Obama's Oil Spill Speech

Obama launched Operation Blame BP from the Oval Office in an attempt to project command of the gulf leak debacle.  I did not watch the speech myself.  Here's the reason.  Because my experience is, when you listen to a guy like a professional politician, he's gonna say all the right things to me.  I'm not interested in words.  I'm interested in actions.

The NY Times editors are also a bit more interested in actions:

On Tuesday, in his first address from the Oval Office, he vowed to “fight this spill with everything we’ve got for as long as it takes” and declared that “we will make BP pay for the damage their company has caused.”

Mr. Obama and his team will have to follow through — with more energy and dedication than they have shown so far.

We know that the country is eager for reassurance. We’re not sure the American people got it from a speech that was short on specifics and devoid of self-criticism. Certainly, we hope that Mr. Obama was right when he predicted that in “coming weeks and days,” up to 90 percent of the oil leaking from the well will be captured and the well finally capped by this summer. But he was less than frank about his administration’s faltering efforts to manage this vast environmental and human disaster.

The speech was panned even by Obama's base at MSNBC:

Olbermann: "It was a great speech if you were on another planet for the last 57 days."

Hm, my presumption that Obama would say all the right things to me may not have been valid.

WOULD IT HAVE HELPED?  With all the things that have gone wrong in the gulf, I was expecting Obama to ask Congress to repeal Murphy's Law.

I DON'T KNOW WHERE WE'RE GOING, BUT WE'RE MAKING GOOD TIME!  Peter Wehner of Commentary highlights "one of the worst sections from an Oval Office address ever"; he includes Obama's refutation of skeptics who doubt that we landed a man on the moon, and this deathless passage:

"Instead, what has defined us as a nation since our founding is our capacity to shape our destiny — our determination to fight for the America we want for our children. Even if we’re unsure exactly what that looks like. Even if we don’t yet know precisely how to get there. We know we’ll get there."

Tomorrow is later, but it is scheduled for arrival any day now.

IF DAN RIEHL IS WITH ME,WHO WILL STAND AGAINST ME?  Via Glenn, we see this from Dan on the speech:

But given that the reviews are so overwhelmingly bad, it occurred to me - it's what we aren't hearing that's most significant. You can call Obama incompetent and no one is accusing you of racism, any more. Now, that's change!!

Ah hah! Just a few short days ago, I noted that Obama had lost the Rolling Stone and said this:

As a stray thought, we have spent months reading about the racist Tea Partiers, and for months it has seemed obvious that come the fall, desperate Dems would start screaming that everyone opposed to them was racist.  That strategy would not be intended to change minds, but it might rally the base a bit.  On the heels of the Gulf debacle (and the perceived civil liberties debacle), the race card will be a lot harder to play.

Comments

[PDinDetroit]

Eh? We're going to shape it even though we don't know what it looks like? We're going to get somewhere (where?) even though we don't know how?

It is like going to an airline ticket counter and saying "I want to go some place that is warm". You might get somewhere, but not really like it when you get there. You have to have VISION of what it will look like or you will be "flying blind".

[Clarice]

From Michelle Obama's Mirror:
You speak like a green girl,
Unsifted in such perilous circumstance."
- William Shakespeare, Hamlet, 1.3

[Thomas Collins]

Picture caption of the day. See LUN.

[Thomas Collins]

Actually, the headline wasn't bad, either.

[Janet]

Here's the movie quote for Obama's speech -
"what you've just said is one of the most insanely idiotic things I have ever heard. At no point in your rambling, incoherent response were you even close to anything that could be considered a rational thought. Everyone in this room is now dumber for having listened to it. I award you no points, and may God have mercy on your soul."
(from the movie Billy Madison)

[Clarice]

Ras -20 today. I bet Obama can feel Hillary's breath .

The WH backstabbed Israel in the UN and Evelyn Gordon says its time for Congress to undo that decision by refusing to fund the investigation into the flotilla incident.

http://www.commentarymagazine.com/blogs/index.php/evelyn-gordon/315271

[Rob Crawford]

I bet Obama can feel Hillary's breath .

