it may not be returned to the Gulf of Mexico.
An excellent piece by Lawrence Solomon.
h/t Don B.
Not one mention of the Jones Act (Merchant Marine Act of 1920) in the article, which indicates to me not much research by the FP.
The Act needs to be repealed.
Forgive me,
It seems as though the US government is run by highly educated idiots.
The parameters seem to be that as long as you have walked in the halls of Harvard, you know and that is that. Any real life knowledge is futile.
Again, the Jones Act needs to be repealed or at least waved for a period of time to allow foreign vessels to work in US waters.
So far the Ogabe Administration has refused to do so, unlike the Bush Administration which did in the aftermath of Katrina.
My own view is that Obama doesn’t care about the oil spill; he cannot ‘see’ it as real. I’ll keep ranting on this, but Obama is a severely pathological individual; he has no capacity to relate to anything (and I mean ‘thing’ or ‘event’) or anyone that he cannot directly manipulate and control.
The oil spill is the environment; he can’t control it. Therefore, for him, it literally does not exist. He can’t ‘see’ to clean it up because ‘it’ (the environment) doesn’t exist. He CAN override the law, ignore due process, and make BP pay up 20 billion for a ‘slush fund’ run by Obama. THAT is something that he controls. But the sea, the fish, the people there…don’t exist for Obama.
A genuine leader (and someone reasonably psychologically healthy) would have instantly dealt with the Jones Act, the oil-to-water ratio, the sand dredges – everything – and called in assistance to clean it up. Obama’s reaction is not merely to pretend the oil doesn’t exist, for to him, it ACTUALLY doesn’t exist..but to interact in the only way he can: manipulate people. In this case, BP.
Note that Obama is quite capable of overriding the law, which he did by extorting that money from BP..so..he could overturn the Jones and oil acts as well.
On the contrary, Obastard does care about the oil spill. He is using this tragedy as a means of getting approval for his version of the Green Energy Act. The longer this mess goes on, the more popular his initiative will be with the “Little People”.
My take on the Jones Act is that it doesn’t restrict foreign vessels as long as they have US Crews and comply with all the regulations outlined in the legislation.
The rule is “Never waste a crisis” but first make sure it is suitably large so the panic stricken fools can be stampeded and thereby trample those still using their brains.
The same EPA that says that spilled cow’s milk, which contains fat, which they deem is “oil” must be treated with the same care and expense of a real “oil” spill.
The stupidity of zealous politicians, over-zealous bureaucrats and a compliant, ignorant media.
OMG. Kevin Costners centrifuge doesnt make that cut.
It took 57 days for Obama to do something about the oil spill but only 2 days for him to do something about McCrystal words in a news paper article.
He gave a cold emotionless boring address to the nation about the oil spill but was so infuriated by a newspaper article that he fired McCrystal before the ink was even dry in the Rollingstone magazine article as if this was the biggest emergency the nation faces.
It shows what is a priority to Obama; HIMSELF.
…Although I still think he is using the oil spill to push his socialist agenda…»no crisis should go to waste»…
atric – Obama doesn’t care about cleaning up the oil; doesn’t care about the damage to the shoreline or oceans or to fisheries or to wildlife.
His reaction to the oil spill is not to acknowledge its material and population reality but its political reality. He thinks he can use it to set up ‘cap and trade’; i.e., to vilify oil as energy which is actually a cover for…more taxes, more money to the statist central government.
His voting base is not the people of the Gulf coast who are affected by the reality of that spill; his voting base are the latte left of the north and California…who are desperate for more tax money.
atric
Section 27, also known as the Jones Act, deals with cabotage (i.e., coastal shipping) and requires that all goods transported by water between U.S. ports be carried in U.S.-flag ships, constructed in the United States, owned by U.S. citizens, and crewed by U.S. citizens and U.S. permanent residents.
from wiki.
It is now abundantly clear that Obama is not just a socialist president intent on turning America into a socialist country. He intends to destroy the country. Crisis after crisis, and his response is to pour gasoline on the fire. He is racking up crushing debts, killing the energy industry without reason, actively working to ensure that the border remains unprotected, intends to give citizenship to millions of Mexicans (who will reward him with continued Democratic support), and is enacting the most extreme socialist policies in every aspect of people’s lives. He is creating an atmosphere in the court system and the American culture whereby people will eventually revolt, leading either to bloodshed or the breakup of the country. Impeachment MUST begin in December of 2010.
Sgt Lajaune beat me to voicing Obama’s real agenda and ET has some great background analysis of the current POTUS.
Yes Fred, we have let the village idiots take too much control.
