The White House has apparently realized that they have something of a perception problem when it comes to President Obama and the federal government's response to the BP oil catastrophe in the Gulf of Mexico. So this week will be devoted to attempting to redeem Obama's image as being "in charge" of what is going on down there. Today, the president flew down to the Gulf, where he will be visiting all the states that have so far been affected. He'll spend the night in the region, then fly back to Washington to give his first-ever Oval Office address to the nation on primetime television. Wednesday, the bigwigs of BP will come to the White House for a meeting.
All this activity is welcome, because up until now the White House has seemed a bit adrift in their response to the tragedy. They may have been on top of the entire situation from Day One, as they claim, but it wasn't readily apparent to the public, meaning they either were actually adrift, or they have been having a communication and press relations problem. This must be frustrating to the White House, since the press has been somewhat lacking in their own response and coverage. Case in point, after obsessing for a solid week that the president needed to "show some rage" over the situation, the press immediately pounced when Obama did show a bit of annoyance, immediately proclaiming that he was "too angry," or the press just giggled in true Beavis and Butthead fashion: "heh heh heh... the president said ass... heh heh."
But the biggest factor in this disaster, and in the response, is that it is happening very slowly. It's not like a tornado or earthquake or flash flood, in other words. What this means is that, while the president has been criticized for the apparent slowness of his response, there is plenty of time to turn that perception around.
The size and scale of this disaster is going to be immense. It already is immense, out in the Gulf. But it is not -- yet -- an immense disaster on the land. Before anyone misinterprets that, please allow me to clarify. The places where oil has come ashore are a disaster -- I am in no way trying to minimize this at all. But from watching the nightly maps of the Gulf and the coastal areas actually inundated with oil, what is remarkable is how lucky the region has been so far, in that water and wind have not spread the oil even further than the areas already affected. Compare the size of the oil spill out in the water to the actual sections of coastline hit so far, and you can easily see that this could be far, far worse by now than it already is.
This could happen at any time. There's a lot of oil out there, and all it would take would be a change in the weather to plaster the entire coastline (instead of just a few barrier islands here and there) with a sheen of oil, from the entire coast of Florida all the way to Texas. And, a fact not many have noted, hurricane season just began. One hurricane stirring things up in the Gulf could multiply this disaster's size a hundredfold from anything we've seen yet.
This is a valid worry, because there will be a lot of oil out there for a long time to come. The well likely won't be plugged until one of the relief wells is completed, which won't happen until (at the earliest) the end of July. Meaning the disaster is replenishing itself at the source. Even after the well is capped, the oil will still be in an enormous stretch of water, and depending on tide and currents, could start washing up on beaches hundreds and hundreds of miles away from anything we've seen yet.
What I am trying to say is: the worst is most likely yet to come. Especially for the shoreline, and the people who live there and make their livings there. A huge amount of the region's economic activity comes from tourism. And the tourists are staying away. If the area affected on the coast gets bigger, the tourist trade will cease entirely. After all, who wants to go to a beach covered in oil?
This is why it is not too late for President Obama to take the reins of this whole operation, which he has obviously planned to do this week. Last Friday, I urged him to do so:
Last week, of course, the media was obsessing over how Obama spoke about the Gulf. Obama obliged them a bit with his "whose ass to kick" statement midweek. But the real problem is not Obama's level of emotion, it's the actual content of what he's saying. And that content needs to get a whole lot stronger very quickly, or else he's going to be seen as standing on the sidelines of the entire problem.
So this week, rather than discrete talking points, I present a speech I'd like to see Obama give. Pre-empt some silly summer television season for a 20-minute speech from the Oval Office, and speak directly to the nation. If Obama said even a tiny portion of the following, it would do him some real good at this point.
But whatever he says, he simply has got to break out of his reactive passivity, and in some way or another grasp the reins of the situation. No, he can't personally swim down and plug the leak, but he sure could be doing a lot of other things at this point, to float ideas on what to do next.
I went on to suggest a few ideas for what to do, including getting FEMA down there to start issuing checks to people whose claims BP wasn't paying fast enough. The White House announced yesterday that they're going to force BP into setting up an escrow account (which better be at least ten billion dollars) and turn over the claims processing to a third-party entity. This may be an even more elegant solution to the problem, I have to admit.
But the key sticking point is that BP is not legally obligated to set up such an escrow fund. Passing a law in Congress forcing them to do so would be blatantly unconstitutional, and would take too long in any case.