Inexplicably, a favorite "Venture Bros." quote just popped into my head: "It's like someone with a fever yelling at your crotch!"

[Clarice]

HEH

[cathyf]

The problem with stuffing a bomb down the hole is that the doomsday risk of this whole mess involves plugging the pipe too high up. It appears from the cameras that the well is leaking through the sides into the seafloor, and then it is percolating through the loose sand up around the well.

Imagine that you have a "soaker" hose -- you, know, with all of the little holes in it. Use a thermonuclear device to close off the end of the hose. It still is going to be spouting water out all of the little holes.

Plugging "the" damn hole too high up will simply make it impossible to plug all of the little holes further down, which will soon be much bigger holes when the pressure goes up.

[PD]

It is like going to an airline ticket counter and saying "I want to go some place that is warm". You might get somewhere, but not really like it when you get there. You have to have VISION of what it will look like or you will be "flying blind".

Indeed. It's hard enough to accomplish what you want when you know exactly what you want. Trying to do so based on vagueness guarantees failure.

Or maybe it doesn't, hmm... If you don't know what you're trying to accomplish, I guess you can't really say you failed to do it. Maybe that's the point? Built-in wiggle room.

[Let Obama come to the mountain; it ain't goin' to him.]

As usual, cathyf has it. This well is leaking deep and may bleed the reservoir. What I find difficult to understand is how a reservoir with such pressure hasn't relieved itself naturally. Then again, I guess they were drilling through 30,000 feet of dirt. Everest class amounts.
====================

[PDinDetroit]

Failing to plan is planning to fail.

No one should be surprised by now that Obama = Fail.

[Clarice]

Today's meeting with BP lasted all of 20 minutes and our own typhoid Mary, Jamie Gorelick, represented BP at it.

Honestly, the company seems so tied up in crony capitalism I don't care what happens to it.

[fdcol63]

" ... And Bush's restraint in not ripping Blanco/Nagin is striking. ..."

Indeed. The restraint that he has shown, and continues to show, in the face of all the Dems' bashing is truly amazing. Almost inhuman.

One could argue that he's done so because he's too weak or too wrong to counter their bashing.

But on the other hand, I believe that he's stronger than they are, and respects the office of the Presidency too much. He knows the power of symbolism, and continues to keep the Office and himself above all that petty sniping.

[Porchlight]

Yesterday 4 workers were moving the canopy down the beach with the rest of the workers underneath as if it was a pharoah's canopy.

rse,

Is there video of that? It should be plastered all over YouTube immediately.

[Sue]

Gorelick? And they paint BP and big oil as a republican crony? It's crazy the connections between BP and Obama people. I'm tellin' ya', these conspiracy theories are lookin' more-n-more like they might have legs.

[fdcol63]

Jame Gorelick, again?

What could go wrong? LOL

[jimmyk]

Today's meeting with BP lasted all of 20 minutes and our own typhoid Mary, Jamie Gorelick, represented BP at it.

Perhaps the JOMers familiar with Chicago-style politics can fill in the blanks as to how this meeting likely transpired. FWIW, BP's stock price jumped up on the announcement, so it sounds like there are more carrots than sticks involved, maybe limiting BP's liability.

[PD]

But on the other hand, I believe that he's stronger than they are, and respects the office of the Presidency too much. He knows the power of symbolism, and continues to keep the Office and himself above all that petty sniping.

That's probably right. On the other hand, Rove states in his book that one of the biggest mistakes they (he, Rove, in particular) made was in being too passive in the face of the baseless attacks. He says in hindsight they should have been a lot more aggressive in countering the lies and disinformation.

[fdcol63]

PD, I agree. They should have been more aggressive in countering the lies and disinformation.

Once that takes root in the public as "conventional wisdom", it's virtually impossible to change the perception.

