Why the Log Cabin Republicans Won't Forgive Chuck Hagel
By Ben Terris
Most gay-rights groups are ready to accept the secretary of
defense nominee's apology for comments in 1998 -- but one conservative
organization is not.
Richard Bloom
It's kind of a classic Washington story. A guy says something stupid.
More than a decade later, he is offered the chance at a fantastically
powerful position, and has to disavow himself from his past comments.
The only question then is whether he will be forgiven by the people he
offended.
In the case of secretary of defense nominee Chuck Hagel, the comment in question involves a homophobic remark. And while many gay activist groups seem to be at least giving Hagel the benefit of the doubt, one group, the Log Cabin Republicans, has been on the offensive against his nomination.
"Now
is not the time to roll dice on nominee and cross our fingers he will
smoothly implement don't ask don't tell," interim director of the Log
Cabin Republicans Gregory T. Angelo said in an interview. "Hagel has
invited people to look at totality of his record. When we looked at the
totality of his record, we saw it as a net negative, and that
disqualified him in our eyes."
The Log Cabin Republicans took out a full page ad (posted in next blog) in the Washington Post
Monday (which, even in an era of declining print revenues, is no small
feat) documenting a troubled history with gay rights, including the time
in 1998 then-Senator Hagel called James Hormel, President Bill
Clinton's nominee for ambassador to Luxembourg "openly, aggressively
gay," and his past stances in favor of don't ask don't tell and the
Defense of Marriage Act.
It's an interesting role for the Log Cabin Republicans. In a sense,
what they are doing falls directly in line with the rest of the party:
They are opposing Hagel's nomination. But, they are attacking from a
flank that other members of the party cannot. And while most Republicans
will hammer Hagel on past comments on Israel or the Iraq war, they
surely won't mind the additional firepower from the social side.
Since Hagel made his now infamous comment, nine states have legalized
gay marriage (10 if you include California, which briefly granted same
sex marriages in 2008) and "don't ask, don't tell" has been repealed.
Just like President Obama said in May of last year when he came out in
support of gay marriage, the country has clearly been going through an
evolution on the issue in recent years.
So when Hagel apologized in December for his comments, saying "they
do not reflect my views of the totality of my public record" and saying
that he is now "supportive of 'open service' and committed to LGBT
military families," many groups took him at his word and saw it as a
changing of the times.
"Senator Hagel's apology and his statement of support for LGBT
equality is appreciated and shows just how far as a country we have come
when a conservative former Senator from Nebraska can have a change of
heart on LGBT issues," the president of the Human Rights Campaign, Chad
Griffin, said in a statement. "Our community continues to add allies to
our ranks and we're proud that Senator Hagel is one of them."
It's a sentiment that has been echoed by many other gay rights groups. Rick Jacobs of the Courage Campaign wrote an article for the Huffington Post today in support of Hagel, and told National Journal there is an "incredible double standard" coming from the opposition.
"If we punished everybody who said 15 years ago that gay people
shouldn't be getting married, for example, then Bill Clinton should be
on the big black list right now," he said. "It was important to point
out Hagel's statement, but it's also important that he apologized for
it."
Jacobs took particular issue with the Log Cabin Republicans' stance.
"It really is the spirit of the bizarre," he said. "Here they are
spending money from we don't know where for a full page ad after they
have endorsed Mitt 'It Gets Worse' Romney. There's a lot of nonsense
going on here."
Even the group with arguably the most skin in the game here,
OutServe-SLDN -- an association of actively serving LGBT military
personnel -- put out a statement saying they appreciated the apology.
"Senator Hagel will have an opportunity to address these issues
during the hearings on the hill and I believe he will be able to do that
effectively and many of the concerns that have been expressed will be
alleviated," OutServe spokesman Zeke Stokes told National Journal.
So why then are the Log Cabin Republicans the outlier here? Angelo
says of course he wished more gay rights groups would align themselves
with him and oppose Hagel, but their decision not to is just proof that
the gay community is not monolithic in its views. He said he did not
know why other groups would support Hagel, and his organization wouldn't
have a problem with an honest evolution of a person's stance on gay
rights. The key word being honest.
"This evolution seemed to happen at a very politically expedient,
coincidental time," he said. "An apology came only after his name was
floated as a nominee, it's suspicious."
For Immediate Release
Contact: Press Secretary
(202) 420.7873
Log Cabin Republicans Releases Second Ad Criticizing Chuck Hagel for "Totality" of Record on Gay Rights(Washington, DC) - Today, the Log Cabin Republicans (LCR) took out a full-page ad in The Washington Post
exposing former Sen. Chuck Hagel’s (R-Neb.) long history of anti-gay
positions. He is widely believed to be President Obama’s pick for
Secretary of Defense, and could be nominated by the President as early
as today.
The Washington Post ad addresses Chuck Hagel’s recent
apology by stating, “Chuck Hagel’s Apology: Too Little, Too Late.”
Hagel’s apology was submitted after his anti-gay remarks opposing the
Ambassadorship of James Hormel for being "openly, aggressively, gay"
surfaced in the media. In Hagel's apology to Politico he said his comments did not reflect the "totality of [his] public record."
However, in actuality, the "totality" of Hagel's public record on gay issues is dismal:
In 1996 Hagel said he supported the Defense of Marriage Act, a
federal law defining marriage as one man and one woman. He also
supported a state constitutional amendment barring gays from marrying.
In
1998 Hagel opposed the nomination of James Hormel as Ambassador to
Luxembourg, arguing that an "openly, aggressively gay" man should not be
selected to represent the U.S.
In 1999 Hagel opposed repealing
the military's "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy, saying, "the U.S. armed
forces aren't some social experiment."
In 2005, in reaction to a
federal judge's ruling that Nebraska's voter-passed ban on same-sex
marriage violated the constitutional rights of lesbians and gay men,
Hagel opposed the decision saying, "I am hopeful the federal appeals
court will recognize the rights of Nebraskans to determine their own
laws governing marriage and reverse this decision."
"At Chuck Hagel's request, we looked into the 'totality' of his
public record on gay rights, and it did nothing to assuage our concerns
that his anti-gay record makes him the wrong choice to oversee the
ongoing integration of gays and lesbians in the military," stated
Gregory T. Angelo, Interim Executive Director of the Log Cabin
Republicans. "Until his name surfaced as a potential nominee for
Secretary of Defense, he has stood firmly and aggressively against not
only gay marriage, but also against gay people in general. Log Cabin
Republicans helped lead the charge to repeal Don't Ask, Don't Tell and
is extremely invested in seeing that we don't lose any ground due to a
lack of sincere commitment to gay people and their families on the part
of the incoming Defense Secretary." Chuck Hagel's Record on Gay Rights
Today's ad is Log Cabin's second to condemn Hagel, following a December 27th advertisement in The New York Times.
"How could I not be eligible to for any of these doggone programs they’ve set up," asks a frustrated Courtney Scott.
After a four-year effort to save her home, Courtney Scott feels like she’s running out of options.
“When
I got started (in 2008) there was HAMP, there was HARP and there were
FHA options,” she said. “So now, I’m in limbo. How could I not be
eligible to for any of these doggone programs they’ve set up?”
Two
weeks ago, she filled out a form under a federally mandated foreclosure
review process set up after widespread mortgage abuses came to light in
2010. On Monday, that program was cancelled as part of an $8.5 billion settlement between federal regulators and 10 banks.
Separately, Bank of America agreed on Monday to pay more than $10 billion to Fannie Mae to settle claims over mortgages that soured during the crash, mostly loans issued by Countrywide Financial, now a BofA subsidiary.
Five
years after the housing bubble burst, roughly a million other U.S.
homeowners trying to save their homes from foreclosure are stuck in the
same limbo as Scott.
With the latest multi-billion-dollar
settlements, the nation’s mortgage lenders are hoping to put the
mortgage mess behind them. But critics of the deal fear it may also
leave behind millions of foreclosed homeowners who got little or no
relief from the lenders that helped create the mortgage mess in the
first place.
"I have serious concerns that this settlement may
allow banks to skirt what they owe and sweep past abuses under the rug
without determining the full harm borrowers have suffered," said Rep.
Elijah E. Cummings, D.- Md., a member of the House Committee on
Oversight and Government Reform and a vocal critical of the government
regulators handling of the mortgage crisis.
Monday’s settlement
brings to an end the government’s two-year case-by-case foreclosure
review to identify victims of industry-
wide mistakes and abuses.
Under
the agreement, JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America, Citigroup, Wells Fargo
and six other mortgage lenders will provide $5.2 billion in mortgage
assistance and $3.3 billion in direct payments to wronged borrowers,
according bank regulators. The other six include Aurora, MetLife Bank,
PNC, Sovereign, SunTrust, and U.S. Bank. Four other banks — HSBC, Ally,
EverBank and One West — are still in talks, said officials at the Office
of the Controller of the Currency, which announced the settlement.
OCC
officials said consumers will be better served under the deal because
claims will now be paid more quickly. The program had proved so costly -
more than $1.5 billion has been spent on individual reviews - that it
was diverting funds that could have been used to pay claims, they said.
“When
we began the Independent Foreclosure Review, the OCC pledged to fix
what was broken, identify who was harmed, and compensate them for that
injury,” Comptroller of the Currency Thomas Curry said in a statement.
“While today’s announcement represents a significant change in
direction, it meets those original objectives by ensuring that consumers
are the ones who will benefit, and that they will benefit more quickly
and in a more direct manner.”
OCC officials maintain that the
amount set aside will be adequate to compensate homeowners who suffered a
financial loss from one of the bank’s mistakes.
Erik Lesser for NBC News file
Courtney Scott has been fighting her mortgage battle for four years. She feels like she’s running out of options.
But
critics of the process argue that, despite the high cost of the review
program, the process wasn’t thorough enough to assess accurately whether
a home had been wrongly seized.
“The only information that the
reviewers were using to determine whether someone had been the victim of
wrongdoing was the servicers’ files,” said Helene Raynaud, a senior
official at the National Foundation for Credit Counseling, whose members
advise homeowners facing foreclosure. “They did not systematically
contact the counseling agencies or whoever else these homeowners may
(have been) talking to. If the information was incomplete, how would
they know?”
Under the agreement, those determinations will now be
made by the 10 lenders, but OCC regulators would not disclose the
criteria for eligibility. A payment agent will contact borrowers who are
determined to be eligible with those details by the end of March,
officials said.
Homeowners will receive payments of between a few
hundred of dollars to as much as $125,000, depending on the type error
made by the mortgage company servicing their loan. Nearly 4 million
borrowers whose loans were foreclosed on in 2009 and 2010 will get some
compensation, regulators said.
The settlement is the latest
chapter in the government’s effort to hold mortgage companies
accountable for widespread abuses in the wave of home seizures after the
2007 housing collapse.
When industry-wide “robosigning”
practices surfaced nearly two years ago, bank regulators issued a
detailed report outlining the scope of the problem. The list of
widespread failures included “inadequate quality control and audit
reviews to ensure compliance with legal requirements,” foreclosure
documents that claimed to have been “executed under oath, when no oath
was administered,” and notary practices “which failed to conform to
state legal requirements.”
Concerns about those industry practices
have substantially slowed the foreclosure process, especially in states
that require a judge to sign off before lenders can seize a home.
Nationwide, the average foreclosure now takes a little more than a year,
up from about 8 months at the start of 2010, according to RealtyTrac.
In New York, the process now takes more than three years, more than a
year longer than it took three year ago.
As part of its
enforcement action, the OCC, Federal Reserve and Office of Thrift
Supervision ordered 14 banks and mortgage servicing companies to hire
consulting firms to contact borrowers and review their cases. Some 4.4
million letters were sent to potential claimants, of which about half a
million submitted review applications by the Dec. 31 deadline.
Consumers
groups working to head off foreclosures have criticized the review
program from the start, in part because the consulting firms conducting
the reviews were hired and paid by the financial institutions cited for
wrongful practices. Since then, critics have cited slow progress in
reviewing cases and compensating wrongful foreclosure victims.
Those
critics argue that Monday’s settlement will leave many wronged
homeowners with no further recourse and that the deal may substantially
reduce the amount that lenders will ultimately have to pay.
“For
many people this will be the end of the line," said Diane Thompson, an
attorney with the National Consumer Law Center. “This is a much lower
number for the banks compared to what they were at risk for.”
Assad gives defiant speech as Syrian rebels edge closer to Damascus
Nearly
two years after the beginning of a civil war in Syria, an estimated
60,000 people have died. In a rare speech Sunday, President Bashar
al-Assad refused to end the conflict. NBC's Stephanie Gosk reports.
By NBC News and wire services
Updated at 4:52 p.m. ET:
Syrian President Bashar al-Assad on Sunday outlined what was billed as a
new peace initiative that included a national reconciliation conference
and a new constitution in a rare speech about the uprising against his
rule, which has killed an estimated 60,000 people and brought civil war
to the edge of his capital.
His foes reacted to the speech with scorn.
George
Sabra, vice president of the opposition National Coalition, told
Reuters the peace plan Assad put at the heart of his speech did "not
even deserve to be called an initiative."
"We should see it rather as a declaration that he will continue his war against the Syrian people," he said.
Speaking before an overwhelmingly supportive crowd that interrupted
his speech with chants and rapturous applause several times, Assad
offered no concessions and even appeared to harden many of his
positions. He rallied Syrians for "a war to defend the nation" and
disparaged the prospect of negotiations. There was little to no
acknowledgement that there are Syrians themselves who have taken up the
fight.
"We do not reject political dialogue ... but with whom
should we hold a dialogue? With extremists who don't believe in any
language but killing and terrorism?" Assad asked.
"Should we
speak to gangs recruited abroad that follow the orders of foreigners?
Should we have official dialogue with a puppet made by the West, which
has scripted its lines?"
In
an interview with a Russian television channel, Syrian President Bashar
Assad vowed to live and die in Syria, amid the 19-month old uprising
against him. NBC's Ayman Mohyeldin reports.
Assad said his initiative would not move forward until foreign funding for the rebels stops.
The
European Union responded quickly, saying there can be no political
solution until Assad steps down, a subject the Syrian president did not
address in today's speech.
The State Department responded in a
statement saying that Assad’s speech is “yet another attempt by the
regime to cling to power.”
“His initiative is detached from
reality,” the State Department said, and “would only allow the regime to
further perpetuate its bloody oppression of the Syrian people.”
It
was the 47-year-old leader's first speech in months and his first
public comments since he dismissed suggestions that he might go into
exile to end the civil war, telling Russian television in November that
he would "live and die" in Syria.
As in previous speeches, he said
his forces were fighting groups of "murderous criminals" and jihadi
elements and denied there was an uprising against his family's
decades-long rule. He struck a defiant tone, saying Syria will not
take dictates from anyone.
At the end of the speech, supporters
rushed to the stage, mobbing him and shouting: "God, Syria and Bashar
is enough!" as a smiling president waved and was escorted from the hall
past a backdrop showing a Syrian flag made of pictures of people whom
state television described as "martyrs" of the conflict so far. PhotoBlog: Destruction, resistance in war-torn Syria
Insurgents
are venturing ever closer to Damascus after bringing a crescent of
suburbs under their control from the city's eastern outskirts to the
southwest.
Assad's forces blasted rockets into the Jobar
neighborhood near the city center on Saturday to try to drive out rebel
fighters, a day after bombarding rebel-held areas in the eastern suburb
of Daraya.
"The shelling began in the early hours of the morning,
it has intensified since 11 a.m. (4 a.m. ET), and now it has become
really heavy. Yesterday it was Daraya and today Jobar is the hottest
spot in Damascus," an activist named Housam told Reuters by Skype from
the capital. Assad officials in Moscow to discuss end to civil war
The
Syrian Network for Human Rights, a London-based group that supports the
opposition, said it documented 76 deaths throughout Syria on Saturday,
35 of them in and around the capital Damascus. Reporting in Syria is
severely restricted, and NBC News could not confirm these numbers.
Amid
violence and chaos in Syria, 400 US troops have been deployed to Turkey
with Patriot missile batteries to bolster defenses along the border.
NBC's Annabel Roberts reports.
Since Assad's last public
comments, in November, rebels have strengthened their hold on swathes of
territory across northern Syria, launched an offensive in the central
province of Hama and endured weeks of bombardment by Assad's forces
trying to dislodge them from Damascus's outer neighborhoods.
Syria's
political opposition has also won widespread international recognition.
But Assad has continued to rely on support from Russia, China and Iran
to hold firm and has used his air power to blunt rebel gains on the
ground. Missile batteries
Despite the estimated death toll of 60,000 announced by the United Nations earlier this week
-- a figure sharply higher than that given by activists -- the West has
shown little appetite for intervening against Assad in the way that
NATO forces supported rebels who overthrew Libya's Moammar Gadhafi in
2011.
But NATO is sending U.S. and European Patriot surface-to-air missile batteries to the Turkish-Syrian border.
Channel Four Europe's Alex Thomson has the rare opportunity to meet some of Syrian President Bashar Assad's troops.
Explosion at Syrian gas station kills, wounds dozens; opposition blames car bomb
The United States military said U.S. troops and equipment had begun arriving in Turkey on Friday for the deployment. Germany and the Netherlands are also sending Patriot batteries, which will take weeks to deploy fully.
Turkey
and NATO say the missiles are a safeguard to protect southern Turkey
from possible Syrian missile strikes. Syria and allies Russia and Iran
say the deployments could spark an eventual military action by the
Western alliance.
Syria's war has proved the longest and
bloodiest of the conflicts that arose out of popular uprisings in Arab
countries over the past two years and led to the downfall of autocratic
regimes in Tunisia, Egypt, Libya and Yemen. Reuters and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Many people are saying that Bashar is in a bubble. By this they are
insisting that his victory speech is bluster or based on bad
intelligence and fawning officers who give him only good news.
Certainly, he is in a bubble. But it is a mistake to overestimate the
power of the rebels. They too have been in a bubble. They have thought
that this was going to be much easier from the beginning – that Bashar
would either roll over because he would not have the stomach for a real
fight, or the international community would do a Libya, or that Syria
would have a Tahrir moment.
