Be a Dolly and Cancel My Trip, Will You?

Hurricane Dolly cancels McCain's trip to offshore oil rig

Posted at 6:57 AM on 24 Jul 2008

John McCain had planned to visit an oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico on Thursday to tout offshore drilling and the industry's environmental friendliness, but Hurricane Dolly canceled his plans. Dolly hit land in Texas Wednesday as a Category 2 storm, cutting oil and gas production by some 5 to 8 percent overall. McCain and other Republicans have been pushing to allow more offshore drilling in U.S. waters, and emphasizing the environmental safety of offshore drilling is one part of the strategy. In a recent speech, McCain said, "As for offshore drilling, it's safe enough these days that not even Hurricanes Katrina and Rita could cause significant spillage from the battered rigs off the coasts of New Orleans and Houston." Which, it turns out, isn't actually true. According to government figures, storms in 2005 caused 146 small spills in federal waters, and Hurricanes Katrina and Rita completely destroyed 113 oil rigs and damaged 457 pipelines; the resulting oil spills were large enough to be seen from space. (But apparently not from campaign headquarters.)

sources: The Washington Post, Bloomberg, Reuters

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Comments: (4 comments)

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Hmmm...

Some might see it as divine intervention...

by gohlkus at 10:17 AM on 24 Jul 2008

Oil Spill

And don't forget the spill from the barge after its accident with the chemical tanker. That would have looked great, McCain claiming how environmentally safe oil drilling is while a spill was taking place just up the Mississippi River. Every aspect of oil is evil as soon as it's removed from where it belongs, which is under the ground: drilling, transporting, refining, more transporting, and burning.

by Wolverine at 12:16 PM on 24 Jul 2008

Sounds like a big f**k you from Mother Nature

I guess Mother Nature doesn't think this is a great idea, huh?

"For as long as space endures, and for as long as living beings remain, until then may I too abide, to dispel the misery of the world." - Shantideva

by mtvyfan at 1:07 PM on 24 Jul 2008

Nothing like a little poetic justice.

If anyone's interested, I stuck a discussion on the semantics of "significant spillage" on the end of this thread here.

Short version, McCain's lamentably safe spouting the bull%#&!! he's spouting, because of an arbitrary MMS standard that's practically designed to support statements like that.

by Pathos at 4:21 AM on 25 Jul 2008

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