Bizarre, Environment, Politics, Society

Palin: Oil Spill is the Fault of Environmentalists

On the heels of Rush Limbaugh suggesting actual sabotage by environmentalists, Sarah Palin is joining the cause in blaming environmentalists for the oil spill by British Petroleum in the Gulf of Mexico.

Palin blamed “misguided radicalism” of environmentalists (as opposed presumably to “guided radicalism” of conservatives) for the disaster. She suggested that, if only these poor struggling oil companies were allowed to drill in wildlife reserves and close to our shores, they would not have to seek oil in the deep ocean.

She added “[t]his is a message to extreme ‘environmentalists’ who hypocritically protest domestic energy production offshore and onshore. There is nothing ‘clean and green’ about your efforts. With your non-sensical efforts to lock up safer drilling areas, all you’re doing is outsourcing energy development, which makes us more controlled by foreign countries, less safe, and less prosperous on a dirtier planet . . . Your hypocrisy is showing. You’re not preventing environmental hazards; you’re outsourcing them and making drilling more dangerous.”

In the meantime, members of Congress and oil lobbyists are demanding that the moratorium on drilling be lifted immediately.

For the full story, click here

126 thoughts on “Palin: Oil Spill is the Fault of Environmentalists”

  1. I’ve never heard such crap in all my life. Here’s a thought…allow the BP’s of the world to be held responsible for thier unbelievably unmitigated greed for $$$ and inability to shift to a healthier FUEL for the masses. Wherever they were drilling….how dare they put everyone at risk by thier stupid stupid stupid ignorance of how to prevent or at the least STOP any kind of potential accident.

    The technology to move away from oil consumption is available…the only thing keeping us from moving forward is a 7 headed beast, at least 1 of which is oil corporations…..and that beast is deliberately fed by the corporate creepos who will always do ONLY WHAT THEY CAN PROFIT BY no matter what the cost. BECAUSE THE COST IS NEVER THEIRS! THE COST IS NEVER THEIRS!

    They have an easy out, they are a ‘corporate person’ not a real person so there is always someone else to hang their crap on. And never a shred of responsibility need be taken.

    They don’t get what they want….everyone suffers till they get paid off. And they don’t use their own resources to do anything but figure out how to pass the costs along. Believe you me….what they may end up paying in the long run is NOTHING compared to what people have had to endure, and will have to endure, because of their ‘corporate’ behaviours.

    Well, I hope they enjoy the seafood.
    I hope they enjoy the fresh drinking water.
    I hope they enjoy the fishing, the swimming, the view…
    I hope they don’t feel too choked up when their grandkids are born with 2 heads…or more likely, begin to drop dead from lymphomas, Hodkins, mitochondrial disease, PEAS, all those lovely toxin mediated cancers and illnesses ad infinitum…and if they manage to buy themselves out of the consequence…I hope they enjoy watching everyone else who HAS TO SUFFER go through every second of what it takes to undo their garbage………………..

    http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/2010-05-06-1Achem06_ST_N.htm

    hows that for a spew

  2. Thank you Dr. Slarti, that was very well thought out, something that I did not do prior to posting that.

    It’s nice to have someone to keep me straight even though I’m naturally bent. 🙂

  4. Slartibartfast,

    I mostly agree with what you stated. The MMS also likely rushed the permits thinking that after hearing Obama’s campaign pledges regarding oil (now known as lies), they had to hurry up approval of permits. However, and we will disagree, Mr. Obama was naive about offshore drilling when he said it was safe–within a month of his statements, he began presiding over the most disastrous man-made environmental disaster in our history on *his* watch. Obama is also squarely and almost equally to blame.

    For others, the chart is under the Menu entitled: ‘The Regulator’ at the link I provided.

  5. Slart,

    This just seems appropriate:

    [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hEIx4kSSeVg&hl=en_US&fs=1&rel=0]

  6. FFLEO,

    I looked at the presentation you posted (which was informative) and it shows that the average drilling depth increased precipitously during the final year of the Bush administration (and has pretty much stayed the same since President Obama entered office). This suggests to me that the increase in drilling depth was due to assurances given to the Bush administration by the industry that their technology was up to it (or, more likely, sexual and other favors given to regulators to rubber-stamp the permits). While you can reasonably criticize the president for not acting fast enough (or correctly) after the disaster, this was yet another ticking time bomb left over from Bush/Cheney and the blame for it occurring, in my opinion, falls squarely on their shoulders.

  7. Bdaman,

    Are you suggesting that the procedure used in your Soviet video is easy (or even possible) to do? First you need to know about the geological strata you are working with to determine the viability of the plan and the necessary depth of the detonation, then you’ve got to drill down to that depth (a process most likely requiring months – since it is probable that a bigger borehole that the relief wells are needed), after which you need a nuke which will function properly at the pressure 2 miles below the ocean’s surface (which is not currently in our arsenal – you don’t think we can just tinker with existing nukes so they wont be crushed like a tin can, do you?) The Soviets used nukes as a last resort (and don’t you think there was a reason they tried other things first?) on LAND wells – the things that have been tried by BP so far are things that generally work on land wells. This is an entirely different engineering problem that BP (and the entire oil industry) are entirely unprepared for.