The opposition has gotten stronger every month since the beginning of
the uprising. But the destructive power of this regime has not played
itself out by a long shot. It is responding to the changes on the ground
and becoming more lethal as well. Patrick Seale in the Aljazeera show,
copied below, argues that Syria could turn out to be like Algeria – with
200,000 killed and no rebel victory. I don’t believe Syria will end up
like Algeria. I don’t believe that Bashar or his military can endure,
precisely because of the emerging sectarian nature of this fight. But I
also believe that Patrick is right to warn the international community
and Syrians that worse may yet be waiting for them. The regime’s
military remains powerful and has many weapons the opposition cannot
match. They are killing the opposition in high numbers.
Most opposition
commanders have no or little military experience. They have little
outside support and what they do have is fickle and irregular.
What this
means is that they will take an extraordinary beating before becoming a
professional fighting force with the ability to destroy the Syrian Army
and take Damascus and Syria’s other cities.
But in the end, the numbers are likely to be decisive. The regime
does not have an infinite supply of supporters who can fight. The rebels
probably do. But what will Syria look like when it is over? The thought
is staggering.
English transcript from Sana
President al-Assad : Out of Womb of Pain, Hope Should Be Begotten, from Suffering Important Solutions Rise
Jan 06, 2013
DAMASCUS, (SANA)_ President Bashar al-Assad on Sunday
said if pain is pervading like a dark cloud over the country, the
emotional state only, with its sublimity, is not enough to compensate
the loss of the loved ones or the restoration of security and peace to
the country or providing bread, water, fuel and medicine nationwide.
Delivering a speech on the latest developments in Syria and the
region at the Opera House in Damascus, President al-Assad added “out of
the womb of pain, hope should be begotten and from the bottom of
suffering the most important solutions rise, as the dark cloud in the
sky conceals the sun light, but it also carries in its layers rain,
purity and hope of welfare and giving.”
President al-Assad said “These feelings of agony, sadness, challenge
and intention are huge energy that will not get Syria out of its crisis
unless it turns this energy into a comprehensive national move that
saves the homeland from the unprecedented campaign hatched against it.”
“This national move is the only balm for the deep wounds which
affected our society and were about to divide it as it is the only way
that is able to keep Syria geographically and making it politically
stronger,” the President added.
“At the beginning they wanted it a fake revolution but the Syrian
people rebelled against them, then they tried to impose it by money,
media and arms secretly and when they failed, they moved to the second
phase through dropping the masks of a “peaceful revolution” and unveiled
the cover of the weapons they were using secretly to use them openly
starting their attempts to occupy cities as to pounce upon other
cities,” President al-Assad said, adding that “their brutal behaviors
didn’t deter our people, thanks to their awareness and steadfastness, to
unveil their lies and reject them. Therefore they decided to take
revenge on the people through spreading terrorism everywhere.”
The President stressed that the Takfiries were working at the back
rows through bombings mass killing leaving the armed gangs at the front
line but the unity of the Syrian people and army obliged them to move
for fighting at the front lines where they led the rudder of the blood,
killing and mutilation ship.
“Each citizen is responsible and able to provide something even if it
is tiny or limited as he/she may consider, because the homeland is for
everyone; we all defend it each with his/her capacity and capability,
because the thought is a way of defense, the stance is a way of defense,
construction is a way of defense and protecting people’s properties is a
way of defense,” President al-Assad added.
“Since the attack is launched against the homeland with all its human
and material components, the mindful citizen has certainly known that
passivity, waiting for time or others to solve the problem is a sort of
pushing the country towards the abyss, and not participating in
solutions is a kind of taking the homeland backwards with no progress
towards overcoming what the home is going through.
“They have killed civilians and the innocent to kill light and
brightness in our country; they have assassinated the qualified and
intellectuals to spread their ignorance on our minds; they sabotaged the
infrastructure built with the people’s money to make suffering pervade
into our lives; they deprived children of their schools to devastate the
future of the country and express their ignorance and they cut off
electricity, communications and fuel supply, leaving the elderly and
children suffering from the cold weather without medicine, emphasizing
their savagery. But their theft has been manifested through sabotaging
wheat stocks, stealing wheat and flour to make the loaf like a dream for
citizens and to starve people… Is it a conflict for power and post or
is it a conflict between the homeland and its enemies? Is it a struggle
for authority or is it a revenge on the Syrian people who did not give
those terrorist killers the key word for dismembering Syria and its
society…. continue
State Dept: Asad’s Speech
2013-01-06
Asad’s Speech Press Statement Victoria Nuland Department Spokesperson, Office of the Spokesperson Washington, DC January 6, 2013
Bashar al-Asad’s speech today is yet another attempt by the regime to
cling to power and does nothing to advance the Syrian people’s goal of a
political transition. His initiative is detached from reality,
undermines the efforts of Joint Special Representative Lakhdar Brahimi,
and would only allow the regime to further perpetuate its bloody
oppression of the Syrian people.
For nearly two years, the Asad regime has brutalized its own people.
Even today, as Asad speaks of dialogue, the regime is deliberately
stoking sectarian tensions and continuing to kill its own people by
attacking Sunni towns and villages in the mixed areas of Jabal Akrad and
Jabal Turkmen in Lattakia province.
Assad has lost all legitimacy and must step aside to enable a
political solution and a democratic transition that meets the
aspirations of the Syrian people. The United States continues to support
the Geneva Action Group’s framework for a political solution, which was
endorsed by the five permanent members of the UN Security Council, the
Arab League, and the UN General Assembly. We will continue our efforts
in support of Joint Special Representative Brahimi to build
international unity behind it and to urge all parties in Syria to take
meaningful steps toward its implementation
It was the first time in two years of revolution we have seen support
for the Syrian leader so choreographed, accompanied by such
fist-pumping chants from the audience.
Even the slogans were the same as the slain Libyan dictator: “God, Syria, Bashar, enough”.
Reminiscent too was the rambling delivery, leaping incoherently back
and forth between vague peace proposals and unremitting imprecations
against the opposition: “al-Qaeda”, “armed criminals”, “foreign
terrorists” were also prominent in Col Muammar Gaddafi’s vocabulary.
Then there were the lapses into bizarre sentimentality, as when he
announced: “I look at the eyes of Syria’s children and I don’t see any
happiness” – something that would hardly surprise anyone who had watched
the news over the last two years.
Mr Assad is no Gaddafi, of course. But his smoother, better-educated,
more rational persona, lacking the Gaddafi instinct for the absurd,
makes him in some ways even more of a mystery.
حليات : الرئيس الأسد يطرح حلاً سياسياً للأزمة من ثلاث مراحل ويؤكد: سورية ستبقى كما كانت وستعود أقوى مما كانت فلا تنازل عن المبادئ ولا تفريط بالحقوق ومن راهن على إضعافها فهو واهم
لقد ترك هذا الخطاب فى لغتها الاصلية, ترجمة الموجود على يمين لجعل هذا باللغة الإنجليزية
I have left this speech in its original language, I have a translate button to the right to make this English
07 كانون الثاني , 2013
لن نتوقف عن مكافحة الإرهاب طالما يوجد إرهابي واحد في سورية
الفكر التكفيري دخيل على بلادنا وتم استيراده من الخارج
الوطن للجميع ندافع عنه جميعا كل بما يستطيع
ويملك
شق-سانا
ألقى السيد الرئيس بشار الأسد كلمة في دار الأوبرا بدمشق ظهر أمس تناول فيها آخر المستجدات في سورية والمنطقة وفيما يلي النص الكامل للكلمة:
السادة رئيس وأعضاء الحكومة... السادة رؤساء وأعضاء قيادات المنظمات الشعبية والنقابات المهنية.. أيتها الأخوات… أيها الأخوة..
اليوم أنظر إلى وجوهكم ووجوه أبناء بلدي وقد كساها الحزن والألم… أنظر إلى عيون أطفال سورية فلا أرى ضحكة بريئة تشع منها ولا ألعاباً تزرع البسمة على وجوههم.. أرقب أيادي العجائز فلا أراها إلا متضرعة بالدعاء بالسلامة لابن أو ابنة أو حفيد. ضاف الرئيس الأسد.. نلتقي اليوم والمعاناة تعم أرض سورية ولا تبقي مكانا للفرح في أي زاوية من زوايا الوطن.. فالأمن والأمان غابا عن شوارع البلاد وأزقتها.. نلتقي اليوم وهناك أمهات فقدن أبناءهن.. خيرة أبنائهن.. وأسر فقدت معيلها وأطفال تيتموا وإخوة تفرقوا بين شهيد و نازح ومفقود.
من رحم الألم يجب أن يولد الأمل ومن عمق المعاناة تجترح أهم الحلول
وقال الرئيس الأسد.. وإذا كان كل هذا الألم يخيم كغيمة سوداء على البلاد، فإن الحالة الوجدانية وحدها.. على سموها.. ليست كافية لتعويض فقدان الأحبة أو عودة الأمن والأمان إلى البلاد أو تأمين الخبز والماء والوقود والدواء على امتداد ساحة الوطن.. فمن رحم الألم يجب أن يولد الأمل.. ومن عمق المعاناة تجترح أهم الحلول فالغيمة السوداء في السماء تحجب نور الشمس.. لكنها تحمل في طياتها مطراً وطهراً وأملاً بالخير والعطاء حينما تمطر.
وأضاف الرئيس الأسد.. هذه المشاعر والعواطف من ألم وحزن وتحد وإصرار هي طاقة جبارة .. لن تخرج سورية من محنتها.. إلا بتحويل هذه الطاقة إلى حراك وطني شامل ينقذ الوطن من براثن هجمة لم نشهد أو نتذكر لها مثيلا في تاريخ هذه المنطقة.
وقال الرئيس الأسد.. هذا الحراك الوطني هو البلسم الوحيد للجروح العميقة التي أصابت أنسجة مجتمعنا وكادت أن تمزقه.. هو الوحيد القادر على إبقاء سورية جغرافيا وجعلها أقوى سياسيا واسترجاعها اجتماعياً وثقافياً وأخلاقياً.. فكل مواطن مسؤول بل وقادر على تقديم شيء ولو كان بسيطاً أو محدوداً بنظره.. فالوطن للجميع ندافع عنه جميعا.. كل بما يستطيع ويملك.. فالفكرة دفاع والموقف دفاع والبناء دفاع والحفاظ على ممتلكات الشعب دفاع.. ولأن الهجمة على الوطن كله بما فيه ومن فيه فكل مواطن واعٍ بات يعلم علم اليقين أن السلبية أو انتظار الزمن أو الآخرين ليحلوا المشكلة هو بحد ذاته سير بالبلاد نحو الهاوية.. وعدم المشاركة بالحلول هو إعادة للوطن إلى الوراء لا تقدم به نحو الخروج مما فيه.
الصراع هو بين الوطن وأعدائه
وأضاف الرئيس الأسد.. ولأن كثيرين سقطوا في فخ ما تم تصويره لهم على أن الصراع هو بين حكم ومعارضة أي صراع على كرسي ومنصب وسلطة.. فقد ابتعدوا والتزموا الصمت والحيادية.. وبالتالي فإنه من واجبنا جميعاً اليوم أن نعيد توجيه الرؤية باتجاه البوصلة الحقيقية للوطن.. فالصراع أيها السادة هو صراع بين الوطن وأعدائه بين الشعب والقتلة المجرمين بين المواطن وخبزه ومائه ودفئه ومن يحرمه من كل ذلك بين حالة الأمان التي كنا نتغنى بها وبث الخوف والذعر في النفوس.
وقال الرئيس الأسد.. قتلوا المدنيين والأبرياء ليقتلوا النور والضياء في بلدنا.. اغتالوا الكفاءات والعقول ليعمموا جهلهم على عقولنا.. خربوا البنية التحتية التي بنيت بأموال الشعب لتتغلغل المعاناة في حياتنا.. حرموا الأطفال من مدارسهم ليخربوا مستقبل البلاد ويعبروا عن جاهليتهم.. قطعوا الكهرباء والاتصالات وإمداد الوقود وتركوا الشيوخ والأطفال يقاسون برد الشتاء دون دواء تأكيداً على وحشيتهم أما لصوصيتهم فتجلت في تخريب الصوامع وسرقة القمح والطحين ليتحول رغيف الخبز حلما وليجوع المواطن فهل هذا صراع على كرسي ومنصب... أم هو صراع بين الوطن وأعدائه.. هل هو صراع على سلطة... أم هو انتقام من الشعب الذي لم يعط أولئك الإرهابيين القتلة الكلمة المفتاح من أجل تفتيت سورية و تفتيت مجتمعها... إنهم أعداء الشعب وأعداء الشعب هم أعداء الله وأعداء الله يحشرون في النار يوم القيامة
. الثورة عادة ثورة الشعب لا ثورة المستوردين من الخارج
وأضاف الرئيس الأسد.. في البداية أرادوها ثورة مزعومة.. فثار الشعب عليهم حارما إياهم من حاضنة شعبية أرادوا فرضها بالمال والإعلام والسلاح خفية وعندما فشلوا انتقلوا إلى المرحلة الثانية فأسقطوا أقنعة "السلمية" وكشفوا الغطاء عن السلاح الذي كانوا يستعملونه منذ البداية خفيةً فرفعوه علناً.. وبدؤوا بمحاولاتهم احتلال مدنٍ لينقضوا كالذئاب من خلالها على باقي المدن.. ضربوا بوحشية.. وكلما كانوا يضربون كان الشعب الكبير بوعيه وصموده ينبذهم ويكشف زيفهم.. فقرروا الانتقام من الشعب بنشر الإرهاب أينما حلوا وفي أي مكان ودون تمييز. وقال الرئيس الأسد.. يسمونها ثورة وهي لا علاقة لها بالثورات لا من قريب ولا من بعيد.. الثورة بحاجة لمفكرين.. الثورة تبنى على فكر.. فأين هو المفكر.. من يعرف مفكرا لهذه الثورة.. الثورات بحاجة لقادة.. من يعرف من هو قائد هذه الثورة.. الثورات تبنى على العلم والفكر لا تبنى على الجهل.. تبنى على دفع البلاد إلى الأمام لا إعادتها قرونا إلى الوراء.. تبنى على تعميم النور على المجتمع لا على قطع الكهرباء عن الناس.. الثورة عادة ثورة الشعب لا ثورة المستوردين من الخارج لكي يثوروا على الشعب.. هي ثورة من أجل مصالح الشعب ليست ضد مصالح الشعب فبالله عليكم هل هذه ثورة وهل هؤلاء ثوار إنهم حفنة من المجرمين.
الفكر التكفيري فكر دخيل على بلادنا
وأضاف الرئيس الأسد.. خلف كل ذلك كان التكفيريون يعملون في الصفوف الخلفية عبر عمليات التفجير والقتل الجماعي.. تاركين العصابات في الواجهة.. داعمين لها من الخلف.. وكلما كان الجيش والشعب يداً بيد يصد قتلهم وإجرامهم كانوا يقتربون من الانهيار.. عندها لم يجد التكفيريون بداً مما ليس منه بد فانتقلوا للقتال في الصفوف الأمامية واستلموا دفة سفينة الدم والقتل والتنكيل.. ولأن الفكر التكفيري فكر دخيل على بلادنا كان لابد من استيراده من الخارج افراداً وافكاراً.. وهنا انقلبت المعادلة.. تكفيريون..إرهابيون..قاعدة... يسمون أنفسهم "جهاديين" جاؤوا من كل حدب وصوب.. يقودون العمليات الإرهابية على الأرض وأما المسلحون وبعد فشلهم نقلوا إلى الصفوف الخلفية كمساعدين بأعمال خطف ونهب وتخريب.. خدم.. وبأحسن الأحوال أدلاء.. جواسيس على أبناء جلدتهم لصالح تكفيريين قتلة لا يتكلمون لغة سوى لغة الذبح وتقطيع الأوصال.
وقال الرئيس الأسد.. نحن أيها الاخوة.. نقاتل هؤلاء.. وكثير منهم غير سوريين.. أتوا من أجل مفاهيم منحرفة ومصطلحات مزيفة يسمونها جهاداً وهي أبعد ما تكون عن الجهاد وعن الإسلام في شيء.. الشيء المؤكد أن معظم من نواجههم الآن هم من هؤلاء الإرهابيين الذين يحملون فكر القاعدة وأعتقد معظمكم يعرف ويعلم كيف تمت رعاية هذا النوع من الإرهاب منذ ثلاثة عقود في أفغانستان من قبل الغرب وبأموال عربية بعد انتهاء مهمة هؤلاء الإرهابيين بتفكك الاتحاد السوفييتي وخروجه من أفغانستان انفلت من عقاله وبدأ يضرب في كل مكان ضرب في العالم العربي.. ضرب في العالم الإسلامي وانتقل إلى الغرب.. حاولوا التخلص منه بحرب أفغانستان وحاولوا التخلص منه بطرق مختلفة بعد غزو العراق ولكن هذا الإرهاب كان معندا ومستمرا بالانتشار وبدأ يتغلغل في قلب المجتمعات الغربية نفسها فأتت هذه الأحداث في العالم العربي وخاصة في سورية كفرصة سانحة لهذه القوى.. أقصد القوى الغربية لكي تقوم بنقل العدد الأكبر الممكن إلى سورية لتحويل سورية إلى أرض الجهاد وبالتالي يتخلصون من خصمين مزعجين بنفس الوقت.. يتخلصون من الإرهابيين ويضعفون سورية العقدة المزعجة بالنسبة للغرب.
وأضاف الرئيس الأسد.. هناك منظمة تعنى بموضوع الإرهاب لا أذكر ما اسمها أصدرت منذ نحو شهر أو أكثر بقليل تقريرا حول تراجع الأعمال الإرهابية بشكل عام وخاصة في منطقة أواسط وشرق آسيا.. صحيح لأن معظم الإرهابيين أتوا إلى سورية من معظم هذه الدول والبعض منهم يأتي من الدول الغربية نفسها.. دخول هؤلاء الإرهابيين إلى أي مجتمع هو خطير من الناحية الأمنية وهذا من البديهيات ولكن ليس مستحيلا دحرهم عندما نمتلك الإرادة والشجاعة لذلك.. ولكن الأخطر هو الدخول بالمعنى الفكري والاجتماعي.. فهذا النوع من الفكر عندما يتغلغل في قلب مجتمع يتحول هذا المجتمع إلى مسخ مشوه وإن لم نعالج هذا الموضوع بشكل جدي بغض النظر عن الأزمة التي تمر بها سورية بجوانبها السياسية.. وبمعنى آخر يجب أن نسمو فوق الخلافات بالنسبة لهذا الموضوع.. وإلا فنحن نورث الأبناء والأحفاد دماء.. ودماء لأجيال وأجيال.. وسورية التي نعرفها لن تكون موجودة ليس بالضرورة بالاسم أو الجغرافيا وإنما على الأقل سورية التي عرفناها كمجتمع ولكن هذا لا يمنع أن هذا النوع من الفكر يخلق فتنة ويدمر الجغرافيا والمعنى السياسي لأي مجتمع يتغلغل فيه.. هذه مسؤولية كبيرة لا بد من أن نتوحد جميعا من أجل مواجهتها.
