Gibbs: 'Premature' For Obama To Change Position On Offshore Drilling

The Obama administration said on Monday that it remains "premature" to rule out including additional offshore drilling as part of comprehensive energy legislation, even as Senate Democrats warn that such a provision would make the bill "dead on arrival."

White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said that the president will determine whether to stay with or abandon his call for additional drilling off various parts of the coast once he gets the findings of an investigation into the massive oil spill in the Gulf.

"The president was specific in ordering [Department of Interior] Secretary [Ken] Salazar to look at all the possible aspects of what could go wrong in this instance [and] to report back to him in that thirty day period," Gibbs said in response to a question from the Huffington Post. "This is an administration that is going to take any information we can get from that and have that dictate our decision making going forward. I think it would be premature to get too far ahead of where Secretary Salazar's investigation is."

While the White House declines to fully abandon offshore drilling in light of the current spill, others in the Senate are ramping up their opposition. On Friday, Sen. Bill Nelson (D-Fl.) said any energy bill that included such exploration in its legislative language would be "dead on arrival" in the Senate. His office went even further, speculating that larger energy bill itself was now all but impassable in the Senate.

"It's dead on arrival if it contains oil drilling," an aide said, "if it doesn't have offshore drilling then you don't have Republicans."

Over the weekend, the lone Republican who had lent his support to a soon-to-be-introduced energy bill re-affirmed his stance that offshore drilling should be a component of the final product.

"We've had problems with car design, but you don't stop driving," Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) told the Greenville (S.C.) News. "The Challenger accident was heart-breaking but we went back to space. The biggest beneficiaries of this proposal to stop drilling would be overseas oil interests, OPEC and regimes that don't like us very much."

Caught between Graham and Nelson, the White House has decided to kick the can down the road. Asked if the president's thinking on the matter had evolved as the news of oil spilling in the Gulf has grown worse, Gibbs said that the administration's priority remains "to plug the leak in the floor of the ocean, deal with the spread of the oil on the surface, to ensure that we are doing all that is possible to prevent environmental and economic damages."

"The investigation [by Salazar] is to determine what happened and to use that information going forward to dictate any changes in our policy," he added.

Comments

[liberalOrgonian]

03:10 PM on 05/04/2010

Will some one PLEASE inform the WH that McCain lost.

[liberalOrgonian]

02:50 PM on 05/04/2010

In the middle of a oil volcano, Gibb and the president talk of continued oil drilling !!! Maybe if the oil was spouting off the shore of Hawaii things would sound different out of DC.
They seen to be ignoring progressive since our vote in November.
I wish president Obama would listen to candidate Obama about renewal green safe energy. The future of our world is at state and only renewal and hydrogen fuel SHOULD be in our vision.

Is one Republican vote worth losing the progressives and environmental minded dems?

[jsgaetano]

02:43 PM on 05/04/2010

Premature? I'd say it's long overdue.

[Ihaveadream]

02:38 PM on 05/04/2010

Didn't Obama meet with this creep and his daddy, the Christian pope a couple of Sunday's ago? Why do these politicians court them and kiss Billy's proverbial ring?

[anelder]

02:34 PM on 05/04/2010

I'll only go along with this, "still thinking about it" for a little while. I'll give them time to be thoughtful and not hair trigger a decision.

But, here I go, conclusion on my part already reached.

Since none of the oil we dig out of Alaska or off shore is ever for America's use lets stop hearing that bit about how it keeps us from dependence on foreign oil.

All of this goes into the common bucket that is then distributed among all nations. I admit I don't know how it all works, considering the Argentina and CITGO situation, but I do THINK oil from our territories does not stay in our backyard.

Would love corrections on this.

[liberalOrgonian]

02:57 PM on 05/04/2010

You are absolute right about oil (safely) drilled off the USA.
It all goes to OPEC and is sold on the world market.
We do not keep a drop of petro oil for the USA.
The only way to make American energy independent is to
create non petro oil for our consumption.
The only exception:
What ends up in our backyards from the Bp-gate fiasco.

[anelder]

08:00 PM on 05/04/2010

Much thanks, need to inform some of my 'dumb' progeny. They think we shall drill and become self sufficient. I keep telling them it's the oil companies getting richer that's the only sure thing.

