Time to strike while the Bullock and wetlands are hot

In addition to The Times-Picayune’s story on FEMA’s massive lump sum compensation to battered New Orleans Schools, Bayou Buzz shared this good news:

New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu will join Oscar-winning actress, Sandra Bullock, to announce the opening of the Warren Easton High School health clinic on Sunday, August 29.
…
The Warren Easton school-based health clinic is scheduled to open this fall as a full-service medical and dental facility. It is the product of a partnership between Tulane Medical Center, Louisiana School Health Connection and the Warren Easton Charter High School Foundation. Major funding for the $700,000 facility comes from the Kellogg Foundation, Sandra Bullock and The San Francisco 49ers Foundation.

Bullock deserves congratulations for generously investing her personal wealth in New Orleans. Nonetheless Bullock raised eyebrows a few weeks ago when she pulled out of the Be the One petition drive for Gulf Coast restoration, after she learned that one of the sponsors, America’s WETLAND, received funding from Shell Oil. Then, shortly thereafter, Bullock reversed course and rejoined the Be the One campaign after representatives from Women of the Storm allayed her concerns, and changed America’s WETLAND from “sponsor” of Be the One, to “partner.”
Note: Be the One is strictly concerned with Gulf Coast restoration, it shouldn’t be confused with the abstinence education site of the same name which encourages “Pants on for Safety.” (I joined that group by mistake, but, like Bullock, quickly pulled out.)

Bullock’s views on the Be the One effort were apparently influenced by Brendan Demelle’s post at DeSmog blog. DeMelle makes a big deal out of funding America’s WETLAND gets from oil companies. He claims Big Oil wants to restore the wetlands in order to protect their drilling and refining infrastructure. They’d prefer taxpayers pay to fix the wetlands damage they helped cause.

This is news?

Stripped of all the guilt-by-association insinuations, DeSmog blog’s argument is pretty thin. While it’s true that King Milling is president of America’s WETLAND (and former President of Whitney Bank), and his wife, Ann Milling, is president of Women of the Storm, and neither are known for being anti-Big Oil, does that mean their coastal restoration isn’t genuine and important?

If King Milling is a simple shill for Big Oil, he’s not doing a great job. In the past, he has praised in-depth articles that do not gloss over the oil industry’s responsibility for coastal loss, and forcefully criticized an oil-friendly White House whose policy on coastal restoration, when it was intelligible, was basically “run out the clock and let someone else handle it.”

Granted, America’s WETLAND web site always emphasizes the oil and gas industry’s importance to the nation, while rarely acknowledging their contribution to the coastal problem. But that’s about what you’d expect. On the other hand, their emphasis on the  “Energy Coast” might be the best way to draw bipartisan Congressional support to address Louisiana’s coastal crisis.

Naturally, I’d prefer that the site included quotes like this one from Times Picayune columnist Bob Marshall’s recent series on the disappearing coastal village of Delacroix:

If levees were all that had happened to the delta, the wetlands in place at the turn of the century would have remained largely intact for hundreds of years, coastal scientists have said. But in the 1930s, oil and gas was discovered in the coastal zone, unleashing a frenzy of canal dredging that would compress the wetlands’ demise into 70 years.

A “frenzy” of dredging following oil and gas discoveries accelerated wetlands loss by hundreds of years. The point is rarely made: industry accelerated the wetlands crisis into our lifetimes. While it would be nice if America’s WETLAND inform its audience about this fact, they wouldn’t be the first to gloss over it.

As you read America’s WETLAND’s explanation of the Causes of Wetlands Loss, you’ll notice that they often categorize the erosive canals that kill our coast as a “shipping” issue (parts XI and XII), without noting the obvious connection of “shipping” to the oil and gas industries. When it explains the causes of wetlands loss at length, but doesn’t clearly acknowledge the role of oil and gas-related channels, they do open themselves to Demelle’s charge of “greenwashing”.

But that’s not the whole story. The site does address oil and gas issues that you might not expect. In their section on “subsidence” they note that oil and gas extraction might be a contributor. Then in part IX, they cite highly-salinated Produced Water as a cause of wetlands loss:

In the late 1980s, it was estimated that about 730 million barrels (almost 31 billion gallons) of produced water were discharged annually in Louisiana waters.  Not only is the brine potentially harmful, but there may be many other toxic substances present.  Produced water has been shown to contain up to 2800 picocuries per liter of Radium 226 (the maximum allowable for the Riverbend Nuclear Plant near St. Francisville is 30 picocuries of Radium 226).

That’s an informative paragraph that would’ve been helpful in the New York Times story I discussed here.

At the very bottom of AW’s “Causes” section, they cite a “recent” study from 1996, which enumerates and categorizes the localized causes of wetlands loss. It shows that when direct and indirect impacts are considered, “Oil and Gas Canals” are the leading cause of localized coastal land loss.

Yes, the information is buried, but it’s there. If America’s WETLAND was a total “greenwash”, it wouldn’t contain such information.

America’s WETLAND will host a conference in New Orleans about the world’s deltas in October. In their press announcement, President King Milling says

“In the working deltas of the world we have provided the infrastructure and resources for great economies and progress, but the key question is, at what price?… We are asking all interests to consider the future and tie the economics to environmental sustainability for a livable world after we are gone.”

I can get on board with that statement. Sure, in my perfect world, Milling would directly tell Big Oil that they should do the right thing – stop downplaying their role in the wetlands disaster and volunteer to help pay for the damage they’ve caused. For example, Milling could’ve weighed in on a dispute recounted in this important Bloomberg article on wetlands loss:

A consensus of coastal scientists puts wetland losses attributable to oil and gas activities at 36 percent, says Douglas Meffert, a deputy director of Tulane University’s Center of Bioenvironmental Research. The Gulf Restoration Network estimates the share as high as 60 percent, says Aaron Viles, the group’s campaign director.

“The idea that we’re mostly to blame is crap,” says Don Briggs, president of the Louisiana Oil & Gas Association, a 1,100-member trade group based in Baton Rouge. He cites a U.S. Department of Energy estimate that the industry accounted for no more than 15 percent of coastal loss.

Environmentalists say 60 percent, industry and the DOE say 15 percent, and the scientific consensus is around 36 percent. Milling could’ve said, statesmanlike, “Hey, Big Oil and environmentalists, given the urgency of this issue, why don’t we all compromise, split the difference and agree to use the scientific estimate? Then we can work to solve this crisis together, after broadly agreeing about the oil and gas industry’s responsibility for the mess.”