سورية ستبقى حرة سيدة لا ترضى الخنوع ولا تقبل الوصاية
وقال الرئيس الأسد.. لكن للأزمة ابعاداً أخرى ليست داخلية فقط.. فما يجري بالداخل بات واضحاً لمن يريد الرؤية.. أما إقليمياً فهناك من يسعى لتقسيم سورية وآخرون يسعون لإضعافها.. بعضها يمد المجرمين بالمال والسلاح والبعض الآخر بالدعم والتدريب.. دول عدوة بنيت على الاحتلال والعدوان لا نستغرب ما قامت وما تقوم به.. ودول جارة جارت على سورية وشعبها لتضعفه وتهيمن عليه.. ودول بحثت عن موقع لها في تاريخ لا تمتلكه.. فكتبته بدماء الأبرياء من الشعب العربي.. والسوري تحديداً.. لكن سورية وشعبها أقوى وأصلب... ويعدهم بأنه لن ينسى.
وأضاف الرئيس الأسد.. وأما دوليا.. فليس خافياً على أحد أن سورية كانت وستبقى حرة سيدة لا ترضى الخنوع ولا تقبل الوصاية.. وهذا ما كان يزعج الغرب ولا يزال.. فأرادوا استغلال أحداث داخلية لإخراج سورية من المعادلة السياسية للمنطقة لينتهوا من هذه العقدة المزعجة وليضربوا فكر المقاومة وليحولونا إلى تابعين شأننا شأن الكثيرين ممن حولنا.. لكن المجتمع الدولي لا يقتصر على الغرب فقط فكثير من الدول في العالم وفي مقدمتها روسيا والصين ومعهما دول مجموعة البريكس وغيرها الكثير ترفض التدخل في شؤون الدول وزعزعة الاستقرار في المنطقة انطلاقاً من مبادئها ومصالحها وحرصها على حرية الشعوب في تقرير مصيرها.. دول تحترم سيادة سورية واستقلالها وحرية قرارها.. لن ترى منا إلا الشكر والتقدير والاحترام المتبادل.. وأخص بالشكر طبعا روسيا والصين وإيران.. لكل من وقف إلى جانب الشعب السوري في تقرير مصيره.
وقال الرئيس الأسد.. في ظل كل ذلك لا يمكن لنا الحديث عن الحل إلا بالأخذ بعين الاعتبار هذه العوامل.. الداخل.. والعامل الإقليمي.. والعامل الدولي.. وأي إجراء لا يغير هذه العوامل لن يسمى حلاً حقيقياً ولا تأثير له على الإطلاق.
وأضاف الرئيس الأسد.. ولنبدأ من الداخل.. فالخلاف إن كان بنظر البعض في البدايات بين معارضة وموالاة.. وأنا لا أعتقد أنه كان بهذا الشكل منذ البداية.. فهكذا خلاف في العالم المتحضر يكون حول كيفية بناء الوطن لا تخريبه.. حول كيفية تقدمه وتطوره لا إرجاعه عشرات السنين إلى الوراء.. العلاقة بين المعارضة والموالاة تكون علاقة الداخل بالداخل.. أما عندما يصبح جزء من الداخل مسيراً ومرتبطاً بالخارج فالصراع هنا بين الداخل والخارج.. بين استقلال الوطن والهيمنة عليه.. بين بقائه سيداً حرا واحتلاله من الخارج سياسياً.. وهنا تتحول القضية إلى الدفاع عن الوطن برمته ويتوحد الجميع ضد العدوان الآتي من الخارج بأدواتٍ بعضها داخلي.. لذلك عندما نقول معارضة خارجية أو أي كلام مشابه لا نقصد المكان الذي يقطن فيه هؤلاء الأشخاص وإنما نقصد المكان الذي وضعوا فيه قلبهم وعقلهم.. ارتباطهم ورهانهم.. والأهم تمويلهم.. هذا ما نقصده بالخارج سواء كان يقطن بالداخل أو بالخارج فهناك اشخاص يقطنون في الخارج ولكن يدافعون عن بلدهم.
نحن الآن أمام حالة حرب بكل ما تحمل الكلمة من معنى.. نحن الآن نصد عدواناً خارجياً شرساً بشكل جديد
وقال الرئيس الأسد.. نعم أيها السادة ليست معارضة وموالاة ولا جيشا مقابل عصابات وقتلة فحسب.. نحن الآن أمام حالة حرب بكل ما تحمل الكلمة من معنى.. نحن الآن نصد عدواناً خارجياً شرساً بشكل جديد وهذا النوع من الحروب هو أشد فتكا وأكبر خطراً من الحروب التقليدية لأنها لا تستخدم أدواتها لضربنا بل تجيرنا نحن لتنفيذ مشاريعها.. تستهدف سورية عبر حفنة من السوريين وكثير من الأغراب.. تحاول استخدامنا لقطع أشجارنا وهدم أحجارنا وللأسف بأيدي بعضٍ منا.. وهكذا حرب تواجه بالدفاع عن الوطن بالتوازي مع إصلاح ضروري لنا جميعا والذي قد لا يغير من واقع الحرب شيئاً لكنه يقوينا ويقوي وحدتنا ويعزز مناعتنا في مواجهتها.. البعض يعتقد أن هذا الحل أو هذا الاصلاح سيحل المشكلة.. لا.. هو عامل مؤثر ولكن هو ليس كل الحل.
الإصلاح دون أمان كالأمان دون إصلاح.. لا ينجح أحدهما دون الآخر
وأضاف الرئيس الأسد.. فالإصلاح دون أمان كالأمان دون إصلاح.. لا ينجح أحدهما دون الآخر.. وهذا ما كنا نقوله وما زلنا.. ومن كرر كثيراً أن سورية اختارت الحل الأمني فهو لا يسمع ولا يرى.. فنحن لطالما قلنا مراراً وتكراراً .. الإصلاح والسياسة بيد والقضاء على الإرهاب باليد الأخرى.. ومن يقلب الحقائق تحت هذا العنوان نقل له..عندما يتعرض شخص للاعتداء ويدافع عن نفسه هل نقول دافع عن نفسه أم اختار الحل الأمني... فلماذا عندما تدافع الدولة عن الشعب وعندما يدافع الشعب عن الوطن يقولون إنهم اختاروا الحل الأمني.
وقال الرئيس الأسد.. الدفاع عن الوطن واجب ليس مطروحا للنقاش وهو واجب قانوني ودستوري وشرعي وهو خيار وحيد فلا يوجد خيار للحل الأمني.. هنا خيار وحيد.. هو الدفاع عن النفس.. فإذا كنا اخترنا الحل السياسي وسعينا إليه منذ الأيام الأولى فلا يعني ألا ندافع عن أنفسنا.. واذا كنا اخترنا الحل السياسي منذ الأيام الأولى فهذا يعني أننا بحاجة لشريك قادر وراغب بالسير في عملية سياسية والدخول في عملية حوار على المستوى الوطني.. واذا كنا اخترنا الحل السياسي ولم نر شريكا فهذا لا يعني أننا لم نرغب.. هذا يعني أننا لم نر شريكا خلال المرحلة الماضية.. بشكل أوضح إذا كان الشخص يريد الزواج وبحث عن شريك ولم يجد من يرغب ويقبل به فهذا لا يعني أنه غير راغب في الزواج.. لذلك أي طرح حول اختيار الدولة في سورية للحل الأمني كلام غير صحيح ولم يطرح في يوم من الأيام ولم يصرح أي مسؤول في الدولة أننا نختار الحل الأمني.
الدفاع عن الوطن واجب وهو خيار وحيد
وأضاف الرئيس الأسد.. عندما تتعرض لهجوم وتدافع عن نفسك فهذا يسمى دفاعا عن النفس ولا يسمى اختيارا للحل الأمني.. فلسنا نحن من اخترنا الحرب.. الحرب فرضت على سورية وعندما تدافع الدولة عن الشعب وندافع عن أنفسنا لا يمكن لعاقل أن يسمي ذلك اختيارا للحل الأمني.. فالدفاع عن الوطن واجب وهو خيار وحيد، وقبولنا بالحل السياسي لا يعني ألا ندافع عن أنفسنا لكن ايضا قبولنا بالحل السياسي يعني وجود شريك سياسي قادر على الحوار وراغب به.
وقال الرئيس الأسد.. نحن لم نرفض يوماً الحل السياسي.. تبنيناه منذ اليوم الأول عبر دعامته الأساسية وهي الحوار.. ومددنا أيدينا لكل من يحمل مشروعاً سياسياً وطنياً يدفع بسورية إلى الأمام.. لكن مع من نتحاور... مع أصحاب فكر متطرف لا يؤمنون إلا بلغة الدم والقتل والإرهاب... مع عصابات تؤتمر من الخارج.. تتبع للغريب وأوامره.. فيأمرها برفض الحوار لعلمه ويقينه أن الحوار سيفشل مخططاته بإضعاف سورية والانتهاء منها وخاصة بعض الدول الإقليمية التي يعلم مسؤولوها أن خروج سورية من أزمتها سيقضي عليهم وعلى مستقبلهم السياسي بعد أن غرقوا وأغرقوا شعوبهم بالأكاذيب وصرفوا مقدرات بلادهم دعماً للإرهاب ولم يعد بمقدورهم تبرير سياساتهم العدوانية وتورطهم في سفك الدماء و قتل الأبرياء.. أم نحاور دمى رسمها الغرب وصنعها وكتب نصوص أدوارها... عندها الأولى أن نحاور الأصيل لا البديل.. نحاور من شكلها لا من يقوم بتأدية الأدوار المكتوبة له على خشبات المسارح الدولية.. نحاور السيد لا العبد.
وأضاف الرئيس الأسد.. وأما الغرب..سليل الاستعمار وصاحب الختم الأول في سياسة التقسيم والتناحر الطائفي البغيض فهو من سد باب الحوار لا نحن..لأنه اعتاد إعطاء الأوامر للإمعات ونحن اعتدنا على السيادة والاستقلال وحرية القرار.. لأنه أدمن الأجراء والأذلاء ولأننا جبلنا على الكرامة والإباء.. وسنبقى.. فكيف يحاورنا... ولماذا يحاورنا... وبالتالي فإن من يتحدث عن الحل السياسي فقط ويتعامى عن هذه الحقائق فهو إما جاهل بالوقائع أو متخاذل يقدم الوطن والمواطن لقمة سائغة للمجرمين ومن يقف خلفهم.. يبيع شعبه ودماء شهدائه بالمجان.. وهذا ما لن نسمح به.
وقال الرئيس الأسد.. البعض يتحدث عن الحل السياسي فقط والبعض يتحدث عن مكافحة الإرهاب فقط وهذا الكلام غير دقيق فالحل يجب أن يكون حلاً شاملاً وفيه محاور.. فيه السياسي ومكافحة الإرهاب وفيه محور ثالث مهم جدا هو الحل الاجتماعي ولدينا نماذج في حمص ودرعا تحديدا حيث تحسن الوضع بشكل كبير بسبب هذا الحل الاجتماعي فأشخاص وطنيون يمتلكون حساً وطنياً وانتماء وطنياً واخلاقاً قاموا بمبادرات بين الدولة وبعض المغرر بهم من المسلحين والإرهابيين واعطت نتائج هامة جدا على الواقع وهؤلاء الأشخاص لا ينتمون إلى أحزاب وليس لديهم أي برنامج سياسي وليس لديهم سوى الانتماء الوطني وهذا النوع من المبادرات هام جدا وخاصة ان أي أزمة في أي وطن وحتى لو كانت جريمة عادية تتفاقم فعلينا ان نعود إلى الجذور الاجتماعية دائما.
سنحاور من ألقى السلاح لتعود الدماء العربية السورية الأصيلة تسري في عروقه
وأضاف الرئيس الأسد.. أوجه تحية إلى هؤلاء الاشخاص الذين أنجزوا إنجازات وطنية كل بحسب ما يستطيع وأنا أعرف البعض منهم والتقيت بهم بشكل مباشر والبعض الآخر سمعت عنه ولكن هناك جنودا مجهولين ونوجه لهم التحية ونقول لهم نحن نعول كثيرا على مبادراتهم.
وقال الرئيس الأسد.. قد يبدو من كل ما سبق أنه لا يوجد أحد نحاوره وهذا الكلام غير صحيح.. فرغم كل ما سبق.. سنحاور ونمد يدنا دائما وأبداً للحوار.. سنحاور كل من خالفنا بالسياسة.. وكل من ناقضنا بالمواقف دون أن يكون موقفه مبنياً على المساس بالمبادئ والأسس الوطنية.. سنحاور أحزاباً وأفراداً لم تبع وطنها للغريب.. سنحاور من ألقى السلاح لتعود الدماء العربية السورية الأصيلة تسري في عروقه.. وسنكون شركاء حقيقيين مخلصين لكل وطني شريف غيور يعمل من أجل مصلحة سورية وأمانها واستقلالها.
المرحلة الأولى للحل: التزام الدول المعنية بوقف تمويل وتسليح وإيواء المسلحين بالتوازي مع وقف المسلحين للعمليات الإرهابية
وأضاف الرئيس الأسد.. وعليه وانطلاقا من ثوابتنا المبدئية وفي مقدمتها سيادة الدولة واستقلالية قرارها ومبادئ وأهداف ميثاق الأمم المتحدة والقانون الدولي والتي تؤكد جميعها على سيادة الدول واستقلالها ووحدة أراضيها وعدم التدخل في شؤونها الداخلية.. وإيمانا منا بضرورة الحوار بين أبناء سورية.. وبقيادة سورية.. ومن أجل استعادة المناخ الآمن وعودة الاستقرار فإن الحل السياسي في سورية سيكون على الشكل التالي.. المرحلة الأولى.. أولا.. تلتزم فيها الدول المعنية.. الاقليمية والدولية بوقف تمويل وتسليح وإيواء المسلحين بالتوازي مع وقف المسلحين للعمليات الإرهابية.. ما يسهل عودة النازحين السوريين إلى أماكن إقامتهم الأصلية بأمن وأمان.. بعد ذلك مباشرة يتم وقف العمليات العسكرية من قبل قواتنا المسلحة التي تحتفظ بحق الرد في حال تعرض أمن الوطن أو المواطن أو المنشآت العامة والخاصة لأي اعتداء.. ثانيا.. إيجاد آلية للتأكد من التزام الجميع بالبند السابق وخاصة ضبط الحدود.. ثالثا.. تبدأ الحكومة القائمة مباشرة بإجراء اتصالات مكثفة مع كل أطياف المجتمع السوري بأحزابه وهيئاته لإدارة حوارات مفتوحة لعقد مؤتمر حوار وطني تشارك فيه كل القوى الراغبة بحل في سورية من داخل البلاد وخارجها.
المرحلة الثانية: عقد مؤتمر الحوار الوطني الشامل للوصول إلى ميثاق وطني يتمسك بسيادة سورية ووحدة وسلامة أراضيها
وقال الرئيس الأسد.. المرحلة الثانية.. أولا.. تدعو الحكومة القائمة إلى عقد مؤتمر الحوار الوطني الشامل للوصول إلى ميثاق وطني يتمسك بسيادة سورية ووحدة وسلامة أراضيها ورفض التدخل في شؤونها ونبذ الإرهاب والعنف بكل أشكاله بما يعني أن دعوة الحكومة للأحزاب وأطياف المجتمع هي لتحديد معايير هذا المؤتمر الذي سيعقد في المرحلة الثانية.. وبالنسبة للميثاق فهو ما سيرسم المستقبل السياسي لسورية ويطرح النظام الدستوري والقضائي والملامح السياسية والاقتصادية والاتفاق على قوانين جديدة.. للأحزاب والانتخابات والإدارة المحلية وغيرها.. ثانيا.. يعرض الميثاق الوطني على الاستفتاء الشعبي.. ثالثا.. تشكل حكومة موسعة تتمثل فيها مكونات المجتمع السوري وتكلف بتنفيذ بنود الميثاق الوطني.. رابعا.. يطرح الدستور على الاستفتاء الشعبي وبعد إقراره تقوم الحكومة الموسعة باعتماد القوانين المتفق عليها في مؤتمر الحوار وفقا للدستور الجديد ومنها قانون الانتخابات وبالتالي إجراء انتخابات برلمانية جديدة.. وكل ما يتعلق بالدستور والقوانين يمكن ان نضع قبله كلمة "إذا" أي إذا اتفق في هذا المؤتمر.. مؤتمر الحوار على قوانين جديدة أو على دستور جديد تقوم الحكومة بالعمل على إظهارها.
المرحلة الثالثة: تشكيل حكومة جديدة وعقد مؤتمر عام للمصالحة الوطنية وإصدار عفو عام
وتابع الرئيس الأسد.. المرحلة الثالثة.. اولا.. تشكل حكومة جديدة وفقا للدستور الموجود في ذلك الوقت.. ثانيا.. عقد مؤتمر عام للمصالحة الوطنية وإصدار عفو عام عن المعتقلين بسبب الأحداث مع الاحتفاظ بالحقوق المدنية لأصحابها.. ثالثا.. العمل على تأهيل البنى التحتية واعادة الاعمار والتعويض على المواطنين المتضررين بالأحداث.
وأضاف الرئيس الأسد.. وبالنسبة للعفو العام يكون مع الاحتفاظ بالحقوق المدنية لأصحابها لأن الدولة يحق لها أن تعفو عن حقها أو ما يسمى الحق العام ولا يحق لها ان تعفو عن حقوق الأشخاص.. واعتقد إذا وصلنا إلى هذه المرحلة فلابد أن يكون العفو عاما ليس من قبل الدولة ولكن من أصحاب الحقوق وعندها عمليا نصل إلى المصالحة الوطنية والكل يسامح الكل.
