Obama refuses Dutch help for the Gulf Crisis

Joe wrote:

The Viking wrote: Personally, I think Obama wanted to let this turn into a national disastor. ..... I think Obama is worse than a terorist!

C'mon Viking, calm down. No one is going to take you seriously if you say things like that. Don't let your passion overtake calm thinking. I do appreciate the info, and it sounds like they did not utilize all the help that was offered. I think Obama's lack of executive experience is clearly showing. And it is also another example of a surprised American public saying "our government has failed us" (in the cleanup response). Get used to hearing that even more in the future on a variety of issues.

You are right. I didn't word that right. I meant more dangerous than a terrorist. When you have one man with that much power running the greatest nation on earth, who is so naive, inexperienced and indecisive, he is dangerous. His indecisiveness and just wanting to create committees is costing our nation tens of billions if not more!

jf1acai wrote:

WASHINGTON — National Incident Commander Admiral Thad Allen today announced the development of specific guidance to ensure accelerated processing of requests for Jones Act waivers should they be received as a part of the BP oil spill response.

Currently, 15 foreign-flagged vessels are involved in the largest response to an oil spill in U.S. history. No Jones Act waivers have been granted because none of these vessels have required such a waiver to conduct their operations in the Gulf of Mexico.

However, in order to prepare for any potential need, Admiral Allen has provided guidance to the Coast Guard Federal On-Scene Coordinator, U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP), and the U.S. Maritime Administration to ensure any Jones Act waiver requests receive urgent attention and processing.

“While we have not seen any need to waive the Jones Act as part of this historic response, we continue to prepare for all possible scenarios,” said Admiral Allen. “Should any waivers be needed, we are prepared to process them as quickly as possible to allow vital spill response activities being undertaken by foreign-flagged vessels to continue without delay.”

To date, the administration has leveraged assets and skills from numerous foreign countries and international organizations as part of this historic, all-hands-on-deck response, including Canada, Germany, Mexico, Netherlands, Norway, the United Nations’ International Maritime Organization and the European Union’s Monitoring and Information Centre. In some cases, offers of international assistance have been turned down because the offer didn’t fit the needs of the response.

Full Article

From the Deepwater Horizon Response website.

That is great that we have help now from other nations, but as the other article staed, the delay accepting the help probably cost us the time we needed to prevent most of it from destroying our coastline and the fishing industry in that area. Most of that help was not accepted for over 5 weeks. How far did it spread in those five weeks? Now we are behind the eight ball and catching up will be almost impossible not to mention it is already on our shores. So much could have been prevented with decisive action in the first week.

The Viking wrote: When you have one man with that much power running the greatest nation on earth, who is so naive, inexperienced and indecisive, he is dangerous.

That was well said!

But he gives good speeches!

I've tried researching this more, but get a lot of conflicting information.

Some articles say the Dutch offered to send ships with skimmers. Others say the offer was to supply skimmers for our ships.

If they supplied the ships, wouldn't it take at least a week to cross the Atlantic? Or are they already in the area? At the time, BP was claiming the leak was 1000 barrels, were the skimmers needed for that? If ships were sent, then the Jones Act would be a factor, but it could be waived. There is an EPA issue with the skimmers in that some oil would be released back to the sea (very little compared to what was picked up) and that is not allowed. So another waiver is necessary. Also I read the skimmers are most effective near the source of the leak, but only about 20% of the oil is at the surface in that area.

Now we have ships with skimmers from many other nations (how long have they been there, and are they effective?), and it sounds like we are getting skimmers from the Dutch. Do we need more, or are there enough?

I guess it's best to err on the side of caution, though, and all solutions should of been brought in ASAP. But people make it sound like Obama personally refused this aid. I suspect it has more to due with bureauracy as usual, especially early on when the magnitude of the issue still wasn't clear. Anyway, we could use more information.

And I don't see how you jump from preferring to use American workers during a bad economy to saying it's all about unions. How many of these workers are union?

Here's what Adm. Thad Allen had to say about the skimmers...

http://www.piersystem.com/go/doc/2931/627127/

Q: There are many people who say that the best dredgers and skimmers in the world come from countries like the Netherlands and France and that they can't—they're not being asked to come in because of the Jones Act. Is that the case? And why not get around that, suspend that, so you can bring that other you know technology in?

ADMIRAL ALLEN: Well, first of all, those are source countries. That's correct, they're available. But we are using them. We are dealing with folks like Norway, the Netherlands, Canada and other places. Anyplace that's got skimming capability that's available, we're willing to talk to them, and we actually have, in some cases, actually transferred the equipment down and will continue to do that.

If it gets—if it gets to the point where there's a Jones Act required, we're willing to do that, too. Nobody's come to me with a request for a Jones Act waiver, but any skimming capability we can bring in, we're looking for.

Q: So are the actual boats being brought in or just the equipment?

ADMIRAL ALLEN: Well, in some cases it's the skimmer itself. In some cases, the skimming equipment is organic to the vessel itself. It depends on what you're talking about. To my knowledge, what we brought in is actually skimming equipment rather than the vessels themselves, but we can give you a detailed listing.

pineinthegrass wrote:
And I don't see how you jump from preferring to use American workers during a bad economy to saying it's all about unions. How many of these workers are union?

