'Drill, Baby, Drill' Champions Silent On Gulf Oil Spill [UPDATED]

UPDATE: Palin has made her first comments on the spill, scroll down to see.

More than a week has passed since the Deepwater Horizon rig exploded 50 miles off the Louisiana coast, killing 11 workers, injuring over a dozen more, and causing a massive oil spill that may eclipse the Exxon Valdez.

Yet the two most prominent political champions of offshore drilling -- Sarah Palin and Michael Steele -- appear not to have uttered a word about the incident.

Not that either one of them has been completely silent. Sarah Palin has published four new messages on her Facebook page since the initial explosion, including a post on Thursday titled "The Straight-talking 'Hockey Dad' with a Message for Reform" and another defending Rev. Franklin Graham after he was asked not to attend a Pentagon prayer event.

Likewise, Michael Steele has issued at least six statements over the past week, including one on a new Republican National Committee web video, "Mr. Obama's Wild Ride."

And yet, if they do comment, it's hard to imagine that Palin and Steele would take the same tone that they've typically used when discussing offshore drilling.

"Drill, baby, drill! And drill now!" Steele memorably chanted at the Republican National Convention in 2008. "Do you want to put your country first? Then let's make decisions about our security based on what keeps us safe and not on what's politically correct," he told the crowd.

And during that year's vice presidential debate, Palin told Joe Biden, "You even called drilling -- safe, environmentally-friendly drilling offshore -- as raping the outer continental shelf. There -- with new technology, with tiny footprints even on land, it is safe to drill and we need to do more of that."

UPDATE: At 10:40AM ET on Friday, Sarah Palin made her first comment on the oil spill, posting the following on Twitter: "Having worked/lived thru Exxon oil spill,my family&I understand Gulf residents' fears.Our prayers r w/u.All industry efforts must b employed"

Comments

[jamejame]

12:34 PM on 06/07/2010

http://www.thepostemail.com/2010/06/06/follow-the-money-rig-gate-exposed-rig-a-boom-bay-of-rigs/

[Zen0469]

06:49 PM on 06/05/2010

Speaking of the flapping gum set and their overwhelming propensity to communicate absolutely nothing save propaganda, we might succeed in changing their mantra to Shill, Baby, Shill. At present they are certainly front row parrot stand-ins for that most outstanding corporate malfeasance artiste British Petroleum.

Neither of the two orifices-for-rent pictured above would see the change as conceptually different or distinct from their past chanting mantras.

[Debi Scott]

07:14 PM on 05/30/2010

Sara Palin is NOT silent on this issue!! She suggests to drill on land, where we should be drilling for gas and oil (with in reason). This forcing the drilling so far under water and so far under the bottom of the sea is just asking for bigger problems. What happened to drilling in Alaska?? We have to have oil to get us through the transition into cleaner energy! We DO NOT need to put all our trust into foreign countries for our oil....countries that want to kill us, as 'non believers' or whatever.

[rsrtampa]

04:29 PM on 06/01/2010

You need to be served up a big dish of truth with a side of wisdom. Sarah was referring to drilling in the gulf coast when she championed the "drill baby drill" slogan so yes she is a supporter of drilling in the ocean. I live on Tampa Bay and no we don't want oil in our back yard and I dont want to see wildlife soaked in crude just so you can drive an SUV.

[jamejame]

12:35 PM on 06/07/2010

http://www.thepostemail.com/2010/06/06/follow-the-money-rig-gate-exposed-rig-a-boom-bay-of-rigs/
Obama really stuck it to those gulf gumps and palin!

[Gema58]

10:43 PM on 06/03/2010

Are you such a follower you can't see the truth? She said in the above video she is ALL FOR OFF SHORE DRILLING. Please research and respond. So you agree that her Drill Baby Drill nonsense? Forcing the drilling so far under water and so far under sea is just asking for trouble. Welcome to the Left way of thinking. Congrats.

[foryourlove]

09:15 AM on 05/28/2010

Keith Olbermann is right..... That woman is an idiot!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[jamejame]

12:44 PM on 06/07/2010

Now Obama has shut down all new offshore drilling in the United States.
A moratorium.

Which is great for Libya and OPEC which are increasing their offshore drilling at the highest rate in history in the past month. Obama has really helped the muslim oil cartels.
It's also great for OPEC since now the US will be dependent upon their oil more than ever. This weakens the US security because it takes years for offshore development.
China is drilling off the coast of Florida, using slant drills to get US oil.

