Rep. John Culberson (R-Texas) took his opposition to the Obama Administration’s decision to enact a six-month moratorium on deep-water drilling in the Gulf of Mexico directly to the President Wednesday, sending him a letter that asked him to view the ongoing BP oil spill in its “proper historical context as a statistical anomaly.”…. His argument? The record since 1985 shows that deep-water rigs have produced 7 billion barrels of oil, while spilling less than 0.001 percent of it. Culberson calls it “a 99.999% record for clean operations.” He then encourages Obama not to ignore that “35-year record of safety,” (though it appears that only 25 years have passed since 1985).
Though I’ve resolved (with varying degrees of success) to be more tolerant and less reactive, it was exceedingly difficult for me to read about Rep. Culberson’s letter to the President without thinking “WTF??”
To Culberson’s way of thinking, the Deepwater Horizon clusterf—k is, in the overall scheme of things, little more than a big “oops”. Though the Gulf of Mexico is gravely imperiled, and though the economies of Gulf Coast states either are or will soon be on the ropes…hey, $#!& happens, eh?
Perhaps instead of placing the blame for the economic impact of this oil spill on the Obama Administration, Culberson should be looking at the oil industry- specifically BP. If procedures had been followed (and if MMS regulators had done their jobs instead of snorting coke of the asses of oil company employees), there’s a pretty good chance this discussion wouldn’t be necessary. Instead, BO, TransOcean, and Halliburton all chose to cut corners…and here we are, enjoying pictures of oil-soaked wildlife and reports of underwater oil plumes the size of small villages.
Of course, I understand that many of Culberson’s constituents work for the oil industry. Houston is, after all, the world oil capitol. I also get that Republicans are beholden to Big Oil like a crack whore is beholden to her pimp/dealer. While the oil spill (hopefully) won’t impact the Texas Gulf Coast, it would be nice to think that Culberson could remove his blinders long enough to recognize that what adversely impacts the Gulf will eventually adversely impact Texas.
While Culberson’s letter implores the Obama Administration to “not to punish the entire oil and gas industry because of any mistakes that were made on Deepwater Horizon,” the industry is in desperate need of a wake-up call. No reasonable person believes that the mistakes which occurred on the Deepwater Horizon aren’t being duplicated in some manner on other deep water platforms. Perhaps the only real surprise in this scenario is that a catastrophic spill hasn’t happened prior to this.
Perhaps the question that Culberson should be asking is why the oil industry’s deep water drilling technology so far outstrips the technology available to clean up potential spills. If oil can be pumped out of wells a mile or more below the surface, then why can’t a well be capped when all Hell breaks loose? That Republicans like Culberson aren’t demanding answers to questions like this only proves how little they really care about the people (and the ecology) of the region.
Profits before people. It might as well be the GOP motto. It certainly seems to be John Culberson’s.