Read this article and it explains it a little better. And this isn't the only story out there that says the only reason Obama won't waive the Jones Act is becaues of Unions.

http://mjperry.blogspot.com/2010/06/is- ... power.html

The explanation of Obama’s reluctance to seek this remedy is his cozy relationship with labor unions. Joseph Carafano of the Heritage Foundation is quoted as saying: “The unions see it as … protecting jobs. They hate when the Jones Act gets waived, and they pound on politicians when they do that. So … are we giving in to unions and not doing everything we can, or is there some kind of impediment that we don’t know about?"

pineinthegrass wrote: Here's what Adm. Thad Allen had to say about the skimmers...

http://www.piersystem.com/go/doc/2931/627127/

Q: There are many people who say that the best dredgers and skimmers in the world come from countries like the Netherlands and France and that they can't—they're not being asked to come in because of the Jones Act. Is that the case? And why not get around that, suspend that, so you can bring that other you know technology in?

ADMIRAL ALLEN: Well, first of all, those are source countries. That's correct, they're available. But we are using them. We are dealing with folks like Norway, the Netherlands, Canada and other places. Anyplace that's got skimming capability that's available, we're willing to talk to them, and we actually have, in some cases, actually transferred the equipment down and will continue to do that.

If it gets—if it gets to the point where there's a Jones Act required, we're willing to do that, too. Nobody's come to me with a request for a Jones Act waiver, but any skimming capability we can bring in, we're looking for.

Q: So are the actual boats being brought in or just the equipment?

ADMIRAL ALLEN: Well, in some cases it's the skimmer itself. In some cases, the skimming equipment is organic to the vessel itself. It depends on what you're talking about. To my knowledge, what we brought in is actually skimming equipment rather than the vessels themselves, but we can give you a detailed listing.

Yes, so some of the best and most sophisticated vessels for this type of disator are offered along with the crews who know how to use them. Instead we turn them down for weeks and now we finally have accepted some of their equiptment but not the vessels becaue unions don't want that. And then our people had to be trained how to use them before they could use them. And we don't have nearly as many as we could be using. Why? It cost us over a month of cleaning up which was a month of it drifting onto our shores. And still we should be taking on 20-30 more vessels to get a handle on this. Why aren't we?

The Viking wrote:

pineinthegrass wrote:
And I don't see how you jump from preferring to use American workers during a bad economy to saying it's all about unions. How many of these workers are union?

Read this article and it explains it a little better. And this isn't the only story out there that says the only reason Obama won't waive the Jones Act is becaues of Unions.

http://mjperry.blogspot.com/2010/06/is- ... power.html

The explanation of Obama’s reluctance to seek this remedy is his cozy relationship with labor unions. Joseph Carafano of the Heritage Foundation is quoted as saying: “The unions see it as … protecting jobs. They hate when the Jones Act gets waived, and they pound on politicians when they do that. So … are we giving in to unions and not doing everything we can, or is there some kind of impediment that we don’t know about?"

Well, your first link didn't mention unions and you simply stated the administration wanted to hire Americans and concluded that ment unions. I know cleanup people are being recruited by BP who are not union.

Plus, the quotes from Adm. Allen in two different links above indicate the Jones Act is not an issue.

The Viking wrote:

pineinthegrass wrote: Here's what Adm. Thad Allen had to say about the skimmers...

http://www.piersystem.com/go/doc/2931/627127/

Q: There are many people who say that the best dredgers and skimmers in the world come from countries like the Netherlands and France and that they can't—they're not being asked to come in because of the Jones Act. Is that the case? And why not get around that, suspend that, so you can bring that other you know technology in?

ADMIRAL ALLEN: Well, first of all, those are source countries. That's correct, they're available. But we are using them. We are dealing with folks like Norway, the Netherlands, Canada and other places. Anyplace that's got skimming capability that's available, we're willing to talk to them, and we actually have, in some cases, actually transferred the equipment down and will continue to do that.

If it gets—if it gets to the point where there's a Jones Act required, we're willing to do that, too. Nobody's come to me with a request for a Jones Act waiver, but any skimming capability we can bring in, we're looking for.

Q: So are the actual boats being brought in or just the equipment?

ADMIRAL ALLEN: Well, in some cases it's the skimmer itself. In some cases, the skimming equipment is organic to the vessel itself. It depends on what you're talking about. To my knowledge, what we brought in is actually skimming equipment rather than the vessels themselves, but we can give you a detailed listing.

Yes, so some of the best and most sophisticated vessels for this type of disator are offered along with the crews who know how to use them. Instead we turn them down for weeks and now we finally have accepted some of their equiptment but not the vessels becaue unions don't want that. And then our people had to be trained how to use them before they could use them. And we don't have nearly as many as we could be using. Why? It cost us over a month of cleaning up which was a month of it drifting onto our shores. And still we should be taking on 20-30 more vessels to get a handle on this. Why aren't we?

Do you have any source for this info? That's what I find difficult, to find a timeline of when we did get the skimmers, how effective they are, and are we not getting enough? I can't blame the administration for not acting in the first 3 days based on the info available at the time (other than in hindsight). But I can blame them if they didn't act in getting needed equipment after the problem was well understood.

pineinthegrass wrote:
Plus, the quotes from Adm. Allen in two different links above indicate the Jones Act is not an issue.

The only reason it is not an issue is because Obama is not asking for help from other nations to bring their skimmers into our waters. He doesn't feel it is that important to get help.