وقال الرئيس الأسد.. إن هذه الملامح الرئيسية للحل السياسي كما نراه وهي مجرد عناوين بحاجة لتفاصيل وستكلف الحكومة بإدارة هذا الموضوع وستقوم بوضع التفاصيل والتوسع في هذه العناوين وتقدم هذه الرؤية على شكل مبادرة خلال الأيام القليلة القادمة وتتابع بعدها كل هذه المراحل حسب البنود المذكورة.
وأضاف الرئيس الأسد.. دعونا نضع كل موضوع في سياقه فنحن نعيش الآن في عصر التزوير والتأويل الخاطئ ولسنا من يؤول الأمور لكن هذه الحالة العامة في تأويل الأمور بعكس مقاصدها لذلك دعونا نضع الأمور في سياقها ونصحح الافكار والمصطلحات التي تطرح.
بالنسبة لمكافحة الإرهاب لن نتوقف طالما يوجد إرهابي واحد في سورية
وأضاف الرئيس الأسد.. أولا.. بالنسبة لهذه الرؤية البعض سيتخوف منها وسيشعر بالقلق وسيعتبر أن فيها عودة إلى الخلف من الناحية الأمنية لكن أنا اطمئن الجميع بأنه بالنسبة لمكافحة الإرهاب لن نتوقف طالما يوجد إرهابي واحد في سورية وما بدأنا به لن نتوقف عنه فأي شيء نقوم به في هذه المبادرة لا يعني على الاطلاق التهاون في موضوع مكافحة الارهاب بل على العكس كلما تقدمنا في مكافحة الارهاب كانت هناك إمكانية لنجاح هذه الرؤية.
وقال الرئيس الأسد.. ثانياً.. هذه الرؤية إذا أرادوا تسميتها مبادرة أو رؤية أو أفكارا فهي موجهة لكل من يريد الحوار ولكل من يريد أن يرى حلاً سياسياً في المستقبل القريب في سورية وهي ليست موجهة لمن لا يريد أن يحاور وبالتالي سنسمع الآن منذ اليوم الكثير من الرفض من قبل الجهات التي تعرفونها ونحن نقول لهم مسبقاً.. لماذا ترفضون شيئاً هو ليس موجهاً لكم بالأساس كي لايعوا وقتهم.
أي مبادرة تطرح من قبل أي جهة أو شخصية أو دولة يجب أن تستند إلى الرؤية السورية
وأضاف الرئيس الأسد.. ثالثاً.. أي مبادرة تطرح من قبل أي جهة أو شخصية أو دولة يجب أن تستند إلى الرؤية السورية وهذا يعني أنه لا توجد مبادرة تحل محل ما يمكن أن نراه نحن كحل للأزمة في سورية.. بمعنى أوضح أي مبادرة هي مبادرة مساعدة لما سيقوم به السوريون ولا تحل محلها.. وبعد طرح هذه الأفكار من قبل الحكومة يجب أن تكون أي مبادرة تأتي من الخارج مستندة إلى هذه الأفكار ومساعدة لها ولا داعي لأن نضيع وقتنا ووقت الآخرين بمبادرات تخرج عن هذا السياق.
وقال الرئيس الأسد.. بنفس الوقت إذا تساءلنا كيف يمكن للمبادرات الخارجية أن تساعدنا.. فهناك محوران.. محور العمل السياسي ومحور مكافحة الإرهاب.. وفي المحور الأول لسنا بحاجة إلى مساعدة ونحن كسوريين قادرون على القيام بعملية سياسية متكاملة ومن يرد أن يساعد سورية بشكل عملي وفعلي وصادق ويرد النجاح فهو قادر على التركيز على موضوع وقف إدخال المسلحين والسلاح والمال الى سورية.. وهذه رسالة لكل من يعمل من الخارج كي يعرف أين يركز.. ولا نريد أحدا يأتي إلى سورية ليقول لنا ما الذي يجب علينا فعله في العملية السياسية.. بلد عمره آلاف السنين يعرف كيف يدير أموره.
وأضاف الرئيس الأسد.. النقطة الرابعة.. أن نؤيد المبادرات الخارجية المساعدة لا يعني بأي شكل من الاشكال أن نقبل بتفسيرها إن لم يكن يتوافق مع رؤيتنا.. ولا نقبل بأي تأويل لهذه المبادرات إلا بالطريقة التي تخدم المصلحة السورية.. وفي هذا الاطار أتحدث عن مبادرة جنيف التي أيدتها سورية ولكن كان فيها بند غامض هو بند المرحلة الانتقالية.. طبعاً هو غير مفسر لسبب بسيط.. لأننا عندما نتحدث عن مرحلة انتقالية فأول شيء نسأله انتقال من أين إلى اين... أو من ماذا إلى ماذا... أن ننتقل من بلد حر مستقل إلى بلد تحت الاحتلال مثلاً... هل ننتقل من بلد فيه دولة إلى بلد ليس فيه دولة وحالة فوضى مطلقة... أم هل ننتقل من قرار وطني مستقل إلى تسليم هذا القرار إلى الأجانب.
وقال الرئيس الأسد.. طبعاً الخصوم يريدون الثلاثة معا.. وبالنسبة لنا في مثل هذا الظرف المرحلة الانتقالية هي الانتقال من اللااستقرار إلى الاستقرار وأي تفسير آخر لا يعنينا.. أما في الأحوال الأخرى لو لم يكن هناك أزمة فالانتقال الطبيعي هو من وضع إلى وضع افضل.. هذا يأتي في سياق عملية التطوير وأي انتقال بالنسبة لأي مرحلة انتقالية يجب أن يكون عبر الوسائل الدستورية فبالنسبة لنا الآن ما نقوم به.. هذه الافكار بالنسبة لنا هي المرحلة الانتقالية.
وأضاف الرئيس الأسد.. خامساً.. أي مبادرة قبلنا بها فلأنها تنطلق من فكرة السيادة وقرار الشعب وفعلاً المبادرات التي طرحت وتعاملنا معها تركز على هذه النقطة في المقدمة.. وبالتالي الأشياء التي يتفق عليها داخل سورية أو خارجها يجب أن تكون بقرار الشعب لذلك حتى الميثاق الوطني الذي يمكن أن يقر من قبل مؤتمر الحوار الوطني لن يمر من دون استفتاء.. يعني يجب أن يكون هناك استفتاء شعبي على أي شيء وخاصة في هذه الظروف الصعبة ونحن قلنا لكل من التقينا به..أي شيء أو فكرة تأتينا من الخارج أو الداخل يجب أن يمر عبر استفتاء شعبي ولن يكون عبر الرئيس أو الحكومة أو الحوار أو أي شيء آخر.
سورية تقبل النصيحة لكنها لا تقبل الإملاء.. وتقبل المساعدة لكنها لا تقبل الاستبداد
وقال الرئيس الأسد.. إن ذلك يشكل نوعا من الضمانة لأن نقوم دائماً بخطوات تعبر فعلاً عن توافق شعبي وعن مصلحة وطنية وإذا فهمنا هذا الكلام البسيط والواضح فإن كل من يأتي إلى سورية ويغادرها يعرف بأن سورية تقبل النصيحة لكنها لا تقبل الاملاء وتقبل المساعدة ولكنها لا تقبل الاستبداد.
وتابع الرئيس الأسد.. بناء على ذلك كل ما يمكن أن تسمعوه أو سمعتموه في الماضي من مصطلحات وافكار وآراء ومبادرات وتصريحات عبر الإعلام ومن مسؤولين لا تهمنا إذا كانت مصطلحات ذات منشأ ربيعي فهي فقاعات صابون كما هو الربيع عبارة عن فقاعة صابون سوف تختفي.
وأضاف الرئيس الأسد.. إن أي تفسيرات لأي موضوع يخرج عن السيادة السورية بالنسبة لنا هو عبارة عن اضغاث احلام.. يحق لهم ان يحلموا ويستطيعون أن يعيشوا في عالمهم الحالم الخيالي ولكن لا يستطيعون ان يجعلونا نعيش في عالمهم الواقعي ولن نقوم بأي مبادرة أو عمل إلا انطلاقا من الواقع السوري ومن مصلحة ورغبة الشعب.
وقال الرئيس الأسد.. أيتها الأخوات..أيها الأخوة.. الوطن يعلو ولا يعلى عليه.. وسورية فوق الجميع.. بالمبادرات السياسية نقويها.. وبالدفاع عن كل حبة تراب نحميها.. فالسوري ينبض تسامحا وعفوا .. لكن الكرامة والوطنية تسريان في عروقه.. وها هي الشرائح الأكبر هبت لمواجهة الإرهاب.. فمنهم من تعاون بإعطاء المعلومات القيمة للأجهزة المختصة ما مكنها من القيام بواجبها في إحباط عمليات إرهابية مخططة ضد المواطنين.. ومنهم من انتفض في وجه الإرهابيين وحرمهم البيئة الحاضنة سواء بالدفاع عن مناطقهم أو حتى بالخروج في مظاهرات ضد المسلحين القتلة واستشهد خلال ذلك.. ومنهم من دافع كتفاً بكتف مع قواتنا المسلحة عن المدن والأحياء والبنية التحتية ولدينا نماذج كثيرة من هذه الحالات.. ولكن أذكر نموذجا واحدا في قرية صغيرة في أقصى الشمال السوري بمحافظة الحسكة اسمها رأس العين حيث قام الشباب الأشاوس في تلك القرية وهي على الحدود التركية مباشرة بالدفاع خلال عدة أيام ضد هجمات ارهابية متكررة وتمكنوا من دحر الإرهابيين القادمين من تركيا فتحية لهذه القرية.
وأضاف الرئيس الأسد.. ومنهم من حاور وأقنع وسامح وتسامح عبر مبادرات للمصالحة الوطنية على المستوى المحلي ما قطع الطريق على الإرهابيين وحول اتجاه الحالة العامة من التصعيد إلى التهدئة وعودة الوئام.
وقال الرئيس الأسد.. هؤلاء المواطنون عبروا بأدائهم عن حالة وعي عميقة فالأمان المنشود لا يأتي عبر الحياد والوقوف موقف المتفرج.. ولا عبر الهروب إلى الامام والانبطاح امام الخارج وعندما لا نكون بخير في وطننا فلن نكون بخير خارجه.. والوطن ليس لمن أقام فيه وحسب.. بل لمن دافع عنه.. ليس لمن نعم بخيراته وتفيأ بظلاله وعندما طلبه لم يجده.. هو لأولئك الذين لبوا النداء عندما ناداهم الوطن رغم أن كثيرا منهم غبنوا في كثير من المواقع والأحيان لكن عندما انتكس الوطن هبوا على اختلاف مشاربهم وانتماءاتهم قائلين.. هذا هو وقت العطاء فكان عطاؤهم دون حدود.. ومنهم من نال شرف الشهادة فأسقطت دماؤهم الربيع المزيف وحمت الشعب من الخداع الذي كاد أن يفعل فعله في البدايات.
وأضاف الرئيس الأسد.. أسقطت دماؤهم ما سماه الغرب ربيعا زوراً وبهتاناً وكان ناراً حاقدةً حاولت حرق كل ما لامسته عبر طائفية بغيضة وحقد أعمى وتقسيم مقيت.. فما كان ربيعا إلا لمن رسمه وخطط له وحاول تنفيذه وها هو يفشل.. فدماء هؤلاء الشهداء هي من حمت وستحمي الوطن والمنطقة.. وهي التي ستحمي وحدة أرضنا وتكرس تجانسنا واندماجنا وبنفس الوقت ستطهر مجتمعنا من الغدر والخيانة وتمنع سقوطنا الأخلاقي والإنساني والحضاري لعقود وأجيال.. وهذا هو الانتصار الأقوى والأهم.. والوطن عندما ينتصر لا ينسى من ضحى من أجله ولأن الوطن حق فسيعطي كل ذي حق حقه.
تحية لأصحاب الحق الأكبر بالتحية.. رجال الجيش العربي السوري
وقال الرئيس الأسد.. تحية لأصحاب الحق الأكبر بالتحية.. رجال الجيش العربي السوري.. تحية إلى ضباطنا وصف ضباطنا وجنودنا البواسل الذين يبذلون العرق والدم من أجل سورية وهم يرونها أولى من أنفسهم ومما يملكون.. تحية إلى قواتنا المسلحة التي تخوض أشرس أنواع الحروب وهي مصممة على إعادة الأمن والأمان للمواطن عبر اجتثاث الإرهاب.
وأضاف الرئيس الأسد.. إن قواتنا المسلحة التي سطرت ملاحم البطولة بتماسكها وصمودها وبلحمتها الوطنية كانت انعكاساً لصمود الشعب وتماسكه فحافظت على المواطن عزيزاً كريماً آمناً وحافظ الشعب عليها باحتضانه لها.. فالمجد لكل جندي قضى في المعركة وهو يدافع عن تراب البلاد والمجد كل المجد لكل جندي يمتشق سلاحه ودمه ليكمل مهمة من قضى.
وقال الرئيس الأسد.. تحية خالصة أوجهها لكل مواطن قام بواجبه الوطني عبر وقوفه إلى جانب قواتنا المسلحة.. كل بطريقته وبإمكانياته.. هؤلاء هم فخر سورية وعزتها وسيسطر التاريخ أسماءهم بحروف من نور ونار لأنهم يكتبون التاريخ بدمائهم وشجاعتهم فكانوا ومازالوا رديف الجيش وحماة المواطن جنبا إلى جنب مع حماة الديار.
وأضاف الرئيس الأسد.. أيتها الاخوات.. أيها الاخوة.. أعلم كما تعلمون جميعا أن ما يمر به الوطن مؤلم وصعب وأشعر بما يشعر به معظم الشعب السوري من وجع بفقدان أحبة أو استشهاد أبناء وأقرباء.. فنار حقدهم طالت الجميع.. ودخلت نعوش الشهداء الطاهرة بيوت الكثيرين.. وأنا منهم لأنني من الشعب وسأبقى كذلك فالمناصب زائلة لكن الوطن باق وأما دموع الأمهات الثكالى فستنزل برداً وسلاماً على أرواح أبنائهن الطاهرة وناراً وجحيماً على القتلة المجرمين الذين سرقوا ضحكة أطفالنا وها هم يحاولون سرقة مستقبلهم ببلد آمن قوي ومستقر.
سورية ستبقى كما عهدتموها بل وستعود بإذن الله أقوى مما كانت
وقال الرئيس الأسد.. سورية ستبقى كما عهدتموها بل وستعود بإذن الله أقوى مما كانت فلا تنازل عن المبادئ.. ولا تفريط بالحقوق ومن راهن على إضعاف سورية من الداخل لتنسى جولانها وأراضيها المحتلة فهو واهم.. فالجولان لنا وفلسطين قضيتنا التي قدمنا لأجلها الغالي والثمين.. الدماء والشهداء.. وسنبقى كما كنا ندعم المقاومة ضد العدو الأوحد.. فالمقاومة نهج لا أشخاص.. فكر وممارسة لا تنازلات واقتناص للفرص.. والشعب والدولة اللذان حملا أعباء ومسؤوليات الوقوف إلى جانب الشعب الفلسطيني في قضيته العادلة لعقود بكل ما حمله هذا الموقف من تحديات وأثمان دفعها كل مواطن سوري مادياً ومعنوياً.. ضغوطاً وتهديدات.. هذا الشعب وهذه الدولة لا يمكن أن يكونوا لأي سبب إلا في نفس الموقع تجاه إخوتهم الفلسطينيين.
وتابع الرئيس الأسد.. لذلك فإن أي محاولة لزج الفلسطينيين في الأحداث السورية هدفها حرف البوصلة عن العدو الحقيقي وهي محاولات فاشلة قبل أن تبدأ.. فالفلسطيني في سورية يقوم بواجبه تجاه وطنه الثاني كأي سوري ونحن في سورية دولة وشعبا نحمل مسؤولية القيام بواجبنا نحوهم كواجبنا تجاه أي سوري.. فتحية لكل فلسطيني شريف في سورية صان العهد وقدر المواقف السورية وتآخى بالدم والمصير مع أخيه السوري ولم يعامل سورية كفندق للاستجمام يغادره حينما تشتد الظروف.
وقال الرئيس الأسد.. أيتها الاخوات.. أيها الاخوة.. رغم كل ما خطط لسورية وما فعله القريب قبل الغريب فينا فلم ولن يستطيعوا أن يغيروا ما بأنفسنا لأن ما فيها عظيم وقوي ومتين وعريق فالوطنية تسري في عروقنا وسورية أغلى من كل شيء.. وما عبرتم عنه من صمود قرابة العامين تجاه ما يجري يخبر الكون كله أن سورية عصية على الانهيار وأن شعبها عصي على الخنوع والذل وأن الصمود والتحدي متأصل في خلايا الجسد السوري.. نتوارثه جيلاً بعد جيل.. كنا هكذا وسنبقى.. ويداً بيد ورغم كل الجراح سنسير بسورية ومعها إلى مستقبل أقوى وأكثر إشراقا.. سنسير بسورية ومعها.. سنسير إلى الأمام ولن يخيفنا رصاصهم ولن يرهبنا حقدهم لأننا اصحاب حق والله دائما وأبدا مع الحق.
There's No 'I' in 'Kumbaya'
Obama doesn't seem to have it in him to make a deal.
By PEGGY NOONAN
Updated January 4, 2013, 6:05 p.m. ET
We're
all talking about Republicans on the Hill and their manifold failures.
So here are some things President Obama didn't do during the fiscal
cliff impasse and some conjecture as to why.
He won but he did not triumph. His victory didn't resolve or ease
anything, and it heralds nothing but more congressional war to come.
Associated Press
President Obama speaking at the White House on Dec. 31 regarding budget negotiations with Congress.
He did not unveil, argue for or put on
the table the outlines of a grand bargain. That is, he put no force
behind solutions to the actual crisis facing our country, which is the
hemorrhagic spending that threatens our future. Progress there—even just
a little—would have heartened almost everyone. The president won on tax
hikes, but that was an emotional, symbolic and ideological victory, not
a substantive one. The higher rates will do almost nothing to ease the
debt or deficits.
