Bush admin skipped re-cert process for the first blown-up well

[captain_kook]

go away 13.99
 
adults are trying to talk

[sweetwater5s9]

Last year the Obama administration granted oil giant BP a special exemption from a legal requirement.   

Federal documents show that the Department of the Interior's Minerals Management Service (MMS) gave BP a "categorical exclusion" on April 6, 2009 to commence drilling with Deepwater Horizon.

Kierán Suckling, director of the Center for Biological Diversity, told the Post that the Obama administration's exemption effectively "put BP entirely in control," adding, "The agency's oversight role has devolved to little more than rubber-stamping British Petroleum's self-serving drilling plans."

The Obama administration's delivery of a special exemption for Deepwater Horizon in April 2009 is the latest in a litany of examples that reveal the close collaboration between the MMS and BP.

Only 11 days before the explosion, BP requested a broadening of the April exemption, and in a separate letter dated September 14, 2009, a BP vice president for operations in the Gulf, Richard Morrison, requested that the Obama administration not put in place new guidelines that would have required audits of its rigs every three years.

At the end of March, Obama announced a dramatic expansion of offshore drilling in Florida's Gulf waters, the Atlantic seaboard, and the northern waters of Alaska—basing himself largely on MMS claims that new drilling poses no major risks to the environment.

A September 2008, Inspector General's report revealed that MMS regulators had for years accepted gifts and money—and even drugs and sex—from the same oil industry executives they were ostensibly tasked with monitoring. The Obama administration's rubber-stamping of "self-regulation" for the oil industry makes clear that while the top political appointees at MMS have changed since the Bush years, the policies have not.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) sharply criticized the very MMS studies that Obama used to approve the Deepwater Horizon site.

Obama's decision to disregard scientific evidence is not the result of a mistaken policy, however. It is the result of definite class interests.

According to a report from the Center for Responsive Politics, BP gave more campaign donations to the Obama campaign in the 2008 election cycle than to any other politician.

BP also took the step of hiring the Podesta Group, the lobbying firm headed up by Obama confidant John Podesta and his brother Tony, paying the firm $720,000 since 2008. All told, BP has spent just shy of $20 million on federal lobbying over the last two years.

The close working relationship between BP and the Obama administration has continued even in the wake of the Deepwater Horizon disaster.

Tom Eley - Global Research.

http://globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=section&sectionName=about

[13.99]

OK, kookie, you adults play nice!

[13]

CK isn't using hearsay, but you are, Thomas.

Despite what the CEO of Transocean claims about the blowout preventer being modified?  Apparently, investigations have found something different from what he claims.

Obama only took office less than 30 days before that Feb 19th 2009 report, and as of the April 1st report Bush appointees were still in charge of the MMS.  In fact they were until sometime in June -- if my memory serves correctly -- and all of this has been posted here before.

When President Obama took office he had the enormous messes Bush dumped into his lap on his way out the door, and the economy and the wars were at that time a much higher priority then getting in there in the MMS and cleaning house -- which all the RWs would have cried foul over anyway -- they would have been belly-aching that Obama removed those people for political reasons.

[Thomasj_tx]

kook, your own posts show that the issues both pre-date and post-date the Bush Administration.

Why are you so myopic?

[captain_kook]

Last year the Obama administration granted oil giant BP a special exemption from a legal requirement.   

Federal documents show that the Department of the Interior's Minerals Management Service (MMS) gave BP a "categorical exclusion" on April 6, 2009 to commence drilling with Deepwater Horizon


We KNOW that sweetie

Like I said - that agency was still filled with Bush-era appointees and industry insiders when that approval was given.

NOW they're out of a job.

[sweetwater5s9]

The Obama administration's rubber-stamping of "self-regulation" for the oil industry makes clear that while the top political appointees at MMS have changed since the Bush years, the policies have not.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) sharply criticized the very MMS studies that Obama used to approve the Deepwater Horizon site.

