Posted on 06/04/2010 12:10:37 AM PDT by ketelone
President Barack Obama 'furious' at oil spill, but won't vent
WASHINGTON: President Barack Obama insisted Thursday he was "furious" about the US oil disaster but that "yelling" would be pointless, as aides rejected claims he had shown insufficient emotion over the crisis.
The White House also disputed a media narrative that political trauma over America's worst environmental catastrophe would crimp Obama's agenda, even as doubts grew over his pending trip to Asia this month.
But as the White House fired its latest shots in the public relations battle over the spill, new video emerged of helpless sea birds coated in oil, likely to sharpen media anguish.
In a new attempt to demonstrate its engagement, the White House said Obama would make his third trip to the Gulf of Mexico coast on Friday, and he appeared on CNN talk show "Larry King Live" to discuss the catastrophe.
"I would love to just spend a lot of my time venting and yelling at people, but that is not what I was hired to do -- my job is to solve this problem," Obama said.
"I am furious at this entire situation. This is something where somebody didn't think through the consequences of their actions," he added.
Obama has been besieged on multiple fronts, and is dealing with the Gulf crisis, the Gaza flotilla raid and North Korea's belligerence, not to mention the slowly recovering economy.
White House spokesman Robert Gibbs hit back at a growing media frenzy, along the lines that the president should simply "do something" to stop a gushing undersea well clogging the Gulf with a thick slick of oil.
"If jumping up and down and screaming would fix a hole in the ocean, we'd have done that five or six weeks ago," Gibbs said.
Gibbs has been peppered with questions in recent days over whether Obama, known for a cool, intellectual demeanor, is doing enough to convey anger and dismay over the disaster.
Some normally sympathetic commentators have also been tearing into him, frustrated at his "no drama" persona.
Comedy host Jon Stewart lampooned Obama for holding receptions for sports teams and interest groups at the White House while insisting the spill was his "top priority."
New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd also mocked Obama: "It's not a good narrative arc: The man who walked on water is now ensnared by a crisis under water," she wrote.
"Instead of buoyant, he seems put upon. Instead of the fairy dust of hopefulness, there's the bitter draught of helplessness."
Television pundits on round-the-clock cable television have also been piling on, adding up to a public relations headache for the White House.
The White House has at various times seemed to be trying to catch up to the momentum of disaster coverage.
Obama also risked looking impotent -- a dangerous political position for any president -- as the government does not possess either the expertise or equipment to plug the well.
Gibbs argued Obama would gain nothing by going on television and throwing a tantrum.
"Pounding on a podium isn't going to fix a hole in the ocean," he said.
Republicans and other Obama critics have portrayed the crisis as Obama's "Hurricane Katrina" noting the terrible damage the killer storm wrought on the presidency of George W. Bush.
But Gibbs insisted Obama was pushing forward on his agenda.
Obama expected the UN Security Council to vote on a top foreign policy priority -- toughened sanctions against Iran as early as next week, and was focused on the war in Afghanistan and Pakistan, Gibbs said.
He was likely to sign a top priority financial reform bill into law by July, and was on track to get Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan confirmed as well, Gibbs said.
"I appreciate that sometimes you guys have one story and you do one story a day," Gibbs told reporters, his voice dripping with sarcasm.
Gibbs said the president's trip to Indonesia and Australia in the middle of the month was still on the schedule, despite speculation it would be impossible for Obama to go abroad with the oil spill worsening.
The president has already cancelled the trip once, and risks annoying his hosts and damaging foreign policy priorities if he had to cry off again.
Asked on CNN if he still liked his job, despite all the challenges, Obama replied: "This is the best job on earth."
"It's an extraordinary privilege to be able to wake up every day and know that you have the opportunity to serve the American people and make their lives a little bit better," Obama said.
‘Furious’ Obama heading to Gulf for spill update
By NANCY BENAC (AP) – 52 minutes ago
WASHINGTON — Determined to project both command and compassion, President Barack Obama is returning to the Louisiana coast for a fresh reality check on work to stanch the oil spewing into the Gulf of Mexico and the spiraling effects of the nation’s worst environmental disaster. The president underscored the mounting political implications by abruptly canceling plans for a trip to Indonesia and Australia later this month.
good stuff. Ya’ know, these morally weak, wannabe dictators all seem to have some type of anger issues.
Awww how cute...he has gone from 2 syllable words to 3 syllable words!
Odd he hasn’t done anything to make my life better. Maybe he should just stay out on the golf course before he screws up something else.
“President Barack Obama ‘furious’ at oil spill...”
Oh, horsecookies.
The boy King obuma is furious at white people, the middle class, free enterprise and individual liberty, and he vents constantly about it. If I close my eyes and just listen to his constant “venting” about identity politics, I hear the Grand Poobah of a washed-up Chicago KKK klan.
LOL! He really, really cares!
Uh huh. Right.
The fact of the matter is that he doesn’t give a damn about the environment. He uses it to push his communist agenda.
So far, what has he done?
Promised to punish oil companies with fees (that you and I pay for at the pump) and to restrict further elsewhere.
Nothing he has done or proposes to do stops the leak or cleans up the mess.
Once again, Obammie and his Commies are taking advantage of a “crisis” to push their communist agenda.
Once again, the damage-and-spin control comes from all quarters, even unlikely ones like Ron Paul, yesterday in a radio interview: they are masters at presenting the false choices, the “it-would-do-no-good-to” scenarios: everyone KNOWS the Federal Government has NO KNOWLEDGE about how to
plug oil wells, that WASN’T the issue. THe issue was the TOTAL dis-engagement of this Administration to the quickly
complicating features of this eco-disaster-—doing what they COULD to help contain the spill, or come to the aid of anybody in the oil’s path, like Jindal....they drag their feet on all these practical things because their MAIN concern is how best to continue to allow to let the thing get out of control , so as to best serve the long-term needs of their agenda, which is now available for your consideration all over the place: this spill will serve the project of the Utopia Green Future, to be brought to us by Cap and Trade (The American Power Act), coming soon to a Congress near you.
This angry word brought to you by the letter "P"
Pot, meet kettle.
Additionally, Maureen Down writes like an overwrought 8th grader. Yeesh..
Not even symbolism. Just image.
For Dem's it's all image over substance.
-And the media buys it hook, line and sinker every time.
This is a crisis that requires leadership and there just isn't any coming from the WH.
LOL. That is going out in an email today!
Perfect.
It’s an accident. You don’t get furious at accidents, you try to stop the damage.
“It’s an extraordinary privilege to be able to wake up every day and know that you have the opportunity to serve the American people and make their lives a little bit better,” Obama said.
Please Mr. 0bama, seize that opportunity and actually start the process of making our lives better instead of what you are doing now.
Actually I want 0b0z0 to remain incompetent & inept. In fact I want he & his policies & programs to fail so miserably, that the commie RAT bastard will br ridden out of town on a rail and straight to the gallows or prison, for high crimes & treason against the U.S. It is the only way we will ever get rid of this commie RAT bastard.
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