(And speaking of things Milling might’ve said, it would have been ideal if he had excoriated oil industry spokesman Chris John when John said oil companies were already doing their “part” to save the coast because they already “pay taxes.” John’s comment is still one of the most outrageously smug things I’ve ever heard. Big Oil pays to fix the wetlands by paying taxes –  sometimes, kicking and screaming, to other countries. Yeah, give them a medal.)

But while I’d love for America’s s WETLAND to sound more like… me, that preference shouldn’t get in the way of the larger mission to save the coast. The window of opportunity is closing, and King and Ann Milling’s organizations are able to unite officials, celebrities, and industry to increase nationwide awareness about the crisis. I don’t think they are pure shills for Big Oil. And while I’m sure Oil companies will never fully pay for their damage to the coast, I will note that a figure like King Milling is in a unique position to get them to admit fault and contribute large sums directly to Gulf Coast restoration.

Truly, if Big Oil can cry like stuck pigs over a drilling moratorium (a policy that seems increasingly justified as more blowout preventer problems come to light), and if they can come together and spend $1 billion on a project to create a solution for oil gushers created by blowouts, then why can’t they unite to address our wetlands crisis and contribute to a fund to protect their $100 billion of assets on the “Energy Coast?”

No time like the present.

Forget wars, oil and economy; we’ve got a mosque alert!

The Park51 Muslim community center and mosque complex should not be built near  Ground Zero because I heard it will contain a birthing pool for terrorist babies.

Seriously, can this manufactured story twist further into the absurd? It’s an election year, and we’re dealing with two wars, a lingering recession, and an environmental catastrophe in the Gulf. Thus, obviously, we’ve decided to engage in heated national debate… about the future of a Burlington Coat place in Manhattan. It’s an embarrassment reminiscent of the Terri Schiavo hullabaloo in the spring of 2005. Will we leave an American city to drown again in a few months so we can put this mosque distraction in perspective?

Justin Elliot traces the arc of the so-called “Ground Zero Mosque” story in an informative Salon article. He shows how Islamophobic conservative blogger Pamela Geller pushed the “Monster Mosque” story until it finally gained national media attention. Then it was off to the races once politicians joined in. Elliot begins his piece with a quick set of helpful facts:

A group of progressive Muslim-Americans plans to build an Islamic community center two and a half blocks from ground zero in lower Manhattan. They have had a mosque in the same neighborhood for many years. There’s another mosque two blocks away from the site. City officials support the project. Muslims have been praying at the Pentagon, the other building hit on Sept. 11, for many years.

In short, there is no good reason that the Cordoba House project should have been a major national news story, let alone controversy.

I recommend you read the whole piece. Alternatively, you can read Elliot’s work in former Louisiana Insurance Commissioner Jim Brown’s widely published commentary, which lifts entire paragraphs from the Salon article without attribution. (It’s not the first time Brown has done this.)

Either way, you’ll see there’s no core “issue” here. Do American citizens have the right to legally build a house of worship in the United States of America? Clearly – YES!

But we want to object. It’s a mosque two blocks from the World Trade Center site. We have dark suspicions because the mosque involves… Islam, and the terrorists were Muslim, so… Well, you see it’s a very emotional issue. Remember that thousands died on 9/11. Those are the non sequiturs forming the empty “core” of this debate so far, as the end of this CNN interview inadvertently demonstrates.

Leadership has been in short supply. Politicians have mostly pandered to voters by condemning the mosque. (New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie being a notable exception.) They’re stoking this “emotional” issue for all it is worth. But that leads to questions. Precisely why is this an emotional issue? What’s at the root of it:

the complaint seems to boil down to a vague sense that doing Muslim stuff near ground zero is an unhappy reminder of terrorism…

And there you have it. We associate American Muslims with 9/11. But if that’s the case, why aren’t we “emotional” about the existing mosque standing five blocks from Ground Zero? Do we know what the imam at that mosque said after 9/11? Should the Manhattan mosque be closed out of “respect” to those murdered on 9/11? And what’s that earlier item about Muslim prayers in the Pentagon? Where’s the outrage about that?

John Stewart’s Daily Show captured the absurdity in this 9 minute segment ,which I consider essential viewing. It reviews the lack of national leadership on this issue, and concludes with the uncomfortably funny query: Should we build catholic churches near playgrounds? (The answer to that is “yes,” by the way.)

What in principle, is the objection to the mosque? Are opponents recommending a new law to address the situation? How would they apply it? Will it affect other properties, like the Ground Zero gentleman’s club? (Apparently a strip club near hallowed ground is okey doke, but a Muslim community center in an old coat store is an affront.)

And if we’re serious about not wanting tokens of Islam besmirching the vicinity of Ground Zero, let’s do this thing right. We’ll go block by block and cleanse the neighborhood around the site: no Arabic may be spoken, no middle eastern flags waved, no chicken shawarma served, no turbans worn, no facing Mecca while praying to the God of Abraham, no Al-gebra practiced… and, for good measure, tourists from New Orleans can’t refer to their home town as the “Crescent City”. All these freedoms will be curtailed, you see, out of “respect.”

As Americans, we’ll surely wreck ourselves if we respect ourselves this way.

The core principle at the center of this controversy is freedom. The United States strives to be a country that respects freedom even when –  especially when – a majority disagrees with a particular expression of that freedom. Actually, that’s precisely when our commitment to freedom counts the most. Over the years we’ve often failed, but that’s no excuse to fail again.

Yet suddenly we have conservatives – who are usually so keen on Constitutional principles – citing polls and people’s sensitivities to justify their opposition to the Park51 house of worship. Local columnist Jeff Crouere cited these reasons in a recent column. Then Crouere went for broke, declaring “no mosque should be built in any location until all questions are answered about the financing and support of the project.” It was unclear whether Crouere wanted to enlarge government in order to enforce his suggestion. New York authorities are satisfied that there are no law enforcement issues regarding the planned mosque, but Crouere is concerned there are questionable “ties.” He cites no specific information.

Must we remind Crouere that the Constitution is a majority of one, and the freedoms enshrined therein aren’t encapsulated in “if/then” clauses related to poll numbers or group sensitivities? If he knows something the authorities don’t about criminal funding or terrorist connections, he should bring it to their attention. He shouldn’t be coy or vague –  unless his goal is to fear-monger about vague “Muslim stuff”.

