It was bad enough when the left side of the blogosphere started accusing President Obama of doing nothing, when actually, he was doing quite a bit. But now pundits like Carville and even Democratic Lawmakers like Bill Nelson are getting frustrated. But it's not about the oil gushing out. No, they've said exactly what they don't like about the President's handling of the situation.
Meet me below the fold to find out what has really got their panties in a bunch.
From the CNN article today, "Lawmakers frustrated with Obama administration's oil spill response", we see very clearly what Nelson's grief is:
"The perception is that we're fumbling around," Nelson said. "I am sure that BP wants to get this plugged as quick as anybody, but it hasn't worked."
He even admits that everyone, including BP, wants to get the well plugged as quickly as possible.
But repeat to yourself the important part, over and over. "The perception is that we're fumbling around".
And then there was Carville this morning on the front page of Huffington Post calling on Obama to "'Get Down Here And Take Control... We're About To Die'. I don't know where Carville was at the beginning of May when Obama was down there. And I thought as well connected to the inner workings of DC as Carville was, he'd know Obama was headed there on Friday. Even I knew that.
He went on: "He could be commandeering tankers and making BP bring tankers in and clean this up. They could be deploying people to the coast right now. He could be with the Corps of Engineers and the Coast Guard." I don't think Carville has Internet, because a simple browsing of the Government response on the White House page dedicated to the response covers much of this, as I discussed yesterday. The President did go to the Gulf, there are over 1200 vessels responding with more than 22 thousand personnel, civilian, BP employees and military personell and these numbers have been increasing since the beginning and will continue to grow.
Ah, but wait. Carville came clean on what's really got his goat. He said: "the political stupidity of this is just unbelievable," which is followed by a discussion with Matthew Dowd about how much a political problem this is and that Obama's numbers should be going up as a result of this.
Let us remind ourselves, as Rachel Maddow recently pointed out on her show, that there is really only one known solution that will stop a gushing well like this that has worked in the past: relief wells. Unfortunately, they take a very long time to drill. And they are drilling them. In the meantime, BP and the government are trying several unproven methods to stop it. They've had a tiny bit of success siphoning some of the oil out at one of the leaks, which is good, but far too little. Regardless, the reality is, the Federal Government has no experience in capping deep sea oil wells that have encountered a catastrophic blow-out. Bringing in Shell or Exxon or some other company isn't going to make the drills go faster. And there is an ever increasing effort, in personell, in ships and resources being provided by the Obama Administration to clean this up.
But Sen. Nelson and James Carville aren't concerned with that. What they are really concerned with is how it all looks. I just wish they understood that they are playing a part in making the Federal response look worse than it actually is. The sad reality is the MSM has always painted Democrats in the worst light and rarely covers what Democrats do well. This is why sites like Media Matters and DailyKos came to be. To counter the right-wing propaganda being spewed 24/7 with the truth. I suggest everyone reading this diary head over to Media Matters to review some of the lies they've been debunking on this issue.
Apparently far too many Democrats, pundits and lawmakers included, are falling for the negative hype on the Obama Administration's response. The media keeps trying to resurrect the term "Obama's Katrina", and responses like Carville's and Nelson's play right into that agenda. Are there issues with the response? Certainly. But are they as bad as Carville and Nelson made them to be. Absolutely not. And it's very clear what those two are concerned with. Perceptions.