He didn't try to exercise dominance over his party. This is a largely
forgotten part of past presidential negotiations: You not only have to
bring in the idiots on the other side, you have to corral and control
your own idiots. He didn't deepen any relationships or
begin any potential alliances with Republicans, who still, actually,
hold the House. The old animosity was aggravated. Some Republicans were
mildly hopeful a second term might moderate those presidential attitudes
that didn't quite work the first time, such as holding himself aloof
from the position and predicaments of those who oppose him, while
betraying an air of disdain for their arguments. He is not quick to
assume good faith. Some thought his election victory might liberate him,
make his approach more expansive. That didn't happen. The president didn't allow his victory
to go unsullied. Right up to the end he taunted the Republicans in
Congress: They have a problem saying yes to him, normal folks try to sit
down and work it out, not everyone gets everything they want. But he
got what he wanted, as surely he knew he would, and Republicans got
almost nothing they wanted, which was also in the cards. At Mr. Obama's
campfire, he gets to sing "Kumbaya" solo while others nod to the beat.
Serious men don't taunt. And they don't farm the job of negotiating
out to the vice president because no one can get anything done with the
president. Some Republican said, "He couldn't negotiate his way out of a
paper bag." But—isn't this clear by now?—not negotiating is his way of
negotiating. And it kind of worked. So expect more. Mr. Obama's supporters always give him
an out by saying, "But the president can't work with them, they made it
clear from the beginning their agenda was to do him in."
That's true
enough.
But it's true with every American president now—the other side
is always trying to do him in, or at least the other side's big mouths
are always braying they'll take him down. They tried to capsize Clinton,
they tried to do in Reagan, calling him an amiable dunce and vowing to
defeat his wicked ideology.
We live in a polarized age. We have for a while. One of the odd
things about the Obama White House is that they are traumatized by the
normal.
A lot of the president's staffers were new to
national politics when they came in, and they seem to have concluded
that the partisan bitterness they faced was unique to him, and uniquely
sinister. It's just politics, or the ugly way we do politics now.
After the past week it seems clear Mr. Obama doesn't really want to
work well with the other side. He doesn't want big bipartisan victories
that let everyone crow a little and move forward and make progress. He
wants his opponents in disarray, fighting without and within. He wants
them incapable. He wants them confused.
I worried the other day that amid all the rancor the president would
poison his future relations with Congress, which in turn would poison
the chances of progress in, say, immigration reform. But I doubt now he
has any intention of working with them on big reforms, of battling out a
compromise at a conference table, of having long walks and long talks
and making offers that are serious, that won't be changed overnight to
something else. The president intends to consistently beat his opponents
and leave them looking bad, or, failing that, to lose to them sometimes
and then make them look bad. That's how he does politics.
Why? Here's my conjecture: In part it's
because he seems to like the tension. He likes cliffs, which is why it's
always a cliff with him and never a deal. He likes the high-stakes,
tottering air of crisis. Maybe it makes him feel his mastery and reminds
him how cool he is, unrattled while he rattles others.
He can take it.
Can they? He is a uniquely polarizing figure. A moderate U.S. senator said the
other day: "One thing not said enough is he is the most divisive
president in modern history. He doesn't just divide the Congress, he
divides the country." The senator thinks Mr. Obama has "two whisperers
in his head." "The political whisperer says 'Don't compromise a bit,
make Republicans look weak and bad.' Another whisperer is not political,
it's, 'Let's do the right thing, work together and begin to right the
ship.' " The president doesn't listen much to the second whisperer.
Maybe he thinks bipartisan progress raises the Republicans almost to
his level, and he doesn't want to do that. They're partisan hacks,
they're not big like him. Let them flail.
This, however, is true: The great presidents are always in the end
uniters, not dividers. They keep it together and keep it going. And
people remember them fondly for that.
In the short term,Mr. Obama has won.The Republicans look bad. John Boehner looks bad, though to many in
Washington he's a sympathetic figure because they know how much he
wanted a historic agreement on the great issue of his time. Some say he
would have been happy to crown his career with it, and if that meant
losing a job, well, a short-term loss is worth a long-term crown. Mr.
Obama couldn't even make a deal with a man like that, even when it would
have made the president look good.
***
We take political pleasure where we can these days, so
we'll end with the fact that 20 women were sworn into the U.S. Senate
Thursday, up from the previous record of 17.
In an interview with ABC's
Diane Sawyer, they spoke of the difference they feel they make: Susan
Collins (R., Maine) said that "with all due deference to our male
colleagues . . . women's styles tend to be more collaborative." Claire
McCaskill (D., Mo.)said women in politics are "less confrontational."
Amy Klobuchar (D., Minn.) said they are more supportive of each other.
Lisa Murkowski (R., Alaska)suggested women have less "ego." Dianne
Feinstein (D., Calif.) said they're effective because "we're less on
testosterone."
It was refreshing to see so much agreement. It was clear they saw
their presence as to some degree an antidote to the roughness and
pointless ego of the Senate. To me they seemed an antidote to the
current White House.
A version of this article appeared January 5,
2013, on page A15 in the U.S. edition of The Wall Street Journal, with
the headline: There's No 'I' in 'Kumbaya'.
Crude injustice in the gulf: why categorical
exclusions for deep water drilling in the Gulf of Mexico are inconsistent
with U.S. and international ocean law and policy.
I tried to read it all, but some was way over my understanding. So I leave most of you to read and tell me what you think. Because somewhere our our law and policy is being side swiped, and oil companies are getting away with 'murder', on our ecosystems, oceans, air quality, and animal life. And certain groups are getting rich off of it. Turning their back on the way the system was set up, the checks and balances, to protect our planet. Am I wrong? I do not think so!
This article examines the current practice of categorically
excluding oil exploration and development/production activities in the
Gulf from environmental review, and argues that the practice violates
NEPA and the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act (OCSLA), and is
inconsistent with U.S. and international ocean law and policy.
Section I
provides a brief overview of the status of the world's imperiled
oceans, with particular emphasis on the Gulf ecosystem.
Section II
addresses America's dependence on crude oil and the increasing role
played by the Gulf in meeting the nation's energy needs, and
examines the projected environmental impacts of the DWH accident that
led to the worst oil spill in U.S. history.
Section III provides a brief
overview of U.S. ocean law and policy.
Section IV discusses the NEPA
review process with particular emphasis on the use of categorical
exclusions, and examines some of the key decisions made during the
environmental review process for the BP lease covering the site of the
DWH well.
Section V provides analysis of the interaction of laws
governing oil exploration and development in the Gulf and concludes that
categorically excluding exploration plans in the Gulf from environmental
review violates national and international law.
"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat
it." (1)
I. INTRODUCTION
II. HIGHSTAKES PROSPECTING IN A FRAGILE OCEAN.
A. Overexploitation
B. Pollution
1. Nutrient Loading
2. Synthetic Pollutants
3. Oil Pollution
C. Climate Change and Ocean Acidification
D. Deepwater Environments-The Last Frontier
III. THE SEARCH FOR LIQUID GOLD; HIGH STAKES
PROSPECTING IN THE GULF
A. Gulf of Mexico: The Nation's Testing Ground
B. Deepwater Horizon: Leaving a Legacy of
Environmental Harms
IV. NEPA AND OFFSHORE OIL PRODUCTION
A. Council on Environmental Quality
B. NEPA Compliance
C. NEPA's "Hard Look" Requirement
D. NEPA and Offshore Oil Drilling
E. Deepwater Horizon-MMS Review of BP Plan
1. MMS: Environmental Review for BP
Lease
2. Categorical Exclusion of BP's Exploration
Plan
V. Analysis and Recommendations
A. Categorical Exclusions for Exploration Plans
Violate NEPA and OCSLA
1. MMS: Failure to Assess the Impacts of a
Catastrophic Oil Spill
2. MMS: Failure to Assess the Impacts of
Using Dispersants in Deep Water
3. MMS: Categorical Exclusion of BP's
Exploration Plan
B. The Existing Environmental Review Process for
Deepwater Drilling in the Gulf is Inconsistent
with U.S. Ocean Policy
C. Categorically Excluding Exploration Activities
on the Outer Continental Shelf from
Environmental Review Is Inconsistent with U.S.
Obligations under International Law
VI. CONCLUSIONI. INTRODUCTION
In an instant, oil and gas fumes raced from the well to the surface
through the drill collar, exploding on contact with the semisubmersible oil rig's motors. Equipment designed to prevent such well blowouts
failed, and oil flowed freely to the surface to fuel a massive fire that
consumed the rig and caused it to collapse into the Gulf of Mexico. As
the rig fell to the sea floor, the underlying well structure broke apart
and allowed oil from the well to spew unimpeded into the ocean. Month
after month the world watched in horror as tens of thousands of gallons
of oil flowed into the Gulf's prime fishing grounds each day. Every
effort to contain the oil failed. As some workers drilled relief wells
to lower the pressure at the site of the blowout, others sprayed
dispersants onto the growing oil slick to break down the oil before it
reached the coast. Workers raced to implement measures to mitigate the
environmental impact of the oil on beaches, inlets and estuaries.
Politicians impatiently demanded accountability and financial
commitments from responsible parties. Within days of the spill, the Gulf
ecosystem revealed its fragility and vulnerability to human activity.
White sand beaches turned black, seabirds lost their ability to fly, and
marine organisms washed ashore dead--all victims of oil exposure.
Technology proved inadequate to remove most of the oil from the water
column. After millions of gallons of oil had been released into the
Gulf, workers finally found a way to cap the well and stop the flow of
oil, leaving the Gulf with a toxic legacy and an uncertain future.
The account above bears a remarkably close resemblance to the April
20, 2010 Deepwater Horizon (DWH) oil well blowout that occurred off the
coast of Louisiana, killed eleven people, and led to the largest oil
spill in U.S. history. (2) Sadly, it is not. It is actually an account
of the 1979 Ixtoc I oil well blowout in Mexico's Bay of Campeche that caused the release of approximately 147 million gallons of oil into
the Gulf of Mexico (Gulf). (3) The oil contaminated 162 miles of Gulf
shoreline, including large sections of the Texas coast. (4) The
migration of oil from Mexican to U.S. waters caused a wide variety of
damages to natural resources in the Gulf and caused economic hardship
for many people who relied on the ocean to earn a living. Within months
of the spill most of the oil that reached the U.S. coastline evaporated
or was removed from the beaches by natural wave action and re-deposited
offshore. (5) The bulk of the oil from the spill, however, remained in
the water column and continued to impact the Gulf ecosystem for decades.
(6)
Today, the Gulf oil drilling industry poses many of the same
environmental risks that were present prior to the Ixtoc spill thirty
years ago. (7) However, those risks have increased with the
industry's movement of oil exploration activities into remote, deep
ocean sites in the Gulf. (8) The deep, offshore waters of the Gulf
contain some of the largest deposits of oil in the United States, but
finding and recovering that oil safely presents unique challenges. (9)
Controlling and managing breaches at deep sea wells is considerably more
difficult than at shallow wells due to the high pressure and low
temperature of the deepwater environment, the force of the flowing oil,
and the need to rely on unmanned, remotely operated vehicles to respond
to accidents. (10) Indeed, the DWH accident resulted in the release of
more than 170 million gallons of oil into the Gulf because almost every
procedure used to stop the blowout failed. (11)
Despite the substantial risk associated with deep sea oil drilling
in the Gulf, the Mineral Management Service (MMS) has routinely elected
to categorically exclude certain offshore oil exploration and
development activities in the Gulf from environmental review otherwise
required under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA). (12) MMS
categorically excluded British Petroleum's (BP) exploration plan
covering the DWH well from environmental review without ever considering
the potential impacts from a well blowout like the one that actually
occurred.
II. HIGHSTAKES PROSPECTING IN A FRAGILE OCEAN
For centuries, humans have exploited the resources of the
world's oceans with little concern for, or understanding of, how
their collective activities caused harm. Nineteenth century Poet Lord
Byron once wrote, "[m]an marks the earth with ruin, but his control
stops with the shore." (13) His words reveal a commonly held, but
incorrect assumption that humans are incapable of causing any lasting
harm to the vast oceans. The current imperiled state of the world's
oceans and the particular sensitivity and ecological importance of the
Gulf ecosystem make imperative changes to the current environmental
review practices. Despite exhibiting remarkable resiliency to
anthropogenic insult for centuries, the world's oceans are
increasingly showing signs of vulnerability to human influences.
Research has unequivocally demonstrated that the synergistic effects of
habitat destruction, overfishing, ocean warming, increased acidification and massive nutrient runoff are fundamentally altering once complex,
vibrant marine ecosystems. (14) As marine biodiversity declines,
ecosystems with intricate marine food webs are being degraded to
primordial seas dominated by microbes, toxic algal blooms, jellyfish and
disease. (15) Absent fundamental changes in the use and management of
ocean resources, human activities may lead to a massive extinction in
the ocean. (16) The Gulf's once pristine waters and productive
ecosystems have been significantly altered as the result of
anthropogenic insults. The primary drivers of ocean degradation are
overexploitation, pollution, climate change, and ocean acidification.
A. Overexploitation
Fish provide a source of protein for almost half of the
world's population, but that resource is at risk. (17)
Technological advancements have dramatically and perhaps irreversibly
altered fishing practices by allowing humans to span the globe to find
fish in remote areas. (18) As a result, today, approximately 80% of all
major marine fish stocks are listed as either fully exploited,
overexploited, or recovering from depletion. (19)
Despite the worldwide decline in fish stocks, demand for fish in
the U.S remains high. (20) The Gulf plays a vital role in meeting that
demand, but increasing fishing activity in the Gulf poses a significant
threat to the future sustainability of the Gulf. (21) Today, four of the
top seven fishing ports in the nation are located in the Gulf. (22) The
increasing fishing effort has the potential to significantly impair
critical habitat in the Gulf that many endangered or threatened species
rely on to survive. (23) It also has global implications for highly
migratory species and other straddling fish stocks that migrate through
Gulf waters and are managed to some degree by more than one coastal
nation. (24)
B. Pollution
Despite the emergence of national and international laws that
prohibit the direct discharge of pollutants into the marine environment,
the world's oceans continue to serve as a depository for remnants
of human activity. An incalculable amount of nutrients, oil, synthetic
material, solid waste, sewage and toxic chemicals enter the sea each
year as a result of human activity. The accumulation of these
pollutants, coupled with climate-induced ocean acidification, has
altered the basic chemistry of the seas, impaired critical marine
habitats, and caused physiological changes that have reduced species
resilience to environmental variability. (25) These impacts and others
threaten to fundamentally alter the Gulf environment.
1. Nutrient Loading
Nutrient loading causes massive blooms of algae that produce and
release potent neurotoxins into the surrounding environment. (26) These
toxins alter food web-dynamics, cause illness or mortality to humans,
mammals, birds, and fish, harm commercial fisheries, and negatively
impact coastal communities. (27) Recent evidence suggests that the
problem may be getting worse. (28) The Gulf is particularly susceptible
to nutrient loading. Each spring, nutrients from the Mississippi River enter the Gulf and spark a massive algae bloom. (29) The algae utilize
oxygen in the water column for respiration and decomposition, and
quickly reduce oxygen levels to concentrations below which life cannot
survive. (30) This so called "Dead Zone" used to form every
other year. (31) Now, the bloom occurs annually and stretches along the
Gulf coast for more than 7,000 square miles between the mouth of the
Mississippi River and Texas. (32) That area cannot support most marine
life, and now resembles a primordial sea where bacteria and simple
organisms thrive. (33)
2. Synthetic Pollutants
Since the 1950's, there has been a ten-fold increase every
decade in the amount of plastics discarded into the sea. (34) The United
Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) estimates that approximately 46,000
pieces of plastic litter are floating on every square mile of the
oceans.35 Most of the plastic will eventually sink to impact benthic communities. Fishing vessels also frequently lose or purposely discard
fishing gear. (36) The gear often entangles marine species before it
sinks to cause harm to benthic communities. The Gulf, as part of the
Wider Caribbean region, faces significant threats from synthetic
pollutants. Indeed, UNEP has opined that marine litter "poses one
of the most severe threats to the sustainability of the natural
resources of sensitive habitats and wildlife and people of the Wider
Caribbean region...." (37)
3. Oil Pollution
Once introduced into the marine environment, oil respects no
political boundary. As oil migrates through the marine environment, it
may contaminate the sea water, damage estuaries, and cause a variety of
lethal and sub-lethal effects to marine organisms. (38) Exposure to oil
can result in reduced reproduction, altered development, impaired
feeding, and decreased defense to disease. (39) Developing organisms
(fish eggs and larvae), marine mammals, sea birds, intertidal and bottom
dwelling organisms are uniquely vulnerable to oil exposure. (40) As the
oil decays it sinks and interferes with marine habitats that depend on
organisms to survive, such as coral reefs, mangrove swamps and salt
marshes. (41)
C. Climate Change and Ocean Acidification
Oceans cover more than 70% of the earth's surface, and play an
integral role in human survival by absorbing, storing, and
redistributing solar energy to keep temperature within a range that
supports life. (42) Climate change threatens to fundamentally alter this
balance. As the global average ocean temperature increases, changes in
sea level are expected to alter marine habitats, interfere with animal
migratory patterns, and impair ecosystem structure and function. (43)
Climate change has already fundamentally altered the chemistry of the
ocean.
Approximately one quarter of all carbon dioxide emissions are
absorbed by the earth's oceans. (44) When absorbed, atmospheric
carbon dioxide dissolves and modifies the chemistry of sea water to make
it more acidic. (45) Ocean acidity has increased by 30% since the
industrial revolution, and in some areas the rate of change is so rapid
that water may turn corrosive by 2050.46 Left unchecked, ocean
acidification is expected to cause wide scale species disruption,
interfere with complex trophic dynamics, and cause fishing and tourism
to decline. (47) Preliminary studies have revealed increasing
acidification in some northern Gulf waters. (48)
D. Deepwater Environments-The Last Frontier
Deepwater environments are critically important to the healthy
functioning of the world's oceans. Historically, however,
environmental concern over marine resources has focused on the coastal
waters--near shore areas less than 200 meters deep--where most
commercially important marine species are found. (49) This area
comprises less than 5% of the world's oceans, and its health and
productivity depend on the remaining 95% of the deepwater ocean. (50) In
fact, a large fraction of biodiversity and biomass production in coastal
areas is directly linked to and dependent upon deep sea ecosystems. (51)
Although relatively little is known about inhabitants of deep sea
environment, those organisms studied to date show common traits of slow
growth, late maturity, slow reproduction, long life (200 years in some
cases), and low productivity. (52) These traits have important
implications for the sustainable management and use of deep-sea
resources. (53) Absent effective management strategies, deepwater
species and their associated ecosystems can quickly be depleted below
sustainable levels. (54) UNEP recommended that governments incorporate
precautionary approaches to manage deepwater environments that take into
account the full range and cumulative effects of potential human
activities and impacts, and added, "[t]he conservation and
sustainable use of the vulnerable ecosystems and biodiversity in deep
waters and high seas are among the most critical ocean issues and
environmental challenges today." (55)
As the oil industry moves its activities into deeper water to find
oil reserve, the risk of harm increases. As UNEP noted:
The increasing demand for oil continues to push drilling activities
into deeper water, and threatens to fundamentally alter the deep sea
environment in the Gulf. Given the industry's attempts to expand
the oil depletion window and sustain profits from a nonrenewable
resource, the outlook for protecting the Gulf environment under the
current status quo is not promising. The industry must make fundamental
changes to ensure that its actions do not impair the future
sustainability of renewable resources in the Gulf.