Worse than Crouere’s piece was New York Times’ columnist Ross Douthat’s recent effort. In it, Douthat identified an “American tradition” that stands alongside the Constitution. He describes it as a “cultural understanding of the country” which offers “real wisdom” apart from the principles in our founding documents. What sort of “wisdom” is he talking about? Well, Douthat believes many Americans suspect that “Islam in any form may be incompatible with the American way of life.” According to Douthat, this alternate, non-Constitutional “understanding” has historically used  discrimination and persecution to force new immigrant ethnic groups to assimilate into the American Way. How useful. (Tapped’s Jamelle Bouie responds to Douthat at more length here.)

While Douthat and other conservatives may believe this second American “tradition” is indispensable, I think it has always dragged us down. Our expanding, evolving American culture needn’t have an extra-legal enforcement division. Our cultural power comes from the things we do as a free people. It’s in our open example to the world. Far from being a source of wisdom, I view American provincialism as a hindrance to our success – a regression into “Know Nothing-ism.” Fear and discrimination have too often clipped the wings of our spirits.

Perhaps the only upside to this NYC mosque hysteria is that it interrupted a national discussion about the aforementioned “terror baby” nonsense. We had just concluded hearings for a new Supreme Court justice that included a lot of talk strictly interpreting the Constitution. Then, suddenly, many of these same strict constructionists want to change the 14th amendment. Why? Because illegal immigrants might come here to have anchor babies, and some of these anchor babies might also be terror babies.

Both of these “issues” were elevated into national discussion because they stoke that dark element in our national character – praised by Douthat – that we’ve spent centuries trying to overcome: fear of the fringe, the other, the different. When times are tough in an election year, we can just make something up – so let’s get tough on the Park51 mosque and terror babies! They’ve had it too easy for too long.

Local pols jumped into the fray, of course. Never one to privilege principle over grandstanding, Sen. David Vitter said the mosque was a “slap in the face to the American people.” His Senate-race opponent, Charlie Melancon responded with a lukewarm objection to the mosque that mirrored President Obama’s lukewarm “support” of it.

But Newt Gingrich was the one who really crystallized my view of what’s wrong with this controversy. While Gingrich is generally regarded as a thoughtful conservative, you wouldn’t know it by the way he’s handled this mosque issue. First, he caught flack from Pat Buchanan (of all people), when he compared the mosque developers to Nazis erecting a sign near the Holocaust museum. Shortly thereafter, Gingrich made a statement against the mosque that sounded like it was penned by Benito Mussolini’s speechwriter. It was this little fascist bon mot that actually inspired me to write this column:

There should be no mosque near Ground Zero in New York so long as there are no churches or synagogues in Saudi Arabia.

Outrageous! Since when do the policies in The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, or any other country for that matter, dictate the extent of our freedoms here in America? The Constitution is our guarantor, whether or not the House of Saud liberalizes its stone-age religious laws. That’s precisely what makes us exceptional: We are an experimental nation, bonded by shared truths in a national compact. Our freedoms are defined by the Constitution, not by our blood, and certainly not by our adversaries. Since when do we curtail inconvenient expressions of freedom based on the standards of a repressive, backwards oligarchy? Is Gingrich prepared to follow his logic and say that until Saudi Arabia opens Mecca to Christians, we will forbid Muslims to enter Manhattan? Is that how the enlightened American Experiment works now?

As embarrassing as this mosque kerfuffle is, the real embarrassment is that nine years after terrorists struck us, the hallowed ground which so many are “defending” is mostly empty space. John Poderetz brings some surprising perspective in his recent New York Post column. (Ignore the “in its place” misnomer):

Imagine that, in the weeks following [9/11], you had expressed the opinion that in nine years’ time… there would be no memorial, no museum, no nothing on the 16 acres on which the towers themselves sat.

Forget the whole question of whether there would be a mosque (or Islamic cultural center) in its place. Just imagine that you’d delivered the view that New York would so completely fail to maintain a sense of purpose regarding the salvation of Ground Zero. Imagine the scorn to which you’d have been subjected at the suggestion.

Yet here we are. Memories of the last nine years have turned Ground Zero from a site of horror, to a reminder of grief, to an occasion for ludicrous artistic posturing — and now to something very close to parody.

Four years ago, in his uniquely inept way, Mayor Ray Nagin observed that the WTC site was still a “hole in the ground.” Despite his horrible choice of words, Nagin might have had a point about the pace of rebuilding. Now New Yorkers like Podheretz are saying that the site is a disgrace. I’ll take it a step further: Isn’t it more shameful that we heatedly argue about a mosque 2 blocks from a hallowed site, yet barely care about the lack of progress rebuilding the site itself? Whatever you think of the Park51 complex, isn’t it a bigger insult to the memory of the victims of 9/11 that almost nothing – no finished memorial or building – exists on this site nine years after the attacks? Why doesn’t this embarrassing fact inflame our emotions like the mosque does?

I thought we were supposed to have a Freedom Tower by now; a monument showing the world that the United States can still take a punch and come back stronger; a dominating presence in a city where every ethnicity and creed peacefully co-exist; a symbolic testament to the fact that our shared belief in American freedom can’t be scared away.

Instead, we have terrorist babies and a mosque at the top of our national consciousness.

Katrina shorthand fatigue

It’s a shame Ray Lang stopped blogging at On Levee Failures & A Weather Event. Ray’s posts were a recurring reminder to defend against “Katrina Shorthand” – the tendency to describe 8/29 as a hurricane, and obscure the fact that poorly designed levee walls flooded most of New Orleans. For us, “Katrina” was a devastating act of man.

Lang’s work is still archived at his site and provides various templates for responding to news items like this doozy from the AFP. While there will be many “5^th anniversary” stories during the next two weeks, you’ll be hard pressed to find one more thoroughly botched:

In 2005, Katrina unleashed torrential rains, leading to disastrous flooding that left about 1,600 people dead, destroyed thousands of homes and marred the presidency of Obama’s predecessor George W. Bush, whose administration was severely criticized for its handling of the crisis.

While Katrina’s storm surge killed people in Mississippi and Southeastern Louisiana,  hundreds of New Orleanians perished due to catastrophic canal wall failures that flooded four-fifths of the city. “Torrential rains” weren’t an issue.

The AFP article elaborates, but only makes things worse:

The 2005 hurricane overwhelmed New Orleans’s series of protective levees and flood walls along the Mississippi River and Lake Pontchartrain, leading to the inundation of entire neighborhoods and the high death toll in the city founded by the French three centuries ago.

