It's all there in the HuffPost archives, posts about the Corps of Engineers choosing what they admit is a "technically (not) superior) solution for the permanent rebuild of the canals whose floodwalls failed catastrophically during Katrina, about the Corps whistleblower's vindicated allegations about the shortcomings of the pumps at those canals, about the White House's silence on those issues during the past year. Commenters favorable to the Obama administration were virtually unanimous in their defense: he's got a full plate, give him time.
Well, this just in: the President's plate doesn't get any less full the longer the administration proceeds. And today, with a slo-mo environmental catastrophe in the Gulf, and a slo-mo federal response threatening to leave this administration looking as pathetic as oil-soaked pelicans, one thing is clear: a full-throated, thoughtful, energetic response to the remaining problems dogging the rebuilding of the "hurricane risk reduction system" in New Orleans might have given the Obama Administration the aura of caring about the area. Which, in turn, might have inoculated it against the charges from opponents that this is Obama's Katrina moment. Having let last year's opportunity slip by, having been beguiled by the wilful blindness of its automatic-pilot supporters, the administration stands un-inoculated politically against the impression that it's impotent in the face of BP's cupidity, laxity, and mendacity.
How's that plate looking now?
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Salazar was not the best pick if he was in bed with the oil companies, that pretty much is expected of Republicans and their excuse is company people know the company best and somehow that makes them good regulators. They ignore the fact that company people are likely to do what the company thinks is best instead of taking the correct adversarial stance that's needed to keep the pressure to toe to the regulations. It's the same as letting the arms manufacturers tell the military what they need.
Obama is a timid President and is dropping the ball in every case from financial reform to health care. He's basically worthless as far as I'm concerned, too bad the Republicans are worse.
I, too, have experience with the construction and chemical industry, and the phrase they always liked to use when weighing safety against the cost of doing it safely, was "calculated risk."
In the long run, the calculated-risk-taking always ended badly, and ended up costing way more than the ounce of prevention would have set them back. And that's not counting the lose of community trust and sometimes loss of life.
In my experience, however, they never learn from these screwups. Rachel Maddow did an amazing piece, on how the offshore drilling spill response has not changed in 31 years since the last Gulf oil spill in 1979.
The only methods that have changed on the industry's part, is their move to drilling even deeper and more dangerous wells that they don't know how to fix once they rupture.
Obama has finally met his unschmoozable delima. He can't pretty-speech his way out of this mess. If Afghanistan blows up, and we have another economic meltdown because he refused to act forcefully against Wall Street and the banks, he's toast in 2012. The sad thing is, so are we.
Let's take three examples of why that's true.
One: When the Stimulus Bill was being debated, McCain offered his version. 500 billion in tax breaks for the wealthy, and not one dollar for actual stimulus. Instant Great Depression.
Two: McCain is dying to go to war with Iran, and a little invasion of N.Korea would be the icing on the cake.
Three: Anything Palin has done or said since we were introduced to her.
So Obama was the only rational choice.
However, voting for him makes it ever more important to complain about his performance when found wanting, and to hold him to his commitments. It's called democracy. It's messy sometimes, but the alternative (never complaining, blindly following) is called a dictatorship.
I have a sister who lives in Mandeville, LA, and works for an oil company. The problem in Gulf Coast communities is that so many of the people there are employed by the oil companies. There is no way to address this disaster, and the ones that may follow, without addressing the economic dependence the oil companies have fostered among these people, and that another economic system must be put in place in order to save our environment in that section of the country.
Harry, I would love to know what can be done. But I fear it will take more years than we, and our environment, can afford!
Meanwhile, I saw this posted somewhere else, and keep going back to it, because I think we have reached this point!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tcx9BJRadfw
Problem: nobody knows HOW to stop it. We simply don't have the knowledge nor the technology.
In that case BP should never have been allowed to start drilling.
So the question is: WHO's responsible for the fact that BP could start drilling without any emergency plan?
Answer: the previous administration ... .
This SHOULD be about political wins and losses. If you care about Louisiana, you cannot let the GOP win in November, because THEY clearly care more about oil companies than about the people of Louisiana ... .
Actually, you might want to take a look at the full press conference, too.
For decades, countless scientists and environmentalists have been waving the red flag on the damage being done to the Gulf Coast and to wetlands by oil compaines and commercial shipping. And what was the response from the residents of Louisiana? "Drill, baby, drill!"
Why would a state that provides a wealth of seafood to the world and which has one of the most biologically diverse ecosystems in the world put all of that at risk? In a word; money. For every dollar of federal tax collected, Louisiana citizens receive approximately $1.78 in the way of federal spending. The vast majority of Louisiana residents have been so comfortable with the costs and risks to their environment, it's impossible for a politician to get elected without being pro-oil. Thus, we suffer from the likes of David Vitter and Mary Landrieu and Bobby Jindal.