III. THE SEARCH FOR LIQUID GOLD: HIGH STAKES PROSPECTING IN THE
GULF
Despite increasing interest in renewable energy, oil is projected
to remain a primary source of energy for the nation for several decades.
(57) Today, oil accounts for approximately 40% of U.S. energy needs.
(58) In 2009, the United States extracted more than nine million barrels
of crude oil per day--third worldwide behind Russia and Saudi Arabia.
(59) Although it has less than 3 % of the world's oil resources,
the United States is the world's largest consumer of oil, using
more than 19 million barrels (798 million gallons) or 25 % of the
world's oil consumption, each day. (60)
Since 1947, the emergence of new technologies has allowed the oil
industry to extend exploration efforts into deeper waters and to produce
more oil at lower costs. (61) The Gulf region comprises one of the most
important areas in the United States for oil exploration, development
and production. (62) Today, approximately 30% of all crude oil extracted
from U.S. territories is obtained from the offshore Gulf environment and
that amount is rising. (6) 3 More than 40% of the total U.S. petroleum
refining capacity is located along the Gulf Coast. (64) Between 1981 and
2010, monthly crude oil production in the Gulf more than doubled. (65)
Further, more than half of all crude oil imported into the U.S. arrives
via the Gulf Coast. (66)
The oil industry continues to invest huge sums to locate and
retrieve remaining oil reserves. (67) As a result, the percentage of oil
produced from water depths greater than 200 meters in the Gulf has
steadily increased from 17.2% in 1992 to 76% in 2007. (68) That trend is
likely to continue. (69) Between 1992 and 2009 the number of active
leases in the Gulf increased from 5,600 to 7,310 but the number of those
leases that cover deepwater sites has increased from 27% to 58%. (70)
That increased activity poses substantial threats to the Gulf
environment. Sadly, it took the DWH spill to remind the nation of just
how risky deep sea drilling is.
B. Deepwater Horizon: Leaving a Legacy of Environmental Harms
Even prior to the DWH accident, scientists recognized that the Gulf
ecosystem was "under significant human-caused and environmental
stress." (71) The DWH accident further impaired the system in a
myriad of ways. Over the course of eighty-seven days, approximately 170
million gallons of crude oil escaped into the Gulf environment. (72)
Despite a massive clean-up effort, most of the oil released from the
well remained in the environment. (73)
Faced with an inability to stop the flow of oil, the U.S.
Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) authorized British Petroleum (BP)
to use a highly controversial chemical dispersant on the surface of the
water and at the well head. (74) By design, dispersants break oil apart
into smaller molecules that sink or evaporate over time. (75)
Approximately 1.84 million gallons of dispersants was used to treat the
spill, 771,000 of which were applied at the well-head 5,000 feet below
the surface. (76) By breaking down the oil, dispersants actually
increase the exposure of fish to hydrocarbons in crude oil. (77)
Dispersants alone can also be toxic to fish. (78)
The use of dispersants also trades coastal impacts for impacts to
the marine environment, and represents a tradeoff of harms that favors
the protection of near shore environments over deepwater environments.
(79) By spraying massive quantities of dispersants on the sea surface
and at the well head, BP ensured that a majority of the oil remained
below the surface of the water. It did this with approval from the EPA,
even though there are significant currents in the Gulf that are capable
of swiftly transporting oil and dispersants throughout the marine
environment. (80)
The impact of the DWH oil spill to the Gulf could be staggering.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) expects the
impact of oil on larval fish to result in declines in recruitment in
future age classes that impact the ability of already overfished
fisheries to rebound. (81) Bluefin tuna are particularly vulnerable to
the spill, because the Gulf serves as one of only two known nursery
grounds for the critically overfished species. (82) The tuna were
spawning in the Gulf at the time of the accident. (83) The impact from
exposure is expected to be so great that NOAA launched a study to
determine whether exposure to the oil has significantly decreased
Bluefin tuna numbers to warrant listing the species as endangered. (84)
NOAA also noted that if the oil from the DWH spill settled to the bottom
of near shore/inshore areas, most of the forty-two reef fish species
managed in the Gulf would be impacted. (85) BP's use of dispersants
ensured that a large portion of the oil broke up and settled on the
bottom. (86) One recent study revealed that a large quantity of oil
settled to the ocean floor and is "effecting the ecosystem from the
bottom up." (87) As a result, scientists have downgraded the
overall health of the Gulf system. (88)
Three commercially important crab species, blue crab, Gulf stone
crab, and stone crab, all forage along the sea floor in the near shore
environment. (89) Oil on the sea floor may contaminate the food these
crabs feed upon, and negatively impact each species. (90) The impact on
the shrimp industry could also be extensive. Several shrimp species
migrate offshore during late development and are expected to be impacted
by the spill in the future. (91)
The impact from oil exposure on cetaceans, sea birds, sea turtles
and other marine and coastal organisms varies, and may manifest in
external or internal injuries. By swimming through the oil and/or
dispersants, the external body parts of organisms, including skin and
eyes, may become covered by the toxic chemicals. (92) By eating,
swallowing or breathing in oil or dispersants, the organism may be
impacted internally. (93) The timeline between exposure and injury is
unclear, and in many cases it may be impossible to immediately determine
the extent of the damage caused to a particular species. (94) Responders
have compiled a list of animals impacted by the spill.
As of October of 2010, a total of 2,080 birds, 456 sea turtles, and
2 marine mammals have been captured alive with visible exposure to the
oil. (95) Animals found dead with visible evidence of oil exposure
include 2,263 birds, 17 sea turtles; and 4 marine mammals. (96) However,
it is the number of animals found dead with no visible exposure to oil
that is most troubling. As of October of 2010, a total of 3,827 birds,
308 sea turtles, and 91 marine mammals have been recovered dead with no
outward sign of exposure to oil. (97) These numbers reflect the number
of animals actually recovered, and likely represents only a small
fraction of the total number of organisms impacted by the spill.
There is no way to know how many other organisms were exposed to
the oil and/or dispersants, and no way to predict how such exposure will
impact different species in the future. For example, all species of sea
turtles inhabiting the Gulf are either endangered or threatened. (98)
One species, the critically endangered Kemp's Ridley, nests only in
the western Gulf of Mexico and forages offshore in the area where the
spill occurred. (99) The Brown Pelican is another Gulf species of
special concern. Listed as endangered since the early 1970's as a
result of DDT exposure, the Brown Pelican made a dramatic comeback after
DDT was banned. (100) The bird was formally removed from the list of
endangered or threatened species only five months before the DWH spill.
(101) Only time will reveal how these animal populations will respond to
the spill.
Given its resources, refining activity, and increasing vessel
traffic, the Gulf region is uniquely vulnerable to oil spills. Not
surprisingly, more oils spills have occurred in the Gulf of Mexico than
in any other area of the U.S.m2 Although the total numberof oil spills has declined over the last several decades, the risk
of offshore spills remains high. (103) Between 1981 and 2001, no oil
spill over 1,000 barrels occurred from federally regulated offshore
facilities. (104) Since 2002, there have been at least seven oil spills
over 1,000 barrels from offshore facilities in federal waters. (105)
This is problematic from an environmental perspective, but it is also
troubling because the overall decline in spills has also led to a
dangerous shortage of personnel knowledgeable in managing spill clean-up
operations, particularly large spills, (106) The decline in oil spills
has also served as disincentive to invest in response technology
sufficient to address a catastrophic oil spill like the one that
actually occurred. AS the DWH response revealed, the industry simply did
not have the technology or knowledge base to immediately regain control
of the well. Attempt after attempt failed, and in the process millions
of gallons of oil flowed into the Gulf environment. Another accident
like DWH could happen again.
Today, more than 27,000 oil wells and over
1,000 oil rigs sit abandoned in the Gulf without proper checks to
discover and control leaks. (107)
IV. NEPA AND OFFSHORE OIL PRODUCTION
Deepwater drilling is subject to environmental review under the
National Environmental Policy Act of 1969 (NEPA). However, current
regulatory practices allow agencies to categoricallyexclude certain aspects of proposed activities, such as BP's
exploration plan, from environmental review. (108) As a result, such
plans never receive the meaningful environmental review necessary to
protect the ocean environment from harm associated with the activities.
NEPA is considered the cornerstone of U.S. environmental law. (109)
Its provisions reflect a national environmental policythat requires
federal agencies to integrate environmental values into the decision
making processes before taking action.(110)
Substantively, NEPA
requires federal agencies to "use all practical means"
consistent with national policy to allow Americans to "attain the
widest range of beneficial use of the environment without degradation,
risk to health or safety, or other undesirable and unintended
consequences." (111)
Procedurally, NEPA requires federal agencies
to take a "hard look" at proposals before acting to reduce,
mitigate or eliminate harm to the environment whenever possible and to
disclose publicly the details of proposed agency projects or actions and
their likely environmental impacts. (112)
Categorical exclusions
circumvent this valuable process by denying the public the opportunity
to provide meaningful comment on certain activities that may have a
detrimental impact to the environment. Moreover, in a tiered review
process like the one used for offshore oil leases, categorical
exclusions elevate expediency over meaningful environmental review.
A. Council on Environmental Quality
To ensure that NEPA worked, Congress established, in the Executive
Office of the President, the Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ).
(113) Among its duties:
the CEQ is charged with evaluating federal
programs and activities to ensure their compliance with the national
environmental policy set forth in NEPA. (114)
The CEQ is also charged
with developing and recommending national policies that foster and
promote the improvement of environmental quality consistent with NEPA.
(115)
Because NEPA did not assure that agencies had access to
environmental expertise to properly consider the environmental effects
of a proposed action, Congress charged the EPA with reviewing an
agency's environmental impact assessment for compliance with NEPA.
(116)
The EPA is required to review proposed agency actions for
compliance with NEPA, and may refer the matter to the CEQ if the agency
does not make sufficient revisions to make the project environmentally
satisfactory. (117)
B. NEPA Compliance
Each federal agency is required to establish specific criteria that
the agency will utilize in determining the level of environmental review
that is required for a proposed action or class of actions under their
jurisdiction. (118) For major federal actions that will significantly
affect the quality of the human environment, the responsible agency is
required to provide an Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) detailing
the environmental impacts of the proposed action. (119)
To determine
whether an impact will be significant:
the agency must consider the
context of the action and the intensity of the action,
with due
consideration given for the cumulative nature of the activity,
the short
and long terms effects of the action, and
the unique or endangered
resources of the area impacted. (120)
In those instances where an agency does not know, at the time of
submitting a proposal for federal action, whether the impacts will be
significant, the agency may prepare an Environmental Assessment (EA).
(121) The EA is a concise public document that provides sufficient
evidence and analysis for determining whether the agency needs to
prepare an EIS. (122) If the agency determines that it does need to
prepare an EIS, it will issue a finding of no significant impact
(FONSI). (123)
Under NEPA, agencies have discretion to find that certain actions
or classes of actions do not individually or cumulatively have a
significant effect on the human environment. (124) Once an agency
categorically excludes an action or class of actions from the NEPA
requirements, the agency is not required to provide any environmental
analysis or documentation to support the decision for subsequent
activities. (125)
Agency officials, however, must ensure that the
procedures underwhich a categorical exclusion has been made considers
"extraordinary circumstances" in which a normally excluded
action could have significant environmental effects. (126) This
"extraordinary circumstances" restrictionhas been applied
where endangered species or other important natural resources may be
affected by the proposed action. (127)
C. NEPA's "Hard Look" Requirement
Although NEPA does not require that environmental impacts be
avoided or even minimized, it does require agencies to take a "hard
look" at proposed actions prior to proceeding to assess the
potential environmental impacts of the action. (128) Agencies are
required to consider in the EIS, inter alia, "impacts which have
catastrophic consequences even if their probability of occurrence is
low" so long as the potential impact is supported by credible
scientific evidence, is not based on pure conjecture, and is within the
rule of reason. (129) The "rule of reason" ensures that
"common sense and reason are not lost in the rubric of
regulation." (130) At a minimum, an EIS must enable the
decision-maker to consider fully the environmental factors involved and
to make a reasoned decision after balancing the risks of harm to the
environment against the benefits to be derived from the proposal. 131
Courts typically defer to the agency's decision in
implementing a categorical exclusion pursuant to its own regulations.
(132) However, in those instances where an otherwise excluded action may
have a significant environmental effect, courts have not hesitated to
invalidate an agency's decision where the facts show that the
decision to categorically exclude the activity from review was arbitrary
and capricious or otherwise unreasonable. (133)
In multi-stage projects, the environmental review process proceeds
in measured steps with multiple stages of environmental review. In
theory, as the proposed activity moves toward implementation, the level
of environmental review becomes more focused. In this type of tiered
environmental review process, the agency must determine at each stage
whether to categorically exclude activities, perform an EA, or proceed
to an EIS. (134) In a tiered review process, if the agency provides
insufficient site-specific analysis in a prior EIS to allow the agency
to rely upon the EIS in finding that the excluded activity will have no
significant impact on the human environment, the court will typically
find the exclusion invalid. (135)
D. NEPA and Offshore Oil Drilling
NEPA and the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act (OCSLA) act in a
complimentary manner to ensure that the environmental impacts from
offshore oil exploration and development are considered before land is
leased. The OCSLA established federal jurisdiction over submerged oil
and natural gas resources on the Outer Continental Shelf (OCS) and
created a procedural framework to allow for "expedited exploration
and development" of those resources to meet U.S. energy and
security demands. (136) The Act also required the Department of Interior
(DOI) to "balance orderly energy resource development with
protection of the human, marine, and coastal environments." (137)
The OCSLA requires the DOI to ensure that oil and gas are extracted from
the outer continental shelf in a manner that minimizes damage to the
local environment on the OCS. (138)
The DOI is responsible for creating a schedule of future leasing
and exploration activities on the OCS, and typically produces a
five-year program. (139) Each lease conveys certain rights for
exploration, development and production of oil and gas resources from
OCS areas under federal jurisdiction. (140) Those rights are delineated
in either an exploration plan or a development and production plan.
In 1978, Congress amended the OCSLA to exempt oil development and
production plans in the Gulf from environmental review under OCSLA.
(141) That amendment provided:
Sec. 25. Oil and Gas Development and Production.
(a)(1) Prior to development and production pursuant to an oil and
gas lease issued after the date of enactment of this section in any area
of the outer Continental Shelf, other than the Gulf of Mexico, or issued
or maintained prior to such date of enactment in any area of the outer
Continental Shelf, other than the Gulf of Mexico, with respect to which
no oil or gas has been discovered in paying quantities prior to such
date of enactment, the lessee shall submit a development and production
plan ... to the Secretary, for approval
(e)(1) At least once the Secretary shall declare the approval of a
development and production plan in any area or region ... of the outer
Continental Shelf, other than the Gulf of Mexico, to be a major Federal
action. (142)
The reason for this exemption is unclear, but it appears that
Congress made the change to "expedite exploration and development
of the Outer Continental Shelf." (143) The amendment did not
expressly exempt exploration plans, such as BP's Gulf Coast plan,
from environmental review. In fact, the amendment requires holders of
leases to submit an exploration plan for approval by the Secretary of
the Interior. (144) The Secretary may issue an exploration permit only
after the Secretary finds that "such exploration will not be unduly
harmful to aquatic life in the area, result in pollution, create
hazardous or unsafe conditions, [or] unreasonably interfere with other
uses of the area ...." (145) Thus, BP's exploration plan
should have been subject to both NEPA review and environmental review
under OCSLA.
E. Deepwater Horizon-MMS review of BP Plan
At the time of the DWH accident, MMS was the agency charged with
managing the nation's natural gas, oil and other mineral resources
on the OCS, and was responsible for assessing the environmental impacts
of proposed offshore oil exploration and development activities prior to
granting a lease. (146) MMS utilized a tiered review process that
ultimately led to its decision to categorically exclude BP's
exploration plan from environmental review. (147) Tiered review is
acceptable under NEPA, and required MMS to incorporate prior
environmental reviews into subsequent, site-specific analysis when
considering the environmental impacts of offshore exploration
activities. (148) However, tiered review presupposes that each step of
the process was conducted appropriately. An analysis of the
environmental review conducted by MMS demonstrates that MMS had no
legitimate basis to exclude BP's exploration plan from
environmental review. More importantly, this flawed review process
served as the basis for granting many active leases in the Gulf.
1. MMS: Environmental Review for BP Lease
Under its 2004 internal NEPA compliance procedures, MMS was
required to conduct an EIS before approving a five-year offshore oil and
gas lease program, approving offshore lease sales, or before approving
"offshore oil and gas development and production plan in any area
or region of the offshore, other than the central or western Gulf of
Mexico ..." (149) If MMS proposed not to prepare an EIS for any of
these actions, it was required to prepare an EA. (150) However, MMS
procedures allowed for the categorical exclusion from NEPA review of:
(10) Approval of an offshore lease or unit exploration
development/production plan ... in the central or western Gulf of
Mexico (30 C.F.R. 250.2) except those proposing facilities: (1) In
areas of high seismic risk or seismicity, relatively untested deep
water, or remote areas; or (2) within the boundary of a proposed or
established marine sanctuary, and/or within or near the boundary of
a proposed or established wildlife refuge or areas of high
biological sensitivity; or (3) in areas of hazardous natural bottom
conditions; or (4) utilizing new or unusual technology. (151)
MMS may have used this as the basis to exempt BP's exploration
plan from review. (152) In effect, it appears MMS interpreted the
language in the 1978 OCSLA amendment to permit an exemption that
Congress never authorized. Because the accident happened at the
exploration stage, BP had not yet submitted a development or production
plan. Even if MMS had the authority to issue a categorical exclusion for
exploration activities, the review process was fatally flawed from the
beginning.