Wrong! Most of the canals that flooded New Orleans were NOT overtopped by Katrina’s rain or waves. They failed because of shoddy construction and poor design.  And when they crumbled neighborhoods were deluged; hundreds of New Orleanians perished, most of them elderly. Imagine a grandparent sweating in a dark attic, clutching a small pet, as water bubbles up through the ceiling.

An independent commission is currently investigating the drilling rig failures off the coast of Louisiana, which claimed 11 souls and resulted in a runaway oil gusher. However, New Orleans never got an independent commission to investigate the catastrophic levee failures on 8/29 that killed 100 times as many people.

And—good gracious!—  interior canals failed New Orleans, not the outer ones, which protect us from lake and river overflow. Some interior canals drain the city, while others are shipping channels for waterborne commerce serving the rest of the nation. But this is why we’re so frustrated! The vast majority of interior canals weren’t overtopped, yet they burst apart and flooded our town.

Despite his respite from blogging, Lang continues to disabuse others of Katrina shorthand and correct other factual errors about 8/29. If the AFP story is any indication, the fifth anniversary of Katrina and the federal flood will provide him with a lot of work.

He could sure use more help.

Don’t waste a good disaster: Spill could help The Hoff

Saints fans carefully appraised my suggestion to play “Glee” songs on game days, and they decided the idea had less merit than an unflushed toilet. After such a blogging debacle, you’d think I’d be disinclined to use my platform at The Lens to make additional pop culture proposals.

But when I get into a hole, I try to dig out of it. I’m no quitter. Onward and upward.

Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour recently decided to use BP money to underwrite a one hour TV special to promote Gulf Coast tourism. The show will feature various musical acts and focus on the “resiliency and spirit” of coastal communities.

David Hasselhoff will host.

That’s right. Barbour’s office apparently selected “The Hoff” –  whose alcohol issues were roasted on Comedy Central last night – to be the master of ceremonies for this televised celebration of the Mississippi Coast. I guess they were thinking the 90’s “Baywatch” star was an appropriate choice. Or perhaps Barbour admires the resiliency of Hasselhoff’s liver, and the way it naturally cleansed his body after a sudden toxic overload.

Now, have you heard about the new “cancer comedy” on Showtime called “The Big C”? It sounds like an edgy show about a delicate topic. Though I haven’t seen the show yet, I already have a suggestion for it: Just as Mississippi is helping to resuscitate Hasselhoff’s career, perhaps “The Big C” can be the vehicle for Tony Hayward’s comeback. I think they should introduce him as a character who goes by the initials “B.P.” B.P. has a lucrative job, but is wanting in people skills. I imagine a scene where another character informs B.P. that she’s been diagnosed with cancer. Current events-based hilarity ensues.

B.P.: “I’m sorry that you have cancer. Is it severe?”

Victim: “The tumor is the size of a softball.”

B.P.: “That’s all?”

Victim: “What!?”

B.P.: “Look at it this way: compared to your entire body, the tumor is quite tiny. Now, if you were, say, 90 percent cancerous tumor, that would be bad. But since it’s much less than that, I think the overall impact will be very, very modest. Well, I’m off to go sailing. Been so busy these days I needed to do something to get my life back. Cheers.”

Can Who Dats get a Gleek on?

As we celebrate our team’s defense of an NFL championship, honor Rickey Jackson’s career, remember the vision of Dave Dixon, and hype a video game, I want to toss an extra doubloon into the Saints-related festivities.

Pop philosopher Katy Perry inspired me. See, in a recent Rolling Stone interview she justified her vapid “California Gurls” hit song – about hot girls who will “melt your Popsicle” – by invoking rap legend Tupac Shakur:

It started in March, at a swanky Oscars afterparty [Perry] attended with guests like Oprah and Madonna. At one point, Jay-Z’s “Empire State of Mind” came on the stereo, and Perry — who grew up surfing in her native Santa Barbara — watched as a room full of L.A. glitterati went crazy for a song about New York. “If 2Pac were here, he would not be OK with this!” she remembers thinking. “I felt like he was rolling in his grave.”

Clearly, something had to be done. So Perry summoned Tupac’s spirit and created this summer’s most persistent earwig about the “fine, fresh, fierce” girls “representin’” the West Coast. Take that Jay-Z! Hi five “2 Pac”! You didn’t die in vain.

In a way, Perry’s sun-kissed buffoonery liberated me to make a suggestion I probably should’ve kept to myself. I’ve been thinking a lot about new songs that could be inserted into the Saints’ game-day rotation. Obviously, nothing could ever replace “Crunk” which we all heard innumerable times last football season – and it never got old because it became the soundtrack to a championship. But here’s my suggestion for this year: I think the Glee remix of Madonna’s “Four Minutes” song could become a Who-dat hit.

Stay with me, now.

Admittedly, I’ve long admired the power of Madonna. But I’m not recommending “Four Minutes” merely because I’m a fan of the Material Girl. The “Glee” show reworked the song, and their version contains a key component that is also the reason why “Halftime (Stand Up and Get Crunk)” resonates so well among New Orleanians. Jeffrey at Library Chronicles blog explained it best:

[T]he main riff in “Halftime” is built from marching band music. In other words, it sounds like a friggin Mardi Gras parade coming at you. Is it really any surprise the whole city is into it?

Take a listen to the robust horns in the Glee version of “Four Minutes”. They’re catchy, like “Crunk.” Surely if a song by an Atlanta band can be successfully recycled for Saints fans, then “Four Minutes” might have a shot as well – especially late in the fourth quarter during a close game. What do you think?

If that doesn’t appeal to you, my other proposal is to have the Saintsations do one of their 45-second routines to the Ramones’ “She’s a Sensation”. Pretty obvious, but I think it would work.

The comments are open. Should the Gleek version of Madonna’s “Four Minutes” get some time in the Dome this season? And if not, what should?

The nation’s sacrifice zone, part II

The New York Times article I referred to in my previous post did more than contrast the crisis of wetlands loss to the oil disaster. It also discussed the longtime degradation of the Gulf Coast, and touched on several “radioactive” issues:

According to data from the Minerals Management Service compiled and analyzed by Toxics Targeting, a firm that documents pollution and contamination, at least 324 spills involving offshore drilling have occurred in the gulf since 1964, releasing more than 550,000 barrels of oil and drilling-related substances. Four of these spills even involved earlier equipment failures and accidents on the Deepwater Horizon rig.

