Obama Out of Step with Rest of the World Leaders

Meetings of the G8 and G20 leaders over the weekend in Canada ended with the usual official summit statements, which in critical areas indicated signals of disagreement with Obama administration policies. The G8 leaders from the countries of the US, Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Canada, Japan and Russia met Friday before the larger group shown above met in Toronto in the G20 summit.

After the G8 meeting, a Communiqué was issued that included (for the first time) a timeline for withdrawing NATO troops from Afghanistan, as suggested by the new Prime Minister of Great Britain, David Cameron. The Communiqué urged the Afghan government to "combat corruption, address illicit drug production and trafficking, improve human rights, improve provision of basic services and governance, make concrete progress to reinforce the formal justice system and expand the capacity of the Afghan National Security Forces to assume increasing responsibility for security within five years."

http://news.nationalpost.com/2010/06/26/full-text-g8-communique/?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter

This statement, which was urged by the leader of the NATO partner contributing the second largest number of troops to the war effort in Afghanistan (after the US military forces), comes just days after President Obama replaced the NATO commander in that war effort, General Stanley McChrystal, with General David Petraeus after a magazine article appeared that demonstrated a lack of respect by McChrystal's staff for the Commander in Chief and his staff. During the events that accompanied this change in command, Obama restated his goal to begin withdrawing US troops from Afghanistan in July of 2011, just one year from now..... not within five years from now, as announced in the G8 statement.

Today the G20 summit ended with another statement that parted with the objectives of the Obama team in Toronto. The normally Obama supporting news outlet at CBS reported the conclusion of the G20 summit this way:

"The G-20 summit concluded in Toronto late Sunday with signs of an economic policy rift between President Obama and other world leaders..... The president came to Toronto hoping to convince his G-20 colleagues to put more emphasis on stimulus spending to keep the economic recovery alive..... For the most part he did not succeed.

The G-20, the top industrialized and developing nations of the world, ended the Toronto summit with a pledge to cut their budget deficits in half within three years. It's something Mr. Obama has been pressing for but [Obama] has also urged more stimulus spending in the short-term to keep the recovery going, a position rejected by Great Britain and some other European nations that say cutting debt should be the top priority."

The Summit host, Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper, said: "Advanced countries must send a clear message that as our stimulus plans expire we will focus on getting our fiscal houses in order." http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2010/06/27/eveningnews/main6624612.shtml

While the rest of the economic power players in the world see the wisdom in cutting government spending and exercising fiscal discipline, our President and his team want to keep spending taxpayers' money, growing the government bureaucracy (which has proven to be very inefficient in helping clean up the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico) and driving up our federal deficit.

Sphere: Related Content

Governor Bobby Jindal Battles Bloated Federal Bureaucracy in the War on the Gulf Oil Spill

Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal has been on the front lines directing and coordinating action to stop the growing oil slick spreading toward the Louisiana coast since the BP oil rig explosion on April 20, 2010. Any action he takes must be approved by the federal government, which has been slow to coordinate its own actions. I reported in an earlier post that Jindal's request for approval to implement a plan for sand-booming and dredging was finally approved in early June after two weeks.

This week the Coast Guard shut down 16 oil-fighting vacuum barges that the Governor had deployed, claiming their operations needed to be halted until federal inspections and certifications could be done. After the barges were shut down for 24 hours before being allowed to resume operations, the Governor said:

"Before the shut down......, oil suction operations using military and civilian vacuum barges had suctioned thousands of gallons of oil out of the marsh already and thousands more could have been removed yesterday if these operations wouldn’t have been shut down.

The frustration here is that we spent weeks talking to the Coast Guard about this new, common sense idea for cleaning out the marsh. At first, we were only allowed to produce a prototype – and once that was seen to be successful, as we knew it would be, we asked for many more of these suction barges to be deployed to coastal communities across the state. Then, after about a week of use, they were shut down because the Coast Guard wanted to inspect them. Now, they have been told they don’t need these inspections.

It is frustrating because it doesn’t seem like the left hand knows what the right hand is doing. There is no streamlined system here. This is why we keep stressing that we need to see more of a sense of urgency from the Coast Guard, federal officials and BP. We are in a war here – we are in a war against this oil that absolutely threatens our way of life."

In addition, Governor Jindal and Grand Isle Mayor David Camardelle met with the Coast Guard on a plan to narrow the passes to the east and west of Grand Isle. Governor Jindal and the Mayor had been pushing to get the rock and barge plan finalized for weeks. The Mayor and the Governor met with President Obama almost two weeks ago about this plan and stressed the importance of the Coast Guard approving the use of the rocks and barge plan quickly in order to help block oil coming into the passes to Barataria Bay. The state needs multiple lines of defense to keep oil out of its wetlands and off of the coast. The Governor and the Mayor have also been pushing for more high sea boom and skimmers for weeks to protect the passes. Since the promised resources have not arrived, the state is now seeking a combination of barges, rocks, and vacuum barges.

