The right-wing states it in any number of different ways. Sometimes they claim that "Obama did not cause the recession, but he made it worse". On other occasions he is the "food-stamp president". Other times they claim that the stimulus program did not create a single job. Alternatively, they try to switch labels -- that Democrats, not Republicans, are responsible for the worst recession since the Great Depression.
The "best Congress money can buy", as Mark Twain once called it, is hell bent on doing the bidding of its paymasters, stripping industry regulations by using the excuse that they are killing jobs. Wall Street and right-wing industrialists whine and moan over the President's "harsh, anti-business" rhetoric, claiming it to be a major cause of low job growth. [Of course, there is nothing the President has said that even comes close to statements made by FDR ("economic royalists"), JFK ("all steel men are sons-of-bitches") or even W himself, but why quibble over facts].
But, if there is one industry whose claims about the president's rhetoric and regulation have even a drop of merit, it is the oil patch. The president has called for repeal of taxpayer subsidies to the most profitable industry on the planet. I suppose if one were a hypersensitive spoiled child, such rhetoric could be deemed "negative". The Environmental Protection Agency has declared CO2 to be a pollutant, subject to regulation (fulfilling, by the way, a promise George W Bush made during the 2000 campaign that Dick Cheney did not allow him to pursue), and the Administration has made an agreement with the auto industry to reduce tailpipe pollution progressively over time. Then, of course, we had the BP oil spill, and the brief suspension of new permits in the Gulf. Finally, the President has kept the oil industry out of ANWAR, and recently disallowed the XL-Pipeline.
Based upon Republican claims of the impact of rhetoric, uncertainty and regulation, one would think that US employment in the oil and gas industry would be plummeting or, at least, not growing.
One would be wrong.
To drill-baby-drill down on the actual data, the Bureau of Labor Statistics shows, US employment in the oil and gas industry has reached record highs. Note that total oil patch employment increased by as many jobs during the first 3 years of the Obama presidency than it did during the first 6 years of the Bush/Cheney Administration. [Of course, Bush had failed as an oil executive -- or, at least, his investors did -- so perhaps that was to be expected].
Do not be at all surprised if Republicans ignore such data and continue to lie about the causes of the great recession and the causes for slow job growth as we come out of it.
They would not be Republicans if they did otherwise.
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I thank you for your agreement, and for supplying some missing details.
http://www.forbes.com/2011/05/02/eliminate-oil-subsidies.html
Seems there are over 3000 different drilling companies. The funny thing is BIG OIL does not qualify for these subsidies or tax deductions because of the dreaded AMT, that's right the Alternative Minimum Tax!
Now the question becomes why would President Obama push an idea per Forbes and other experts that would make BIG OIL stronger and help reduce the competition?
I do not suggest that compliance accounts for all increase in employment.
Besides staff, increased complexity of operations required by regulation also increases labor demand.
All of it raises fuel prices.
In case you haven't noticed, they are drilling in the Dakotas. More jobs.
Roger Stern, an economic geographer at Princeton University published a peer-reviewed study on the cost of patrolling the gulf from 1976 to 2007 for the explicit mission of securing oil shipments, he combed through the Defense Department's data and came up with a total, over three decades, of $7.3 trillion. Just in the Gulf.
Day-trading and trading around expiration of futures contracts are likewise boosting grains and other commodities. Data released by CFTC Chairman Gary Gensler suggest that "huge inflows of speculative money are driving up (oil) commodity prices."
Saying that “net speculative positions are four times as high as in June 2008,†investment banker Goldman Sachs “issued a warning that the price of oil has grown out of control due to excessive speculation."
Exxon Mobil Chief Executive Rex Tillerson noted in testimony before the Senate Finance Committee that this year's oil prices don't make economic sense. He said current fundamentals and production costs would dictate oil around $60 to $70 a barrel. That's $43 cheaper than this year's highs of $113 a barrel reached on April 29 and May 2.
Delta and the Air Transport Association, the lobby for airlines, have been out in front among 98 companies and trade groups that banded together to create the Stop Oil Speculation Now coalition. During peacetime, Delta is the world's largest consumer of jet fuel, edging out the Department of Defense.
And the GOP will still rant "Supply and Demand." Brilliant.
http://bls.gov/
Because he has exposed to the masses that the chemicals used in fracking is the source of the contamination of ground water in people's wells in Wyoming.
and, what if there were environmental engineers and compliance personnel? Isn't it better to have the oil extracted safely, rather than spawning more BP spills? Is that what you want our beautiful country to become, a waste dump?
http://money.cnn.com/2010/05/27/news/economy/offshore_drilling_ban/index.htm
I think Obama okayed the drilling for 2012. Maybe employment will accelerate even faster now.
Domestic oil production is already up 11% under Obama.
CanaÂdian oil production continues to grow quickly.
US is a gasoline EXPORTER…
But oil is 3 times more expensive than in late 2008.
Because today U.S. and Canada are only producing 12% of the world's oil.
OPEC and Russia are producing 46 % of the world’s oil and they don’t want to bring the price of oil down.
At the same time, outside the Middle East, new drillings make economic sense as long as oil prices remain between $60 and $80 a barrel.
So, oil will remain expensive.