Scarborough wants Republicans to pretend they don't support oil companies

Scarborough sings a different tune when his own ox is getting gored. Why is he such a late convert to opposition to oil companies?
See also Republican suggests US pay for oil spill.

Scarborough: "Why is Joe Barton being allowed to keep his job?"
By Greg Sargent
Washington Post
June 24, 2010

"Why is Joe Barton being allowed to keep his job, when Joe Barton apologized to a corporation that is destroying my home town's economy, and is destroying the environment across the Gulf Coast?"

That's Joe Scarborough this morning, posing a very well-framed question to Eric Cantor. The ensuing verbal skirmish between the two men is the day's must-watch video:

Cantor put up a good fight, repeatedly claiming that Joe Barton is "not the issue," reiterating the Republican line that the real issue that matters is stopping the spill. When Cantor compared Barton's BP apology to gaffes issued by Joe Biden, Scarborough repeatedly pushed back hard, pointing out that Barton's apology came from prepared remarks.

And Scarborough wondered aloud in a mystified tone why Republicans weren't axing Barton:

"This hurts the Republican Party. This hurts the Republican brand. Joe Barton is the most powerful Republican on the Hill when it comes to energy policy, and that shows his mindset. Does it not?"

The question is, Why haven't Republicans removed him? As best as I can determine, Republicans believe there's no political percentage in doing so because Dems will continue attacking them as stooges for Big Oil no matter what they do. Republicans don't appear to think the Barton attack is as effective as, say, attacking them for taking Big Oil's campaign contributions. ..

Republican Joe Barton seems to feel that he's the only one who should shake down oil companies

Republican, Under Pressure, Backpedals From Apology to BP
By JACKIE CALMES
June 17, 2010

Representative Joe L. Barton had to be truly sorry by the time he apologized for his apology on Thursday.

In the four hours between his televised apology to BP — for what he called a $20 billion “shakedown” by President Obama for loss claims in the gulf oil spill — and his apology for that apology, Mr. Barton, a Republican from Texas, had been pummeled in the blogosphere, assailed by Democratic Party operatives and Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr., and, in the blow that landed, threatened by Republican leaders with being yanked from the party’s top seat on the powerful House energy committee.

...“Who would the G.O.P. put in charge of overseeing the energy industry & Big Oil if they won control of Congress? Yup, u guessed it — JOE BARTON.”

...The shakedown, in the eyes of the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics, which monitors campaign contributions to lawmakers, is actually the pitches by lawmakers for oil industry donations.

Individuals and political action committees in the oil and gas industry have been Mr. Barton’s biggest source of campaign money, it reported, contributing $1.4 million since the 1990 election cycle.

Support Big Oil Bailout Prevention Liability Act of 2010

Support Big Oil Bailout Prevention Liability Act of 2010

No Taxpayer Bailout of Big Oil — Hold BP Accountable for Gulf Coast Drilling Disaster
BP oil spill cleanup

One month after BP’s Deepwater Horizon oil rig exploded and sank off the Louisiana Gulf Coast, attempts to cap the gushing well have failed. Thick oily sludge has reportedly reached Louisiana’s coastal wetlands, threatening to destroy the delicate ecosystem and the multimillion-dollar seafood industry of the region.

Congress must act now to ensure that the corporations responsible for this massive disaster pay the full cleanup costs. Under current law, corporate liability for oil spills is capped at $75 million. For companies such as BP, which reported a profit of over $6 billion in the first quarter of 2010, it amounts to less than one day’s average earnings. Senator Robert Menendez (D-NJ) recently introduced the Big Oil Bailout Prevention Liability Act of 2010 (S. 3305), which would increase corporate liability to $10 billion.

Urge your senators to cosponsor S. 3305 today and prevent the bailout of Big Oil!




Who is really at fault for the oil spill?

This Time Is Different
By THOMAS L. FRIEDMAN
New York Times
June 11, 2010

My friend, Mark Mykleby, who works in the Pentagon, shared with me this personal letter to the editor he got published last week in his hometown paper, The Beaufort Gazette in South Carolina. It is the best reaction I’ve seen to the BP oil spill — and also the best advice to President Obama on exactly whom to kick you know where.

“I’d like to join in on the blame game that has come to define our national approach to the ongoing environmental disaster in the Gulf of Mexico. This isn’t BP’s or Transocean’s fault. It’s not the government’s fault. It’s my fault. I’m the one to blame and I’m sorry. It’s my fault because I haven’t digested the world’s in-your-face hints that maybe I ought to think about the future and change the unsustainable way I live my life...

Why didn't the Gulf oil rig have a remote-controlled shut-off switch? Because Dick Cheney wanted his oil company pals to keep the $500,000

Now we have a clearer idea of how the oil companies came up with such hugely obscene profits during the past decade.

Contempt for the environment seems to be based on the belief that if we don't have proof that something bad will happen, then we shouldn't worry about it. I believe the correct term for this kind of thinking is "short-sighted." Or perhaps it should be called magical thinking?

May 3, 2010
Who's to blame for the oil spill? Dick Cheney
By Alex Pareene

The Gulf of Mexico oil spill could end up being the worst American man-made environmental catastrophe of this generation. With the oil still spilling and investigations into the causes yet to come, it's too early to neatly assign blame to any one person. But for now, let's hold Dick Cheney personally responsible for the whole thing.

Here's the evidence: The Wall Street Journal reports that the oil well didn't have a remote-control shut-off switch. The reason it didn't have a thing that it seems every single offshore drilling rig should have? According to environmental lawyer Mike Papantonio, it's because Dick Cheney's energy task force decided that the $500,000 switches were too expensive, and they didn't want to make BP buy any...