Author Archives: Steve Maley

Louisiana’s 3rd Congressional District is Southeastern Louisiana: it stretches from St. Bernard Parish and Plaquemines on the east, through the Bayou Country near Houma, to the  sugar cane fields of New Iberia.  Now, LA-03 is Ground Zero for the BP … Continue reading →

I’m no apologist for Big Oil. As a resident of South Louisiana, I’ve seen the mess that was left behind when they left for greener pastures. The simmering animosity between the “majors” and us “independents” goes back generations. They also … Continue reading →

Colleague and occasional RS diarist Steve Maley testified before the House Subcommittee on Energy and Mineral Resources on Thursday. The topic of the hearing was “The Deepwater Horizon Incident: Are the Minerals Management Service Regulations Doing the Job?” Full video … Continue reading →

It’s BP, not British Petroleum, ever since Maggie Thatcher privatized the government’s stake in the energy giant back in the 1980s. But the stakes involve a large chunk of the UK’s national wealth, not to mention their national pride. From … Continue reading →

President Obama and Interior Secretary Salazar have done their best to shift the blame of the Deepwater Horizon disaster to the Bush Administration and the supposed ‘cozy relationship’ it fostered between the Minerals Management Service and the oil and gas … Continue reading →

Confusion was the order of the day. On Wednesday, the first new shallow-water well drilling permit was issued, to the consternation of the environmental community: “I’m outraged,” said Kieran Suckling, executive director for the Tucson, Ariz.-based Center for Biological Diversity. … Continue reading →

In his two most recent appointments to his presidential commission on the BP oil spill, President Obama reveals that he’s got waaaay bigger fish to fry than finding out what went wrong on the Deepwater Horizon, and fixing it. Obama’s … Continue reading →

Amidst the puffing, pontificating and finger-pointing in the aftermath of the Deepwater Horizon disaster, two large questions loom: Who will the Feds hold accountable? How can our government assure us that a big oil spill will never happen again? Quick … Continue reading →

Rookies make rookie mistakes. With all due respect. For the last fifteen years, I’ve been the operations manager for a small Gulf of Mexico oil and gas company. I’ve had more than a few sleepless nights in that time, whether … Continue reading →

President Obama, quick to criticize George W. Bush for his appointment of a lightly-qualified Michael Brown as FEMA director, apparently learned little from his predecessor’s mistake. In today’s press conference, President Obama claimed to know nothing of MMS Director Liz … Continue reading →