But the MSM still has considerable power in that they can almost always shape "first impressions" with their first news broadcasts and opinion articles. It's almost impossible to change those first impressions and initial judgments in the minds of the public after they are made, and especially so when the MSM grudgingly prints their retractions and corrections on Page F32 several days or weeks later.

By aggressively countering them, you run the risk of 2 things:

1) Getting sucked into a never-ending tit-for-tat where the MSM picks apart everything else you say. Even the best of us will slip up somewhere, and say something else that will give them even more ammo in the future against us.

2) You then find yourself needing to expend more resources in that tit-for-tat that distracts and diverts you from the other important issues you're facing and dealing with. The GWOT, Afghanistan, Iraq, and rebuilding the economy after 9/11 were such issues.

Just my 2-cents.

[rseintheFLpanhandle]

No video alas.

It was early, about 10.

When I came up to make lunch a bit ago 2 BP mini-jeeps were driving down the beach to set up further canopies west of here.

The type of people being recruited is clearly politically driven.

After saying they looked like homeless shelter and prison labor, I have since been told by those who have gone thru the Hazmat training that that's precisely where they are from.

I guess everyone cannot be a prison worker.

Will let you know of any further jawdropping images.

[rseintheFLpanhandle]

census worker.

[George W]

'Time is on my side, yes it is, time is on my side, yes it is'

The Glimmer Twins

[PDinDetroit]

OT - UAW has elected a King as their new President. LUN.

[Old Lurker]

Sorry, having trouble focusing. The comments above featuring Hillary's breath at 3AM and somebody's crotch have upset my nap.

[MarkO]

Gore-lick? Come on. What a great political party.

[Clarice]

Jane, more errands today. It's muggy and hot so I'm working on my breads..I think today I have perfected the French baguette. Tomorrow I work on Jim Lahey's stecca--a thin Italian type baguette--a little softer than a baguette and better for sandwiches--it's studded with olives, garlic or tomatoes and looks very wonderful and easy to master.

The baguettes were the hardest bread to do because of some special but not difficult techniques used and the need for a special pan to best cook them in.

[NK]

Jamie Gorelick reps BP in this crony capitalism flim flam game. Oy Vey! Let's see, BP makes $5B/year in payouts, meanwhile BP cuts the $8B dividend for the rest of the year -- dividends that in large part go to Brit fixed income pensioners-- to pay for it --BRILLIANT. If Great Britain still had a Royal Navy they would have steamed up the Potomac and started a little old bon fire in DC like they did back in 1812. Meanwhile- Jamie 'effin Gorelick?! It is absolutely gross that she does this crony capitalism deal today on the same day the NYSE DE-LISTS Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Jamie 'effin Gorelick was Vice Chairman of Fannie for 7 years 97-2004 and took out $26M in comp from Fannie, and left behind-- get this -- up to ONE TRILLION DOLLARS of taxpayer liability (depending on the direction of the housing markets). ONE TRILLION DOLLARS. She was also responsible for that little World Trade Center bonfire back on 9/11 because she ordered the FBI and CIA/NSA never to speak to each other about terorists inside the good ole' USA. Jamie 'effin Gorelnick. Does anybody have an explanation why Jamie, and Jim Johnson (Vice Chairman) and Frank Raines (CEO) are not in Federal prison with Madoff for their accounting fraud and gross incompetence at Fannie that first wiped out AIG (oh yeah AIG used Fannie/Freddie stock to collateralize the swap default insurance they sold-- what could possibly go wrong!!!) and now that the NYSE has kicked Fannie/Freddie out as fraudulent enterprises (after the Shareholders have been wiped out of course) why aren't these thieves under indictment for the ONE TRILLION DOLLAR LOSS they've stuck to the taxpayers. Jamie 'effin Gorelnick should spend the rest of her natural life mowing the greens at an USAF golf course and Frank Raines should be cleaning out the latrines in Haliburton port-a-potties. She's TYPHOID JAMIE and BP retained her to rep them?!

[PDinDetroit]

Not only do they work only 20 minute out of each hour, they also trample Pelican Nests crushing eggs and killing chicks.