Obama's decision to disregard scientific evidence is not the result of a mistaken policy, however. It is the result of definite class interests.

According to a report from the Center for Responsive Politics, BP gave more campaign donations to the Obama campaign in the 2008 election cycle than to any other politician.

BP also took the step of hiring the Podesta Group, the lobbying firm headed up by Obama confidant John Podesta and his brother Tony, paying the firm $720,000 since 2008. All told, BP has spent just shy of $20 million on federal lobbying over the last two years.

The close working relationship between BP and the Obama administration has continued even in the wake of the Deepwater Horizon disaster.

Tom Eley - Global Research.

http://globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=section&sectionName=about

[captain_kook]

"The Obama administration's rubber-stamping of "self-regulation" for the oil industry makes clear that while the top political appointees at MMS have changed since the Bush years, the policies have not."

THAT is supposed to be supportive of Bush?
 
 
The long-standing "culture" of coziness of the MMS with the oil industry grew much WORSE under eight years of the whatever-industry-wants-they-gets style of the Bush Admin.
 
 
Whatever mistakes the Obama admin made early on in 2009 are regarding BP and the MMS are now being corrected
 
 
something that should matter to you Bushbots

[sweetwater5s9]

According to a report from the Center for Responsive Politics, BP gave more campaign donations to the Obama campaign in the 2008 election cycle than to any other politician.

BP also took the step of hiring the Podesta Group, the lobbying firm headed up by Obama confidant John Podesta and his brother Tony, paying the firm $720,000 since 2008. All told, BP has spent just shy of $20 million on federal lobbying over the last two years.

The close working relationship between BP and the Obama administration has continued even in the wake of the Deepwater Horizon disaster.
 
 
 

[13]

Proof that even remedial education doesn't help the RWs:  The following is a post I made to Thomas in early June somewhere between the 7th and the 9th:

You're the one who doesn't know what you're talking about and should get your facts straight... Thomas.

Chris Oynes was appointed by G.W. Bush in 2007:

"During his tenure at the Gulf regional office in Louisiana for the MMS, Chris Oynes played a central role in an offshore leasing foul-up that cost taxpayers an estimated $10 billion in lost revenue. The Interior Department's inspector general called the matter "a jaw-dropping example of bureaucratic bungling." Despite that, the agency's then-director promoted Mr. Oynes in 2007 to associate director for the offshore program."
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/05/17/chris-oynes-mms-official_n_579009.html

Chris Oynes was the U.S. Minerals Management Service (MMS) associate director for offshore energy and minerals management before he retired in May 2010. Oynes, who oversaw oil and gas leasing in the Gulf of Mexico for 12 years before being promoted to MMS associate director had come under fire for being too close to the industry officials he regulated.

During his tenure at the Gulf regional office in Louisiana for the MMS, Oynes played a central role in an offshore leasing foul-up that cost taxpayers an estimated $10 billion in lost revenue. The Interior Department's inspector general called the matter "a jaw-dropping example of bureaucratic bungling." Despite that, the agency's then-director, Johnnie Burton,
promoted Oynes in 2007 to associate director for the offshore program.

On May 24, 2010 the New York Times reported that under his watch in the Gulf, MMS regulators allowed industry officials to fill in their own inspection reports in pencil and then turned them over to the regulators, who traced over them in pen before submitting the reports to the agency. MMS staff also routinely accepted meals, tickets to sporting events and gifts from oil companies
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chris_Oynes

The last MMS report on the Deepwater Horizon was made on April 1, 2009 and Oynes -- a Bush appointee -- didn't retire until May amid a ton of controversy about bribes and gifts including sex to him and his department by the oil companies!

[sweetwater5s9]

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) sharply criticized the very MMS studies that Obama used to approve the Deepwater Horizon site.

[Thomasj_tx]

 

Oynes, who oversaw oil and gas leasing in the Gulf of Mexico for 12 years

Do the math, you simpleton.