Louisiana on Drilling Moratorium: "They Took Our Jobs!"

by Ben Proffer · 2010-07-14 15:56:00 UTC
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"They took our jobs!"

On South Park, this refrain has gone from cliche to running gag. In Louisiana, you can hear it sound in the stagnant air. Since the deep-water drilling moratorium took effect, real shouts of dismay have been ringing from all corners. They are especially loud coming from Gov. Bobby Jindal, shown here skimming oil in a blue Oxford and brown Italian loafers. This grief is no surprise, considering how many people in Louisiana live, and die, by these rigs.

But when the co-chair of the national commission investigating the BP oil spill joins the chorus you have to step back and ask: Is anyone in Louisiana except the oil industry working these days?

The short answer: No. Long answer after the jump.

If you had picked up a copy of New Orleans' Times-Picayune yesterday, you would get the impression that the only people offering testimony to the national oil spill commission, in their first public meeting, were business leaders and local politicians, who either gushed about how great drilling is or complained about why the investigation and spill response is taking so long; this after three months of industry "experts" throwing everything they could at a truly insoluble disaster. It is the commission that should have a reservoir of impatience 3 million barrels deep, not Jindal.

So what did William K. Reilly, a former EPA chief and the commission's co-chair, say in response? "I come to this experience with a much greater sense of the economic dislocation being experienced here than I had three days ago . . . It's not clear for me why it should take so long to reassure oneself about (safety) considerations on those rigs." Further, he couldn't understand "why it's going to take so long to convince people the existing rigs are safe."

I'm sorry, but what the duck? Reilly was charged, in Executive Order 13543, to "develop options for guarding against, and mitigating the impact of, oil spills associated with offshore drilling." In other words, making sure the existing rigs are safe is his job.

I know; I know; he's on the board of directors of ConocoPhillips (as my colleague Mike Gaworecki pointed out a while back). The fact that he has more than one priority is not at issue. Men like this have lots of jobs, and he's sat on more boards than a lumberjack with sore feet. What's at issue right now is that he's not performing the mission charged to him by the President of the United States of America. His statements concerning the drilling moratorium— aside from being ill-based; the president has earmarked $100 million for oil worker relief— are inappropriate.

I'd urge you to go to the presidential spill commission site, and tell Reilly to get back to work immediately.

Photo Credit: lagohsep

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Ben Proffer is an environment writer and has written for Sherman’s Travel and New York magazines.
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