LUN.

Just wait until your environmentalist mother gets home!

[matt]

Cathy, the guys at Livermore can do the math on such a detonation pretty quickly. How big and thick a sheet of glass on the bottom of the ocean encompassing the leak could be probably be determined from the existing survey data.

If it is a capillary leak there should be a way to measure the range of the leak using either manned or unmanned submersibles.

[Janet]

fdcol63,Really good comments on Bush. He is an honorable man.
Indeed. The restraint that he has shown, and continues to show, in the face of all the Dems' bashing is truly amazing. Almost inhuman.
I believe the Almighty gives him the strength for that.

The Libby case showed what happened when any effort was made to correct the lies and disinformation. The MSM is the enemy.

[Janet]

LUN Woman pleads guilty to accessing Obama's student loan records.

[Rob Crawford]

Ya know, the current excuse that the EPA refused the Dutch ships because they don't remove 100% of the oil has, at least, the ring of truth. The environmentalists (emphasis on 'mental') have long been believers in the 'zero tolerance' idiocy, so it's likely they would refuse to clean up 99% of the oil if it means 1% had to be cleaned up some other way.

BTW -- heard the latest about the boom? The company paid for a third-party to examine it, and he concluded it exceeds the requirements and is better than the booms currently in use.

Has anyone actually seen the report that pans the Maine-manufactured booms? We've all heard the "it doesn't meet the requirements" line from the government, but I've not heard of anyone actually seeing the paperwork to back that up.

[Clarice]

I just read we are going to use the Dutch booms after all.

That Alabama professor (Amy Bishop) who killed three colleagues has just been arrested for the decades old murder of her brother.

[PD]

The Libby case showed what happened when any effort was made to correct the lies and disinformation.

That reminds me: The Rove book is also interesting for his account of what it was like to be a participant in the Plame grand jury investigation. Hair raising.

[Rob Crawford]

That Alabama professor (Amy Bishop) who killed three colleagues has just been arrested for the decades old murder of her brother.

Her parents are no longer politically connected, I take it?

[narciso]

Bishop, Bedell, Stack, two raving lefty anarchist types, with violent tendencies, I'm sure Matthews will get around to classifying
them as threats to the nation

[Andrew_M_Garland]

Obama should have given the "standard speech". Time-tested and short.

This standard political speech sums up the liberal position: Life is troubling; We will save you; It will take some time, cost some money, and require your full cooperation.

Excerpt from A Political Speech: Troubling Times

I could go on. My staff has compiled a list of 463 of life's difficulties, and I am not convinced that we have listed them all. I haven't published this list, it is too depressing.

The good news is that I am ready to roll up my sleeves, sit down with the very best people who will work with the government, and deliver to you a better life. If we organize things in a different way, and all come together in support of this common good, we can finally get a grip on the situation and prosper in ways that are not even imaginable today.

I want to be realistic. My time in political office may not be enough to complete all of the changes that are needed. I can set the government onto a new path, and it will be the work of others from my party to continue on that path.

[Jane says obamasucks]

The baguettes were the hardest bread to do because of some special but not difficult techniques used and the need for a special pan to best cook them in.

Nothing better than the smell of a fresh baguette.

Her parents are no longer politically connected, I take it?

Delahunt is retiring. If anyone looks I think it will show he had a big hand in giving her a pass.

[Captain Hate]

LUN Woman pleads guilty to accessing Obama's student loan records.

I can't believe she might get jail time for this if she didn't send the info to somebody else. Do you realize how many people would be incarcerated for stuff like this if they applied this standard across the board? The entire country would be a penal colony.

WTF; this isn't a national security issue.

[Bill in AZ sez it's time for Zero to resign]

I have to agree with NK - Jamie Gorelick has been dead center in just about every disaster in the country in the last 20 years. Is she a magnet or is it intentional? I cringed when I read her name associated with this. And then somewhere upthread - some mucky-muck from BP wrote the climate change bill? The dots connect themselves. What new disaster is she at the center of now?

