The dems lost their supermajority 1/19/2010 .. so you're telling me by one vote that allows the fillibuster, they couldn't get enough dems to support it (They still have the majority, even with Brown (a liberal republican)).
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REPs can filibuster (ie. do nothing when something needs to be done)
Definitions of filibuster on the Web:
* a legislator who gives long speeches in an effort to delay or obstruct legislation
That doesn't mean that the vote will never happen .. Dems still have the majority.
I'm not saying either party is right .. I can't stand either one of them right now, but this "blame the reps" - "blame bush" game has to stop. There comes a time when the current president has to take responsibility for what's happening, good or bad. The "blame bush" line is getting really old.
No, but they can prevent a vote at all by calling for filibuster.
I don't necessarily blame the reps for everything, nor the democrats. I think in some cases with the Interior dept corruption it was simply greed and bad oversight that allowed oil companies to bribe their investigators. However, Bush did pick some of those people that ran to oil companies when offered jobs.
The UAE are just loving this grappling over this oil disaster. While the american government and environmentalists are bickering.....theUAE are singing....'CHA-CHING'
When was the last time there was an oil spill in the middle east? Ya know....with the same magnitude that we have in this country?
When the INSANE are running the ASYLUM In individuals, insanity is rare; but in groups, parties, nations and epochs, it is the rule. -- Friedrich Nietzsche
“How fortunate for those in power that people never think.” Adolph Hitler
The UAE are just loving this grappling over this oil disaster. While the american government and environmentalists are bickering.....theUAE are singing....'CHA-CHING'
When was the last time there was an oil spill in the middle east? Ya know....with the same magnitude that we have in this country?
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Two teams of scientists calculated the well has been spewing between 504,000 and more than a million gallons a day. Even using the most conservative estimate, that means about 18 million gallons have spilled so far. In the worst-case scenario, 39 million gallons have leaked.
let's see, a million gallons a day, - 42 gallons in a barrel, that's roughly 23800 barrels a day .. X roughly $75/barrel (market price) = $1,785,000/day .. X 31 days = approximately $55,335,000 spilled. That's not including cleanup costs, etc.
President Obama: Fed Gov't in Charge of Efforts to Contain Oil Spill, Not BP Obama Says Critics of Administration's Efforts to Contain Spill 'Don't Know the Facts'
By JAKE TAPPER, KAREN TRAVERS and SUNLEN MILLER WASHINGTON, May 27, 2010
In his most extensive remarks about the Gulf oil spill, President Obama pushed back today against critics who say his administration has been less than fully engaged in efforts to contain the damage and stressed that the federal government is in charge.
"Those who think that we were either slow on our response or lacked urgency don't know the facts," Obama told a news conference at the White House. "This has been our highest priority since this crisis occurred."
Obama said that the oil spill was the first and last thing he thinks about every day and dismissed an opportunity to respond to comparisons to the Bush administration's handling of Hurricane Katrina.
"I'll leave it to you guys to make those comparisons and make judgments on it, because what I'm spending my time thinking about is, 'How do we solve the problem?'" he said. "And I'm confident that people are going to look back and say that this administration was on top of what was an unprecedented crisis."
Twice calling the spill "unprecedented," Obama reiterated that BP is responsible for the "horrific disaster" and will be held fully accountable.
But after nearly an hour of engaging with reporters, Obama finally said bluntly that the buck stops with him.
"I take responsibility," he said. "It is my job to make sure that everything is done to shut this down."
Obama will travel to the Gulf region Friday, his second trip since the oil leak began.
Amid mounting criticism that his administration has done too little to fix the problem in the Gulf, Obama emphasized that BP is operating at the direction of the federal government.
"Every key decision and action they take must be approved by us in advance," he said. "I've designated [U.S. Coast Guard] Adm. Thad Allen, who has nearly four decades of experience responding to such disasters, as the national incident commander. And if he orders BP to do something to respond to this disaster, they are legally bound to do it."
Obama announced today that planned oil exploration in that region and off the Atlantic Coast will be cancelled and a six-month moratorium will be placed on new, deepwater drilling permits..............>>>>..............>>>>...............http://abcnews.go.com/Politics.....ng/story?id=10759142
BP Announces Failure of 'Top Kill' Procedure to Stop Oil Gusher
BP chief operating officer Doug Suttles said Saturday that the maneuver known as a top kill had failed.
ROBERT, Louisiana -- BP admitted defeat Saturday in its attempt to plug the Gulf of Mexico oil leak by pumping mud into a busted well, but said it's readying yet another approach to fight the spill after a series of failures.
BP PLC Chief Operating Officer Doug Suttles said the company determined the "top kill" had failed after it spent three days pumping heavy drilling mud into the crippled well 5,000 feet underwater. More than 1.2 million gallons of mud was used, but most of it escaped out of the damaged riser.
In the six weeks since the spill began, the company has failed in each attempt to stop the gusher, as estimates of how much is leaking grow more dire. It's the worst spill in U.S. history -- exceeding even the Exxon Valdez disaster in 1989 off the Alaska coast -- dumping between 18 million and 40 million gallons into the Gulf, according to government estimates.
"This scares everybody, the fact that we can't make this well stop flowing, the fact that we haven't succeeded so far," Suttles said. "Many of the things we're trying have been done on the surface before, but have never been tried at 5,000 feet."
The company failed in the days after the spill to use robot submarines to close valves on the massive blowout preventer atop the damaged well, then two weeks later ice-like crystals clogged a 100-ton box the company tried placing over the leak. Earlier this week, engineers removed a mile-long siphon tube after it sucked up a disappointing 900,000 gallons of oil from the gusher.
Suttles said BP is already preparing for the next attempt to stop the leak that began after the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig exploded April 20th, killing 11 people.