That’s 23 million gallons– about one tenth of the estimated leakage of the BP/Macondo well – dispersed over 46 years. This is  neither an insignificant nor an apocalyptic amount. But to hear the pro-drilling contingent tell it in 2008, rigs were nearly leak free after Katrina so why should we worry about the possibility of a spill?

The article goes on:

Thousands of tons of produced water — a drilling byproduct that includes oil, grease and heavy metals — are dumped into the gulf every year. The discharges are legal and regulated by the Environmental Protection Agency.

Well, toxic dispersants are “legal” too, but that doesn’t comfort me. And the FDA has approved a dubious “sniff test” to ascertain the toxicity of Gulf seafood, which doesn’t put me at ease, either. I’d like to know more about this “produced water”:

But in the early 1990s, Robert Wiygul, an environmental lawyer who works on the Gulf Coast, brought at least a half-dozen lawsuits against companies that were found to be dumping produced water in shallow areas along the coast without any permit at all, citing little to no enforcement by the E.P.A. and little concern from regional politicians. The E.P.A. later tightened regulations, including an outright ban on dumping produced waters near shore. But Mr. Wiygul described the situation as typical. If you’d had high-level politicians saying, ‘Y’all need to do this, this needs to happen,’ you would have seen a different situation there,” he said.

After barely introducing the topic, the article then shifts to the Gulf’s hypoxic “dead zone” caused by fertilizer runoff in the Mississippi River. It seems like an explanatory paragraph was cut from the piece. Precisely what are the risks of the drilling fluids contained in “produced water”? If the EPA banned “near shore” dumping, why is it ok for rigs to dump it directly in the Gulf further out? The NYT article doesn’t say. I called Robert Wigyul to ask him about this, and mentioned that oil drilling proponents have long extolled the apparent “benefits” rigs have on fishing, since some of the most active fishing areas are around rigs. Mr. Wigyul agreed that rigs are “productive structures” which certainly concentrate “biomass” (whether or not they actually increase it). However, since these biomass concentrations occur in areas where produced water is dumped, there is certainly cause for concern. Wigyul pointed to Ben Raines’ 2002 award winning report on the high mercury levels around rigs which dump drilling fluids directly into the Gulf:

The [Mobile] Register’s Hazard Ranking System calculations showed that:

The well-documented contamination in the sediments beneath some rigs reached the Hazard Ranking System’s maximum value for observed releases of hazardous pollutants.

Mercury concentrations in many fish and shellfish sampled around at least one of the rigs were high enough to qualify the area as a contaminated fishery.

Frequent use of the rigs by commercial and recreational fishermen means that the contamination around the rigs represents “a human food chain threat.”

Yesterday, Secretary of the Navy and Gulf Coast Restoration Czar Ray Mabus appeared at a town hall event in Houma. A member of the audience went up to the microphone and he implored Mabus to not let the government “reinvent the wheel” on restoration. Otherwise, the government should just get out of the way and empower Cajuns like himself to fix the coast. As an aside the man said he had worked on oil rigs for 30 years and had shuddered at all the pollution dumped into the Gulf. Mabus thanked the man for his statement and said he understood that only “bottom up” solutions would work, and promised that the government would not reinvent the wheel. He didn’t address the claim about rig pollution, among many others.

Simply put: do drilling rigs lure our seafood into some of the most polluted areas in the Gulf?

At the risk of overkill, I want to point to another under-investigated issue, but first a strong caveat about oil industry analyst Matt Simmons. Simmons has been one of the most visible and most alarmist analysts to frequently discuss the oil gusher. He has raised numerous potential problems related to the BP oil disaster that few others rarely broach (perhaps with good reason). While Simmons’ vast experience in the oil drilling field can’t be discounted, in the past three months he has made all kinds of unsupported claims about the current disaster. He’s said that BP “killed” the Gulf of Mexico, and predicts they will go bankrupt because it will cost them more than a trillion dollars to clean the polluted Gulf. He also believes there is a hole “5-10 miles” from the Macondo gusher that is still emitting fuel, and the only way to close this rupture will be to nuke the well shut. (See this link for rebuttals to these and other claims.)

Simmons is retired from the oil industry, but he is no passive observer. Currently, he is recruiting private investors for his alternative energy company, before he plans to take it public with a (lucrative) IPO. Thus, Simmons might have a financial interest in portraying the Macondo disaster in apocalyptic terms, to garner more support for his wind and tidal business ventures.

A couple weeks ago, Simmons appeared on Jeff Crouere’s local radio show on 990am. The discussion got bogged down after Simmons said the methane risk from the Macondo well would necessitate wholesale evacuation of the Gulf Coast. Crouere’s listeners began calling in with skepticism, and the discussion devolved into an argument about the limitations of gas masks… etc.

But before that, Crouere asked Simmons about his proposal to nuke the Macondo hole shut, and about the danger of radioactive “fallout” from such a nuclear solution. Simmons replied, “We are already experiencing fallout from the crude.” That woke me up. “We are?” I wondered. Unfortunately, without further explanation, the topic was dropped for another one. So, like the NYT’s processed water issue, Simmons’ claim about radioactive “fallout” went unexplored.

Trolling around the internet, I found this Rense article which – with Simmons-like alarmism – claims that “deep Earth oil is flooding to the surface [of the Gulf] and it is contaminated with uranium and thorium.” I wrote to a scientist named Kelley who publishes the Singularity blog, and asked him to comment on this claim. While not a geochemist, Kelley cast doubt on the dangers of radioactive fallout at the surface of the Gulf.

Uranium and thorium are both non-volatile, and even as charged salts they tend to oxidize to states that aren’t freely soluble. They not only would tend to stay at the bottom of the ocean, they’d tend to sediment further even if dispersed….Methane itself is not a health hazard to anything except global warming. The petroleum damned sure is a hazard to every living thing it encounters – especially with chemical dispersants added.

In a July 21 interview with Bloomberg news, Simmons seemed to refer to the topic, saying that “the floor of the Gulf is already polluted with toxins,” and calling it, in his fact-of-the-matter way, “the biggest environmental cover-up in history”.

Again, Simmons might be wildly wrong about the impact and risks, but that doesn’t mean the issue itself is not worth a look. Like processed water, the impact of radioactive elements in crude oil needn’t have apocalyptic consequences in order for it to justify study. But if mainstream journalists and officials ignore the topic, or just barely introduce it, then the “fringes” get to feast on the unknown. And fringe sites like Rense.com traffic in alarmism, and discredit the mainstream by implying that their lack of coverage on a topic is evidence of a vast cover-up.

