June 2010

The Obama Administration recently used red tape to force Louisiana to stop using 16 barges that were cleaning up the Gulf of Mexico by sucking thousands of gallons of oil out of Louisiana’s oil-soaked waters.

Earlier, it delayed the clean-up of the Gulf of Mexico by months, by blocking foreign crews from operating sophisticated clean-up vessels.  The Jones Act bans foreign vessels and crews from working in U.S. waters, but it gives the president the authority to completely waive that ban if he wishes.  Obama refused to lift the ban, even though American shippers who generally support the ban said they wouldn’t object to lifting it to fight the spill.  As a result of the ban, the U.S. has rejected a lot of foreign aid from counties with expertise in fighting oil spills, and accepted only a small amount of foreign equipment to fight the spill.

Even Democrats are now criticizing the Obama administration for refusing to waive the ban to allow America’s allies to clean up the oil spill:

“Rep. Corrine Brown (D-Fla.) said it was unacceptable that her state couldn’t utilize foreign vessels for skimming. She held up pictures of skimmers available in Mexico and Norway that could help.  ‘We are in emergency mode and we need skimmers,’ Brown said. ‘We need the big ones. I understand they’re available in other countries, including Mexico and Norway. What is the process for the state to utilize these vessels from other countries? … We’re talking about protecting Florida’s coast.’ . . .Deputy Maritime Administrator David Matsuda confirmed there has been one Jones Act waiver request for a foreign deck barge to operate within three miles of the U.S. coast. That request was denied . . . .Of course, the Obama administration could eliminate the bureaucratic delay entirely by simply following the precedent set by the Bush administration, which waived the Jones Act in the aftermath of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita in 2005 to transport oil and gasoline throughout the Gulf region. Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano has the legal authority to suspend the law.”

“The BP clean-up effort in the Gulf of Mexico is hampered by the Jones Act. This is a piece of 1920s protectionist legislation, that requires all vessels working in U.S. waters to be American-built, and American-crewed. So” the U.S. Coast Guard ”can’t accept, and therefore don’t ask for, the assistance of high-tech European vessels specifically designed for the task in hand.”

The law itself permits the president to waive these requirements, and such waivers were “granted, promptly, by the Bush administration,” in the aftermath of hurricanes and other emergencies. But Obama refused to do so after the spill, notes David Warren in the Ottawa Citizen.  Instead, Obama rejected a Dutch offer to help clean up the spill, noted Voice of America News:

“The Obama administration declined the Dutch offer partly because of the Jones Act, which restricts foreign ships from certain activities in U.S. waters.  During the Hurricane Katrina crisis five years ago, the Bush administration waived the Jones Act in order to facilitate some foreign assistance, but such a waiver was not given in this case.”

“After the Obama administration refused help from the Netherlands, Geert Visser, the consul general for the Netherlands in Houston, told Loren Steffy: ‘Let’s forget about politics; let’s get it done.’” But for Obama, politics always comes first: “The explanation of Obama’s reluctance to seek this remedy is his cozy relationship with labor unions. . . ‘The unions see it [not waiving the act] as … protecting jobs. They hate when the Jones Act gets waived.’”

(The Obama Administration belatedly accepted some foreign equipment for use in fighting the spill, although it still blocked ships with foreign crews from working in U.S. waters.  As Voice of America notes, although ”the Netherlands offered help in April,” such as providing ”sophisticated” oil “skimmers and dredging devices,” the Obama Administration blocked their crews from working in U.S. waters, and as a result, this crucial ”operation was delayed until U.S. crews could be trained” in June.  “The Dutch also offered assistance with building sand berms (barriers) along the coast of Louisiana to protect sensitive marshlands, but that offer was also rejected, even though Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal had been requesting such protective barriers.”)

In April 2009, the Obama administration granted BP, a big supporter of Obama, a waiver of environmental regulations.  But after the oil spill, it blocked Louisiana from protecting its coastline against the oil spill by delaying rather than expediting regulatory approval of essential protective measures.  It has also chosen not to use what has been described as “the most effective method” of fighting the spill, a method successfully used in other oil spills.  Democratic strategist James Carville called Obama’s handling of the oil spill “lackadaisical” and “unbelievable” in its “stupidity.”

Obama is now using BP’s oil spill to push the global-warming legislation that BP had lobbied for.  Obama’s global-warming legislation expands ethanol subsidies, which cause famine, starvation, and food riots in poor countries by shrinking the food supply.  Ethanol makes gasoline costlier and dirtier, increases ozone pollution, and increases the death toll from smog and air pollution.   Ethanol production also results in deforestation, soil erosion, and water pollution. Subsidies for biofuels like ethanol are a big source of corporate welfare: “BP has lobbied for and profited from subsidies for biofuels . . . that cannot break even without government support.”

