Wednesday, June 23, 2010

You Can't Do That

U.S. District Judge Martin Feldman in New Orleans today overturned the Administration's moratorium on off-shore drilling imposed by the Interior Department. Calling it arbitrarily imposed and rash, the Judge concluded that the government acted wrongly in stopping all drilling just because one rig had an accident.

The Interior Department had halted approval of any new permits for deep-water drilling and suspended drilling of 33 exploratory wells in the Gulf.

Here's what the Judge had to say in rendering his decision:

The Deepwater Horizon oil spill is an unprecedented, sad, ugly and inhuman disaster," he wrote. "What seems clear is that the federal government has been pressed by what happened on the Deepwater Horizon into an otherwise sweeping confirmation that all Gulf deep-water drilling activities put us all in a universal threat of irreparable harm."

His ruling prohibits federal officials from enforcing the moratorium until a trial is held. He did not set a trial date.--Fox News

This was definitely the right thing to do. The moratorium would have crippled the world's energy supplies, cost thousands of jobs, and further damaged the economies of both the states directly affected by the spill, as well as the nation at large.

We expect the White House will appeal. You didn't expect them to admit they overreacted and made a mistake, did you?

This decision, if upheld, would also place limits on the Executive branch's authority. Many feel the President exceeded his authority in imposing the moratorium, or directing that it be imposed. The President's powers ARE NOT unlimited, and there must be a basis in law for his actions.

And now to ClearOurBrainZ !

We cannot afford to let emotion overcome reality as it relates to our energy policy. We have to have increased domestic production of oil and gas while we transition to cleaner technologies.

The moratorium was a kick in the pants to Louisiana and the other gulf state's economies, already losing money from the lack of tourist business this summer.

Thank you, Your Honor.

Your comments, please.

2 comments:

Terence said...

Great and lovely post.

Terence said...

Great and lovely post.