I believe we should get these issues on the table, because there won’t be a better time to perform a comprehensive risk-analysis of oil drilling (as well as a cost/benefit analysis of prompt coastal restoration). Granted, topics like processed water and radioactive oil are complex, and may require further research and study. But if mainstream news articles like the NYT’s barely raise the issues without factual follow-up, then alarmists at the edges of the debate will dominate the discussion. This disaster provides us an opportunity to take a hard look at the total risks oil drilling poses to our environment and our health. We might not like what we find, but it’s better to address these issues now rather than later, in a sensible way, without misinformation or undue alarmism.

We’ll end on a hopeful note: I’ve learned that filmmaker and award-winning blogger Jason Berry is currently in pre-production on a documentary seeking answers to many of these under-reported issues, like processed water and radioactive crude. I can’t wait to see what he uncovers.

The nation’s sacrifice zone, part I

Simple answers to simple questions

Washington (AFP) – With BP’s broken well in the Gulf of Mexico finally capped, the focus shifts to the surface clean-up and the question on everyone’s lips is: where is all the oil?

Some oil has evaporated, some cleaned. The rest is still out there: matted on beaches in Grand Isle and Grand Terre, floating in tar balls “from South Pass to Southwest Pass”, staining Louisiana wetlands brown, clearly entering Lake Pontchartrain, and forming nearly 12,000 square miles of sheen on the surface of the Gulf of Mexico. Beyond that, most of the remaining oil is congregated in vast “plumes” under the surface, detected up to 50 miles from the Macondo wellhead.

And don’t forget about the oil in the food chain, which has been mixed with a dollop of toxic dispersant, for flavor.

This has been another edition of “Simple Answers to Simple Questions.”

Vitter candidacy scarred by PTSD, among other disorders.

At this moment in American history, about a third of veterans from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder and military suicides are on the rise. Knowing all that, I was hoping this election year would include a frank discussion of military mental health care. Though that, apparently, was asking too much, PTSD has become something of an unexpected background factor in Louisiana’s U.S. Senate race.

In June, ABC News ran a story revealing Senator Vitter’s aide Brent Furer’s checkered history of DUI’s and cocaine possession, as well as an incident in which the aide stabbed his ex-girlfriend with a knife and held her captive for 90 minutes, asking her charming questions such as, “Do you want to die?” While the violent episode was not made public when it occurred, Sen. Vitter, no stranger to questionable love practices himself, knew about it when it occurred but did not think it significant enough to merit firing Furer, according to ABC.  Instead, the senator accepted Furer’s resignation only after “learning” about his past drug and alcohol issues. (ABC News cast doubt on that explanation, noting that Vitter’s regional campaign director “oversaw” Furer’s community service obligations after one of his DUI incidents.)

Vitter’s spokesman claimed Furer was originally hired because of his service in Gulf War I. Retired Marine General James Livingston – who has testified to Congress about the benefits of early PTSD detection – defended Vitter’s choice, saying Furer had PTSD after witnessing “horrific” violence in Operation Desert Storm. Gen. Livingston applauded Vitter for letting a veteran with PTSD keep his job after a knife-wielding encounter, rather than letting him “flounder on his own in his time of need”.

ABC News disclosed an instance of road rage involving Furer which transpired as he was driving to get PTSD medication:

[An] ugly incident occurred in late 2008 when Furer was driving to pick up medication from a Washington [D.C.] area pharmacy. Furer, a former Marine and veteran of the first Gulf War, has told lawyers he takes medication for treatment of post traumatic stress disorder.

The ride turned ugly when Furer and another former Marine, Gregory Blake became caught up in a violent road rage incident in late 2008. As Furer allegedly chased Blake through the streets of Washington in their SUVS, Furer struck a motorcyclist, throwing the cyclist to the pavement and breaking his femur, according to a lawsuit that followed. When police arrived, Furer flashed his senate ID and told them he worked for Sen. Vitter, according to court records. Furer’s insurance company settled the civil case.

Rep. Charlie Melancon, a Democratic aspirant to Vitter’s seat, has emphasized reported claims that Furer handled “women’s issues” for Vitter in a hard-hitting internet ad. There’s a cryptic twist at the end, when the ad implies Vitter kept Furer on staff because the aide might “have” something on his boss. Melancon invites viewers to speculate about Vitter’s other “serious sins,” beyond those Vitter vaguely referenced in 2007 while apologizing for his involvement in a D.C. prostitution ring.

Sen. Vitter’s Republican primary challenger, Louisiana Supreme Court Justice Chet Traylor, is also stoking doubts about Vitter’s past. Justice Traylor’s campaign manager, Lev Dawson, recently raised the possibility of more skeletons emerging from Vitter’s closet in an AP story:

Lev Dawson believes Vitter is vulnerable. Dawson is a conservative north Louisiana farmer and businessman and a frequent contributor to past Republican campaigns, including Vitter’s. But now he is managing Traylor’s fledgling campaign and says Republicans who want Traylor to run believe the latest scandal isn’t the last.

“Is there more coming? We think there might be. And if there’s more coming, how bad is it? And what will happen to the women’s vote in Louisiana, and will he survive it?” said Dawson. “We think if Justice Traylor gets the nomination, he’ll win.”

Despite Traylor’s “complicated romantic history” – which if expressed in chart form would be tangled yet disturbingly vertical – Dawson says his candidate’s reputation is “impeccable”. Republican voters will have their say on Vitter and Traylor on August 28.

But there’s a PTSD episode connected to Traylor’s campaign personnel, as well. Lev Dawson’s son, Seth, who was appointed to the Louisiana State Police Commission in 2008, was arrested in May for drawing a gun on a security guard at Harrah’s Casino in New Orleans. Lev Dawson attributed his son’s behavior to symptoms of PTSD from a 2001 incident, saying: “On 9-11 [Seth Dawson] was involved in a gunfight with two drug dealers who were trying to collect a debt from another drug dealer. He shot and killed one of the drug dealers, a justified shooting, and suffered a severe form of PTSD.”

Back in November I wrote a post at Humid Beings with a teaser to a personal story that I will complete in the near future:

Several months ago I was riding in a car with a soldier named Vic, who just learned that he was going back to Afghanistan. We were driving through Broadmoor, and I asked about his circumstances. “You don’t know what it’s like over there,” he said. I agreed that I didn’t know, and asked what I could do for him before he left. He didn’t directly answer but became increasingly anxious and stressed. Then he pulled over and did something quite unexpected and dangerous.