In his speech last night, President Obama used the massive oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico to push his failed energy policies, such as a “green jobs” program that has replaced American jobs with foreign “green” jobs, and a climate-change bill that includes ecologically-devastating ethanol subsidies.  Meanwhile, Louisiana residents rated Obama’s inept response to the oil spill as worse than Bush’s much-criticized response to Hurricane Katrina, in a public opinion poll–perhaps because Obama delayed the clean-up of the oil spill by blocking assistance from many foreign experts.

Obama used the oil spill to push for more so-called “green jobs” programs, deceptively boasting that “over the last year and a half,” the government has subsidized the so-called “clean energy industry.”  This was a reference to the February 2009 stimulus package, which contained so-called “green jobs” funding, 79 percent of which went to foreign firms, replacing American jobs with foreign green jobs.  (The administration never bothered to define what a “green job” is, and some so-called “green jobs” turn out to be harmful to the environment.)  The stimulus package also contained regulations that destroyed jobs in America’s export sector.

In his speech, Obama also used the spill to push the so-called “comprehensive energy and climate bill” passed by the “House of Representatives” late “last year.”  That bill expands ethanol subsidies, which cause famine, starvation, and food riots in poor countries by shrinking the food supply.  Ethanol makes gasoline costlier and dirtier, increases ozone pollution, and increases the death toll from smog and air pollution.   Ethanol production also results in deforestation, soil erosion, and water pollution. Subsidies for biofuels like ethanol are a big source of corporate welfare: “BP has lobbied for and profited from subsidies for biofuels . . . that cannot break even without government support.”

Obama said nothing about waiving the Jones Act, a law that bans foreign ships from working in the U.S. waters unless the President waives the ban.  Past presidents have waived the ban after hurricanes to allow foreign experts to assist the U.S., and speed shipping of relief to hurricane victims.  But Obama refused to do so after the spill, report Voice of America News, the Washington Examiner, and Canadian, Australian, and European newspapers, even though it would make obvious sense to accept help from oil-producing, maritime countries like Norway that have big fleets and expertise in handling oil-drilling and oil-spill issues.   As a result, the Obama administration rejected various offers of assistance from Norwegian, Belgian, Dutch, and Mexican firms.

(The Obama administration has belatedly accepted some foreign equipment for use in fighting the spill, although it continued to block ships with foreign crews, delaying the foreign equipment’s use.  As Voice of America notes, although ”the Netherlands offered help in April,” such as providing ”sophisticated” oil “skimmers and dredging devices,” the Obama administration blocked their crews from working in U.S. waters, and as a result, this crucial ”operation was delayed until U.S. crews could be trained” in June.  “The Dutch also offered assistance with building sand berms (barriers) along the coast of Louisiana to protect sensitive marshlands, but that offer was also rejected, even though Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal had been requesting such protective barriers.”)

In April 2009, the Obama administration granted BP, a supporter of Obama, a waiver of environmental regulations.  But after the oil spill, it blocked Louisiana from protecting its coastline against the oil spill by delaying rather than expediting regulatory approval of essential protective measures.  It has also chosen not to use what has been described as “the most effective method“ of fighting the spill, a method successfully used in other oil spills.  Democratic strategist James Carville called Obama’s handling of the oil spill “lackadaisical“ and “unbelievable“ in its “stupidity.”

Crucial offers to help clean up BP’s oil spill “have come from Belgian, Dutch, and Norwegian firms that . . . possess some of the world’s most advanced oil skimming ships.” But the Obama administration wouldn’t accept the help, because doing so would require it to do something past presidents have routinely done: waive rules imposed by the Jones Act, a law backed by unions.

“The BP clean-up effort in the Gulf of Mexico is hampered by the Jones Act. This is a piece of 1920s protectionist legislation, that requires all vessels working in U.S. waters to be American-built, and American-crewed. So . . . the U.S. Coast Guard . . . can’t accept, and therefore don’t ask for, the assistance of high-tech European vessels specifically designed for the task in hand.”