Governor Jindal's frustration is understandable in view of the many agencies involved in approving any action the states want to take to clean the oil and prevent further damage from oil coming into the coast, bays and wetlands. The federal government Gulf Oil response team is under the command of Coast Guard Admiral Thad Allen, whose team is ironically called the Unified Command. This federal team, in addition to BP personnel, includes officials from 14 federal agencies. As Bobby Jindal's comments above indicate, it often seems that the left hand of this team does not know what the right hand is doing.

But lack of coordination among all the agencies in the Unified Command is not the only problem caused by the federal bureaucracy. The citizens of the Gulf Coast have also been harmed by the moratorium on deepwater oil drilling in the Gulf of Mexico while the President's team investigates the causes of the oil rig explosion.

Even though this is the worst environmental disaster in US history, it is also the first and only rig explosion of this sort in over forty years of off-shore oil drilling in the Gulf. As many have noted, the moratorium is equivalent to stopping all airlines from flying after a single airline crash. In decades of airline flight, there have been many crashes, but rarely are there government orders to cancel all flights after any plane crash.

Last week, Bobby Jindal met with community groups, businesses, oil workers and local government leaders harmed by the shut down of oil drilling to protest the moratorium. A local newspaper website reported on this gathering as follows:

"In a rally atmosphere at an offshore-service dock ...., Gov. Bobby Jindal, local workers and lawmakers added to the growing outcry over a presidential ban on deepwater drilling.

'People in Louisiana shouldn't have to lose their jobs because federal officials failed to properly regulate the oil-and-gas industry', Jindal said to applause.

'There's not a man or woman in Louisiana who wants an unemployment check,' Jindal told an audience of about 200 workers, lawmakers and other oil-and-gas industry members. They were assembled at a cavernous dock where oilfield ships pull up for service at Edison Chouest Offshore's C-Port 2. 'We shouldn't have to choose between saving our coast and safe domestic energy production." http://www.houmatoday.com/article/20100611/FEATURES12/100619813/0/ARTICLE

A few days ago, President Obama gave his first address to the nation from the Oval Office to discuss his plans for resolving the disaster in the Gulf. He seemed to acknowledge the concerns of the people on the Gulf Coast when he said:

"As the cleanup continues, we will offer whatever additional resources and assistance our coastal states may need. Now, a mobilization of this speed and magnitude will never be perfect, and new challenges will always arise.... So if something isn’t working, we want to hear about it. If there are problems in the operation, we will fix them.

But we have to recognize that despite our best efforts, oil has already caused damage to our coastline and its wildlife. And sadly, no matter how effective our response is, there will be more oil and more damage before this siege is done."

Apparently, Governor Jindal will have to go on letting Obama's team hear about what isn't working. The question is whether any of those problems can be fixed quick enough to minimize the continuing damage being done to the Gulf Coast. Governor Jindal has not been satisfied with the speed and urgency demonstrated by the federal bureaucracy so far.

Sphere: Related Content

Consequences of Presidential Bluster and Blame

Since the Gulf of Mexico oil disaster began, President Obama has restated many times that BP is responsible for stopping the oil leak at the bottom of the Gulf, cleaning up the oil in the water, as well as the environmental damage to the Gulf Coast, and for paying claims to those harmed by the loss of business, property and income due to the crisis that began with the oil rig explosion on April 20, 2010. He emphasized this point in his press conference on May 27. The next day, he said it again:

"We have ordered BP to pay economic injury claims, and we will make sure they deliver.... As I’ve said before, BP is the responsible party for this disaster. What that means is they’re legally responsible for stopping the leak and they’re financially responsible for the enormous damage that they’ve created. And we’re going to hold them accountable, along with any other party responsible for the initial explosion and loss of life on that platform."

Nevertheless, President Obama also noted in May that:

"I ultimately take responsibility for solving this crisis. I’m the President and the buck stops with me. So I give the people of this community and the entire Gulf my word that we’re going to hold ourselves accountable to do whatever it takes for as long as it takes to stop this catastrophe, to defend our natural resources, to repair the damage, and to keep this region on its feet. Justice will be done for those whose lives have been upended by this disaster, for the families of those whose lives have been lost -- that is a solemn pledge that I am making."

Basically, the President is saying that BP is responsible, but he will make sure they take all the necessary action to fix the problem and pay for it.

