President Barack Obama crushed greens’ hearts Monday by giving Shell the final go-ahead to drill for oil in Alaska’s Arctic waters, just two weeks after he thrilled them by issuing his landmark regulations on climate change.
In the long run, Obama’s successors will determine whether the industry can tap Alaska’s prized offshore oil — and one 2016 contender, Hillary Clinton, has expressed “doubts” about opening the Arctic to drilling. But it was Obama’s Interior Department that gave Shell its nod Monday, in the face of an opposition campaign that has seen activists dangling from a bridge in Oregon and swarming the company’s Arctic-bound rig with kayaks to try to block the project.
For greens, the announcement was even more galling because it arrived only two weeks before Obama is due to talk climate change during his first visit to Alaska’s Arctic.
“The president cannot have it both ways,” Greenpeace USA Executive Director Annie Leonard said. “Announcing a tour of Alaska to highlight climate change days before giving Shell the final approval to drill in the Arctic ocean is deeply hypocritical.”
Now you guys know that I am an ardent supporter of this President.
I have taken his side over and over again, and defended his actions even when I was not sure of the end game.
Here we are moving toward a more responsible energy policy here in America, and then the President acts as if he is taking advice from Sarah "Drill baby, drill" Palin.
The ecosystem in those arctic waters is incredibly fragile, and if there were an event even a tenth the size of the Deepwater Horizon spill is would have the kind of devastating effect that would last for decades.
No Mr. President, this is wrong, and you sir are wrong for supporting it.
No excuses.
P.S. Hillary Clinton tweeted this yesterday, which I think marks the first time that I have found her take on situation to be more reasonable than Obama's.
The Arctic is a unique treasure. Given what we know, it's not worth the risk of drilling. -H
— Hillary Clinton (@HillaryClinton) August 18, 2015