It’s not too much of a spoiler to say that the conclusion to this nail-biter will involve Vic’s PTSD symptoms. By the way, I concluded that post with a chilling quote from a Boston Review article, which I described as speaking to “this perverse, recurring impulse we have to err on the side of LESS care for Vets, rather than more”. It still shocks me:

[Paul] Sullivan was working as an analyst at the Veterans Benefits Administration in Washington in early 2005 when he was called to a meeting with a top political appointee at the VA, Deputy Assistant Secretary for Policy Michael McLendon. McLendon, an intensely focused man in a neatly pressed suit, kept a Bible on his desk at the office. Sullivan explained to McLendon and the other attendees that the rise in benefits claims the VA was noticing was caused partly by Iraq and Afghanistan veterans who were suffering from PTSD. “That’s too many,” McLendon said, then hit his hand on the table. “They are too young” to be filing claims, and they are doing it “too soon.” He hit the table again. The claims, he said, are “costing us too much money,” and if the veterans “believed in God and country . . . they would not come home with PTSD.” At that point, he slammed his palm against the table a final time, making a loud smack. Everyone in the room fell silent.

The U.S. is still waging two long wars that began under different circumstances after 9/11, and continued throughout the Great Recession. Multiple deployments in these conflicts have taxed the psyches of military personnel and families in ways that are impossible to calculate. In addition, South Louisianans have been struck by two mega-disasters in the past five years: the  BP/Macondo oil gusher as well as hurricanes Katrina, Rita and the Federal Flood of New Orleans. The effects of all these disasters – compounded by wars and recession – will likely affect the mental health of Louisianans more severely than anywhere else.

The irony in all this is that even as the disorder’s scary symptoms creep into campaign PR battles, Louisiana’s Senatorial candidates seem to have no platform on the issue, beyond using it to bash their opponent. Sure it’s fun to speculate about a wave of Vitter disclosures being on the horizon, but not if we’re ignoring the wave of mental health challenges that’s about to crest.

Perfunctory platitudes in a few campaign speeches to veterans groups aren’t enough. I fear PTSD won’t be treated as a top-tier issue for our state until it’s recognized as an official  ”crisis”– probably only after a series of high-profile PTSD acts result in deat

Obama moratorium may be result of being twice bitten

Despite howls from South Louisiana, President Obama hasn’t budged on his deepwater oil drilling moratorium, which will cost thousands of jobs.  Many people can’t understand why he is so steadfast on this particular policy response to the BP oil disaster, while being somewhat flexible on other issues, such as  sand berms and skimmers.

Many conservative pundits imply that Obama’s slow response to the oil disaster and his drilling moratorium policy are payback to Louisiana, which voted for John McCain over Obama in 2008. It’s a pretty hideous thought, to which I reply: If the President has such a vendetta against Louisiana, why was he moving forward on coastal wetlands restoration, which is so important to Louisiana’s long-term future? Opting to tackle a hugely expensive problem in a state you can never win is an odd way to demonstrate political vengeance. Why not kick the issue down the road for a term or two (as other presidents have done) and let Louisiana wash away? Further, if Obama wanted to hurt Louisiana, why would he announce a massive expansion in offshore drilling areas in early March?

Obviously, explaining Obama’s motivation in terms of his “hatred” for Louisiana is too simplistic, and hardly accounts for the totality of his policies. But that hasn’t stopped some conservatives from holding fast to the premise, and promoting all kinds of bizarre conspiracy theories about the oil gusher that shouldn’t be dignified with a serious response.

When Obama signaled a desire to “make tough decisions” about expanding drilling in his State of the Union speech, many (including myself) assumed this was part of a compromise with pro-drilling Republicans, in order to pass an Energy bill in 2010.  Expanded drilling seemed to be a prime bargaining chip for Obama – a way to lure votes to pass legislation that would include a tax on carbon and other so-called “Cap and Trade” provisions. (Like many of the elements in Obama’s Health Care bill, the “Cap and Trade” idea was originally proposed by conservatives.)

Obviously, Obama’s strategy didn’t go as planned. The BP Macondo oil gusher erupted in April, and became a political nightmare for the administration. Obama suspended his plans to expand oil drilling and ordered a 6-month deepwater oil-drilling moratorium, despite Big Oil’s talking points and the sincere concerns from Louisianans worried about job loss. Climate change legislation – whose prospects were always dubious – lost all momentum after the brutal Health Care debate, and is now officially toast.

So, again: What accounts for Obama’s intransigence on the moratorium issue? Surely, a six-month stoppage of deepwater drilling after the biggest environmental catastrophe in memory is not a wildly unjustified overreaction. Big Oil has always downplayed the catastrophic risks of blowouts, and lied – there’s no other word for it – about their ability to clean and mitigate massive oil spills. The excruciating saga of “top hats,” “top kills” and other experimental solutions, designed and built on the fly, has been a cruel, absurd spectacle for Gulf Coast residents to witness. Now a tropical storm might push oil far into Louisiana’s precious estuaries.  Is it so extreme for Obama to order the oil industry to “pause before they play” rather than “drill, baby, drill” during an ongoing catastrophe?

Perhaps not. We still don’t know the long-term effects of this disaster. But the immediate flip side is jobs: thousands of good jobs in a catastrophe-stricken state that is all too dependent on oil. Why doesn’t Obama opt for a less draconian solution that will cost fewer jobs while preserving safety? Why not require mandatory relief wells for deepwater drilling, or have revolving safety inspections at each rig, or allow drilling that doesn’t tap oil reservoirs? Why insist on a moratorium that will cost thousands of good jobs during a slowing recovery? It’s puzzling. While “hatred of Louisiana” is too simplistic an explanation, we shouldn’t dismiss the possibility of a political angle. After all, Louisiana does have a governor with aspirations to national office. And, as web pundit Mike Stagg points out, the moratorium directly affects the business interests of two of the state’s biggest Republican contributors.

But do we really think Obama’s commitment to a moratorium is about sticking it to Gov. Bobby Jindal or Republican businessmen? While perfectly sufficient for many talk radio loons, that theory still doesn’t explain why a few months ago Obama wanted to help Jindal’s state with coastal restoration, and enrich Louisiana oil service titans by expanding drilling operations in the Gulf.

A recent Wall Street Journal cover story offers a remarkably informative background to the moratorium, which may help us better understand Obama’s uncharacteristically firm commitment to the moratorium. It shows that the policy responses to the BP Oil Gusher disaster did not occur in a vacuum.