For BP, its CEO Tony Hayward has said:

"[W]e are doing everything we can to do the right thing. We are going to stop the leak. We're going to clean up the oil. We're going to remediate any environmental damage and we are going to return the Gulf Coast to the position it was in prior to this event. That's an absolute commitment, and we will be there long after the media has gone making good on our promises."
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/andrew_marr_show/8724549.stm

That firm commitment by BP to make things right has not been good enough for Obama and his team, however. After Obama said that he does not want to hear that BP is "nickel and diming" the people of the Gulf Coast filing claims for harm suffered due to the oil spill crisis, the President and many other Democrats want to tell BP how to pay for its obligations, including urging BP to cut or cease paying dividends to its shareholders.

An article on the Washington Post last week indicated the widespread implications of any government imposed restriction on BP's ability to pay its dividends:

"Smaller dividend payments would have a broad impact. The London-based giant accounts for about 12 percent of all dividends paid in Britain. A cut would be most keenly felt among pensioners there. But the impact would also reach the United States, where about 40 percent of the company's shares are held. At the end of March, major institutional holders of BP stock included State Street and Wellington Management; the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation also had a substantial stake." http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/06/05/AR2010060500727_2.html?hpid=topnews&sid=ST2010060503052

Many of the shareholders of BP stock are pension funds, mutual funds held in 401k accounts and individual retirees in the US and the UK. Many people of average or modest means would be adversely affected by forcing BP to stop its dividend payments.

The Obama team's drumbeat of comments criticizing BP have also caused negative reactions from some UK political figures:

"Former Conservative Party chairman Lord Tebbit accused [Obama] of giving a 'xenophobic display of partisan political presidential petulance against a multinational company'.
London Mayor Boris Johnson said there was 'something slightly worrying about the anti-British rhetoric that seems to be permeating from America'." http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/politics/10303619.stm

The pressure on BP to stop its dividends and to act more quickly to resolve all of the problems caused by the oil spill is still not enough for the Obama team. On "Meet the Press" today, Obama's top political adviser, David Axelrod, said that Obama is planning to demand that BP set up an escrow account with substantial funds to pay all claims that will result from the Gulf oil spill. Axelrod said: “Our mission is to hold them accountable in every appropriate way.”

Axelrod stated that the White House wants an independent, third party to administer the escrow account and to assure that those with “legitimate” claims for damages will be compensated. Then he went on to say:

“We’re not interested in undermining the integrity of their company, but this disaster is having an impact on their company. We believe that BP has the resources to meet the claims, and we’re going to make sure that they do. They’re a highly profitable company. They’ve got lots of assets. They have the prospect of continuing, but they have to meet their obligations here.”

This type of rhetoric raises the question of whether BP can survive this disaster in the Gulf. BP executives, as well as Wall Street analysts, have all confirmed that BP has the financial strength to meet its obligations to plug the leak, to clean up the environmental damage and to pay those affected by the Gulf oil spill, but when a high ranking White House official makes a statement about "the prospect of [BP] continuing", it will raise questions in the minds of many investors that should not have been raised by a political adviser.

The consequences of this irresponsible statement by Axelrod will likely cause further erosion to the value of BP's stock, which has already dropped by about 50% since the oil rig explosion, because it is extremely probable that that his comments will appear in news media all around the country tomorrow.

The real cause of the delay in more effectively addressing the crisis in the Gulf was revealed in another statement by David Axelrod: “I don’t consider [BP] a partner.”

This statement clearly demonstrates what many with crisis management experience have noticed about the Obama team. They don't play well with others! They do not know how to work cooperatively with other interested or affected parties to resolve issues.

They cannot work with Republicans to achieve bi-partisan legislative objectives. They do not want to hear any outside advice or criticism. They only want to dictate action by others to meet their goals. This became very clear when the health care bill was rammed through Congress with legislative tricks, back room deals and no Republican votes.

Now they are using the same tactics to push a multi-national corporation to do things the Obama way, regardless of the consequences. The problem is that their ignorance of how corporations work and how to work in partnership with a non-governmental entity to achieve effective results in a timely manner has been exposed every day that this crisis continues.

This should have been a joint cooperative effort using all appropriate resources of BP and the US government from the start. Instead, more than 50 days later, the White House still does not consider BP a partner in the effort to resolve the biggest environmental disaster in US history! How tragic for the Gulf Coast, BP shareholders and our once "special relationship" with Great Britain. Sphere: Related Content

Crisis Management, Obama Style

President Obama talks a good game, but he has difficulty effectively following through with his rhetorical commitments. At his press conference regarding the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico on May 27, 2010, President Obama said:

"The American people should know that from the moment this disaster began, the federal government has been in charge of the response effort....BP is operating at our direction. Every key decision and action they take must be approved by us in advance.... The federal government is also directing the effort to contain and clean up the damage from the spill -– which is now the largest effort of its kind in U.S. history."

