Oilgate could spell the end of Obama

By JR Dieckmann

What is wrong with Obama? Did he actually go down to the gulf and try to suck up oil with a straw after saying he couldn't do it? You might think so by the way he has been handling the gulf oil spill. Rahm Emanuel says, "Never let a crisis go to waste," while the Obama administration is exploiting the oil spill for every political point they can make. Enter the cap & tax energy bill — designed in part to kill the oil industry.

Obama has done just about everything wrong since snorting that oil. The Energy and Commerce Committee's Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations prematurely held hearings — strike that — interrogations of BP CEO Tony Hayword last Thursday. Most of the questions concerned decisions made on the rig during the drilling process. Hayword had one answer to almost all of their questions, "I don't have that information, the investigation is not yet complete."

Of course, he wouldn't have the answers. He is the CEO charged with running the overall company, not the drilling Forman who was involved in these decisions. The CEO doesn't have time to be involved in every operational decision of every rig in the company; it's not his job. That's what managers are for. Even if he did have the answers, he is not going to answer questions that are under investigation by Obama's justice department. Anything he might say would be used against him in court.

Time and again, they drilled Hayword with questions on well pipe centralizers and the cementing operation. The issue centered around BP's decision to use seven centralizers on the well pipe instead of the 21 recommended by Halliburton. It was an engineering decision made aboard the drill ship and agreed to by Halliburton. Centralizers are attachments that encircle the pipe to keep it centered in the borehole during cement operations.

Why was so much time spent with questions about the well pipe and cement job? The well pipe and cementing appear to have suffered no failure and are still perfectly intact — as far as we've been told. They had nothing to do with the blowout that occurred at the top of the riser pipe, a mile above the sea floor.

Oh yeah, Dick Cheney was once CEO of Halliburton who did the cementing of the well pipe. It must be Bush's fault. Or maybe it was made into such an issue to show that BP had cut corners and costs, and that was the best example they could come up with.

Or maybe it was something else that we are not being told. Did the committee know of a problem with the borehole? Why didn't Hayward at least point out that no failures had occurred in the borehole and save himself an hour of badgering. Could it be that he didn't want to commit perjury? If Hayword and the committee knew of a problem with the well itself, then Obama would have known about it too.

I have just received what appears to be reliable information that the problem may be much worse than we have been told. The source tells me that the down pipe has been compromised and is leaking oil into the sea floor. Any attempt to cap the well and stop the oil plume at the wellhead would result in the rupturing of the down pipe, collapse of the wellhead, expanding the borehole in the ocean floor through erosion, and creating an unstoppable gusher of oil that will continue to get larger until the entire oil reservoir has emptied into the Gulf of Mexico.

This scenario is likely to happen soon due to erosion even without attempting to cap the well. The only hope for the gulf is for BP to complete the relief well before it does. I will have more details on this posted on GreatAmericanJournal.com in the next few days. This is a worse case scenario but unfortunately, the source of the information can see no other scenario possible.

You can follow the work now being done on the seafloor with 12 streaming video feeds from the underwater ROVs at the Great American Journal website.

One highly significant question was asked at the hearing, but it was asked of committee chairman Bart Stupak by Rep. Phil Gingrey of Georgia: Why are officers of the Mineral Management Service not at this hearing and being questioned? Rep. Michael Burgess of Texas later reiterated the same point saying that MMS needs to be held accountable for the miserable cleanup failures.

Everything BP did on that rig was regulated and approved by the MMS. With hundreds of safety violations already against BP, why didn't MMS or Congress speak up and investigate this before the drilling was done under a record 5000 feet of water?

As Stupak gaveled down for a recess, Burgess again brought up his request for the MMS to be present at the hearing. Stupak didn't want to hear it. He immediately interrupted, shoved it under the rug, and recessed the hearings. He seemed quite upset that anyone on the panel would even suggest that questions be asked of Obama's MMS department, but he did say that there would be at least two more hearings and that all parties would be heard from. He then added, "MMS isn't going to help Mr. Hayward answer these questions."

On Wednesday, Tony Hayword had met with the White House and agreed to a $20 billion trust fund for the victims of the spill. Obama and BP agreed that the fund will be run by Kenneth Feinberg, now the White House's "pay czar" who sets salary limits for executives of companies getting government bailout money.

If our free market economy is even going to be salvaged, companies and states must stop accepting federal money and the strings that come with it. BP also agreed to put another $100 million into a foundation for out-of-work oilrig workers.

Rep. Joe Barton called it a "shakedown." I don't know if that's the right word to use, but it is cause for concern. BP said they would cover all LEGITIMATE claims but they should never have agreed to this. Why — because with the White House administering the payouts, a lot of the money will go to people whom Obama put out of work with his 6 month moratorium on oil production. BP is not responsible for that — Obama is. BP shouldn't have to pay for Obama's disastrous and politically oriented response to the spill, but now they will.

