President Obama Tours the Gulf Coast
June 14th, 2010
Employees from the Bateman Heating and Air company unfurled a sign for President Obama as they waited for the presidential motorcade to make it’s way down Fort Morgan Road on Monday. Other businesses and some homeowners and tourists staying in the beach houses on the peninsula also displayed signs, including one that read, “Stop Dat Oil, Obama.”
by Glynn Wilson
GULF SHORES, Ala. — Police cars and a few people with signs lined Fort Morgan Road Monday afternoon as President Barack Obama made a swing across the Gulf Coast from Gulf Port, Mississippi, to Baldwin County, Alabama to gather facts to take on the British Petroleum corporation in a showdown scheduled for Wednesday in Washington, D.C.
The president also issued a bully-pulpit public service announcement to try to bolster tourism along the coast.
President Obama assured residents and state officials in Mississippi and Alabama that his administration is taking steps to ensure the British oil giant BP pays back businesses and individuals who lost income due to the massive oil leaks still gushing in the Gulf of Mexico.
In Gulfport, Obama said Admiral Allen provided a detailed report about what was being done in Mississippi and fielded a range of questions and suggestions about how responses can continually improve.
“One of the things that came out of this discussion is how do we make sure that there’s effective coordination in terms of skimmers, vessels of opportunity that are out on the water right now,” the president said. “Can we make sure that they are responding as quickly as possible to the oil before it starts getting closer to shore?”
President Barack Obama, joined by Coast Guard Admiral Thad Allen and Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour, delivers remarks following a briefing at Coast Guard Station Gulfport in Gulfport, Miss.
The president mentioned problems with communications issues that need to be addressed, and said there is an inventory of vessels underway to determine which ones have the size and trained crew to lay boom or engage in skimming operations.
“I think it was a very useful conversation,” the president said.
Captain Steve Poulin, who is the local incident commander, gathered a lot of the suggestions and is going to be moving on them in the days to come, the president indicated.
There was a discussion of the status of BP’s progress in paying claims for damages.
“We also talked about claims to make sure that people here in Mississippi (and) throughout the region, are going to be adequately compensated for the damages and the losses that they are experiencing right now,” Mr. Obama said. “There are still problems with them.”
“We’re gathering up facts, stories right now so that we have an absolutely clear understanding about how we can best present to BP the need to make sure that individuals and businesses are dealt with in a fair manner and in a prompt manner,” Mr. Obama said.
As we reported first here Saturday, under orders from President Obama and Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar, the Minerals Management Service is drafting a plan to grab Gulf oil assets of the British Petroleum corporation and to seize revenue from the company’s Gulf drilling operations to pay for a massive cleanup operation in the Gulf of Mexico.
The Minerals Management Service staff is now conducting an inventory of all of BP’s drilling operations in the Gulf and calculating quarterly royalty payments to the U.S. Treasury from oil and gas leases, according to a source who works for the agency.
The new policy, which leaked out more on the Sunday television talk shows and will be formally announced in an address to the nation Tuesday night, is designed to ensure recovery of enough money to pay damage claims, and it has been reported that Obama may ask BP officials on Wednesday to set up an escrow account of perhaps $20 billion for that purpose.
A full plan to pay for the cleanup itself would cost much, much more, however, so it will be interesting to see what the president proposes. It will also be interesting to see how the president’s latest visit to the coast and the policy will be met by critics, who have said the administration has left too much of the cleanup effort so far to the corporation that caused the problem, the worst environmental disaster in U.S. industrial history.
A side benefit of grabbing BP’s revenue is that it could make the company less subject to bankruptcy or a hostile takeover, which could result in the company skating from financial responsibility.
On his visit to Theodore, Alabama, the president said he realized all the oil won’t be cleaned up right away.
“I can’t promise folks here in Theodore or across the Gulf Coast that the oil will be cleaned up overnight. It will not be,” Mr. Obama said. “There’s going to be a harmful effect on many local businesses and it’s going to be painful for a lot of folks. Folks are going to be frustrated and some folks are going to be angry. But I promise you this: Things are going to return to normal.
“This region that’s known a lot of hardship will bounce back, just like it’s bounced back before,” the president said. “We are going to do everything we can, 24/7, to make sure that communities get back on their feet. And in the end, I am confident that we’re going to be able to leave the Gulf Coast in better shape than it was before.”
The president said after talking to folks along the coast, he understands there’s a sense that this disaster is not only threatening fishermen and shrimpers and oystermen, not only affecting potentially precious marshes and wetlands and estuaries and waters that are part of what makes the Gulf Coast so special, but “there’s also a fear that it can have a long-term impact on a way of life that has been passed on for generations.”
“And I understand that fear,” Mr. Obama said. “We are absolutely committed to working … to do everything in our power to protect the Gulf way of life so that it’s there for our children and our grandchildren and our great-grandchildren.”