MMS issued a final programmatic EIS for its Five Year Offshore Oil
and Gas Leasing Program in April of 2007. (153) The program covered
leases in three regions: the Gulf of Mexico, Atlantic, and Alaska. (154)
In the EIS, MMS disregarded the risk of a well blowout, and assumed that
any spill would be primarily short term and localized in nature. (155)
It assumed that the most likely platform-related oil spill would not
exceed 1,500 barrels per day (63,000 gallons). (156) MMS also assumed
that it would be unlikely that oil from such a small spill would migrate
into coastal water to cause significant environmental harm. (157) The
EPA found the EIS acceptable under NEPA. (158)
Environmental groups challenged the validity of the EIS, arguing
that MMS failed to take a 'hard look' at the potential harm
that could result from the proposed activities in some lease areas.
(159) The challenge, however, was not directed to the EIS as it related
to the Gulf. (160) The D.C. Circuit vacated and remanded the EIS after
finding that MMS failed to consider the environmental sensitivity of
different areas of the outer Continental Shelf to drilling activities.
(161) Upon remand, MMS removed lease sales in Alaska (North Aleutian
Basin; Beaufort Sea; and the Chukchi Sea Sales) noting that it wanted to
"appropriately balance discovery of oil and gas with potential
environmental damage." (162) However, to offset the loss associated
with the cancelled leases, MMS simply added additional lease sales to
the Gulf based on its belief that state and local governments supported
continued drilling in the Gulf. (163) In doing so, MMS violated its
mandate under NEPA by failing to consider the cumulative impact of
adding a new lease to the already overcrowded Gulf.
In April of 2007, MMS issued an EIS for multiple lease sales in the
western and central portions of the Gulf, which included land leased to
BP. (164) In that document, MMS evaluated the risks associated with oil
exploration and well blowouts. (165) Using historical spill data, MMS
predicted that if a large spill occurred it would not exceed 4,600
barrels per day, it would break down within ten days, and it would
likely not reach the coast to cause measureable harm. (166) MMS
acknowledged that more than 40% of the oil could remain in the water
column and spread through the water via natural dispersion, yet did not
consider the impact such retention might cause. (167) Moreover, MMS did
not consider what would happen to oil that remained below the surface as
a result of being treated with dispersants even though it knew that that
was an approved method of combating an oil spill. (168) Instead, it
noted that, in the event of a spill, the effects would be non-fatal
because "fish swim away from spilled oil." (169) It also noted
that because fish overproduce eggs, most of which die or get eaten by
predators, an oil spill would have "no detectable effect on the
adult populations...." (170) MMS failed to consider organisms
incapable of migrating away from the spill or the impact oil exposure
might have on fish species already in decline due to overfishing. In
short, the EIS failed to take the requisite 'hard look' at
potential impacts to the Gulf.
Despite finding that there was a 99% chance that spills larger than
10,000 barrels would occur during the 40 year lease period, (171)
MMS continued to base its environmental assessment on a spill of
4,600 barrels. (172) As a result, MMS determined that such an offshore
spill did not pose a significant risk of harm. (173) Although MMS
mentioned a blowout, it predicted that in the event of a blowout, oil
would flow for only one half of one day and the volume of oil released
would not cause significant harm. (174) MMS did not provide any further
analysis. The EPA reviewed the EIS and issued a letter to MMS, formally
noting that it had no objection to the proposed offshore activities.
(175)
In October of 2007, MMS issued an EA for lease sale 206, which
included the plot where the DWH well blew out. (176) In that document,
MMS noted that it elected not to prepare an EIS because it found no new
significant impact that had not already been addressed in the prior EIS.
(177) The EA incorporated much of the EIS, but retreated from the
earlier risk assessment in the EIS by noting that previously identified
impacts were based on scenarios that were overestimated. (178) MMS noted
that offshore spills were not expected to significantly damage any
wetland on the Gulf Coast. (179) It also noted that the biggest impact
to the offshore environment from the lease sale would be "physical
disturbance of the seafloor and minor impacts from sediment
resuspension." (180) Although MMS noted that "accidental
blowouts, oil spills, and spill-response activities" could impact
marine species in the Gulf, it did not go further to analyze what that
impact might be or whether the lessee had the ability to adequately
respond to such a blowout, (181) MMS simply noted, "blow outs are
expected to have temporary localized impacts on water quality."
(182)
Collectively, the environmental reviews conducted by MMS were
flawed. Each significantly downplayed the potential risk of harm from
the proposed activity. Instead of examining impacts which have a low
probability of occurrence, but catastrophic consequences if they do
occur, MMS elected to examine historical oil spill records to project
what might happen in the future. MMS had virtually eliminated from
consideration the possibility of significant environmental harm from the
activity. Because the review process was tiered, and subsequent reviews
were based on earlier risk assumptions, and the stage was set to exclude
BP's exploration plan from further environmental review.
2. Categorical Exclusion of BP's Exploration Plan
In its Exploration Plan (EP) for lease sale 206, BP asserted that
the chance of an oil spill occurring was unlikely. (183) Although it
noted that a blow out would likely result in the release of the
"highest volume of liquid hydrocarbons,"
BP asserted that it
was not required to discuss its oil spill response. (184)
BP added that
it was not required to provide a scenario for a potential blow out, thus
it did not discuss the blow out preventer it used on the well. (185)
BP
certified that it had ability to respond to the worst case scenario, and
added that its spill response plan was approved by MMS. (186)
However,
it defined a "worst-case" scenario as a spill of 162,000
barrels per day. (187) This is more than thirty-five times higher than
spill volume upon which MMS based its earlier risk assessments. (188)
BP did not consider any alternative to the proposed activities to
minimize environmental harm. (189)
BP did not consult any other agency
regarding the potential impacts of activity, and it noted that there
would be no mitigation measures taken to "avoid, diminish or
eliminate potential impacts on environmental resources." (190)
Despite its spill assessment, BP asserted that in the unlikely event of
a spill, the impact would be minimal and would cause only sub-lethal
effects on fish, marine mammals and birds. (191) It added that if a
blowout occurred, it would not have a significant impact on the
environment"based on the industry wide standards for using proven
equipment and technology for such responses...." (192)
BP pushed hard to get the CEQ to expand the use of categorical
exclusions for its activities, and even suggested that the prohibition
against activities that impact endangered species be loosened. (193) MMS
categorically excluded BP's exploration plan from environmental
review despite recognizing that "[t]he primary difference between
surface and subsea technologies is the restricted ability to detect and
respond to releases in the deepwater environment and the extreme
temperatures and pressures on the seafloor." (194)
As the DWH accident progressed, and the reality of a catastrophic
deepwater spill captured the world's attention, MMS continued to
issue leases for offshore exploration and drilling in the Gulf. From
April 21, 2010--one day after the blowout-through May, 7 2010, the MMS
issued twenty-seven additional drilling permits for the Gulf. (195) Two
of those permits were issued to BP and were based on the same faulty
environmental review process. (196)
On May 30, 2010, the Secretary of Interior imposed a moratorium on
deepwater drilling after finding that "under current conditions,
deepwater drilling poses an unacceptable threat of serious and
irreparable harm or damage to wildlife and the marine, coastal and human
environment...." (197) Less than five months later, without
addressing the environmental review process or the use of categorical
exclusions, the Secretary lifted the moratorium.(198) Not surprisingly,
that decision has already been challenged. (199) As that and other
lawsuits proceed through the courts, deepwater drilling continues to
pose significant risks to the Gulf environment.
V. ANALYSIS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
The current U.S. ocean policy recognizes the interconnected nature
of the global ocean environment and the responsibility to take action to
protect, maintain and restore the health and biological diversity of the
ocean system. (200) It also acknowledges obligations under international
law to prevent domestic activities from causing harm to waters beyond
U.S. jurisdiction. (201)
The practice of categorically excluding
deepwater drilling activities in the Gulf from environmental review has
significant domestic and international ramifications and should be
eliminated.
The practice violates federal law, is inconsistent with
ecosystem-based management that lies at the core of U.S. ocean policy,
and is contrary to principles of ocean governance accepted under
international law.
A. Categorical Exclusions for Exploration Plans Violate NEPA and
OCSLA
NEPA applies to oil exploration activities in deepwater
environments under U.S. jurisdiction. (202) Indeed, NEPA itself was
promulgated, in part, in response to an offshore oil well blow out.
(203) Courts have recognized that the NEPA review process for offshore
oil leasing, exploration and development/production activities is a
tiered analysis and that the level of specificity required in an
environmental review varies at each stage of the analysis. (204) As
such, courts have been willing to accept that staged consideration of
uncertain environmental factors does not violate the rule of reason
requirement under NEPA. (205) However, courts do require agencies to
conduct a detailed assessment of potential environmental impacts at some
point prior to commencing activity. (206) The current environmental
review process for offshore drilling activities ignores this mandate,
and is inconsistent with current U.S. ocean policy that requires
informed decision making for activities that impact the oceans. The BP
disaster provides a clear example of the flaws in the review process.
MMS failed to take a 'hard look' at the potential
environmental impacts of deep sea drilling by failing to consider a
catastrophic oil spill and by failing to consider the need to use
dispersants at the sea floor. Because the EISs and EA conducted by MMS
were insufficient and therefore invalid, its subsequent decision to
categorically exclude BP's exploration plan from environmental
review violated federal law and U.S. ocean policy.
1. MMS: Failure to Assess the Impacts of a Catastrophic Oil Spill
Although CEQ regulations implementing NEPA no longer require
agencies to consider worst case scenarios in an EIS, they do require
agencies to consider reasonably foreseeable significant impacts and
impacts that have a low probability of occurrence but catastrophic
consequences if they do occur so long as the potential impact is
supported by credible scientific evidence, is not based on pure
conjecture, and is within the rule of reason. (207) In its environmental
review, MMS never considered the risk of a catastrophic spill even
though the possibility of such a spill was reasonably foreseeable and
MMS knew that such a spill could result in catastrophic damage to the
Gulf environment. It did this even though the likelihood of, and impacts
from, a well blow out were neither speculative nor indefinite.
Since 1955, there have been fifty offshore well blow outs. (208)
Prior to the DWH accident, the five worst well blowouts resulted in the
release of more than 170 million gallons of oil into the marine
environment. (209) The scientific literature is replete with studies
documenting the significant short-and-long-term impacts that result from
oil released into the marine environment. Indeed, almost a decade
earlier MMS itself recognized the significant harm that would likely
result in the event of a catastrophic well blow out. In 2000, MMS
acknowledged that:
Deepwater operations have the potential to result in oil spills on
the OCS that are greatly larger than those previously analyzed....
The behavior and transport dynamics of accidental subsea release of
oil are not completely understood. After weathering and
dissipation, proportionally greater volumes of oil could remain in
the marine environment or be delivered to coastal habitats than
spill volumes that have been previously analyzed in MMS NEPA
documents. (210)
MMS also acknowledged that in the event of a well blow out, workers
may need to drill a relief well to regain control of the well and that
drilling the relief well could take several months to complete. (211)
MMS knew that drilling in the deepwater environment posed
significant and unique risks to the marine environment, and chose to
ignore what might happen if a well blew out 5,000 feet below the surface
of the water. Instead, it chose to focus on the environmental impacts
expected from a 4,600 barrel spill, even though it acknowledged that
there was a 99% chance that multiple spills exceeding 10,000 barrels
would occur in the lease area.
MMS's actions are particular egregious in view of the fact
that BP managers estimated that a well blowout would result in the
release of 162,000 barrels per day. MMS's decision to ignore the
very real potential for a release in such a high risk area was
unreasonable and rendered the environmental review invalid.
Worse perhaps is the fact that the same ill-informed environmental
review process served as the basis for granting many other active leases
in the Gulf.
2. MMS: Failure to Assess the Impacts of Using Dispersants in Deep
Water
Prior to the DWH accident, dispersants had never been used near the
sea floor. (212) The government knew that use of dispersants on the
surface of the water caused environmental harm, and admitted that it had
no idea what harm might occur through the use of dispersants at a
well-head located 5,000 feet below the sea. (213) It did, however,
recognize that deep sea dispersant use, "increases the extent of
biological impacts to deep water pelagic" environments that may
cause "changes in the diversity, structure and function of the
microbial community, leading to changes in trophic level dynamics and
changes to key biogeochemical cycles." (214) The EPA Administrator
acknowledged that the use of dispersants was "unprecedented"
and that "the effects of underwater dispersant use on the
environment are still widely unknown," but still decided to allow
BP to use the dispersant. (215) The EPA took that action despite
evidence of toxicity because that dispersant was listed on the National
Contingency Plan schedule of devices and substances that may be used to
remove or control oil discharges. (216) The EPA noted that "when
mixed with oil, [the dispersant] is generally no more or less toxic than
mixtures with the other available alternatives." (217) In effect,
the EPA authorized BP to clean up the toxic oil by breaking the oil
apart with another toxic chemical. It did so despite having no
understanding of how such use would impact deepwater ecosystems. Given
the increased level of activity at deep sea sites, and the fact that
chemical dispersants are an approved method of responding to oil spills,
MMS should have assessed the potential use of dispersants at the well
head. BP's own estimate of the flow volume shows that it was well
aware of how much oil might escape from the well in the event of a blow
out, and it must have known that it would not be capable of responding
to the spill without the use of dispersants at the well-head. Had MMS
considered this, that decision may have prompted the EPA to conduct
appropriate tests on dispersants to determine the risk posed by the
subsea use of dispersants. Instead, BP was caught unprepared and the EPA
was forced to use the Gulf as a testing ground for the deep sea use of a
toxic substance. MMS was required to take additional action before
allowing BP to commence exploration activities, and its failure to do so
violated NEPA. (218)
3. MMS: Categorical Exclusion of BP's Exploration Plan
MMS's decision to categorically exclude BP's exploration
plan from environmental review was based on its own internal
regulations, which are based, in part, on a 1978 amendment to the OCSLA.
(219) Congress amended the OCSLA to create new polices that would result
in, "expedited exploration and development" of the outer
continental shelf. (220) Congress did not authorize an exemption for
exploration plans covering activities in the Gulf. Indeed, Congress
expressly required review and approval of exploration plans in the Gulf.
(221) Yet, MMS interpreted the language of the amendment broadly to
exempt all exploration and development/production plans in the Gulf from
environmental review. (222)
MMS's interpretation of OCSLA improperly suggests that
provisions in OCSLA take precedence over competing provisions in
NEPA--they do not. The Acts are complementary. OCSLA, through MMS,
requires a lessee to obtain approval of an exploration plan via
permitting before starting to drill, and that plan must include a
project-specific environmental impact analysis that assesses the
potential effects of the exploration activities. (223) MMS then Conducts
an environmental review pursuant to NEPA. (224) Without Congressional
authorization, MMS avoided this review process by exempting exploration
plans for activities in the Gulf, and therefore violated both OCSLA and
NEPA.
Even if MMS had the authority to issue a categorical exclusion
under OCSLA, under NEPA it had no basis to issue the exclusion for the
BP Exploration Plan. Agencies are allowed to issue a categorical
exclusion only for those activities that do not individually or
cumulatively have a significant effect on the human environment. (225)
Agencies must consider "extraordinary circumstances" in which
a normally excluded action could have significant environmental effects.
(226)
MMS never considered the possibility of a catastrophic spill or
even a large spill, so it had no way of determining how a well blow out
at 5,000 feet below the sea surface would impact the marine environment.
MMS also failed to consider the environmental impact of using
dispersants at the well-head. MMS did not have sufficient information to
adequately assess whether the exploration activities could have an
individual or cumulatively significant effect on the human environment
required to issue the categorical exclusion. Moreover, it failed to
consider the extraordinary circumstances--pollution, overfishing,
increasing ocean acidification--that already imperil the Gulf
environment or impact leasing more land for exploration and development
may have to that environment.
In Alaska Wilderness League v. Kempthorne, environmental groups
challenged MMS's approval of an exploration plan to drill multiple
offshore exploratory wells in the Alaskan Beaufort Sea over a three year
period. (227) Petitioners argued that MMS violated NEPA and OCSLA by
approving the plan without taking a 'hard look' at the impacts
the exploration activities would have on marine mammals in the program
area. (228) MMS approved the plan without conducting an EIS, despite
evidence of potential impacts. (229) The Ninth Circuit vacated MMS'
approval of the plan and ordered MMS to take a hard look at the
potential impacts. (230) The opinion was later vacated and the issue
declared moot when MMS rescinded its approval of the exploration plan.
(231) Here, had MMS subjected BP's exploration plan to
environmental review, it may have determined that it was inadequate
because it did not adequately address the potential impacts to marine
resources from a well-blow out or the sub-sea use of dispersants.
At a minimum, MMS should have conducted an EA for the exploration
plan because MMS admitted that it lacked critical knowledge on how the
proposed activity would impact deep sea communities. Had MMS examined
BP's exploration plan, MMS would have been required to evaluate the
impact from a well blow out and the propriety of using a blow out
preventer that fell below the state of the art in the industry. (232)
As a result of its "hands-off" approach to regulation and
indifference to its substantive mission, MMS has been reorganized. (233)
With that change comes the opportunity to properly balance the need to
protect impaired marine systems with the need to extract oil to meet the
nation's energy needs. Given the declining health of the Gulf, the
practice of categorically excluding exploration and
development/production plans from environmental review must end.
B. The Existing Environmental Review Process for Deepwater Drilling
in the Gulf is Inconsistent with U.S. Ocean Policy.
The new U.S. ocean policy requires agencies to use an
ecosystem-based approach to manage ocean resources. This represents a
paradigm shift away from traditional sector or single-species based
management that often led to fragmented and inconsistent protection of
the marine environment.