[narciso]

"In May 2003, shortly after joining the Kean Commission, Gorelick also joined the Washington firm of Wilmer, Cutler & Pickering. A month earlier, this firm announced it would defend Saudi Prince Mohammed al Faisal, third in command in the Saudi government?and a plaintiff in several of the billion-dollar lawsuits filed by relatives of 9/11 victims.”

[Pofarmer]

WTF; this isn't a national security issue.

If it reveals that Obama was calling himself and Indonesian to get financial aid, it might be.

[bunkerbuster]

The key political victim of Katrina was the Bush strategy of keeping expectations low. The administration had resorted to the tactic habitually in the unfolding Iraq debacle -- willfully portraying the president as being incapable of having foreseen, for example, the reality that there were no WMD or that Iraqis would not welcome the invasion or that the costs would be many times over the initial estimates. (How could he have known? lol) The strategy worked so well because it was consistent with both Bush's persona and his actual performance: he probably was ideologically if not intellectually unable to take on board the abundant information pointing to the prospect of catastrophe in Iraq, should the U.S. invade.
Then along came Katrina. With the National Guard having become a key factor in staffing the unraveling Iraq invasion, the emergence of a disaster that legitimately called for the Guard's deployment, only highlighted the fact how risky, poorly planned and disastrously executed the Iraq invasion was. A week and half into the Katrina disaster, Rove deployed the strategy to shift blame to local officials. It was damage control and it worked to at least shore up the president's image among his SUPPORTERS, who had begun to turn on him in light of his performance on Katrina. But it was far too little too late. But that's not at all because the levee problems were Bush's fault in any way. Rather, the debacle nuked the administrations' main damage control tactic on Iraq. It was no longer possible for the administration to maintain the noise-machine's No. 1 talking point: The nation's safety depends on the invasion of Iraq. Katrina demonstrated beyond question that the nation's safety was, in fact, far more vulnerable to the mere whims of weather and, of course, to incompetence and disorganization at Bush crony-staffed organizations like FEMA. While Obama is fighting a PR war with at least three fronts: the problems in Afghanistan, the lingering effects of the Bush credit collapse and, now, the BP spill, there is no credible narrative that links his performance on one to the next. On the war, Obama has in almost every detail, maintained policies the American right has advocated. On the credit meltdown, he's done primarily what most of Wall Street wanted done. This is why the BP spill will never hurt Obama's political fortunes to near the extent Katrina hurt Bush.

[narciso]

Cue that statement from Billie Madison, there's a reason I dubbed her the Zelig of disaster, her memo formalized the already lousy relationship between the CIA and the FBI, then she moved onto Fannie Mae, inflated
the profits, there, then the commission, which
covered part of the results of her first act,
then representing Al Faisal, in the above case, probably using confidential information
and finally fumbling the defense against the
Sallie Mae takeover by the Government

[bgates]

The one answer I will not settle for is the idea that this challenge is somehow too big and too difficult to meet....The same thing was said about our ability to harness the science and technology to land a man safely on the surface of the moon.

This from the man who plans to destroy our ability to put a man into orbit without the assistance of the Russians.

[Clarice]

Andrew--that's a great speech!

[centralcal]

Some tidbits on the ratings for last night's speech, courtesy of the Baltimore Sun's David Zurawik:

"A combined audience of 32 million viewers on 11 channels tuned in Tuesday night for President Obama's first address from the Oval Office.

As large as that audience might sound, it was down 33 percent from his first State of the Union talk on January 27, 2010."

[snip]

"As for the cable news wars, Fox News had the biggest audience by far Tuesday night, but ratings-challenged CNN can take some encouragement from its solid second place showing ahead of MSNBC."

[snip]

"The Fox News channel’s analysis of Obama's address averaged 3,395,000 viewers, with 877,000 in the key deomographic, accoring to Nielsen Media Research.

The Fox News audience is certainly an engaged one that turns out time after time for important events in the civic life of this nation. I wonder if anyone can explain why members of MSNBC's audience don't respond that way."