Yes, we must clean up the oil spill. But the next time one of the talking heads cry about their beloved Louisiana, ask them where they were when the cheers for Drill, baby, drill were being chanted.
It seems to me that all of our hands are dirty in this (maybe we could leave the Amish out of it), and that Louisiana has been used and abused for decades by the rest of the country, in order to feed our insatiable lust for natural gas and oil.
I'll defer to Harry or any other Louisianan who might wish to address your points specifically on their state's issues. Living in a state, myself, that is being ecologically decimated to supply the nation's lust for coal, gives me some sympathy for the situation.
And while the bulk of the federal revenues generated from the compromise that you mention wont be received until 2017, Louisiana is already drawing on a smaller share of the royalties it will eventually receive. Ironically, Louisiana's Congressional delegation made sure that all royalties received until 2017 were spent not on hurricane protection and coastal restoration, but on the creation of new oil wells. So much for arm-twisting.
It is not my figures that are skewed. What is skewed is the marriage between Louisiana and big oil. What is skewed is the fact that despite this tragic oil disaster, the citizens of Louisiana are looking forward to this summer's 75th annual Louisiana Shrimp and Petroleum Oil Festival, with a golf tournament sponsored by the American Petroleum Institute, with parades and live music and arts and crafts and a coronation of a Petroleum king and queen. All sponsored by the good people of big oil.
http://www.shrimp-petrofest.org/
she also said that some people who were doing clean-up were getting sick and that she was involved in getting respirators to the boat crews.
The Bush administration could have invested in prevention against hurricanes but ACTIVELY decided to invest LESS in huricane prevention before Katrina arrived, and the response to the hurricane was extremely slow.
In this case Obama has NEVER deregulated the oil industry, on the contrary, we know that in any case he wanted tougher rules and would start to work on it once other more urgent issues were dealt with.
And secondly, I really don't see what the federal government could have done more or earlier once the oil spill started.
As usual, this article compares the BP disaster (a man caused disaster) to Katrina (a natural disaster), without indicating WHAT Obama concretely could have done differently than what he did or WHY it would make sense to compare them.
Conclusion: I don't understand the use of articles like this, besides promoting 'free speech' ... .
You're so right. They had all of those big fans all set up to stop the hurricane and George W. Bush called up the fan operator and personally had the fellow pack up and go home.
*sheesh!*
What a maroon.
The devastation caused in NOLA in the aftermath of Katrina was a direct result of poorly designed and constructed levees and, therefore, was NOT a natural disaster. Hurricane Katrina, as you may recall, just grazed the outskirts of New Orleans and was little more than a CAT 2 storm.
Secondly, you are really missing the point of this piece. It is clearly NOT a comparison of disasters. It is an analysis of why the mantra, 'Obama's Katrina', may have staying power and resonance. Because the Obama/Biden administration, in its first year and half, has not made even the necessary commitment to implement a comprehensive plan to restore the coastal wetlands and barrier islands of south Louisiana, it has left itself open to criticism that the BP disaster is its "Katrina moment".
Harry is absolutely right in his analysis. And, he should know. You would be doing yourself a big favour if you were to check out his columns on Katrina over the course of the last five years.
2. I can fully understand that his conclusion maybe 'resonates' with your personal opinions, but I hope you'll understand too that such a 'resonance' is not exactly the same thing as showing WHY we should adopt this conclusion too (as the headline suggests "WHY this is Obama's Katrina moment").
3. I didn't really miss the point of this piece, I simply don't 'resonate' with it. I even have to say that I found it rather funny. So this is supposed to be Obama's Katrina NOT because there would be some objective similarities to the way he handles the oil crisis and the way Bush handled Katrina, but ... because he didn't really clean up the Katrina mess that Bush left yet. I don't know if you see see problem with this kind of reasoning .... ?
a. Bush's prevention of and then response to Katrina was disastrous
b. Bush should have repaired the damage in 2006-2008 but didn't really do that
c. the damage being still there, the next president has to clean it up
d. when a new disaster arrives, WHATHEVER this next president does, it will be as bad as what Bush did with Katrina because ... he didn't entirely restore the wetlands yet.
a, b and c are ok. But d is rather funny, no ... ? Obama had to save the country from the worst economic crisis in decades (inherited by Bush), to fight two wars (one illegal and the other that has never really been fought so that things only got worse) also inherited by Bush, and when in the meanwhile the next disaster arrives (mainly caused by lack of regulations, again caused by Bush), then you think it's fair to say that Obama's response is similar to that of Bush only because he did not yet clean up the Katrina mess ... ?
I can understand that for some people this 'resonates' somehow in such a way that you want to speak about Obama's "Katrina moment", but as far as I'm concerned, it's simply flawed logic. What you reproach the Obama administration is to not yet have tackled what remains of the problematic way Bush has reacted to Katrina, period.