The law itself permits the president to waive these requirements, and such waivers were “granted, promptly, by the Bush administration,” in the aftermath of hurricanes and other emergencies. But Obama has refused to do so, notes David Warren in the Ottawa Citizen. Instead, Obama rejected a Dutch offer to help clean up the spill, noted Voice of America News:

“The Obama administration declined the Dutch offer partly because of the Jones Act, which restricts foreign ships from certain activities in U.S. waters.  During the Hurricane Katrina crisis five years ago, the Bush administration waived the Jones Act in order to facilitate some foreign assistance, but such a waiver was not given in this case.”

“After the Obama administration refused help from the Netherlands, Geert Visser, the consul general for the Netherlands in Houston, told Loren Steffy: ‘Let’s forget about politics; let’s get it done.’” But for Obama, politics always comes first: “The explanation of Obama’s reluctance to seek this remedy is his cozy relationship with labor unions. . . ‘The unions see it [not waiving the act] as … protecting jobs. They hate when the Jones Act gets waived.’”

Ironically, even the staunchest supporters of the Jones Act are now distancing themselves from refusals to accept foreign help, saying they have “not and will not stand in the way of the use of these well-established waiver procedures to address this crisis.” Obama is being more intransigently pro-union than the unions themselves.

One can only hope Obama will change his mind now, given that “each day our European allies are prevented from helping us speed up the clean up is another day that Gulf fishing and tourism jobs die.”

(The Obama administration has belatedly accepted some foreign equipment for use in fighting the spill, although it still blocks ships with foreign crews. As Voice of America notes, although “the Netherlands offered help in April,” such as providing “sophisticated” oil “skimmers and dredging devices,” the Obama administration blocked their crews from working in U.S. waters, and as a result, this crucial “operation was delayed until U.S. crews could be trained” in June. “The Dutch also offered assistance with building sand berms (barriers) along the coast of Louisiana to protect sensitive marshlands, but that offer was also rejected, even though Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal had been requesting such protective barriers.”)

In April 2009, the Obama administration granted BP, a big supporter of Obama, a waiver of environmental regulations.  But after the oil spill, it blocked Louisiana from protecting its coastline against the oil spill by delaying rather than expediting regulatory approval of essential protective measures.  It has also chosen not to use what has been described as “the most effective method” of fighting the spill, a method successfully used in other oil spills.  Democratic strategist James Carville called Obama’s handling of the oil spill “lackadaisical” and “unbelievable” in its “stupidity.”

Obama is now using BP’s oil spill to push the global-warming legislation that BP had lobbied for.  Obama’s global warming legislation expands ethanol subsidies, which cause famine, starvation, and food riots in poor countries by shrinking the food supply.  Ethanol makes gasoline costlier and dirtier, increases ozone pollution, and increases the death toll from smog and air pollution.   Ethanol production also results in deforestation, soil erosion, and water pollution. Subsidies for biofuels like ethanol are a big source of corporate welfare: “BP has lobbied for and profited from subsidies for biofuels . . . that cannot break even without government support.”

The $800 billion stimulus package is also using taxpayer subsidies to replace U.S. jobs with foreign green jobs. And its regulations destroy jobs in America’s export sector.

Last Thursday, by a vote of 53-47, the Senate rejected S.J.Res.26, Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski’s resolution of disapproval to overturn EPA’s endangerment rule.

Although Sen. Murkowski fell four votes short of achieving a legislative victory, she nonetheless won an important political victory. 

During the past four-plus months, despite vicious attacks by eco-pressure groups and preemptive cringing by the subsidy dependent auto industry, Sen. Murkowksi worked patiently, calmly, and indefatigably to clarify the real issues, which are: (1) “The sweeping powers being pursued by EPA are the worst possible option for reducing greenhouse gas emissions”; (2) “politically accountable members of the House and Senate, not unelected bureaucrats, must develop our nation’s energy and climate policies”; and (3) ”those policies must be able to pass on their own merits, instead of serving as a defense against ill-considered regulations.”

All 41 Republican Senators and six Democrats voted to stop EPA from ‘enacting’ controversial global warming policies through the regulatory back door. This means Democratic leaders have become the Party of Endangerment — the party taking ownership of the regulatory consequences of EPA’s endangerment rule; hence the party taking responsibility for the economic fallout.

By denying President Obama bipartisan cover for greenhouse gas regulation under the Clean Air Act, Sen. Murkowski has made EPA’s endangerment rule a political liability for Democrats and a political asset for Republicans in an election year.

That should increase the pressure on moderate Dems and Republicans alike to distance themselves from Democratic leaders and eschew cap-and-trade, which, like EPA’s regulations, would increase consumer energy prices, killing jobs and growth.