With a 6-month moratorium on oil wells in the gulf and Alaska, thousands of oil workers are now out of work and those jobs aren't going to come back. Those floating oilrigs will be moved to less hostile waters in countries that are friendly to oil drilling. The rigs are way too expensive to let them just sit idle and unproductive. They are not going to wait around while their business dies and Obama fiddles.

Thousands of fraudulent claims are now pouring into the gulf region. It's going to be up to Feinberg to decide which claims to pay and which to reject. With the White House deciding which claims are valid and which are fraudulent, isn't it likely that the first question asked of the applicant will be: Which union do you belong to? The fishermen better find one and sign up before they file their claims.

In an email to his worshipers, the Obama regime says Joe Barton should step down for his shakedown comment. When are Democrats even asked to step down for their nasty and derogatory comments? But just let a Republican show a little contempt for this regime and it's off with their head.

Hell no he should not step down. He should step up more often — and more representatives of the people on the right should do the same. They are the only ones who are standing up for Americas' energy needs, affordable taxes, and constitutional rights and liberties that the left has been trampling on.

Hayword should have stood his ground and insisted that BP attorneys and the courts would determine the credible claims. When will these industry CEOs get a spine instead of cowering in the corner when these despicable politicians start hammering on them? It was the same with the CEOs of GM and Chrysler who were even badgered into selling their private jets and taking the train. Stop kissing government asses and defend yourself. The government is not your mother.

BP doesn't even have $20 billion. Their available funds currently rest at $7 billion. They have worked out a payment schedule with the government, but that is contingent on BP remaining a viable and solvent company. Already, BP stock has lost 50% of its value and BP has agreed to deny stockholder dividends. What effect is that going to have on BP stock? Who wants to invest in a company stock that doesn't pay dividends?

With the typical Obama demonizing and badmouthing of privately owned companies and industries, BP has been made the sacrificial lamb in the Progressives' scheme to destroy the oil industry, just as Fannie and Freddie were sacrificed to disrupt the economy in an election year. In spite of their $100 billion bailouts, Fannie and Freddie stock, now down to about 42 cents, is being taken off the stock exchange while the two are back asking for more taxpayers' money.

With the oil cleanup costs, the lawsuits, and loss of production, BP may not be able to pay the claims and may end up in bankruptcy court. Then who do you suppose will be held liable for the claims? That's right, we taxpayers. BP stock may go the way of Fannie and Freddie stock. Will BP too get a taxpayer bailout, and how much will that cost us? Where are the British pounds?

So not only will we have to shell out a minimum of $20 billion to cover oil damage claims, but also to cover the income of those oil workers that Obama put out of work with his 6 month moratorium on oil production in the gulf and in Alaska. And that $20 billion? — They say that is just the beginning. But I am sure Congress will work that into their "pay as you go" budget by cutting out tens of billions in waste.

A majority of these expenses could have been avoided as well as most of the shoreline damage with proper government management. When 13 oil-producing countries with ships equipped for oil cleanup offered to help, Obama refused the offers. When they sent their ships to the gulf anyway, Obama dug up the 100-year-old Jones Act to deny them entry into the gulf.

The Jones act — waved by President Bush during Katrina — and other presidents, was created to protect American Merchant Marine ships from foreign competition while hauling goods in American waters from port to port.

These foreign skimmer ships and tankers have the capacity to collect 88% of the oil being spilled into the gulf. They are still waiting outside the gulf while Obama refuses to wave the Jones Act.

Is Obama intentionally making this crisis worse, or does he simply care more about protecting union jobs than the people and businesses along the gulf coast and especially Louisiana? Maybe "he just hates black people." On the other hand, maybe he just hates white people.

What is ironic here is that BP is run by a bunch of European liberals who supported Obama and were a major contributor to his campaign. Now, with the demonization of BP by Obama, the dogs are eating the dogs and turning on their own kind. The only difference is that the dogs being demonized are productive workers.

Obama has done everything wrong from day one of the oil spill. Many people believe he is doing it intentionally while others believe he is just an idiot with no idea of what to do. I think maybe it is both. This is just another crisis not to be wasted and a chance to run up the bill for the taxpayers again. But I also see signs now that due to his massive failures of leadership, this could be the crisis that destroys his presidency as his poll numbers fall to an all time low.

"Every time that we try to lift a problem from our own shoulders, and shift that problem to the hands of the government, to the same extent we are sacrificing the liberties of our people." — John F. Kennedy

Even JFK would be turning over in his grave if he could see what is going on now with this regime in Washington.

© JR Dieckmann