  9. I think Sister Sarah’s head would explode if she even thought words like “truth” or “fact”. She just does not have it in her black little heart to tell the truth.

    Besides, most of the oil we extract from our shores and our lands is put on the world market, not kept for ourselves, so that kind of shoots her psychotic rantings to hell.

    The only way we will wean ourselves off foreign oil is if we seriously seek other energy alternatives and keep what oil we do pump for ourselves. But I’m not holding my breath – all they do in DC is blow more smoke up our butts about green technology, and the need to free ourselves from our oil addiction, and do absolutely nothing about it.

    This woman is such a moron.

  10. 1) The US uses roughly 25% of the world’s oil and has only 4% of the world’s oil reserves. That’s pretty simple math that we CANNOT drill enough oil to satisfy our addiction. These aren’t environmentalists’ figures, these are what the oil industry has published.

    2) Our biggest suppliers of oil from outside the US are Canada and Mexico. Middle eastern oil is less than 25% of US consumption.

    3) What Palin means is that if not for environmentalists, that hole in the earth BP created would have been able to gush oil much faster and much gooier onto the shores of Louisianna, Mississippi, etal.

    Don’t even try to put any lipstick on either Palin or BP. This is a disaster caused directly by corporate greed, corruption and abject contempt for safety, people and the environment. There are no excuses and no silver linings. To even suggest anything except the reality of BP’s poor management of this well, being the sole cause of the hole and their litany of non-fixes is to be living in a different mental universe.

  11. As usual, Sister Palin is an ill-informed liar. It was the Bush–and now–Obama administation’s MMS that was “sleepin’ with the enemy; that is, for ‘easy’ permits MMS ispectors and regulators were gittin’ a litte (w)h’orderves on the side laced with their drugs of choice as gifts.

    Ms. Palin, Environmentists like sex too, but they prefer it clean n’ green without black crude oil as the bump n’ grind lubricant.

    “MMS plans, documents, e-mails, memos and databases reviewed by The Denver Post show an agency quick to sell offshore leases and approve drilling plans, while downplaying the potential for environmental damage and the risk of oil spills.”

    http://www.denverpost.com/headlines/ci_15236764

  14. Wouldn’t it be cheaper to invade a country that has 115 billion barrels of reserves, like Iraq?

  16. The BBC reports Russia is moving ahead with its plans to drill in the Gulf off the Cuban coast:

    “Russian Deputy Prime Minister Igor Sechin signed four contracts securing exploration rights in Cuba’s economic zone in the Gulf.
    Havana says there may be some 20 billion barrels of oil of its coast but the U.S. puts that estimate at five billion.

    Read more at the Washington Examiner: http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/blogs/beltway-confidential/BBC-reports-Russia-set-to-drill-for-oil-in-Gulf-of-Mexico-52531757.html#ixzz0q5YAfB2D

  17. This is just from one area that has been producing oil since 1950.

    Can you imagine how much more is out there where drilling is off limits.

  19. Here’s what Bdaman is not saying about the Bakken Formation. From this site:
    http://jacksonville.com/news/metro/2010-03-07/story/fact_check_is_the_bakken_formation_americas_oil_bonanza

    “Snopes.com, a well-respected Web site that confirms or debunks rumors and urban legends, also puts the number into perspective: ‘The U.S. currently imports an average of about 10 million barrels of oil per day, so even if all the estimated undiscovered oil in the Bakken Formation were extracted, it would only be enough to wean the U.S. off crude oil imports for one year … not enough to fuel the American economy for 41 years straight as the e-mail claims.’

    He is also wrong when when he says that we are not getting it because of “regulations and the environmentalist”:
    “No one is putting a stop to drilling in the Bakken. About 190 million barrels of oil has been extracted from it since the 1950s and as of August 2009, according to the USGS Web site.”

    Also note that the FAQ on the USGS website makes no mention of bans on drilling in the Bakken Formation. On the contrary, it says “Oil has been produced from the Bakken Formation since the 1950’s and, as of August 2009, cumulative oil production from the Bakken Formation totaled about 190 million barrels (up from 164 million barrels in March 2009, 149 million barrels in December 2008, and 135 million barrels in September 2008).”

    Here is more:
    http://www.theoildrum.com/node/3868
    Please note the conclusion: “The Bakken potential resource, while large by US onshore field standards, will have only a minor effect on US production or imports. Using 2006 US imports and consumption for comparison, the Bakken undiscovered resource of 3,649 million barrels of oil, if subsequently discovered and fully developed, would provide us with the equivalent of six months of oil consumption or 10 months of imports, spread over 20 or more years. In reality, the reserves developed are likely to be many times smaller than this value.”

    That took me about 5 minutes on google.

  20. Although the Obama administration has ruled out a nuke option, one has to wonder why.

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