Sen. Murkowski’s opening and closing statements in the floor debate clearly and cogently explain how the endangerment rule imperils our economy and representative democracy. Below are some noteworthy excerpts.

Excerpts from Sen. Murkowski’s Opening Statement

The sweeping powers being pursued by the EPA are the worst possible option for reducing greenhouse gas emissions. . . .It would amount to an unprecedented power grab, ceding Congress’ responsibilities to unelected bureaucrats, and move an important debate from our open halls to behind an agency’s closed doors.

* * *

The only similarity I see between the spill in the Gulf of Mexico and EPA’s regulations is that both are unmitigated disasters — one happening now, the other waiting in the wings if Congress fails to adopt this resolution.

* * *

No one is more aware of this uncomfortable fact [that EPA’s regulatory net would expand by orders of magnitude] than the EPA itself. That’s why the agency has attempted to dramatically increase the thresholds for greenhouse gases in its so-called tailoring rule. Unhappy with the plain language of the Clean Air Act, the agency plans to lift its limits up to 1,000 times higher than Congress directed. It’s deeply disturbing that EPA did not accept that the Act is simply not structured for this task, and instead attempted to make it so by ignoring the plain language and unilaterally amending it.

* * *

I encourage my colleagues to think about the logic behind the tailoring rule. The EPA is asking us to accept that while greenhouse gases are not in the Clean Air Act, Congress clearly intended them to be regulated under it. At the same time, we’re expected to believe that while explicit regulatory thresholds are in the Act, Congress meant for EPA to ignore them.

* * *

To this day, the agency still has not provided anything close to a full projection of the economic impacts that its economy-wide climate regulations will have. There are two potential reasons why: the EPA either has no cost estimates, or knows they are too astronomical to calculate and release.

* * *

The problem is that BACT [best available control technology] remains completely undefined at this point. It could mean efficiency improvements, expensive add-on technologies, or even fuel-switching requirements. Over time, the EPA would have little choice but to impose all of those requirements and more, regardless of the consequences.

* * *

Again, it’s hard not to find this both surreal and deeply alarming. We need to be growing our economy, not paralyzing it.

* * *

This brings me to my final point: politically accountable members of the House and Senate, not unelected bureaucrats, must develop our nation’s energy and climate policies. And those policies must be able to pass on their own merits, instead of serving as a defense against ill-considered regulations.

* * *

Nor is it [S.J.Res.26] about fuel efficiency — the Department of Transportation is and has been in charge for 35 years, and we don’t need another agency and another standard thrown into the mix to do the same job . . . .The EPA does not need to take over this process, and it should not be allowed to do so under a law that was never intended to regulate fuel economy.

* * *

Bringing climate science, the oil spill, and fuel economy into this debate are attempts at misdirection — “green herrings” intended to convince members to oppose our resolution. But this debate has nothing to do with those topics. . . .It’s about maintaining the separation of powers between the legislative and executive branches, as our founding fathers intended, and rejecting an unprecedented overreach by the EPA into the affairs of Congress.

Excerpts from Sen. Murkowski’s Closing Statement

Most cynical are the efforts to link our resolution to the oil spill. That serves only to cheapen the horrible and ongoing tragedy in the Gulf of Mexico and distract from the reasons why 41 Senators sponsored this resolution. Here’s the real question: why is the EPA attempting to impose economy-wide regulations — regulations that will not help clean up or prevent future accidents — instead of focusing its resources on the spill?

* * *

We’ve heard that our resolution is anti-science. Some of our supporters agree with it [EPA’s endangerment analysis], and some do not. The reality is that the science is what it is, and it is beyond the power of Congress to change. But this is an issue of the best way, and the most appropriate body, to respond to the conclusions being reached by members of the scientific community.

* * *

Threatening to disrupt our nation’s economy until we pass a bill by the slimmest of margins, regardless of its merits, won’t be much of an accomplishment. Nor is that approach worthy of the institutions and people we serve. It isn’t appropriate for a challenge of this magnitude. No policy that results from it will achieve our common goals or stand the test of time.

* * *

Today is the day for the Senate to take the threat of EPA climate regulations off the table once and fall all. . . .By passing our bipartisan resolution of disapproval resolution, we can return the debate over climate policy to its rightful home, here in Congress, where duly-elected representatives can represent the best interests of their constituents.

Here are headlines from two stories about the same peer-reviewed study.

Reuters: “Melting mountains put millions at risk in Asia: study”

Nature: “Global warming’s impact on Asia’s rivers overblown”

I’ll go with Nature on this one.