I especially appreciated that last paragraph.

[centralcal]

Sorry, I forgot to include LUN . . .

[Janet]

WTF; this isn't a national security issue.

She should have sent the info to Woodward, Leahy, or Walter Pincus...then it is protected. I don't know why, it just is.

[Extraneus]

He says in hindsight they should have been a lot more aggressive in countering the lies and disinformation.

Come on... He may be the Bald Man, but who wouldn't have been smart enough to get some operatives out there to recite chapter and verse every night on how Clinton, Kerry, Gore, Hillary, Kennedy, and all the rest of them swore that Iraq had WMDs before Bush was even in the picture? Did they not remember anything about Vietnam, or at least read about it or know someone who could have explained what the left would do?

Gross political malpractice, with major consequences for all of us.

[Andrew_M_Garland]

Clarice,
Thanks for the shout out.

[narciso]

Iowahawk delivers the goods, in the LUN

[JM Hanes]

Andrew:

"We will save you; It will take some time, cost some money, and require your full cooperation."

ROTFL! It just takes Obama 2,500 more words to say it.

[Fundforlife]

Extortion. Hurricane took money from Congress with special vote 2 or 3. Spill takes it from BP with dividends not even knowing id it was terror or corrupt refineries that have a national security monopoly. This is how O does foreign aid and N.O. fits right in. SC has a problem.............

[PD]

Will Eric Holder, who said we're a nation of cowards when it comes to race, defend the racial courage of Rep. Steve King?

[Jane says obamasucks]

I'm watching Chris Matthews special on the Tea parties - where he says we are just like the militia.

[Old Lurker]

"I'm watching Chris Matthews"

You are, so we don't have too.

Say hello to the other four people who watch that idiot.

[Jane says obamasucks]

well he pissed me off this morning with something he said - and I blogged it - so I wanted to see him prove it - he hasn't yet.

[JM Hanes]

bunky:

"....willfully portraying the president as being incapable of having foreseen...."

Now that there is surely unintended irony, what with Obama claiming he had no idea that it would be so hard to reform the MMS. Apparently his Secretary of the Interior never thought to clue him in. Let's just add that to the burgeoning list of the unforeseen challenges he keeps bumping his head on. It's even harder to believe you could take blame-shifting out for a spin with a straight face. Obama is certainly fighting a PR war, but then, that's his forte -- or was once upon a time.

The WSJ provides some useful context on the economic front:

Who is better informed about the policy choices facing the country—liberals, conservatives or libertarians? According to a Zogby International survey that I write about in the May issue of Econ Journal Watch, the answer is unequivocal: The left flunks Econ 101.

What's almost as newsworthy is that it comes from Zogby. I suspect the results were a surprise.

[Old Lurker]

I find everything he says does that to me. My blood pressure can't take it.

(Ours kids were in school together so he was around... Did not like him then, either)

[Jane says obamasucks]

I hate him, but I feel compelled to debunk his lies about the Tea party

[JM Hanes]

Jane:

I surfed through all of 5 minutes with Rachel Maddow last night, just in time to hear her say that Chris Matthews was up next to discuss what Harry Reid's opponent could possibly have meant when she said, "We need to take Harry Reid out."

[Charlie (Colorado)]

What happened to the GM bondholders was done by a bankruptcy court.

Are you sure about that, DoT? What I recall was that it was a pre-negotiated deal with some very clear threats about the government not coming through with cash unless the deal was done exactly as it was defined, including screwing the bondholders in favor of the unions.

[centralcal]

Jane - just a little something to add to your guilt over watching Chrissy:

Chris Matthews discusses his documentary "Rise of the New Right" (tonight, 7pmET) with The Huffington Post. "What we're trying to do is get a big audience, to ne honest with you," Matthews admits. "The bigger audience I get, the more [documentaries] I can do."

[Clarice]

I remember it the way Charlie does, if that adds even a scintilla of authority to his claim.

