A Black Tide, and Obama Plays Golf
Published in La Stampa
(Italy) on 22 June 2010
by Agnese Vigna (link to original)
(Italy) on 22 June 2010
by Agnese Vigna (link to original)
Translated from
by Roberta Mura.
Edited by Sam Carter.
Obama is playing golf while the Gulf is drowning in oil? How outrageous! At least this is the opinion of Michael Steele, the Republican National Committee chairman who compared Obama’s 39th round of golf of his presidency, and the 7th since the oil spill began, to the unfortunate and inopportune yacht race of Tony Hayward, BP’s CEO, who apparently has neither said nor done anything right since the oil started spilling out in the Gulf of Mexico.
“It is equally incredible that President Obama finds himself on yet another golf course as oil continues to spew into the Gulf," Steele said in a statement commenting on Obama’s last golf game. The Republican also criticized the concert of ex-Beatle Sir Paul McCartney, held two weeks ago at the White House, and Obama’s trip to the Washington Nationals baseball game last Friday. “Until this problem is fixed, no more golf outings, no more baseball games, no more Beatle concerts, Mr. President,” said Steele.
Bill Burton, the deputy press secretary, defends the Obama’s right to leisure activities, underlying the fact that they happen only after the president has honored his commitments. “I don't think that there's a person in this country that doesn't think that their President ought to have a little time to clear his mind,” said Burton. He added that, in the last week, Obama got BP to agree to put aside $20 billion to pay claims, strengthened lobbying and ethics rules in the White House, and went to Ohio to talk about the economy and the stimulus package
“It is equally incredible that President Obama finds himself on yet another golf course as oil continues to spew into the Gulf," Steele said in a statement commenting on Obama’s last golf game. The Republican also criticized the concert of ex-Beatle Sir Paul McCartney, held two weeks ago at the White House, and Obama’s trip to the Washington Nationals baseball game last Friday. “Until this problem is fixed, no more golf outings, no more baseball games, no more Beatle concerts, Mr. President,” said Steele.
Bill Burton, the deputy press secretary, defends the Obama’s right to leisure activities, underlying the fact that they happen only after the president has honored his commitments. “I don't think that there's a person in this country that doesn't think that their President ought to have a little time to clear his mind,” said Burton. He added that, in the last week, Obama got BP to agree to put aside $20 billion to pay claims, strengthened lobbying and ethics rules in the White House, and went to Ohio to talk about the economy and the stimulus package
Would you have felt better about him if he had stayed in the Oval Office & played video games, instead?…
…or perhaps you feel he should be out in the gulf, perhaps navigating a skimmer around in circles, picking up oil…24 hours a day?
The massive breach that is spouting oil into our gulf and destroying lives is entirely the fault of BP cost-cutting procedures, which we now learn is typical of the company. And whether or not President Obama is there to inspect BP’s disaster as it occurs, will not alter what BP has done to America, nor will it alter the economic misery BP has caused to our citizens in an already economically stressed region of my country.
Don’t be misled by the political attempts to somehow hang BP’s reckless disregard for safety around the neck of my president…if you wish to criticize Mr. Obama, there is plenty of inaction & failures that can be laid at his doorstep, such as the half-measure health insurance debacle, that solves nothing, or the lack of action in returning our tax structure to the functional structure of the 1960’s, where we didn’t have ALL of the GDP in the pockets of just a few overly-wealthy individuals, or his refusal to lift the tax cap on the wealthy when it comes to Social Security, in order to save the institution from bankruptcy…
…or, perhaps more importantly, his refusal to reinstate tariffs on foreign goods, to try and bring industrial jobs back to my country, from which they fled…
But this environmental disaster is not his…it is entirely the fault of criminal negligence on the part of BP, and they have been caught doing this before.