This is where Obama can shine. Because he has no legal leverage, he must use the leverage of public opinion instead. He needs to announce tomorrow night that he will be bringing to the meeting with BP executives a piece of paper for them to sign. This will be a legally-binding promise to set up such an escrow account (again, no mention of the size of this account has been made by the White House, but it better be at least ten billion dollars, to show everyone that BP is serious), and a legally-binding promise for them to make good on paying the damages to people's lives caused by their oil well blowing up. Whether it's an individual who has been laid off or a business that is going to lose the three-month "season" that they rely on to pay their bills all year long, BP needs to make sure everyone is compensated fully.
Obama, by forcing them to do so on a very public stage, is going to show leadership on the issue that will be remembered. By handing the claims processing off to a third party, Obama will be seen as providing fairness for everyone affected. BP really doesn't have a choice, here. If they refuse to sign, then we're going to see some real outrage out there -- and not just in the area directly affected.
Exxon successfully fought in the arena of the courts, and wound up paying far less than it could have (or should have) in the Valdez spill. This was mostly because they had the money for lawyers to stretch the proceedings out for decades (a final judgment in the case just happened, for instance). By that time, the American public wasn't paying any attention to Alaskan fisherman anymore, and there was no public outcry or boycott of Exxon stations.
Obama has to make sure BP doesn't have this route open to them. And the way to do it is to get them to sign legally-binding promises now -- while America's attention is focused on BP, the spill, and the cleanup. If BP refused to do so, not a lot of people are going to be filling up at their gas stations -- that's my guess, anyway.
If Obama can manage to force this agreement on BP now, and if the escrow fund is quickly set up and the third party quickly begins dispersing checks to affected people, then there will be a lot of people on the Gulf Coast whose lives can be made better by direct presidential intervention. Which is another way of saying leadership.
Obama was slow to react to the disaster. Luckily for him, the disaster itself is happening in slow motion as well. And we have not yet seen the true size and scope of how the oil is going to affect the Gulf Coast. The worst is yet to come. But, to be cynical for a moment, by that time the American media may have deemed the story to be "old news" and may be covering other things. The media has been devoting a lot of time and attention to the spill so far (in a haphazard sort of way), so much so that it has all but dominated the news for about the past three weeks, if not longer. But the American attention span is notoriously short, and pretty soon the public is going to get tired of hearing about oil in the Gulf. "Another bird covered in brown goop, ho hum, let's see what's on Comedy Central," they'll say, and the news media will move on to fresher disasters to occupy their time.
That is when it would be too late for the White House to show leadership on the issue. While many have criticized Obama and his team for not being more proactive for the past two months, that period may be forgiven (if not entirely forgotten) by the people in the Gulf region -- if, by the time the coastline really gets hit hard (in hundred-mile long stretches), there is a visible army of cleanup workers and a visible navy of boats offshore battling it, and Obama is credited with kicking BP's ass to make it happen. If people are regularly and reliably getting paid by the escrow fund, it will mitigate the helplessness and frustration so many in the region are feeling now.
So, while it may be a little bit late, it is definitely not too late for Obama to lead. He can still redeem himself and his image. What he does and says this week may prove to be the difference in how he is thought of in the future when the subject of the oil spill is remembered. Because most Americans don't play the media game of "Obama needs to be angry / Obama's too angry" -- what most Americans care about (especially those directly affected) is actual results. And while this week is obviously chock full of photo ops for the president, what is going to matter most in later weeks is not how Obama looks or seems this week, but what he manages to get done.
Chris Weigant blogs at: 
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Chris,
I agree that the consistency in the polls as demonstrated in your Obama Poll Watch - the gold standard of poll analysis, I should hasten to add - is stunning.
More importantly and infinitely reassuring, it provides some proof that the opinion commonly voiced here at HP is NOT representative of how opinion breaks down amongst the wider electorate. Call me a cockeyed optimist.
LEAVE MY PRESIDENT ALONE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I feel sorry for our president. Nothing, and I repeat, nothing he can do will be enough. He will be criticized and hated with all their might. They won't look for any other reason but to despise a black man in the office of the president. They are despicable. Bush created two wars, and nothing was said. Carville stands and sends out demands and complaints, but I've yet to see him in the clean up suits helping clean up the shorelines. This country has gone mad with hate, and sometimes I wonder if God isn't looking upon us all with sadness.
Our president is doing all that is within his power to resolve this oil spill. Despite the fact that the previous administration's diregard for failing to regulate the oil industry. We all saw Congressman Barton apologize to BP, failing to publicly announce his 1.4 million contributions he has received from oil companies. Amidst the corruption and the reasons why BP was allowed to drill in the first place, Pres Obama is taking the heat for a problem that was long in the making before he took office. He is trying everything he can to resolve this issue. And that is something many choose to overlook, but rather continue to hate and critcize him with an underlying reason -- the color of his skin.