[StopMakingSense2]

01:32 PM on 05/04/2010

Sadly I agree with them.. No viable alternatives yet... If our life style is going to cause problems it might as well be on our shore instead of someone elses. It at least makes us think about it.....before going back to our old ways.....

[LiberalDem]

01:39 PM on 05/04/2010

In other words, it's perfectly fine to continue to treat our world as a gigantic commode? I don't think so.

Of course, if Obama changed course it would undoubtedly hurt the chances of Ken Salazar or Rahm Emanuel for a seat on BP's board, now wouldn't it?

[ChimpmasterDJ]

01:26 PM on 05/04/2010

It's premature to prematurely declare that the politically expedient decision was premature.

Although it's painfully obvious.

[GoldsteinD]

12:05 PM on 05/04/2010

at least definitely should not let BP do any more coastal drilling or any of these companies that have accidents

[lioness39]

11:48 AM on 05/04/2010

No, no, nooooo. It's not a safe way so please, Mr. President take the stance you had during your campaigns. Stay away from big oil and go with your original ideas of green and environmentally safe energy.

[JimR]

12:22 PM on 05/04/2010

Green and environmentally safe energy, yes. Any energy bill should include those. But it will have to include other sources of energy, too, including oil. Otherwise, it has zero chance of passing.

[jsgaetano]

02:55 PM on 05/04/2010

Coal and oil make more than enough money. They not only do NOT need handouts from Big Gubment, they can also cover ALL their own liability.

The pollution industry spent hundreds of millions of dollars lobbying against a "Windfall Profits Tax". Therefore, they can completely accept unlimitted liabilities for the things they do wrong.

And if they are too worried about the liability... let them take out insurance policies against it. That's how the "free market" conservatives claim to worship works, isn't it?

[hang319]

11:40 AM on 05/04/2010

Its too damn bad that politics determines the fate of my coastline, the wetlands, wildlife refuges, and sea animals. Shame on us all.

[JimR]

12:22 PM on 05/04/2010

Are you going to give up your car, then?

[underthegun1]

01:54 PM on 05/04/2010

A car is a bit different than an oil spill. These platforms are already in place, so OK, but we do not need any additional threats to the environment.

[jsgaetano]

02:56 PM on 05/04/2010

So we can't run cars unless we dump millions of gallons of oil into the ocean?

[igotzmilkk]

10:33 AM on 05/04/2010

Can Obama flip flop on a flip flop?

[jsgaetano]

02:57 PM on 05/04/2010

People need to understand, Obama's not a liberal, and never has been.

He can't flipflop when he never held those beliefs in the first place.

[Thelightbringer]

10:27 AM on 05/04/2010

check this video out... its amazing.... and if u like share cuz it only has a couple hundred views http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LtICrdq8nQ8

Viva La Revolution

[MissingAmerica]

10:23 AM on 05/04/2010

I recall "Drill, Baby, Drill" being a Bush catchphrase, never thinking that Obama would adopt it. Anyone who thinks it's a good idea, that it's a safe way to satisfy our energy needs, that it can be done without destroying a sensitive ecosystem, is misinformed. That he could make such an assertion after looking at this manmade disaster in an area devastated not all that long ago by a natural disaster proves him to be delusional.

[JimR]

12:23 PM on 05/04/2010

Our energy needs are so gluttonous, we will have to have new sources of oil for years and years to come. And that's even if we do pursue alternative sources of energy.

[ennis438]

08:01 AM on 05/04/2010

I wish Obama would wake up and realize that trying to coddle the GOP has , and will continue to be a way to commit political suicide. He still does not get it. He had 60% approval ratings 18 months ago. Not any more, and the more he tries to please theGOP, the more his ratings go down. MEMO TO WHITE HOUSE: WAKE UP!!!!!!

[TDano]

08:34 AM on 05/04/2010

18 months ago...? U mean 60% approval on what he campaigned about...not what he actually did

[boston997]

09:12 AM on 05/04/2010

How is he coddling?
If he was an effective leader, he would get things done.

[robwriter]

06:32 AM on 05/04/2010

Gibbs has since conceded that we won't have to drill after all. We can pump it directly from the Gulf of Mexico as the ocean basin fills.