Joe Barton has company

Some folks in high offices seem to have no idea about the ethical and moral implications behind conflicts of interest, or they don’t care. I would wager the latter.

The latest oil industry supporter masquerading as a public servant could be U.S. District Judge Martin Feldman, a 1983 Ronad Reagan appointee, who on Tuesday, overturned an offshore drilling moratorium in the Gulf imposed by the Obama administration. The drilling ban would have guaranteed that no other rigs had the chance to fail or that no other oil-related incidents would have taken place until we: A) get the current leak completely contained and B) by whatever means necessary, ensure it never happens again.

Credit: AP

As it turns out, Feldman owns about $15,000 in Transocean Ltd. stock. Transocean, of course, is the company that owned the Deepwater Horizon (Unfortunately for him, the stock has dropped 27 points in the last year). Also, according to The Associated Press:

Feldman’s 2008 financial disclosure report – the most recent available – also showed investments in Ocean Energy, a Houston-based company, as well as Quicksilver Resources, Prospect Energy, Peabody Energy, Halliburton, Pengrowth Energy Trust, Atlas Energy Resources, Parker Drilling and others. Halliburton was also involved in the doomed Deepwater Horizon project.

Feldman wrote in his ruling:

If some drilling equipment parts are flawed, is it rational to say all are? Are all airplanes a danger because one was? All oil tankers like Exxon Valdez? All trains? All mines? That sort of thinking seems heavy-handed, and rather overbearing.

No it’s not rational. Of course all rigs aren’t flawed. That’s not the assertion. The assertion is that oil companies are operating potentially volatile rigs without having adequate contingency plans in the event of an emergency. How catastrophic would it be in the unlikely, but theoretically possible, event that some other piece of equipment fails on some other rig, thereby sending more oil into the ocean? Worse, when signs of an impending problem do crop up, warning signs are apparently ignored and special permissions made to keep the oil flowing despite company policies to the contrary. After all, it’s their money to lose if they don’t.

Rep. Joe Barton, of course, would be the formerly mentioned public servant holding the above honorary title, who apologized to BP execs, and then pathetically apologized for his own apology. He is the top recipient of funds from oil and industry individuals and political action committees in the House.

As for the moratorium ruling, the administration plans to appeal:

Interior Secretary Ken Salazar said that within days he would issue a new order imposing a moratorium on deep-water drilling that would contain additional information showing why it was necessary.

BP finally gets something right

In one of its smartest moves, and there haven’t been many, or any, since the Gulf oil spill disaster, BP has dethroned the haughty and shockingly nonchalant Tony Hayward from his duties of day-to-day overseer of the cleanup and rig-mending efforts.

Credit: Reuters

According to the above linked report from Yahoo News:

The main reason for the shift is plain enough for anyone who’s been following the spill: BP executives acknowledge that as the company’s face during the crisis, Hayward has blown it. (BP chairman Carl-Henric) Svanberg, while defending the BP CEO, acknowledged that Hayward’s comments have not been helpful to the company’s efforts to control fallout from the disaster.

“It is clear Tony has made remarks that have upset people,” Svanberg tells Sky News. “This has now turned into a reputation matter, financial and political, and that is why you will now see more of me.”

Great! We can only hope you have infinitely more heart and competency than the last bloke.

Apologizing for an apology? Doubly wrong

Thursday was a bad day for Rep. Joe L. Barton.

We can see the game clearly. Was Barton sorry for being sorry? Or sorry for being sorry, sorry?

Barton, who on Thursday said the federally mandated edict on BP to create a $20 million escrow account to financially support those affected by its pitiless oil spill in the Gulf was a “shakedown,” apologized to BP for the administrations’ actions against the British company. When pressed, he then apologized for the apology.

Here is Barton to the House Energy and Commerce Committee:

I’m ashamed of what happened in the White House yesterday. I think it is a tragedy of the first proportion that a private corporation can be subjected to what I would characterize as a shakedown — in this case a $20 billion shakedown.

A tragedy indeed. A monumental tragedy, in fact, if you are financially backed by the very industry you are defending. According to an Associated Press report:

“I’m ashamed of what happened in the White House” on Wednesday, said Barton, who has received at least $100,470 in political contributions from oil and gas interests since the beginning of 2009, the second-highest amount among all the committee members.

Mr. Barton, in his statement, apologized “for using the term ‘shakedown’ ” to describe the $20 billion escrow account that BP and the White House announced Wednesday. He also retracted the apology to BP and said the company “should bear the full financial responsibility for the accident on their lease in the Gulf of Mexico” on April 20 and “fully compensate those families and businesses that have been hurt.”

Empty rhetoric and driven, most likely, by the criticism he faced. Again, The Times:

Of the five Gulf Coast states, Mr. Barton’s Texas is the only one whose beaches, fisheries and tourist haunts are not threatened by oil spewing from BP’s ruined well. Republican lawmakers from Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Florida quickly disavowed Mr. Barton’s apology to BP, and one was the first to call for stripping Mr. Barton of his committee seat.

Actually, if a politician issues an opinion on a certain issue, however against the grain, why redact it, if only for political expediency? Stand by your convictions, Mr. Barton. If you are in bed and bequeathed to Big Oil, say so. At least, then, you would go down as an honest person. If you care not one wit for our environment, but everything for the cash and equity provided by companies like BP,  say so. At least, then, you would skirt the charge of hypocrisy and salvage a very minute shred of your dignity. As it stands, there’s not much left.