While in Gulfport, the president also pointed out that there’s still a lot of opportunity for visitors to come to the Gulf Coast to support hurting businesses as vacation plans are changed and reservations are canceled since not many tourists want to visit an oil-stained beach where you can’t swim in the water or fish.
“A lot of beaches that are not yet affected or will not be affected,” the president said. “We just want to make sure that people who have travel plans down to the Gulf area remain mindful of that, because if people want to know what can they do to help folks down here, one of the best ways to help is to come down here and enjoy the outstanding hospitality.”
Letter to Supporters
In a letter to supporters today, President Obama said the BP oil spill in the Gulf Coast is “the worst environmental disaster of its kind in our nation’s history.”
“I am returning to the region today to review our efforts and meet with families and business owners affected by the catastrophe,” Mr. Obama said. “We are working to hold BP accountable for the damage to the lands and the livelihoods of the Gulf Coast, and we are taking strong precautions to make certain a spill like this never happens again.”
He acknowledged the work will not end with this crisis. He’s invited lawmakers from both parties to the White House to discuss what it will take “to move forward on legislation to promote a new economy powered by green jobs, combat climate change, and end our dependence on foreign oil.”
“Today, we consume more than 20 percent of the world’s oil, but have less than two percent of the world’s oil reserves,” the president said. “Beyond the risks inherent in drilling four miles beneath the surface of the Earth, our dependence on oil means that we will continue to send billions of dollars of our hard-earned wealth to other countries every month — including many in dangerous and unstable regions.”
In other words, he said, “our continued dependence on fossil fuels will jeopardize our national security. It will smother our planet. And it will continue to put our economy and our environment at risk.”
We cannot delay any longer, the president said, “and that is why I am asking for your help.”
“Please stand with me today in backing clean energy,” Mr. Obama said, calling for supporters to sign up to support the legislation at my.barackobama.com/CleanEnergy.
“The time has come, once and for all, for this nation to fully embrace a new future,” the president said.
That means continuing our unprecedented effort to make everything — from our homes and businesses to our cars and trucks — more energy-efficient, he said.
“It means rolling back billions of dollars of tax breaks to oil companies so we can prioritize investments in clean energy research and development.”
Many businesses support this agenda because shifting to clean energy creates opportunities for entrepreneurship, he said. “This is how we will reinvent our economy — and create new companies and new jobs all across the country.”
There will be transition costs and a time of adjustment, the president said.
“But if we refuse to heed the warnings from the disaster in the Gulf — we will have missed our best chance to seize the clean-energy future we know America needs to thrive in the years and decades to come,” he said.
The House of Representatives has already passed a comprehensive energy and climate bill, and there is currently a plan in the Senate — a plan that was developed with ideas from Democrats and Republicans — that would achieve the same goal.
“But this is an issue that Washington has long ignored in favor of protecting the status quo,” Mr. Obama said. “Show that the American people are ready for a clean-energy future.”
White House
President Barack Obama, third from left, rides a ferry from Dauphin Island, Ala., to Fort Morgan, Ala., past a natural gas rig, as he visits the Gulf Coast region affected by the BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill. From left, National Incident Commander Adm. Thad Allen, Mayor of Dauphin Island, Al., Jeff Collier; President Obama, Mayor of Gulf Shores, Al., Robert Craft, Alabama Gov. Bob Riley; and Senior Adviser Valerie Jarrett
Full text of the president’s remarks at Theodore, Alabama
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3 Responses to “President Obama Tours the Gulf Coast”
June 14th, 2010 at 7:11 pm
ObamaINC uhhh just go shopping it’ll all be over but i don’t know when butt for sure the Corporations will get a big pass on responsibility – butt i’m gonna make it look like they are on top of “it” BS
This poppy cock rhetoric is just more of his Agenda for Corporate takeover of American – as if it already wasn’t taken over.
There is more OIL in Eastern Montana and western North Dakota than has been found any where within in our USA limits. Google it Bakken and Willetson Oil Fields. Some Analysts say we enough to last 100 years at current consumption…
June 14th, 2010 at 7:37 pm
Mr Crain you might want to look at the quality of that oil i.e. sulphur content and the little fact you apparently overlooked that at present prices it will cost more to refine it than the market price. Thus there is a reason it hasn’t been drilled.
Maybe long term when the price supports it – in excess of 4 bucks a gallon.
Further you should read up on the Alberta tar sands which has the largest free market deposits of oil in the world. Here the costs are better, but not much above the break even point and you can get a idea of the struggle to refine oil and the cost entailed. Note the tar sands has been heavily subsidized by the Canadian government. Meanwhile….China is building electric cars and converting there taxi fleets to them.
June 14th, 2010 at 7:43 pm
I say grab BP’s assets and pay all damaged parties — and clean this shit up.
But first, PLUG THE DAMN LEAK!