A sheen is an iridescent thin film of oil on the surface of the water, not a thick layer of orange-brown gunk. A sheen usually consists mostly of the more volatile fractions, so it doesn't last all that long before mostly evaporating and partly dissolving. What could come ashore all along the Gulf is much worse than a sheen.
"One hurricane stirring things up in the Gulf could multiply this disaster's size a hundredfold from anything we've seen yet."
In some ways, it will. However, it may also ameliorate some of the effects. Huge dead zones are perhaps the worst threat: they would come from depletion of oxygen by bacteria that eat some of the chemicals in the oil, just as existing dead zones come from decay of algae blooms. Hurricanes mix the water, which may help in two ways, by bringing dissolved oxygen from the air and by dispersing the oil into a larger volume of water and thus decreasing the concentration.
You're absolutely right -- sheen was the wrong word there. Was trying for something poetic, wound up with something incorrect. Mea culpa. How about, from the parenthesis on, "...with tons and tons of gloppy oil."?
I think the worst thing about a hurricane passing by is that (1) it would shove a lot of oil towards the coast, instead of the bulk of it still being out in the water, and (2) it may move the oil to places that it normally wouldn't have hit (Texas, or Mexico, for instance).
Let's hope we don't find out, that's all I'm saying.
-CW
I really support our president, and I don't think the media is alway fair where he is concerned.
Yes, but by your own words, this has been a failure of communication by the White House. Up until his speech (which I liked). Obama may have been on top of every detail, but that was decidedly not the public perception of things. And part of his job is communicating such things to the public. That part of his job he hasn't been handling very well since the DH blew up.
Now, I think he's had a much better week this week than the past few (see my Friday column), so a lot of this is water under the bridge as far as I'm concerned. But I still say, in this, Obama will be judged by results, not words. And the results we've only begun to see. The public's perception of this disaster will change over the next few months. What it changes to is anyone's guess right now, but I have to say Obama had a pretty good week last week.
-CW
I'll stay tuned and I'll keep reading :)
Sorry, with a comment like that I just couldn't resist.
Sorry, with a comment like that I just couldn't resist.
You do not have what it takes to be POTUS and, quite honestly, you are doing a terrible job! You have nowhere to go from here, except down!
If you stay, you face the embarrassing prospect of a Primary challenge from your own Party. If you did, by chance, survive that challenge, you face an HUGE defeat in 2012 and will be regarded as another Failed 1 term Democrat President.
If you resign, the Democratic Party has a chance to recover and start fresh in 2012. You can go back to Chicago, be loved and Adored, and write a couple more books about yourself. No one will challenge anything you say and you can vote "Present" when asked for a decision.
Mr. President....Resign Now! PLEASE!
We all know that you are secretly representing the tea-baggers, and our president is a threat to you, and you should beg him to leave. However, he will not. Go to the White House website, www.whitehouse.gov -- click on Issues, and observe all the great things our president has done since he took office. Love and support our president because he IS the greatest. Peace.
Our new Louisiana poll has a lot of data points to show how unhappy voters in the state are with Barack Obama's handling of the oil spill but one perhaps sums it up better than anything else- a majority of voters there think George W. Bush did a better job with Katrina than Obama's done dealing with the spill.
50% of voters in the state, even including 31% of Democrats, give Bush higher marks on that question compared to 35% who pick Obama.
Overall only 32% of Louisianans approve of how Obama has handled the spill to 62% who disapprove. 34% of those polled say they approved of how Bush dealt with Katrina to 58% who disapproved.
http://publicpolicypolling.blogspot.com/2010/06/fallout-from-spill.html
I guess CW's next Obama Poll Watch should be very interesting!
Obama will probably get the usual bump, and probably from his own base. I don't think that speech is going to have any positive, long-lasting effect, though. It felt about 54 days late.
He didn't put on a show for the media, and if that is what people are judging, then they need to take the time to go to the White House website and there they will see a chronology of what our president had done from the first day this spill took place.
As far as the polls, the results depend on who you ask. If you ask Republicans, then no, the results won't be good. Personally, I think our president has done everything in his power to do.
The equipment BP was using should have passed safety inspections, and the technology is 40-50 years old. By all means, they should have had an emergency plan in place should a disaster take place, and they did not. Comparing our president to Bush is unfair, since Bush's administration was the boldest and most egregious executive power grabs in U.S. history.
