Did Obama block foreign aid to BP oil spill?

[Christopher]

One of the most disturbing reports mentioned on the web is that Obama supported the Jones Act to prevent foreign aid from assisting in oil spill cleanup efforts and protect maritime unions. Link 1 , Link 2 ...

Unfortunately, not a single source reporting seems to have any popular or official legitimacy. Conspiracy? Unlikely. These unofficial sources seem to even confuse themselves. For example, the Daily Caller wrote about Obama supporting the Jones Act here, but then wrote another article here, suggesting that the Jones Act may not be having a significant impact on the whole issue. If you follow the citations from article to article, you see that the sources are circular, citing each other.

So did Obama significantly hinder the oil spill cleanup efforts in order to protect unions? The evidence is definitely not strong enough yet to support this assertion. If anyone has more solid evidence, I'd be interested to read it. Otherwise, wow, internet gossip.

[Kelly]

I suspect the game plan is to criticize Obama as much as possible, whether based on fact or lies, and negatives will add up in peoples minds. The Jones Act story is a great example; people who don’t like unions or democrats will hear the false version of this story and it will confirm what they want to believe about Obama. Even if they hear the true story, which they more than likely will not, the damage has been done. There are enough valid criticisms of the current administration without resorting to false ones. All that being said

is a video that I saw that addresses the issue.

BTW this is my first post on OL, but I've been lurking for quite a while now. Great site.

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Kelly,

Welcome to OL.

Helluva name you've got there.

I agree that the facts have to be documented and that the right lies just as much as the left does when it goes into attack mode. This irritates me, to be frank. After I watch the news, I often get so wound up at being lied to by politicians and reporters that I blow my productive creative time all to hell and back.

Robert Ringer used to call our political landscape the Demopublican Party. That sounds about right. The right wants bigger government for some things and the left wants bigger government for others. To me, it's the difference between dog poop and cat poop.

The only ray of sunlight I see is the clamor for small government popping up here and there. The rub is when to believe it. But I'm an optimist, so I have to.

As to the oil spill, I suspect much of the delay in the government's response was ineptitude by Obama and his people--and the boneheaded sluggish bureaucracy in place. The Jones Act has become the hot issue right now, but I don't have much to say about that. Frankly, I tuned out that part because of all the yelling. My speculation--even when it first came up--is that someone on Obama's team mentioned it in some boneheaded official communication and the right boneheadedly inflated it all out of shape.

But there is a really galling part to me--in addition to this kind of stuff: Obama's solution is to create more boneheaded sluggish bureaucracy.

More committees and laws should help. Maybe they should fine the ocean floor or throw the oil spill in jail or something...

Michael