The moratorium was not a separate, discrete decision made after an isolated “one-time” disaster event. It occurred after a series of decisions by the Obama administration to expand and promote oil drilling despite repeated warnings from courts, scientists and activists, that industry and government were ignoring large, environmental risks inherent in oil drilling. My interpretation is that Obama repeatedly decided to “bet” against the (small) chance of an oil catastrophe, in order to have an offshore drilling “bargaining chip” that he thought would lead, eventually, to an Energy bill. For him, it was a political means to a desired end – and he got badly burned. Then, as the dimensions of the disaster became clearer, he overreacted with a harsh measure against Big Oil, whose untimely disaster spoiled his big legislative goals.

Here are select quotes from the WSJ story. Please read it in full and tell me your view in the comments:

Less than four months after President Barack Obama took office, his new administration received a forceful warning about the dangers of offshore oil drilling.

The alarm was rung by a federal appeals court in Washington, D.C., which found that the government was unprepared for a major spill at sea, relying on an “irrational” environmental analysis of the risks of offshore drilling.

The April 2009 ruling stunned both the administration and the oil industry, and threatened to delay or cancel dozens of offshore projects in Alaska and the Gulf of Mexico.

Despite its pro-environment pledges, the Obama administration urged the court to revisit the decision. Politically, it needed to push ahead with conventional oil production while it expanded support for renewable energy.
…

The U.S. Court of Appeals reversed its decision and allowed drilling in the Gulf to proceed—including on BP PLC’s now-infamous Macondo well, 50 miles off the Louisiana coast.
The Obama administration’s actions in the court case exemplify the dilemma the White House faced in developing its energy policy. In his presidential campaign, President Obama criticized the Bush administration for being too soft on the oil industry and vowed to support greener energy forms.

But, once in office, President Obama ended up backing offshore drilling, bowing to political and fiscal realties, even as his administration’s own scientists and Democratic lawmakers warned about its risks.

…
Along with cleaning up the [scandal-plagued Minerals Management Service, the Interior Department] had to wrestle with a five-year drilling plan the Bush administration had filed just days before leaving office. The plan sought to open the waters in most of the U.S. outer-continental shelf to oil and gas exploration between 2010 and 2015. The push into ever-deeper waters in the Gulf, which began in earnest in the mid-1990s, reflected the reality that drilling in shallower waters was largely tapped out.

To buy time and work out its own policy preferences, the Obama administration reopened the Bush plan for public comment.
…

The administration was apprehensive about expanding offshore drilling. But it also hoped to get a legislative package on climate change through Congress. At the center of the bill was a controversial and potentially expensive provision requiring companies to acquire permits to release carbon dioxide.

To navigate Capitol Hill, the administration needed to strike a balance between the “green energy” projects favored by environmentalists and liberals, and the traditional oil and gas projects favored by Republicans, whose support would be crucial in the Senate. Continuing to promote offshore drilling was part of that bargain.

…

Still, inside the administration there was debate about the right policy for offshore drilling.
On Sept. 21, Jane Lubchenco, Mr. Obama’s handpicked head of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, filed a lengthy comment on the Bush-era drilling plan still under review. She cited several concerns, including the government’s tendency to underestimate the likelihood of oil spills and to downplay their potential environmental impacts. She also noted the government’s penchant for cribbing from older, often outdated, environmental analyses.
She cited a Congressional Research Service study from earlier in the year. “The threat of oil spills raises the question,” the report said, “of whether U.S. officials have the necessary resources at hand to respond to a major spill.”

So first there was an alarming court ruling about oil spill risk and preparedness. Despite environmental concerns from officials in his own administration, Obama (reluctantly?) allied with Big Oil to argue that new drilling was necessary. Perhaps he thought the risk was low enough, and the ends (a climate/energy bill) justified the means (expanded drilling).  Strike one.

The administration’s struggle to find middle ground on its offshore policy came to a head in Senate hearings in mid-November, just weeks after a drilling rig off the coast of Australia had suffered a deepwater blowout, creating an oil leak that would go on for months.

MMS Deputy Director Walter Cruickshank assured the panel that such fears were misplaced. The Australian rig wouldn’t have been licensed to operate in U.S. waters, he said. The U.S., he said, had “what we believe is the most aggressive oil spill contingency planning…in the world.” Two weeks before the Deepwater Horizon explosion, President Obama offered a plug for wider offshore exploration. “Oil rigs today generally don’t cause spills,” he told a gathering in Charlotte, N.C. “They are technologically very advanced.”

Sen. Robert Menendez (D-NJ) pointed to an enlarged photo of the Australian rig in flames and asked rhetorically whether he was “just being old-fashioned” to worry that a similar blowout could occur in the U.S.

So after the inconvenient court ruling comes the Montara oil gusher off Australia’s coast. But instead of reversing itself out of caution, the Obama’s administration “doubled down” on not having an accident. They “kept much of the Bush [drilling] plan intact, and even added for the first time new lease sales off the coast of Virginia”. They joined The Petroleum Institute in arguing that drilling was safe, relying “extensively on environmental impact analyses carried out in April 2007 that the court had found wanting”. Strike two.

On April 20, with the blowout on the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig, everything changed.
The Macondo spill has forced the administration to take many of the steps it dismissed as draconian last summer in the wake of the appeals court ruling. On May 27, Mr. Salazar canceled a lease sale in the Gulf set for August. He ordered that all lease sales set for 2011 had to face tougher environmental scrutiny.
And he ordered a six-month moratorium on all drilling activity in the Gulf of Mexico. That moratorium was struck down as arbitrary by a federal judge in New Orleans in June, but Mr. Salazar has fought back, insisting the moratorium remain in place. So far the judge’s ruling stands.

The BP/Macondo disaster was strike three for Big Oil.

The WSJ article demonstrates that the Macondo was not an isolated event. It occurred after the Obama administration repeatedly sided with Big Oil after a court ruling and a blowout in Australia. Obama’s team hoped the disaster risks were justified by the larger goal of nominally bipartisan energy legislation in 2010. But now “Cap and Trade”  is dead, along with thousands of birds and fish in the Gulf. Obama bet with Big Oil again and again, and eventually lost big. Now he feels burned, and is in no mood to err on anything but the side of extreme safety.  Perhaps, viewed in this larger historical context, the moratorium seems much less extreme than it does as an isolated policy decision.