What at first seemed just another lie by this administration to further its agenda, has actually deteriorated into a war of them versus us. After Interior Secretary Ken Salazar added two paragraphs to a 44 page report by a panel of seven experts, recommended by the National Academy of Engineering, indicating the experts agreed with his recommendation of a six-month moratorium on drilling in the Gulf, he got caught and exposed by the experts. Of course, the moratorium went into effect and all off-shore drilling was halted. Yesterday, a federal judge in Louisiana ruled against the government in a lawsuit brought against the moratorium by the "small people" whose lives were virtually wrecked by the decision which had been based on the altered report. The judge stated: "an invalid agency decision to suspend drilling of wells in depths of over 500 feet simply cannot justify the immeasurable effect on the plaintiffs, the local economy, the Gulf region, and the critical present-day aspect of availability of domestic energy in this country."
That should be the end of it, right? It should be, but the government now says it will appeal the ruling by the judge. Should an appeal be filed, the adjudication of the lawsuit could take much longer than the original moratorium.
So, Salazar should go back to Colorado and crawl under a rock, but he won't. He's just one of so many in this administration who will always justify any nefarious act on their part if it advances the agenda of the Left - their constituency.
The story was first reported by Fox News, on June 11, 2010, and the Hidenblog posted a follow-up today.
A good summary of the fiasco to date was provided yesterday (after the court ruling against the moratorium) by Reuters.
We're spending a lot of time and money that could more prudently be spent on stopping the leak because Ken Salazar believes, as do most liberals, that the ends justify the means (if the ends are the ends favored by the Leftist agenda).
