A Federal judge in New Orleans just ruled that Obama’s six-month moratorium on offshore drilling in deep water is NOT legal. The President’s Press Secretary, Robert Gibbs, responded quickly by saying the White House will immediately challenge this ruling.
This is a big deal for Obama because he believes it doesn’t make sense to drill in such deep waters when it is difficult or impossible to repair when something goes wrong. He also is concerned that current drilling procedures may not be safe enough to prevent future mistakes and spills.
It makes sense for President Obama to ban offshore drilling in deep waters until he can be sure these drilling rigs are safe. This concern comes in the aftermath of BP’s (British Petroleum) explosion that killed elven people and the disastrous oil spill in the gulf, which is still leaking at a rapid pace until they can fix it. His own accountability demands that the President take a closer look at safety issues for this type of drilling.
The problem is, however, that many in the industry who have invested a lot of money, say Obama’s actions go too far. They say the President’s sx-month moratorium on all current dwelling in deep water, stopping all new permits for deepwater drilling, and suspending drilling on 33 exploratory wells in the Gulf, is unnecessary and illegal.
The argument is that twenty-nine wells were inspected before the BP explosion and twenty-seven were determined safe; British Petroleum (BP) just happened to be one that was deemed safe. Their claim is that it is not fair to stop all drilling for six months because just one rig blew up; in other words, only one of twenty nine rigs had an explosion.
Those drills have all been determined safe and the White House cannot give a good reason for them not being safe; the judge agreed ruled against President Obama’s ban.
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There have been many who have speculated that the President may be dragging his feet on cleaning up the Gulf Spill for political reasons. Whatever the President’s reasons for not being able to stop this spill or to be quicker in cleaning up spill, he needs to be more involved in getting this disaster cleaned up. Below is a video that may help you understand what is being done to date about cleanup efforts.
