The Firebagging Begins Again

The firebagger attacks on Obama's response to the Deepwater Horizon disaster are in full swing now, and it's former Clinton campaign operative Peter Daou leading the charge over at HuffPo.

The administration seems miffed and mystified that it is being criticized. After all, it can reel off dozens of swift actions taken in the aftermath of the spill. The White House's defenders want the spotlight aimed exclusively at BP. But this is a situation where body language and words are just as important as actions. Scheduling an 'angry' presidential news conference weeks after oil started gushing into the Gulf waters is exactly the wrong thing to do. Authentic anger isn't something you turn on for the cameras and leak to the press the previous day. Indignation and defensiveness are precisely the wrong message...

White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs faced a barrage of questions at his daily briefing about why the federal government is not intervening to take over responsibility for the cleanup from BP. "Again, we are overseeing the response, OK?" Gibbs said just hours before the news about the commission broke. "I don't know what you think - we're - we're working each and every day. That's why Secretary (Steven) Chu - the Department of Energy - it sounds technical. The Department of Energy doesn't have purview over oil, oil drilling. That's not in their governmental sphere."

That this lame response from various quarters of the administration, Congress, the media and the public comes on the heels of a banner year of climate denialism is no coincidence. We are at an inflection point, one that will likely determine the fate of our species. Green-haters have been winning the message war, the all-important battle of public opinion. If those of us who want to salvage and protect our earth don't rise in righteous anger and use this moment to cement our case, then we have failed ourselves and future generations. 

Here's the problem.  On one hand, I've said before that without a strong response from the Obama administration, these attacks were going to be inevitable, and that response has in fact not been good enough yet...not even close.

On the other hand, Daou's righteous indignation, while justified, doesn't serve much of a useful purpose here. Blaming Obama for this catastrophe only helps the Republicans get back in power in November, and the response from the GOP on this will absolutely be far worse.  Crap like this is uncalled for.

This isn't Katrina II, it's worse. As the oil keeps gushing and the damage keeps growing, we are squandering a rare chance to turn the tide against those whose laziness and greed and ignorance is imperiling every living thing on our wonderful and beautiful - and wounded - planet.

This will fix the oil geyser, how exactly?  This will keep the Republicans from continuing to rape the environment how exactly?  To their credit, the Firedoglake crew actually has a list of things the Obama administration should be doing.  But hanging the "Obama's Katrina" albatross on Obama isn't going to do a goddamn thing to fix this mess, and Peter Daou knows that.

The wingers are gleefully screaming "Even the liberal Huffington Post..." this morning.  Good work, Pete.

The good news is we're finally seeing the Obama Administration threaten the big stick on BP:  The DoJ.

BP, whose shares have dropped from £6.50 to £5.17 since the disaster began, is now blocking the EPA from publishing the reasons it has given for refusing to stop using Corexit, citing commercial confidentiality. The agency is therefore "evaluating all legal options". 

Company executives may soon have to worry about the prospect of criminal charges. The White House says Justice Department officials are also in the region following President Obama's announcement on Saturday of a formal inquiry, which he said could lead to possible prosecutions. 

It's a start.