Obama bids to curb political damage from spill
PENSACOLA, Florida (AP) - President Obama's spokesman said Tuesday that the president is poised to seize the handling of damage claims from BP, if necessary...
PENSACOLA, Florida (AP) — President Barack Obama prepared to address the nation Tuesday with an “I’m in charge” message as a blown out BP well deep in the Gulf of Mexico gushed crude oil for a 57th day, creating an unprecedented environmental and economic disaster.
Obama spent the night in Pensacola, where he will inspect the damage to famous white sand beaches and meet with local officials before heading back to the White House to deliver the first televised Oval Office message of his presidency.
Obama’s spokesman said Tuesday that the president is poised to seize the handling of damage claims from BP, if necessary.
Suffering under the impression among some Americans that he reacted too late, the president toured the damage caused by the BP oil well blowout that has been gushing millions of gallons (liters) of crude oil into the Gulf since April.
The president’s two-day tour aimed to stanch the political bleeding and show his deepening involvement. At the same time, Obama collected information and impressions for the televised White House address.
Obama’s national speech sets the stage for his showdown White House meeting Wednesday with top executives at British-based, BP, the company that leased the rig that exploded April 20, killing 11 workers and causing the catastrophic spill. It’s part of an effort by Obama, who’s been seen by some as detached as the oil spill disaster has unfolded, to convince a frightened Gulf Coast and a skeptical nation that he is in command.
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On the matter of the disputed damage payments, spokesman Robert Gibbs told television news shows: “We have to get an independent claims process. I think everyone agrees that we have to get BP out of the claims processes and, as I said, make sure that fishermen, hotel owners have a fast, efficient and transparent claims process so that they’re getting their livelihoods replaced.”
He noted in one interview that Obama “has the legal authority” to make the claims process independent. And Gibbs said “the best way to prevail upon BP is to take the claims process away from BP.”
As he toured the region on Monday, Obama delivered a message of hope and sought to show he was leading a winning battle against the raging oil spill.
During stops in Alabama and Mississippi, Obama assured Gulf residents and businesses that the region’s beaches will be restored to their “pristine condition” even as he promised he was bringing the full force of his government to get BP to pay damage claims in the country’s worst environmental disaster.
The oil gusher a mile (1,600 meters) deep in the Gulf, which the U.S. government does not have the technology to stop, has forced Obama and the federal government to rely on BP for an eventual fix. That isn’t likely to happen until a relief well penetrates the blowout in a couple of months.
With the oil continuing to wash onto beaches and into critical wildlife habitat — delicate marshlands in particular — Obama has taken a hit in the polls.
The crisis also has taken up massive amounts of his time and cut severely into his schedule, including forcing him to cancel a trip to Asia and Australia, and threatening his legislative agenda on such issues as financial overhaul, climate change and immigration reform.
As he took the microphone in Theodore, Alabama, on Monday afternoon, Obama likely was previewing what he would tell the country at large from the Oval Office on Tuesday evening.
“I can’t promise folks here in Theodore or across the Gulf that this oil will be cleaned up overnight,” the president said. Yet he offered assurances that the “full resources of our government are being mobilized to confront this disaster.”
Obama also told the country that seafood from the region remained safe to eat, and implored holiday-makers not to cancel visits to the Gulf coast where many of the famous white beaches remain untouched.
But oil from the blown out BP well is spoiling significant parts of the shoreline and already has penetrated into critical breeding grounds for wildlife, waterfowl and sea creatures — in particular shrimp and oysters. The shell fish are a mainstay of some of the Gulf state economies.
The trip gave Obama ammunition for the speech and for his meeting with BP executives, during which he intends complete the details of a victims compensation fund. He visited vacant beaches in Mississippi where the threat of oil has scared off tourists, heard the stories of local employers losing business, watched workers in hazardous-material coveralls scrub down boom in a staging facility in Theodore, Alabama, and took a ferry ride through Mobile Bay and then to Orange Beach, Alabama, where oil has lapped on the shore.
He was beginning the day Tuesday in Pensacola where he was to attend a briefing and then make remarks at Naval Air Station Pensacola.
BP’s board was in session Monday in London to discuss deferring its second-quarter dividend and putting the money into escrow until the company’s liabilities from the spill are known.
The administration had said earlier — uncertain whether BP would voluntarily establish the damage fund — that Obama was prepared to force BP to take the step.
The company was likely to be hit with still more anger Tuesday where Congress was holding three hearings on the Gulf tragedy, which has long ago outstripped the previously worst U.S. environmental tragedy, the 1989 Exxon Valdez spill in Alaska.
Copyright 2010 The Associated Press.
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