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The Chicago Way – Never Let a Crisis …
June 21, 2010 Uncategorized

… go to waste without awarding your union cronies. Mark Perry excepts two pieces on the Jones Act:

Wall Street Journal — President Obama has repeatedly said his Administration is doing everything in its power to expedite the oil clean-up and mitigate the damage. But in the two weeks immediately after the spill, 13 foreign governments reached out and offered their assistance. The U.S. response? Thanks, but no thanks.  Blame it on the protectionist Merchant Marine Act of 1920, also called the Jones Act, that requires ships working in U.S. waters to be built, operated and owned by Americans.

Michael Barone — And what about the decision not to waive the Jones Act, which bars foreign-flag vessels from coming to the aid of the gulf cleanup? The Bush administration promptly waived it after Katrina in 2005. The Obama administration hasn’t and claims unconvincingly that, gee, there aren’t really any foreign vessels that could help. The more plausible explanation is that this is a sop to the maritime unions, part of the union movement that gave Obama and other Democrats $400 million in the 2008 campaign cycle. It’s the Chicago way: dance with the girl that brung ya.

I’m sure this is just another isolated example.

"4" Comments
  1. also a 75 million cap on lawsuit payments for oil companies? how is this overlooked when it is combined with a ban on much safer drilling in ANWAR? so you force oil companies to drill miles offshore (which they can still do profitably and safely if the right incentives and risks are in place) and then cap liabilities so the inherent risks of off-offshore drilling are significantly reduced a la very lax safety procedures.

    and the oil response i can milk from anybody is “blah blah evil oil companies.”

  2. sorry, oil is only

  3. also banning them from having private insurance, i hear, who would have 100% required strict safety measures out of the oil companies to reduce their risk and increase profitability

  4. In the interests of “equal time,” check out the comment left in response to my post on this: http://bit.ly/9kUkCY

    I see there’s also more info on it at the Media Matters site, though I give that source little credence.
    http://mediamatters.org/search/index?qstring=jones+act&x=0&y=0

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