Since the BP Deepwater Horizon disaster, I have avoided the TV pundit class. Network news is enough, trailing the underlying stories by a few weeks but what the heck (ie. fudged oil spill volumes from the start). Last night, I couldn't help watching the CNN pundits in the run-up to President Obama's speech from the Oval Office.
The worst by a country mile: CNN’s Donna Brazile. As campaign manager for Gore in 2000, Brazile was one of the key insiders who persuaded the candidate to stop talking about the environment. That CNN should allow Brazile to be 'an authority' or voice to be trusted about the catastrophe in the Gulf of Mexico, (knowing first-hand her role in the Gore campaign's refusal to take up environmental issues), is gross.
Brazile has company. Among the CNN panel there is James Carville and Paul Begala; both insiders in the Clinton White House for whom the environment was a low face card on the poker table. And Mary Maitlin, somberly intoning how the Gulf disaster elevates the environment above partisan politics: bullshit. It was Maitlin’s party that lobbied for “hands off” industry in the matter of environmental regulations. It was the GOP who turned the Minerals Management Service into a catering service for the oil industry. It was the GOP and Dick Cheney who closed off the public to deliberations on the oil industry from the first month of the Bush White House. Not a partisan issue? Give credit, at least, to President Obama raising the issue of federal authority, rules and laws and suggesting to the American people that this destructive dialogue is the root cause of the BP Gulf Oil catastrophe.
But to answer the question, how manufactured is the concern of the cable TV pundits, ask another question: when will these self-proclaimed experts, endorsed by CNN and other cable outlets, bring the same focus and energy to the matter of global warming? Not yet. Not until food crops are failing and millions dying. Timing is everything.
8 comments:
I notice you've ignored the post on one of your recent blogs by Legal Eagle:
Legal Eagle said...
I laugh every time I hear an Obama apologist blame Bush-Cheney for the lack of regulations for deep water oil drilling. If Obama had concerns that there were not adequate regulations in place for deep water drilling, he could have declared a moratorium on the drilling on the first day he took office. He didn't. Not only did he proceed with deep water drilling, he announced on March 31st that after carefully studying the matter, he was greatly EXPANDING deep water drilling. He stated, "This is not a decision that I've made lightly." On April 2nd, Obama said, "Oil rigs today generally don't cause spills. They are technologically very advanced. Even during Katrina, the spills didn't come from the oil rigs, they came from the refineries onshore."
I'm sure these are horrible misquotes. And I'm sure the corruption at the MMS ceased the day Obama was sworn in as the MMS employees just knew that with the advent of the Obama administration, non-ethical government would no longer be allowed to exist.
Why don't we just call the truth the truth. No administration has enough fingers to plug every hole in the dike and every once in a while, the level behind the dike raises high enough to make it through a hole without a finger in it. It's just bad luck.
This spill is an immeasurable tragedy. Almost as bad is the making of political hay out of it.
The Obama administration missed its opportunity to put strengthened environmental rules, regulations and tough new appointees in place from the first day of its administration. I have written about this at some length, and readers can avail themselves of these views. Do a search, 'environmental failure', on this blog.
There is no sense in trying to re-write history, how and what political party and influence created the conditions that allowed this "mistake" to occur. It's in the public record. Let the Bush administration top people-- like Karl Rove-- step forward and explain their roles directing the EPA, US ACE, DOI, USGS, and other federal agencies away from tough enforcement and rules to protect the environment. Pretty quiet, on that front, right?
On this point, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is very good:
http://www.patagonia.com/web/us/patagonia.go?slc=en_US&sct=US&assetid=5227
This show is also very enlightening. Please take a listen. This guy lived in Alaska and witnessed how the affected communities were treated. The info is better than the spin crap we are hearing on news.
http://www.c-spanvideo.org/program/294042-3
I could barely watch the President let alone all the noise/jabber from the pundits. When it comes to giving time to "those" kinds of shows these days, Rachel Maddow is the only one I tune in. She's doing a heck of a job.
As quiet as the noise over Clinton being on the leading edge of this movement. My point is that ALL administrations, Republican and Democrat continue to move in the same direction- less regulation of business, more control over an economy that would be better off if they just left it alone, and continuous erosion of personal freedoms, rights, and the Constitution.
To blame one administration or party for something no one but BP had any real control over is political doctrinaire, disingenuous, and sophomoric demagoguery.
David...I put a different face on things: I think Dems tend to put regulation in place because they think it will solve our problems. Republicans (who clearly do not share that view) tend to defund things because it is easier to defund something than get rid of it (i.e., how do you get rid of the DOE without looking like a bunch of kid haters).
SO we end up with empty agencies that work very inefficiently as they fool most people into thinking we are safer than we really are (until the next bad thing happens.) This is the nature of systemic government failure. And this is why I say, if you can't do things right, get out of the way. (My right of center mantra.)
Bubbles, leaks and other bad things happen and you have big players with big problems that spawn from lack of anti trust, too much trust and crooked politicians.
Very large failures become very large national problems and a witless nation that is misinformed, uninformed or under-informed (by an under regulated FCC). Enter populous politics that swings the congress back and forth like a diabetic who cannot regulate his insulin.
Put it in the soup pot and you have the recipe: US version of a Greek Tragedy (pun intended).
Thank God for blogs, yo
So, does anyone think that putting $20B in a trust fund amounts to a "shake down?" I say, show me the money!!!
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