The President of the United States was swept into office two years ago promising to bring change to Washington, starting with a more transparent and ethical government. In fact, Obama declared, “transparency and the rule of law would be the touchstones of this presidency.” Apparently, not everybody in the White House read the interoffice memorandum.
Following the BP tragedy, the White House commissioned the Secretary of the Interior to provide a safety report on offshore drilling. Secretary Salazar pulled in a panel of seven outside advisors to assist in his analysis of the safety of offshore drilling, and provide recommendations for going forward. A final draft of this report was sent to White House Climate Czar Carol Browner’s office before being forwarded to the president. Last week, it was reported that Browner’s staff edited the document to imply that the outside advisors recommended a drilling moratorium, when in fact this was not true. The tailored draft was given to the president, and the policy was made.
Whether or not the recommendation of outside advisors would have changed minds regarding the drilling ban is debatable. What isn’t debatable is the resulting economic destruction in the Gulf from President Obama’s decision based – in part – on information from a falsified document.
Drilling operations in the Gulf of Mexico provide employment for over 150,000 Americans. As a result of the halting of this activity, the region stands to lose19,500lost jobs, $5 billion in unrealized economic activity, and nearly $240 million in uncollected state and local tax revenue, according to a conservative estimate using government modeling by noted LSU economist Dr. Joseph Mason. This was a harsh blow during what the President himself has described as the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression.
Make no mistake: these job losses lie solely on President Obama’s shoulders. And for the thousands of Americans impacted by this decision, nothing the President says or does will make it right. But the President can still prove that he is being true to his promise of transparency in government by holding Czar Browner accountable for her reckless disregard for the livelihoods of thousands of Gulf families whose only crime, it seems, was their employment in the oil and gas industry.