If you haven't bought dad a gift yet..you might like this..I bought one for Howard (intending fully to steal it for my cooking ) and haven't been able to get it out of his hands for a second.
http://www.amazon.com/Raytek-MT4-Mini-Infrared-Thermometer/dp/B0000WUM4C>Zap

[Jane says obamasucks]

"We need to take Harry Reid out."

Yeah and in the documentary he equates tea partiers with militia, truther and birthers - and calls them all the "New Right" which is extremist and a lot like John Birch, Strom thurmond, father Coglin and Alex Jones.

[peter]

Clarice, exactly how do you use an infrared thermometer when grilling? Do you aim it at the charcoals, the grill, or the food, after it's been taken off the grill?

[Jane says obamasucks]

BTW Obama was mentioned several times at the Blago trial today.

[hit and run]

Typepad ate my comment. Maybe whining about it will bring it back.

[Clarice]

It will give you the surface temp of the food, the temp of the coals and the temp of the grill. It can tell you when it should be refrigerated for safety reasons.

Chefs apparently use them because they can test the surface temps of several items without cross contamination. There is one with a pop out thermometer you can use to get an internal temp as well.

[Clarice]

*it* for refrigeration is the food, not the grill BTW.

[narciso]

documentaries, 'that word you're using. . ."
they do have Sarah prominently up in the clip I saw, so she can say boo.

[Extraneus]

Thanks for the link, narciso. I'm ready to sign up for Sensei Bob Etheridge's next seminar.

[peter]

I have been using an electronic thermometer built into a fork tip lately when grilling with amazing results, i.e., complete predictability as to doneness with certain meats. Never want to overcook a lambchop.

[Old Lurker]

Peter, what brand/model?

[SunnyDay]

I use one of the electronic forks too - love it.

[Melinda Romanoff]

The reason you might you Jamie Gorelick as your rep for a meeting at the White House is that everything was pre-arranged and in the can.

And it also explains why only twenty minutes of face time was needed.

The Rose Garden delay was a reaction to that the twenty minutes was brazenly stamped on the schedule, and was being questioned in the press (Rick, for one.)

[MayBee]

I notice that recently Jamie Gorelick was hired as the lobbyist to lobby *against* the government takeover of student loans.
Shockingly, she lost! I bet she was super bummed. But I bet she was still paid.

[Clarice]

Of course it was all pre arranged and simply window dressing.
I have an internal thermometer, too..but this gadget is fun. My husband ran out to the pool to test it on the water..People use it to test stove temps, heaters, air conditoners, thermal leaks,

It's great fun.

[peter]

OL, it's a Redi-Fork Pro Model 64. I received it as a Dad's day gift, last year, I think.

[JM Hanes]

Charlie:

Obama's team twisted arms and made the deals, but the bankruptcy judge had to OK it. I remember being stunned when he agreed to it. IIRC, he explicitly dismissed the claims of the group who lodged an objection -- or what was ultimately left of them after team O got finished -- because everyone else was officially, if not willingly, on board, But I'm not 100% sure of that part.

[Old Lurker]

Thanks, Peter.

Young Lurker, if you come by, I suggest Amazon and FedEx...

[peter]

People use it to test stove temps, heaters, air conditoners, thermal leaks,

It's great fun.

Maybe we can use it on Keith Olberman's head.

[Old Lurker]

Actually we should use your fork for that.

[Clarice]

Exactly..give him the fork.

[RichatUF]

JM Hanes-

Those that complained weren't big enough to make a difference. The biggest creditors were the USG and TARP banks. None of the other issues were litigated. IIRC, they did a 363 bankruptcy and the USG ate around 40 billion of the bailout ("New" GM only had about 8 billion in US government money it had to pay back). Should be interesting when "New" GM does its IPO.

In re: BP and the escrow account, I wonder when the shareholder lawsuits start? Under existing law I can't envision BP being liable for anything approaching that. But at least they got ACORN COI crooks Obama's natural constituency to work 20 minutes an hour to "clean up the beach". All the money will probably all get conduited to Dems just in time for the election.