It is very clear from that Presidential statement that the Obama team is taking the lead in managing this terrible environmental disaster in the Gulf and any action to be taken by BP to plug the leak and clean up the oil slicks must be approved by the federal government. However, the President also admitted that only BP has the technology and expertise to stop the oil leaking from the bottom of the Gulf:

"What is true is that when it comes to stopping the leak down below, the federal government does not possess superior technology to BP. This is something, by the way -- going back to my involvement -- two or three days after this happened, we had a meeting down in the Situation Room in which I specifically asked [Secretary of Defense] Bob Gates and [Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman] Mike Mullen what assets do we have that could potentially help that BP or other oil companies around the world do not have. We do not have superior technology when it comes to dealing with this particular crisis."

That, of course, is understandable since the oil companies are in the business of exploring for oil reserves and deploying the drilling technology needed to retrieve the crude oil. So they would naturally have experts, scientists and technology on hand that would give BP superior ability to plug the leak.

But the federal government certainly must have plans in place based on past experience (Exxon Valdez comes to mind) to clean up oil spills. Don't they? So why did it take the US Coast Guard two weeks to approve Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal's sand-booming/barrier island/dredging plan to prevent the oil from advancing to the coastline and spoiling the marshes, wetlands and beaches of Louisiana?

Here's President Obama's answer at his press conference:

"So let’s take the example of Governor Jindal’s barrier islands idea. When I met with him when I was down there two weeks ago, I said I will make sure that our team immediately reviews this idea, that the Army Corps of Engineers is looking at the feasibility of it, and if they think -- if they tell me that this is the best approach to dealing with this problem, then we’re going to move quickly to execute it."

However, Governor Jindal did not think that federal "movement" in two weeks was very quickly executed. Here's what the Governor said after the Coast Guard decision:

"We are frustrated that it took two weeks to get any kind of response. We are frustrated that the federal government then only agreed to make BP pay for one segment while the Corps [of Engineers] approved six segments for construction. We are frustrated that they said the other five would not be approved because they needed to ensure the ‘effectiveness’ of sand-booms even though the Area Contingency Plan already calls sand-booming an ‘effective’ measure."

If sand-booming was already approved in pre-existing federal contingency plans, it would seem that the government decision-making required to protect Louisiana's coast could be done more swiftly and effectively. Under these circumstances, it is very reasonable for Governor Jindal to expect faster federal responses to their plight. However, even though oil was spreading day by day ever closer to the Gulf Coast and now has reached it, the President's answer appears to suggest that taking two weeks to make a decision already included in prior contingency plans is perfectly acceptable.

So what is the federal government doing in its role of Overlord of the Gulf Oil Crisis of 2010? Well, in addition to too slowly considering Bobby Jindal's requests for help, the President told us that he is getting reports every day; he is thinking about the problem; everyone involved knows that resolving this crisis is his number one priority; he has established a Commission to study the causes of the disaster and how to prevent future such catastrophes; he has sent Attorney General Holder to the Gulf Coast to so helpfully announce civil and criminal investigations by the Justice Department into BP's culpability in the crisis and visited the Gulf Coast three times so far to be sure that we all know he is engaged.

In his most recent visit to the Louisiana coast on Friday, Obama met with commercial fishermen, other local business people and local government officials. He assured all that he will hold BP accountable for plugging the oil leak, cleaning up the environmental damage and paying claims filed by those economically hurt by the oil spill disaster.

While the Coast Guard is clearly on the scene and playing a critical role in helping to resolve this crisis, the basic message from the President reconfirmed the government's continued reliance on BP to solve the problems and make things right with the coastal communities.

BP has already spent over $1 billion in its efforts to stop the oil leak, clean up the oil spreading through the Gulf and paying claims to people economically injured by the disaster. BP's CEO has repeatedly accepted the company's responsibility and committed to continuing BP's work on all aspects of the problems caused by the oil rig explosion that started the crisis on April 20.

The question now is whether BP will get the approvals required from the federal government to do its job quickly and efficiently or whether Obama will continue to talk a tough game while threatening and investigating BP as it keeps working to fix the mess it created. Let's hope that the federal government can move more quickly in fulfilling its oversight responsibilities from now on than it did in giving Bobby Jindal an answer to his request for approval to implement plans last month to block the oil from reaching the Gulf coast in Louisiana. Sphere: Related Content