My e-mail from the POTUS abot the oil spill

[panader0]

Sorry if this has been posted already
Douglas --

Yesterday, I visited Caminada Bay in Grand Isle, Louisiana -- one of the first places to feel the devastation wrought by the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. While I was here, at Camerdelle's Live Bait shop, I met with a group of local residents and small business owners.

Folks like Floyd Lasseigne, a fourth-generation oyster fisherman. This is the time of year when he ordinarily earns a lot of his income. But his oyster bed has likely been destroyed by the spill.

Terry Vegas had a similar story. He quit the 8th grade to become a shrimper with his grandfather. Ever since, he's earned his living during shrimping season -- working long, grueling days so that he could earn enough money to support himself year-round. But today, the waters where he has worked are closed. And every day, as the spill worsens, he loses hope that he will be able to return to the life he built.

Here, this spill has not just damaged livelihoods. It has upended whole communities. And the fury people feel is not just about the money they have lost. It is about the wrenching recognition that this time their lives may never be the same.

These people work hard. They meet their responsibilities. But now because of a manmade catastrophe -- one that is not their fault and beyond their control -- their lives have been thrown into turmoil. It is brutally unfair. And what I told these men and women is that I will stand with the people of the Gulf Coast until they are again made whole.

That is why, from the beginning, we have worked to deploy every tool at our disposal to respond to this crisis. Today, there are more than 20,000 people working around the clock to contain and clean up this spill. I have authorized 17,500 National Guard troops to participate in the response. More than 1,900 vessels are aiding in the containment and cleanup effort. We have convened hundreds of top scientists and engineers from around the world. This is the largest response to an environmental disaster of this kind in the history of our country.

We have also ordered BP to pay economic injury claims, and this week, the federal government sent BP a preliminary bill for $69 million to pay back American taxpayers for some of the costs of the response so far. In addition, after an emergency safety review, we are putting in place aggressive new operating standards for offshore drilling. And I have appointed a bipartisan commission to look into the causes of this spill. If laws are inadequate, they will be changed. If oversight was lacking, it will be strengthened. And if laws were broken, those responsible will be brought to justice.

These are hard times in Louisiana and across the Gulf Coast, an area that has already seen more than its fair share of troubles. The people of this region have met this terrible catastrophe with seemingly boundless strength and character in defense of their way of life. What we owe them is a commitment by our nation to match the resilience they have shown. That is our mission. And it is one we will fulfill.

Thank you,

President Barack Obama

[Tansy_Gold]

1. No mention of weaning ourselves off oil

Meh.

[obxhead]

2. You didn't expect any mention of it did you?

Seriously, BP is going to pay for his reelection campaign, he can't fight the beast now.

edit to add:

Even if he did mention it, I wouldn't hold my breathe. I mean he was for a strong robust public option for a long time, then he tossed it under the bus along with us in the end.

[Tansy_Gold]

5. I probably should have inserted

:sarcasm: but. . . . . .

No, of course I didn't expect it. My expectations/hopes for Barack Obama's presidency plunged as soon as he nominated Geithner for treasury.




Tansy Gold, disgusted and disappointed

[izquierdista]

3. "Hundreds of top scientists..."

Damn, now nothing will get done. If there is anything I have learned from sitting in meetings with just tens of top scientists, it's that talk can go on forever, while action items cause an instant freeze. Many of these "top scientists" have been stewed in the culture of studying a problem for so long, they have forgotten how to solve one. But I am sure that they will come back with lots of data and samples to analyze and will start modeling and making predictions to check the model, which will require going out to collect more data to validate the model. By 2024, I'm sure they will figure out how to proceed!

Engineers, that's a different story. If they are given a task and told to go fix it, usually they can, often in very creative ways. But while they are convening, they don't get crap done. They need to be sent out into the field, to a specific grid location, with tools and an expense account to buy more, and then they actually start making progress.

[AnArmyVeteran]

4. I wish he would have included "Arrest warrants have been issued to BP executives..."

Just when is he going to get tough! Jimmy Carter was very 'cerebral' too and look what happened to him in 1980. He was trounced. If Obama doesn't start being more forceful and start being a leader he is going to be a one term president and we are going to return to evil conservative rule. If he just got tough he could have been a hero by now. He should have forcefully shoved through the Public Option, but Obama caved and now the insurance industry is going to rip even more people off. We didn't elect someone to wear corporate logos all over his suits. We elected him to be a leader.

And by the way, lest anyone attack me for daring to speak out against Obama's timidity, I was one of his delegates who worked tirelessly for a year to get him elected. I even spent a lot of money I could have used to pay bills. I sacrificed as so many other millions did. But I have no idea who that man is who is in the White House. I voted for the candidate-Obama, not the person who is caving in to one industry after another. And when he does finally act, it's almost too late. Leaders lead. Leaders are forceful. And they certainly wouldn't let illiterate and ignorant tea baggers seize the national dialogue and outsmart you, as Obama did.

Where has candidate-Obama gone? He needs to fire the people who are advising him. And he needs to purge everyone around him who is a corporate hack. He could replace them with liberal/progressive activists. We have this golden opportunity to take our country back but President Obama is squandering it. All the hard work from so many millions of people will have gone to waste. We didn't work to have a corporate-owned 'Bush-Lite'. We voted for a progressive candidate who would represent the people for a change. That's the 'change' I believed in.

We deserve better. We deserve a leader, a strong leader. And we need someone who has the courage to go up against corrupt corporations and the lunacy of the right.

BTW: How long do you think you would remain free if you caused so much damage to the environment? YOU would be in jail right now, so why are leaders of corporations allowed to remain free?