The Jones Act is not of can be waived/ignored in this case. The US regularly permits foreign military vessels in US Ports. The Refusal of foreign assistance is from the top, the Obamunist/Ayers Complex.
The latest excuse for refusing assistance is that the vastly efficient European slick-lickers and Costner’s device only remove 99% of the oil and release contaminated water……..
Better to have 100% of the spill than remove 99% of it.
Costner’s centrifuge can process 154,000 barrels of contaminated water per day…..apparently 34 are on order but they will likely suffer the same fate as the guy with the containment boom….wrong politics–not union made-or lack of kick-backs to the DNC.
You know, this bit about the EPA regs isn’t about Obama. That bit of insanity was in place before Barry got there.
The EPA has -never- been about the environment. It has -always- been about increasing the power of the federal government by the back door, doing an end-run around the Constitution of the USA.
Where the failure of the current regime becomes apparent is that they didn’t suspend the regulation. Barry can suspend EPA -regulations- by presidential order, its part of his Constitutional powers.
What he did instead was extort $20 billion bucks from BP, which is -not- part of his Constitutional powers. It isn’t about the environment, its about seizing more power. Again and again and again we see this pattern.
People in the Gulf region should get used to oil on the beach, because the government is not going to clean it up, and furthermore they aren’t going to let BP clean it up either. There will always be some regulation that prevents a key piece of equipment or a key technique. Or in the case of the Louisiana berm fiasco the EPA will join up with another Federal department to gang-bang state efforts at doing something.
They-aren’t-going-to-clean-it-up.
All that remains to be seen is what all of y’all in America are going to do about it. We here in Canada have done NOTHING, and as a result we pretty much live in a police state where nobles get protection and commoners get f- all except tax hikes.
I suggest you not follow our example. Its crap.
If the one was serious about cleaning up the oil in the Gulf of Mexico he could have turned loose the czar of the EPA, enforcing the so-called “endangerment finding” of the Clean Air Act. The Act superceeds the Constitution, congress, the people of the coast, the military, the Jones Act, you name it. But that would be for the good and the Crisis would have been averted with all available international expertise and aid ……… definitely not part of the Plan. And of course….what ET said.
I have to appologize in advance for this, but we can explain US reluctance for help, in a single word…
Arrogance.
Sadly, we’re watching the destruction of the Gulf, not because of a lack of technology but because of a stubborn belief that it’s not alright to admit you don’t have the answers to all the world’s problems.
RFC-Acknowledged. I stand corrected.
However in this case, the vessels are not carrying goods between US ports. They are merely assisting in cleaning up an environmental tragedy.
How arrogant can one get to not accept assistance from well-meaning friends?
Ivory settles for 99.44% pure.
Obama doesn’t want to solve this oil spill. If he let’s it continue, public support for offshore drilling will erode, he’ll be able to add more environmental regulations. He’ll be able to extort ever-growing amounts of damages from BP to give away to wasters and idlers.
Ivory settles for 99.44% pure.
Obama doesn’t want to solve this oil spill. If he let’s it continue, public support for offshore drilling will erode, he’ll be able to add more environmental regulations. He’ll be able to extort ever-growing amounts of damages from BP to give away to wasters and idlers.
Obama has few talents and direct action is not one of them. I had a feeling he would exploit this disaster for his crappy “green” bill and voila!
This little skimmer has the untested potential to skim about what they have skimmed todate…… in a day.
http://hotair.com/archives/2010/06/27/day-68-why-isnt-the-a-whale-in-the-gulf-yet/
How does it go?– Never miss an opportunity to leverage a crisis? I don’t think it was arrogance at all. Obama refused help because he thought he could turn it into political capital.
It is really embarrassing to listen to our idiot regulators. The fact that the skimmers don’t remove every molecule of oil is silly. What little oil that is returned to the sea pales to the amount removed. Bacteria will rapidly eat the tiny amount remaining. Bottom line, we have stupid people making important decisions that affect millions. I’ll bet the people along the gulf coast would gladly make that oil trade.
The oil spill is Obama’s gateway to Nationalizing oil as he’s done other Industry. The press is next.
Why Americans are blind to this is a mystery to me.
In Alberta we seen it coming a mile away. From our than resident self declared World citizen Trudeau.
Another Marxist with an Ego, who sniffed Castro’s butt like Obama as well.
Look at how it worked out for him!!
Incompetence joined to hubris, outs the fascists every time.
JMO
IMHO, this is not mere incompetence. The current administration in the WH intends to see the USA go down. The Gulf spill is perfect for their agenda. IF they didn’t start it then they certainly intend to keep it going, indefinitely if need be. There is no other explanation for the blatant disregard for the massive destruction happening directly under their noses.