Scary Truths About Garland Robinette

In what appears to be an attempt to boost his national profile to the levels it reached in the immediate aftermath of the storm, WWL radio host Garland Robinette has been ranting about British Petroleum and the Deepwater Horizon environmental catastrophe. While an initial listen to Robinette's rant generates a rousing chorus of "yeah you rite," closer examination offers some disturbing revelations about Robinette himself.

Appended to WWL's article on Robinette's rant are "14 Scary Truths about the BP Oil Leak," and that's where the trouble lies.

For openers, Mr. Robinette seems to have forgotten that ELEVEN MEN DIED ON DEEPWATER HORIZON. The primary "scary truth" of this entire incident is that people were killed. Deepwater Horizon, the BP corporate offices, as well as those of Transocean, Halliburton, other BP sub-contractors, and the Department of the Interior's Minerals Management Service (MMS) should be treated as homicide crime scenes. Funny, no mention of the lives of men who put their trust in these oil-industry corporations that they'd come home to their families at the conclusion of their offshore shifts.

I'm glad you like the Louisiana oysters at Drago's, Mr. Robinette, and I'm sure Tommy appreciates the plug, but there are eleven men who won't ever eat oysters at Drago's again, and it's a pity that you didn't even take a moment to recognize those men and their families before you started in on New York restaurant menus. But that would mean you'd have to stop for a moment in your loathing of Democrats and point the finger at big business.

Now, as far as the fourteen things that Mr. Robinette does think are important. His very first point is to make a comparison between the broken promises of George W. Bush and the statements made in the aftermath of the Deepwater Horizon blowout by Barack H. Obama. Before discussing his precious oysters or recognizing the deaths of eleven men, Robinette's primary objective is to reduce President Obama to the level of ineptitude of his predecessor.

Scary Truth #2 alludes to the testing BP/Halliburton/Transocean should have done. Rather than point out that these tests might have saved eleven lives, Robinette wants to take a swipe at MMS:

2. BP may have purposely chosen not to do a final test that might have averted this catastrophe. (Minerals Management Service would’ve protected us from that, right?)

"MMS would've protected us" - this from the guy who's spent weeks prior to the Deepwater Horizon crime carrying on and on and on about how offshore drilling should be expanded. This is typical Republi-tarian bullshit. Robinette spends a lot of time decrying government regulation and interference. When his precious oil industry creates a fuck-up of epic proportions, he runs to the government and wants to know where his protection is. This is akin to the guy who kills his parents then begs for mercy because he's an orphan.

Robinette's third and fourth points are that Halliburton cut corners that the tests which BP did not do in his second "truth" might have revealed. Again, however, this is the fault of MMS. Robinette totally glosses over the fact that this corner-cutting by two corporations killed people; he's mad that the government he usually thinks does too much didn't do enough.

His fifth "truth" makes me scratch my head:

5. BP said they are liable, but increasingly you can hear them now point responsibility to the contractor and rig owners. (But, MMS knows the truth, right?)

For starters, BP's line is that they will pay all legitimate claims. They are going to spend the next three decades arguing that no claims are legitimate, of course. I'm curious to know how MMS knew the truth here, as he puts it. If MMS is the keeper of secrets here, where was Mr. Robinette when it was revealed that, under the Cheney-Bush administration, MMS employees were easily bribed by oil/gas industry representatives, even to the point of snorting cocaine with them? All of a sudden, MMS is at the top of the pantheon that was supposed to protect the world (and his Drago's char-broiled oysters) from devastation. Funny how we never heard such concerns from him on this prior to the blowout. If he attached such significance to MMS' role in the preservation of the Southern Louisiana way of life, why didn't he shout this from his very-large microphone on a daily basis?

In Truth #6, Robinette throws the Environmental Protection Agency under the bus. Funny how he respected the EPA enough when it was run by Republicans to accept an award from them in 2008.

To sum this up: Republican-run government=good. Democratic-run government=bad. I think we can now dismiss any attempts Mr. Robinette wants to make on non-partisanship.

on Truths #7 and #8, Robinette continues to flog the "government should have protected us" log. You'd think that Robinette was a hard-line, pro-regulatory liberal, listening to this crap. Maybe he thinks it's just the oil industry that needs draconian government regulation, because he thinks government interference in HIS industry, broadcasting, is "socialist."

In #9, Robinette continues to be critical of estimates of the volume of oil dumped into the gulf. It's hard to discern whether or not Robinette's outrage is genuine, given that he once ran a corporate public relations department whose job was to minimize environmental impact estimates.

Numbers 10, 11, and 12 all rant about how government should "have our backs" and such. But if government protected us in these ways, wouldn't that mean we'd have to have "socialism," Mr. Robinette? You know, that over-regulatory "socialism" that would put the Fairness Doctrine back into place?

In 13, Robinette delves into the issue of mineral royalties. He refers to this issue as "reserves," but it's not the actual oil/gas, but rather the royalties from leasing blocks of the Gulf of Mexico to oil/gas companies. (Don't you have a producer to do fact-checking, Mr. Robinette? At the least, doesn't wwl.com have editors?) His mash-up of blame starts with Congress and bounces to the President, to the point where none of this makes much sense.

Of course, Robinette's saved his most outrageous statements for #14, his last "truth."

14. Governor Jindal (a Republican’t) who’s worked so hard throughout this oil crisis, is reduced to begging President Obama (the Demodon’t) to please allow us to dredge sand barriers to avoid more destruction of our wetlands. We want to use our own sand…OUR sand… did you get that, Washington? We can’t even use OUR sand? Oh, that’s right! the Army Corp of Engineers is here to protect us. They’ve just been “thinking” about it for WEEKS…as black crude lands on our shores and eats up our wetlands. (That whole Demodon’t/Republican’t thing – how’s that working for ya now? Are your parties coming through, when we need them most?!?)

Gotta love this one, the hard-working Republican (Jindal) is begging. Who is he begging? Why, a shiftless negro, who don't do nothing, of course. Funny, if Jindal is working so hard, where was he on the various safety issues related to deep water drilling prior to this incident? The State of Louisiana has a Department of Environmental Quality, and Jindal has been in charge of that department since 2007. While Robinette is quick to blame his former buddies at EPA for not watching out for us, notice his silence on Jindal's people.

Mr. Robinette, you have become one of Ashley Morris' "Fucking Fucks." Heckuva job, Garland!