Wednesday, June 16, 2010

A Speech Too Far

(too far from the point, and from timeliness, to be specific)

It took 2 hours of after-comment, a World Cup match (Ivory coast vs Portugal) inundated with those less-annoying-than-an-Obama-speech vuvuzelas, and a little crab fishing (Deadliest Catch), to wash the bad taste out of my mouth from the anger that I was forced to vomit out as I listened to a speech that was 10 minutes longer than necessary, and most certainly a speech that would have made sense had it been given IN APRIL when there was a need for the leader of this country to mobilize everything we could scrape up to combat this mess.

So rather than piecemeal the POS speech, I'll grab a few snippets that hit the most important points:

That is why just after the rig sank, I assembled a team of our nation's best scientists and engineers to tackle this challenge....

From the very beginning of this crisis, the federal government has been in charge of the largest environmental cleanup effort in our nation's history....


The first thing is this "from day one" bullshit, when the evidence is to the contrary.  He didn't address it in the first day, or the first week.  The Dutch offered some ships we haven't taken.  There is some collection equipment still sitting in (I think) Maine.  There was a plan to burn the oil that was authorized in advance but never implemented.  Requests for support and authorizations to build breaks are still being ignored.  (Note to Bobby Jindall:  You should have made a call, and then said screw the feds and started building up the sand after a week.)

Simply put: it's BP's responsibility to "plug the damned hole," but only the federal government is big enough, powerful enough, and loaded with enough resources to combat a massive oil spill threatening several states.  And waiting two months to make a speech mostly about what you're GOING TO DO for an oil spill is wretched incompetence at best.

And in the snide comment bin:  If the government has been in charge of the cleanup, that explains why the beach is covered.

We will make BP pay for the damage their company has caused.

Now I will be clear that BP is most certainly financially responsible for this mess.  No one is arguing that point.  But there was a whole section in this speech about how the Obama's Imperial Federal government was going to punish those filthy, disgusting, evil bastards at BP while they're working to cap the well and there's still assloads of oil to clean up.

*smacking the President of the United States upside his head*

Seriously?  You're worried about punishing a company before the investigation is complete?  Your concern is to make them hand over billions of dollars for you (or your handpicked cronies) to hand out? 

There's a time for BP to pay for the mess.  But turning them into the ultimate evil of the week to make an enemy to "fight" in this "crisis" does nothing to help the damned situation.  If I had a grease fire in my kitchen because a child turned on a burner, I'd take care of the fire, then the smoke.  Only then, after the damage was contained and there was nothing that required my immediate attention,  would I be looking for who's "ass needs kicked."  In the grease fire situation, it would be scrubbing soot off walls and ceilings (which sucks so very much).  In the oil spill, that's after the well is contained and the spill is cleaned or dispersed from the ocean for the most part.

Oh, and if BP is collapsed from all the demonizing (and the boycot bullshit, and so on), how the hell will they be able to pay for all of this?  They're not the government; they can't just print and borrow it.  And if I were BP's CEO, after hearing that speech I'd call the White House and tell him I'm not coming and to go to hell.

The third part of our response plan is the steps we're taking to ensure that a disaster like this does not happen again.

First of all, this is the first major accident in 40 years. We already know that there were things done wrong that led to the accident. So "to ensure that a disaster like this does not happen again," we don't do what they did.

Wow, that was easy, wasn't it?  Can I get the money that was going to be wasted on some commission of eggheads that will come up with the one good piece of regulation and a gazillion stupid ones to fix the problem?  I wouldn't need another thing from the government after that.

So that makes me wonder how banning all drilling for 6 months will help?  Not only are we talking just idling an industry that could investigate the accident while they continue a necessary process, but it's also doing more damage to the economy of a state already damaged by Katrina, and by an oil spill.  

And while I'm thinking about Katrina, I want to apologize for calling this mess "Obama's Katrina."  Specifically, I want to apologize to the Bush administration.  Their response was slow, but they got it cranked up and dealt with it.  They learned, they improved.  And they led.  They didn't spend two months spinning and blaming and waiting until their own party started turning on them before they took bold action made a bold speech.

Which brings us to the political crap: 

Clean energy, clean energy, clean energy, clean energy, clean energy, clean energy, clean energy, clean energy, clean energy, clean energy, clean energy, clean energy....
Now why do I say this is crap?  It's not because I don't think that oil is the future of energy.  It's because we don't even know what the technology that will replace oil is going to be.  It's not ethanol.  It's not solar and wind.  And there's nothing out there with enough research to even be close yet. When we find it, oil will die, as did steam engines and horses.

Of the things we do have, oil has become harder because of all the places we've decided we "can't" drill.  Natural gas could be a better alternative, but again, it's a fight against the enviro-douches and the NIMBY brigades (the latter also don't like wind turbines).  And then there's nuclear.  Clean as hell, but no one is building anything (thanks, e-douches, NIMBYs, and the red tape brigades).  Oh well, maybe we can go back to horses, and make fuel out of the horseshit too.

In the end, energy independence and this clean energy pipe dream bullshit are mutually exclusive.  And it will be paid for by taxes on top of taxes.  AND WHY ARE WE WORRIED ABOUT YOUR FUCKING AGENDA WHEN THERE'S A MESS TO CLAN UP?!?!  I shouldn't even have to have written these last three paragraphs.  

*banging head against wall, then going to bed*

(Wow, it's 2:15.  Sleep good.)

4 comments:

Satyavati devi dasi said...

And then there's nuclear. Clean as hell,

...let's check with them folks in PA about that, and how bout the good people of Chernobyl?

In the end, energy independence and this clean energy pipe dream bullshit are mutually exclusive.

That's defeatist. It's an attitude that promotes indifference and apathy. It's a whole lot of bullshit.

I feel like crap. Don't piss me off today.

Shaw Kenawe said...

Dear Patrick,

How's your head?

Patrick M said...

Saty: Yes, nuclear is clean as hell. And safe as hell. We've had one small accident 30 years prior. And that didn't do that much damage. We all know why Chernobyl blew.

Compare that with what coal does. No question which one is safer.

As

And yes, energy independence and this clean energy pipe dream bullshit are mutually exclusive.

It's not that we won't come up with a clean energy source. It's that no one has yet, which means we are probably decades from being able to implement it. Trying to force us that direction before we can is the fastest way to gimp the whole damned economy (which will make us more dependent on foreign everything).

And the fact that the AKOTUS is busy using a disaster to push this shit is reprehensible at best.


Shaw: Full of unwritten wisdom.

dmarks said...

"And then there's nuclear. Clean as hell"

OK, lets put THIS claim to the test. OK, would you honestly rather sleep with a bucket of plutonium under your bed, or a bucket of coal dust?