WOULD THIS BE A BAD TIME TO POINT OUT...:

US failing to tighten ecological oversight, say activists: Charges that ecological review waived on 26 new offshore drilling projects come as latest attempt to seal well fail (Suzanne Goldenberg, 5/09/10, guardian.co.uk)

The Obama administration waived environmental reviews for 26 new offshore drilling projects even as the BP oil disaster spewed hundreds of thousands of gallons of crude oil into the Gulf of Mexico, environmental activists said today.[...]

The Centre for Biological Diversity said that even after the disaster, the Obama administration did not tighten its oversight of offshore drilling. An investigation by the respected environmental group revealed that since 20 April, when an explosion the Deepwater Horizon rig killed 11 workers, 27 new offshore drilling projects have been approved by the Mineral Management Service (MMS) the regulatory agency responsible for overseeing extraction of oil, gas and other minerals.

All but one project was granted similar exemptions from environmental review as BP. Two were submitted by the UK firm, and made the same claims about oil-rig safety and the implausibility of a spill damaging the environment, the centre said.

"This oil spill has had absolutely no effect on MMS behaviour at all," said Kieran Suckling, the director of the centre. "It's still business as usual which means rubber stamping oil drilling permits with no environmental review."

...that areas governed by Republicans weathered Katrina reasonably well, but that the Democrat area fared poorly?

Posted by Orrin Judd at May 10, 2010 5:46 AM