President Obama is blamed for all that ails this country based on a grossly flawed perception of reality -- blatent racial predjudice. If he could do anything more to stop that gusher of oil, he would, but our country, until now, never reformed the oil industry, and equipment was not properly kept up to date by the oil companies, ( in cost cutting efforts). We don't care very much for polls, they go up an down, but we'll be there in 2012.
While the spill is the worst in history, comparing our president to Bush is really pathetic. Bush never gave a d#@ about the people when the Exxon Valdez took place, nor did he care about the city of New Orleans when Katrina took place. We all know that, it's been proven.
President Obama has taken a lot of flack from the people, and it seems that regardless of WHAT he does, it isn't good enough NOR is it enough. Personally, I think it's because he is black. No president has been treated like our president, and he managed to make BP put up an escrow account of 20 billion and and an additional 100 million for the people of the gulf. Bush would not have done that. Perhaps they could be a little more grateful for all our president has done without the racism. As for the polls-- it all depends on who you ask because many ARE pleased with Pres
Obama, those that are not didn't vote for him anyway. Peace.
Not really. If they pass a law explicitly saying that the punishment for the spill is to include setting up an escrow fund, that would be blatantly unconstitutional. But if they pass a law saying "no person shall operate a petroleum-extraction system which ... (gobbledygook gobbledygook) ... without setting up an escrow fund", there's nothing unconstitutional about that, and it has almost the same effect.
"If BP refused to do so, not a lot of people are going to be filling up at their gas stations -- that's my guess, anyway."
It's not my guess. My guess is that they would lower the price a penny, create a wholly-owned subsidiary to do the gas-station business, replace the BP logo on the gas stations with one saying Avalon Fuel Distribution or whatever the new company would be called, and continue selling gasoline with exactly the same people in exactly the same jobs. People aren't mad at the franchisee who runs their local gas station.
As to your first point, I still say while Congress could pass a law for any future spills, it would be ex post facto to do so for the situation in the Gulf currently. Read the link from the bit you quoted, as it goes into this point in further detail.
Your second point, sadly you may be right. But some local mom-and-pop BP frachisees have already started feeling the effects of this. It may not be widespread yet, but it could easily become so.
-CW
http://www.chrisweigant.com/2010/06/01/before-and-after-the-fact/#comment-9100
On paper, the hypothetical law would simply recognize how dangerous we now know poorly-managed oil wells are, and forbid anyone from operating one in the future without making provision for the future effects of such wells. On paper, it is not a penalty for anything they did before the passage of the law.
Anyway, the spill is on-going. If the only way for them to take advantage of an old liability cap is to prove that the particular drop of oil that causes any particular damage was spilled before the passage of the law, they'll have a tough time of it.
Meanwhile, look what's linked from wikipedia:
"the ex post facto provision of the Constitution (Art. I, § 10, cl.1) applies solely to criminal cases, not civil cases."
http://www.michaelariens.com/ConLaw/cases/calder.htm
http://supreme.justia.com/us/428/1/
"in Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp. v. R.A. Gray & Co., the Court stated:
Provided that the retroactive application of a statute is supported by a legitimate legislative purpose furthered by rational means, judgments about the wisdom of such legislation remain within the exclusive province of the legislative and executive branches.
... [Due process is satisfied] simply by showing that the retroactive application is itself justified by a rational legislative purpose. "
http://www.law.buffalo.edu/Academics/courses/640/CERCLA_1_07.htm
Their racist mindset will always accuse and blame Mr. Obama -- but you never heard this up-roar while Bush was in office. Never. It all has an underlying reason -- because the man is black. Pure and simple. The hate is enormous, and trust me, today is Sunday -- they will all be in church. Come Monday, it's back to hating Pres Obama.
The good news (and interesting thing) is that this crisis is not affecting his job approval. The bad news is, that's because voters had already turned off to him prior to the crisis. So while he'll likely get a bump in the polls after his Oval Office address, I don't think he's going to accomplish anything from it in the long run, because those voters departed due to the ideology of his governing (i.e., it's too "left" and "big government" for them).
But I digress. Back to his "leadership" damage-control goal: He had better talk about more than just money, in his Oval address. People want to hear that x-number of skimmers are being dispatched; that a new streamlined avenue of distribution has been instituted, to get resources to governors within hours, vs. weeks; etc.
And you know who he should appoint to lead the entire operation? Carville.
Do you suppose that he'll mention anything about the possibility that the well bore below the seabed may be damaged, as officials from BP have already admitted, and that this deep water well cannot be repaired?
It seems to me that he should prepare everyone for the absolute worst case scenario in which the oil will still be gushing long after he finishes his second term.
I don't think we're looking at a two-term president here. The guy is in his first term with approvals in the 40's for the past half-year.