[macphisto]

groovy, as Bernadine Dohrn would say.

[squaredance]

That $20 bil is s disaster. What will be allocated this year will go right to the Unions, ACRON, etc. just in time for the elections. They will buy a lot of votes with this cash, and at all level of elections.

Note that political actors/agents unaccountable to the electorate are in charge of it. Chicago political on a national scale.

This puts the Nov. elections further at risk.

Just a disaster. Guess BP figure they can make it up in Cap and Trade. The lame duck congress will ram it through in now. What a disaster. What a corrupt nation we have become. How will the institutions survive it? What evil people these villains are.

It will take a generation to just begin to recover on any practical or oral sense--and that is if there is the will. America will never recover her power in the world, a power she had een 3 years ago.

The American people are either do weak, corrupt, ignorant or stupid to care. Brazil, here we come.

Never have we seen something like this. Right in the light of day. They would not have gotten away with this 20 years ago.

Hardly a peep now. How this nation as fallen in one generation. What a grim future we have ahead of us.

[PaulL]

Over at RealClearPolitics I just now watched the Frank Luntz group on Sean Hannity last night.

The only two people in the big group interview who supported Ibama were, wait for it, a black woman and a black man.

[PaulL]

Pessimistic much, squaredance?

[Jane says obamasucks]

BP only has $7b at this point. They are $13 short.

IIRC many of those objecting withdrew their objections and it sounded to me that they were threatened - Chicago style of course.

[JM Hanes]

squaredance:

"It will take a generation to just begin to recover on any practical or oral sense--and that is if there is the will."

You're unusually optimistic tonight.

Richat UF:

"But at least they got .... Obama's natural constituency to work 20 minutes an hour to "clean up the beach."

They'll probably plug 30,000 into their jobs created number, and say the Gulf has jump started the employment recovery.

[RichatUF]

Why stop at 30k?

[centralcal]

Tom Maguire: You got a shout out from Ace's blog by Russ from Winterset:

"OK, so this is just another reason to link a worthy blog: So what? If you don't read "Just One Minute" regularly, then you should seriously consider doing so. He was one of my Daily Reads back during the Valerie Plaime Payback Tour & the Duke Lacrosse scandal, and he's just as good now as he was then."

He then continues with a link to your Chaos in the Gulf post.

Watch out in the comments . . . those AoSHQ commenters are quite a crew!!!! grin.

[MarkO]

This oil spill is no helping Obama's kids. I think that is the true north of understanding him. Almost everything is a distraction. Actual work; natural disasters; financial meltdowns; being made fun of by the idiots in charge of say, Iran and other similar crazy places; ordinary civil discourse, simple understanding of history.

These are not a few of his favorite things. These things are not mentioned in his mission statement---his real mission, you who were the ones waiting for yourselves remember don't you: to make an Obama suutable for perpetual worship.

These things just get in the way of cap and trade and disarming America.

Oh well, Uruguay beat the hell out of South Africa. Dale, dale.

[MarkO]

*not*

[bgates]

say Obama's brilliant! Unprecedented! response to the tragic lack of government regulation he inherited which caused the disaster in the Gulf has jump started the employment recovery

[JM Hanes]

Jane:

The Wall St. Journal ends a pretty detailed summary of events as of May 11, 2009 with this :

At noon the next day, April 30, Mr. Obama said Chrysler would file for bankruptcy. He blamed "speculators" who had turned down the $2 billion offer for their $6.9 billion of debt. A lawyer for holdout firms, Tom Lauria, accused the White House of threatening to destroy the reputation of Perella Weinberg. The White House denied exerting pressure on it. Mr. Lauria's clients took their fight into bankruptcy court last week, imperiling the administration's plan to guide Chrysler into and out of court swiftly. But on Friday, the holdouts abandoned the fight as too costly, financially and politically.

Looks like we were remembering different parts of the elephant. :-)

[RichatUF]

centralcal-

Quick, we need to dirty up the place. Valu-rite and hobos...get Captain hate in here.