And best of all he gets to mock Palin, who he hates venomously.

[mollymac]

09:16 PM on 05/27/2010

This woman is an embarrassment to this country. She is a prevaricator extraordinaire.

[MattintheCatClub]

03:32 AM on 06/10/2010

She is not. She's not speaking evasively, she is thinking evasively. And not on purpose either.

[arctan1701]

01:13 PM on 05/27/2010

Drill, baby, drill! http://twitpic.com/1rkm7d

[122521]

06:53 PM on 05/21/2010

The slience is deafining from the Palin camp and her like minded cohorts.She politicisized an environmental issue just like her Republican big business partners are continiuing to do as Louisiana and its sister states are being inundated with a disaster that will proberly exceed that of Katrina.When will these knucleheads that support these imbiciles learn that they are pitting one faction against the other while they got a hand on your wallet.Wake up and smell the oil(on your beaches,in your shrimp and ruining your way of life that you have known for years.)Its amazing to me that Obama is being blamed when oil does what oil wants to do.

122521

[Debi Scott]

07:16 PM on 05/30/2010

Sara Palin is NOT silent on this issue!! She suggests to drill on land, where we should be drilling for gas and oil (with in reason). This forcing the drilling so far under water and so far under the bottom of the sea is just asking for bigger problems. What happened to drilling in Alaska?? We have to have oil to get us through the transition into cleaner energy! We DO NOT need to put all our trust into foreign countries for our oil....countries that want to kill us, as 'non believers' or whatever.

[hs2938]

11:34 PM on 05/31/2010

Bull, when she made that statement she was specifically talking about ocean drilling. We don't have any "American" oil companies - they're all multinational.

[deadendchief]

05:38 PM on 05/21/2010

Keep drilling. We need lots more oil.

[HJS2010]

07:08 PM on 05/09/2010

PALIN/STEELE: DO AS I SAY AND NOT AS I DO!

[pockets46]

01:27 AM on 05/08/2010

Well well well, pardon the pun, but sarah and her ilk are silent, (which is good) I got tired of hearing her yapping because they have no clothes. You can see who and what they are, and that isn't much. She is off making money off the religious folk and ignorant followers of the Tea Party. Only when it serves her bank account does she make a showing. The beehive, square glasses, and high cheek bone should be behind a cosmetic counter at Sears. She's actually quite ugly.

[mollymac]

09:17 PM on 05/27/2010

It's because she is ugly inside.

[volakis]

04:18 PM on 05/07/2010

Yeah...I would like to see Miss Drill baby Drill with her little waders on cleaning up in the Gulf with the family (like the publicity stunt she pulled after quitting the Governorship of Alaska). She could whistle her little tune while slopping up the crude oil off all those beaches....hell...bring her shotgun along too and pick off any pesky surviving sea birds or other sea creatures that manage to crawl to shore. Now that's some good, clean (sic) God fearing fun!!!

[Neolib777]

03:41 AM on 05/07/2010

Will all you teabaggers quit comparing this to a plane crash! As far as I know, the last plane crash didn't cause millions of dollars of damage to multiple states and wreck enviroment and the fishing industry in the Gulf of Mexico. Yes accidents happen but you should examine the differences in the magnitude of damage of a plane crash and this oil spill.

[Phreedemman21]

12:10 PM on 05/08/2010

The dead people in that plane crash disagree with you!

[Seventhof5]

02:30 PM on 05/10/2010

Since when can dead people disagree?

[Abo]

07:20 AM on 05/06/2010

Considering the scope of the disaster and Obama's fronting for oil interests, as he previously served health insurance-pharm interests, under the guise of passing some symbolic notion of reform, he is pretty damn quiet too.

[mollymac]

09:18 PM on 05/27/2010

Oh hush up.

[Doug Holmes]

09:27 PM on 06/01/2010

And John McCain, who received even more money?

Is it any surprise to you that they fund both sides of the fence?

[Hammerofthor]

07:25 AM on 05/05/2010

Governator wavers. Obama wobbles; but Gov. Palin is the epitome of courage & consistency.

[Trawlerman]

02:21 PM on 05/12/2010

She is the epitome of the mental midget. Has about one idea per week and it is consistently stupid. Never has the foresight to vary from initial dumb statement.

[mollymac]

09:18 PM on 05/27/2010

She is the epitome of lying and vapidity.

[MekhongKurt]

10:27 PM on 05/04/2010

Of course they're silent. Their entirely uncritical, unreasoning, blind embrace of oil has been exposed.