How Big Oil Conned Obama

[Cees Binkhorst]

REPLY TO: D66 at nic.surfnet.nl

Obama to Mr BP: Mr. BP I don't want to know how you are going to do it,
but I will give you four weeks to stop this flow.
If you don't manage, I will immediately thereafter ;)

Groet / Cees

How Big Oil Conned Obama
http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2010-05-31/top-kill-fails-why-obama-should-ignore-bp-and-nuke-the-spill/
by Christopher Brownfield Info

BS Top - Brownfield Obama & BP President Barack Obama picks up balls of
tar while touring the beach on May 28, 2010 in Port Fourchon, Louisiana.
(Photo: Win McNamee / Getty Images) The president asked the oil
companies for their advice instead of ordering them to stop the spill.
Christopher Brownfield on what Obama could learn from Bush and Putin
about forceful decisions.

So a law professor, a Nobel Prize winning physicist, and an oil
executive walk into a bar…Stop me if you’ve heard this one. It’s the
story of President Obama, Energy Secretary Steven Chu, and Big Oil.

On Friday, a host on CNBC and a senior White House official personally
reminded me that President Obama consulted with numerous advisers before
deciding on his response to the oil spill. These advisers included oil
company executives, leaders of environmental agencies, and many
scientists—including the Nobel laureate, Dr. Chu.

It would be far better for our president to pick up the red phone and
call Vladimir Putin for a lesson on ninjapolitik than to leave BP in
charge of the ineffectual plans that it’s bringing to the table.

It was important to bring the environmental agencies to the table so
that the White House could mitigate this ecological Chernobyl with a
strong, coordinated effort.

It was smart to bring the Secretary of Energy to the table for political
and regulatory reasons.

It was right to bring the oil companies to the table, too, because the
U.S. government does not possess the oil-related equipment and expertise
that countries like Venezuela and Brazil control within their
nationalized deep-water oil industries.

But there was one person missing from this A-list of extraordinary
advisors: Joe the Plumber. Where was the pragmatic, no-nonsense
blue-blooded American who could look President Obama and Chu in the eye
and tell them to stop over-thinking this underwater plumbing problem,
and furthermore, not to trust BP? Would you send a lawyer and a
physicist to fix your plumbing? And would you trust an oil company
executive to give you a fair deal?

We should have demolished this well with explosives over a month ago.
And yet we watch in excruciating suspense while BP fumbles through plan
after plan to recover its oil and cover its asset.

The president has set up an independent commission for investigating the
accident before the spill is even stopped. How can we be so far-sighted
as to miss the obvious things right before us? Establishing a commission
before stopping the spill is like calling an attorney to file a lawsuit
the moment after being run over by a truck.

• Reihan Salam: Who Needs an Oil Spill Czar?The oil companies stood
together and advised President Obama that BP’s plans for the crisis
response were the best of all available options. If this sounds kosher
to you, then please contact me and I’ll sell you a bridge in Brooklyn at
a very special price. Historically, oil companies are remarkably
consistent in supporting each other when the industry is threatened by
political forces and a popular backlash. Only on rare occasions are
there exceptions to the lock-step unity of petrol power. For example, in
the 1950’s, an Italian oil executive named Enrico Mattei broke ranks and
decided to undercut the deals that other oil companies enjoyed
throughout the Middle East. When Mattei offered his host countries a
50/50 split on the revenues, the oil industry erupted in anger. The
50/50 deals had broad normative appeal that paved the way for other
oil-rich countries to demand equal treatment. But fairness can have
consequences in a den of thieves; poor Enrico was killed in a mysterious
plane crash in 1962. One doesn’t need to be a Nobel laureate to do that
math.

The problem with this BP spill response is that President Obama asked
the oil companies for their advice instead of ordering them what to do
to stop the spill. BP’s response would not look the same if President
Obama threatened to nationalize their assets and take charge of the
situation. I know that the Bush administration gave aggression a bad
name, but sometimes it’s ok to be aggressive. It was a mistake for
President Obama to construct a team of advisers so intelligent and
accomplished, yet so green with casualty response and so susceptible to
oil company coercion. It would be far better for our president to pick
up the red phone and call Vladimir Putin for a lesson on ninjapolitik
than to leave BP in charge of the ineffectual plans that it’s bringing
to the table.

The opportunity is slipping away for President Obama to stop the spill
quickly and heroically with a controlled demolition. Let’s take note and
try to get this right in the days ahead and the next time a crisis hits.

Christopher Brownfield is a former nuclear submarine officer, an Iraq
veteran, and a visiting scholar on nuclear policy at Columbia
University. He is the author of My Nuclear Family, to be published by
Alfred A. Knopf in September.

**********
Dit bericht is verzonden via de informele D66 discussielijst (D66 at nic.surfnet.nl).
Aanmelden: stuur een email naar LISTSERV at nic.surfnet.nl met in het tekstveld alleen: SUBSCRIBE D66 uwvoornaam uwachternaam
Afmelden: stuur een email naar LISTSERV at nic.surfnet.nl met in het tekstveld alleen: SIGNOFF D66
Het on-line archief is te vinden op: http://listserv.surfnet.nl/archives/d66.html
**********