After the DWH accident, President Obama signed an Executive Order
(EO) establishing a new national policy for the Stewardship of the
Ocean, Coasts, and Great Lakes. (234) The EO announced the current
stewardship policy of the United States to:
Protect, maintain, and restore the health and biological diversity
of ocean ... ecosystems and resources; [i]mprove the resiliency of
ocean ... communities and economies, [u]se the best available
science and knowledge to inform decisions affecting the ocean ...
and to] [s]upport sustainable, safe, secure, and productive access
to, and uses of the ocean ... (235)
The new policy requires agencies to consider the marine ecosystems
as part of the "global interconnected systems of air, land, ice,
and water" and "their relationships to humans and their
activities." (236) The new policy addresses current and future uses
of the oceans and requires agencies to work collaboratively by employing
ecosystem-based and adaptive management principles in all decisions that
impact the ocean and its resources. (237) Ecosystem-based management
"integrate[s] ecological, social, economic, commerce, health, and
security goals, and recognize[s] humans as key components of the
ecosystem and healthy ecosystems as essential to human well-being."
(238) Adaptive management requires "routine reassessment of
management actions to allow for better informed and improved future
decisions." (239) It allows resource managers to incorporate new
information into the decision making process to ensure decisions at each
stage incorporate the latest knowledge and consider changing conditions
that may impact the decision making process. (240) Although the new
policy seeks to balance multiple uses of the marine environment, the
primary goal of the new policy is to improve the overall health of the
marine environment. (241)
The EO directs all federal agencies to implement the new policy as
delineated in the final recommendations of the Interagency Ocean Policy
Task Force. (242) In implementing the new policy, every agency decision
and action affecting the ocean must be guided by the stewardship
principles and national priority objectives to the fullest extent
consistent with applicable law. (243) For example, in addition to
considering direct impacts of a proposed action, agencies must also
consider indirect impacts--those "caused by the action and are
later in time or farther removed in distance, but are still reasonably
foreseeable." (244) These include "effects on natural
resources and on the components, structures, and functioning of affected
ecosystems." (245)
The federal environmental review process for deepwater drilling
remains inconsistent with this new ocean policy. When MMS was
reorganized into the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management Regulations and
Enforcement (BOEMRE), the new agency retained many of MMS's flawed
practices. In 2001, MMS created a grid system that separated the Gulf
into multiple areas based on biological similarity. (246) It then
prepared programmatic environmental assessments (Grid EA) to address the
impacts of proposed development projects in each grid. (247) The grid
system is specifically intended to serve as a foundational reference
document in the tiered NEPA review process, and to reduce the need for
further analysis because subsequent documents can build on the original
Grid EA. (248) In fact, all subsequent EAs are only required to focus on
issues and impacts of the specific project that are substantially
different from those analyzed in the Grid EA. (249)
Although each Grid EA considers a wide range of environmental and
socioeconomic impacts that may harm a particular grid, the system is
inconsistent with U.S. ocean policy. By design, the grid system fails to
address the interconnectedness of the Gulf system. The grid system
evaluates the Gulf as multiple, distinct ecosystems. It fails to address
the migration of marine species and the impact such migration has on
different grids. It also fails to address the impact of surface and deep
sea currents that can cause the movement of larval species and
pollutants from one grid to another.
Using a programmatic EA as the basis for future grid-specific EAs
expedites the environmental review process, but it also raises a strong
possibility that important environmental considerations that impact the
entire Gulf ecosystem will be missed. The grid system ensures that
environmental reviews are conducted in the same fragmented manner that
created the need for a fundamental revision to ocean policy. Indeed, MMS
continued to use the grid system even after acknowledging that it knew
little about deep sea environments or how species are distributed within
the Gulf. (250) BOEMRE continues to base environmental assessments on
site-specific inquiries. BOEMRE must reconfigure its existing grid
system to allow for the comprehensive evaluation of all potential
impacts to the Gulf system.
C. Categorically Excluding Exploration Activities on the Outer
Continental Shelf from Environmental Review is Inconsistent with U.S.
Obligations under International Law
Oceans cover 140 million square miles, roughly 72% of earth's
surface and play a vital role in the development and security of coastal
states. (251) Recognizing the need to preserve ocean resources while
maintaining national security, members of the United Nations developed a
comprehensive set of rules to govern ocean activities and procedures to
resolve competing and overlapping ocean uses. That work culminated in
the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), which
has since served as a de facto international constitution governing
ocean-related activities to ensure the conservation of marine resources
for future generations. (252) Through its provisions, UNCLOS acts to
protect the economic, environmental, and national security interests of
member states use of the ocean and provides a mechanism for the
cooperative resolution of conflicts.
Under UNCLOS, states are obligated to protect and preserve the
marine environment. (253) Although states have a sovereign right to
exploit their natural resources, they may only do so in accordance with
their obligation to protect and preserve the environment. (254) States
must take "all measures ... necessary to prevent, reduce and
control pollution of the marine environment from any source ... and must
employ the "best practicable means at their disposal and in
accordance with their capabilities" to prevent such pollution.
(255) States also have an affirmative obligation "to ensure that
activities under their jurisdiction or control are so conducted as not
to cause damage by pollution to other States and their
environment." (256) Further, coastal states have an affirmative
obligation to enact and enforce domestic laws when dealing with
pollution from sea bed activities consistent with the certain
environmental provisions of UNCLOS. (257) Collectively, these provisions
reveal an international consensus that coastal states have positive
duties and responsibilities to take action to protect and preserve the
marine environment. The obligation of states to control marine pollution
extends to all potential pollution sources, including offshore drilling
operations. (258)
Although the United States has not ratified UNCLOS, it has
acknowledged that most of the Convention's provisions reflect
binding, customary law and apply to U.S. activities. (259) In his EO
announcing the new U.S. ocean policy, President Obama reiterated the
need to ratify UNCLOS to allow the United States to exercise a more
integral role in the preservation and restoration of the world's
oceans. (260)
The accidental release of oil associated with offshore exploration
and development activities in the Gulf presents a constant threat to the
natural resources of nations in the wider Caribbean basin. In
recognition of this constant threat, the United States is also a bound
by two regional agreements to protect the Gulf environment from oil
pollution. Following the Ixtoc I accident, the U.S. signed an agreement
with Mexico that requires both nations to take steps to prevent harm to
the marine environment from oil spills. (261) The United States, along
with twenty-three coastal states on the Caribbean Sea and Gulf of
Mexico, also ratified the Convention for the Protection and Development
of the Marine Environment of the Wider Caribbean Region (Cartagena
Convention). (262) That Convention requires parties to:
[T]ake all appropriate measures in conformity with international
law ... to prevent, reduce and control pollution of the Convention
area and to ensure sound environmental management, using for this
purpose the best practicable means at their disposal and in
accordance with their capabilities. [Art. 4(1)];
[T]ake all appropriate measures to prevent, reduce and control
pollution of the Convention area resulting directly or indirectly
from exploration and exploitation of the sea-bed and its subsoil.
[Art. 8]; and
[A]ssess within its capabilities ... the potential effects of such
projects on the marine environment, particularly in coastal areas,
so that appropriate measures may be taken to prevent any
substantial pollution of, or significant and harmful changes to,
the Convention area. [Art. 12(2)]. (263)
The Oil Spill Protocol to the Cartagena Convention further requires
contracting parties to cooperate in protecting the marine and coastal
environment of the wider Caribbean basin and to ensure they have the
means of responding to oil spill incidents under their jurisdiction.
(264)
Although the U.S. retains a sovereign right to exploit its natural
resources, it must do so in a manner that does not cause harm to
neighboring states. That almost happened during the DWH accident, and
could happen in the future if greater safeguards are not taken. (265) By
failing to conduct adequate environmental reviews and by exempting
critical exploration activities from environmental review, MMS violated
its obligations under UNCLOS and regional agreements. Given the
increasing industry activity in the Gulf, and the movement of that
activity into the outer Gulf, the risk of harm posed to other countries
from U.S. oil exploration and development activities remains high. The
United States must take appropriate steps in recognition of its
obligations under international law to ensure that activities occurring
under its jurisdiction do not cause harm to neighboring countries.
VI. CONCLUSION
Someone once remarked, "[i]f the sea floor was writ in Braille
the bumps on the bottom of the Gulf of Mexico would spell, 'Gardens
of Eden.'" (266) Today, that Garden is imperiled by increasing
anthropogenic pollution, overfishing and ocean acidification. Unfettered
offshore oil exploration and development activity in the Gulf increases
that stress, and poses substantial risks to the future sustainability of
the Gulf ecosystem. Increasing demand for oil coupled with dwindling
supplies has forced the industry to venture into deeper and deeper water
to find remaining reserves. To properly balance the dual goals of
meeting U.S. energy demands and protecting the environment, the
environmental review process for offshore exploration and development
activities must be reevaluated. This process should begin by eliminating
categorical exclusions and subjecting all aspects of the proposed
activity to stringent environmental review.
Index
(1.) George Santayana, Reason in Common Sense, in THE LIFE OF
REASON 34, 284 (1905).
(2.) NAT'L COMM'N ON THE BP DEEPWATER HORIZON OIL SPILL
AND OFFSHORE DRILLING, REPORT 'TO THE PRESIDENT, DEEP WATER: THE
GULF OIL DISASTER AND THE FUTURE OF OFFSHORE DRILLING vi--vii (2011),
available at http://www.gpoaccess.gov/deepwater/deepwater.pdf.
(3.) Id. at 6; see also Office of Response and Restoration,
Nat'l Oceanic & Atmospheric Admin., USCG Case History: Bahia De
Campeche, Mexico, INCIDENT NEWS, June 3, 1979,
http://www.incidentnews.gov/entry/508786; BUREAU OF LAND MGMT., ACCESS
NO. 29103, IXTOC OIL SPILL DAMAGE ASSESSMENT STUDY 1-3 (1982)
[hereinafter [XTOC I ASSESSMENT], available at
http://www.gomr.boemre.gov/PI/PDFImages/ESPIS/3/3973.pdf.
(4.) See IXTOC I ASSESSMENT, supra note 3 (noting that an unknown
oil dispersed in the waters of the northwest Gulf of Mexico over the
biologically productive continental shelf); see also BUREAU OF LAND
MGMT., IXTOC OIL SPILL ASSESSMENT FINAL REPORT EXECUTIVE SUMMARY 1
(1982) [hereinafter IXTOC I FINAL REPORT], available at
http://invertebrates.si.edu/mms/reports/IXTOC_exec.pdf (noting that 1-3
million gallons of oil from the Ixtoc I oil spill impacted U.S.
beaches).
(5.) IXTOC I FINAL REPORT, supra note 4, at 1.
(6.) See id. at 1, 3, 27.
(7.) See generally id.
(8.) In 2008, of 7,310 active oil leases in the Gulf, approximately
58% covered deepwater water sites (= 1,000 ft.). Approximately 27% of
the leases covered ultra-deepwater sites (= 5,000 ft.). LESLEY D. NIXON
ET AL., MINERAL MGMT. SERV,, MS 2009-016, DEEPWATER GULF OF MEXICO 2009:
INTERIM REPORT OF 2008 HIGHLIGHTS 10 (2009), available at
http://www.gomr.boemre.gov/PDFs/2009/2009-016.pdf.
(9.) See id. at 13, 31, 50, 58.
(10.) V.C. Kelessidis, Challenges for Very Deep Oil and Gas
Drilling-Will There Ever Be a Depth Limit?, in 3RD AMIREG INTERNATIONAL
CONFERENCE: ASSESSING THE FOOTPRINT OF RESOURCE UTILIZATION AND
HAZARDOUS WASTE MANAOEMENT 222 (2009), available at
http://drillinglab.mred.tuc.gr/Publications/56.pdf.
(11.) CHUCK HOPKINSON, GEORGIA SEA GRANT, OUTCOME/GUIDANCE FROM
GEORGIA SEA GRANT PROGRAM" CURRENT STATUS OF BP OIL SPILL 1--5
(2010), available at
http://uga.edu/aboutUGA/joye_pkit/GeorgiaSeaGrant_OilSpillReport8-16.pdf.
(12.) On May 19, 2010, the Secretary of the Department of Interior
reorganized the Minerals Management Service and renamed it the Bureau of
Ocean Energy Management, Regulation and Enforcement. DEP'T OF THE
INTERIOR, ORDER No. 3299, ESTABLISHMENT OF THE BUREAU OF OCEAN ENERGY
MANAGEMENT, THE BUREAU OF SAFETY AND ENVIRONMENTAL ENFORCEMENT, AND THE
OFFICE OF NATURAL RESOURCES REVENUE (May 19, 2010) [hereinafter INTERIOR
ORDER], available at
http://www.boemre.govlooclpdfs/DOI_pressrelease/SecretaryOrder3299.pdf.
(13.) LORD BYRON, CHILDE HAROLD'S PILGRIMAGE 125 (2009)
(1812-18).
(14.) See, e.g., Jeremy B. C. Jackson, Ecological Extinction and
Evolution in the Brave New Ocean, 105 PROC. OF THE NAT'L ACAD. OF
SCI. 1148, 1148 (2008).
(15.) Id.
(16.) Id.
(17.) FOOD & AGRIC. ORG. OF THE U.N., STATE OF WORLD'S
FISHERIES AND AQUACULTURE 2008 3 (2009) [hereinafter FAD WORLD
FISHERIES], available at
ftp://ftp.fao.org/docrep/fao/011/i0250e/iO250e.pdf (noting that fish
provide approximately 2.9 billion people with at least 15% of their
animal protein intake).
(18.) Kenneth R. Weiss, ALTERED OCEANS: A Primeval Tide of Toxins
(pt. 1), L.A. TIMES, July 30, 2006,
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-ocean30jul30,0,7764272.story
[hereinafter Altered Oceans I].
(19.) FAD WORLD FISHERIES, supra note 17, at 34.
(20.) In 2009, the average American ate 15.8 pounds of fish and
shellfish, ranking the U.S. third behind China and Japan as the
world's largest consumers. See U.S. Seafood Consumption Declines
Slightly in 2009, NAT'I Oceanic & Atmospheric Admin. (Sept. 9,
2010), http://www.noaanews.noaa.gov/stories2010/20100909_consumption.html [hereinafter NOAA Seafood].
(21.) In 2008, fishermen harvested approximately 1.27 billion
pounds of finfish and shellfish from the Gulf and earned approximately
$659 million. Recreational fishermen took twenty-four million trips in
the Gulf in 2008. See Fish Stocks in the Gulf of Mexico, Fact Sheet,
NAT'L OCEANIC & ATMOSPHERIC ADMIN. (Apr. 2010),
http://sero.nmfs.noaa.gov/sf/deepwater_horizon/Fish_economics_FACT_SHEET.pdf [hereinafter NOAA Stocks].
(22.) General Facts about the Gulf of Mexico, U.S. ENVTL. PROT.
AGENCY: GULF OF MEXICO PROGRAM,
http://www.epa.gov/gmpo/about/facts.html#resources (last updated May 17,
2010).
(23.) See generally U.S. DEP'T OF INTERIOR, MINERALS MGMT.
SERV., MMS 2004054, GEOLOGICAL AND GEOPHYSICAL EXPLORATION FOR MINERAL
RESOURCES ON THE GULF OF MEXICO OUTER CONTINENTAL SHELF: FINAL
PROGRAMMATIC ENVIRONMENTAL ASSESSMENT (2004), available at
http://www.gomr.boemre.gov/PDFs/2004/2004-054.pdf.
(24.) Straddling Stocks, FOOD AND AGRIC. ORG. OF THE U.N.:
FISHERIES & AQUACULTURE DEP'T,
http://www.fao.org/fishery/topic/14769/en (last visited Jan. 24, 2011).
(25.) See, e.g., Scott C. Doney, The Growing Human Footprint on
Coastal and Open-Ocean Biogeochemistry, 328 Sci. 1512, 1512-16 (2010).
(26.) Altered Oceans I, supra note 18.
(27.) For example, more than 14,000 seals, sea lions, and dolphins
that were either sick or dead have washed ashore on California's
coast in the last decade alone. An additional 650 gray whales have
washed up along the west coast over that period. In
2004, 800 adult harbor seals with no apparent injuries washed up
dead on the Maine Coastline. In Florida, hundreds of dead manatees have
washed ashore with no apparent injuries. See Kenneth R. Weiss, Altered
Oceans: Sentinels under Attack (pt. 2), L.A. TIMES, July 31, 2006,
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-meocean31jul31,0,223033.story
[hereinafter Altered Oceans II]; see also Leanne J. et al.,
Brevetoxicosis: Red Tides and Marine Mammal Mortalities, NATURE, June 9,
2005, at 755-56 (attributing sickness and death in marine organisms to
exposure to toxins released from algae blooms brought about by excess
nutrient loading in the sea).
(28.) Kenneth R. Weiss, Altered Oceans: Dark Tides, Ill Winds (pt.
3), L.A. TIMES, Aug. 1, 2006,
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-oceanlaug01,0,60488 24.story
[hereinafter Altered Oceans III]. On Florida's Gulf Coast,
residents complain that harmful algae blooms have become bigger, more
frequent and longer-lasting. Toxins from these red tides have killed
hundreds of sea mammals and caused emergency rooms to fill up with
coastal residents suffering respiratory distress noting. One study that
examined water samples dating to 1954 and found that toxic algae
outbreaks off Florida's Gulf Coast are getting stronger, lasting
longer and spreading farther. Id.; see also Altered Oceans I, supra note
18.
(29.) Elizabeth Carlisle, The Gulf of Mexico Dead Zone and Red
Tides, LA. ENV'T,
http://www.tulane.edu/~bfleury/envirobio/enviroweb/DeadZone.htm (last
updated Jan. 5, 2000).
(30.) Id.
(31.) Id.
(32.) Id.
(33.) Id.
(34.) Kenneth R. Weiss, Altered Oceans: Plague of Plastic Chokes
the Seas (pt. 4), L.A. TIMES, Aug. 2, 2006,
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-ocean2aug02,0,6507578.story
[hereinafter Altered Oceans IV].
(35.) Id.
(36.) GRAME MACFADYEN ET AL., U.N. ENV'T PROGRAMME, ABANDONED,
LOST OR OTHERWISE DISCARDED FISHING GEAR 47-48 (2009), available at
http://www.unep.org/regionalseas/marinelitter/publications/docs/
Marine_Litter_Abandoned_Lost_Fishing_Gear.pdf.
(37.) LJUBOMIR JEFTIC ET AL., U.N. ENV'T PROGRAMME, MARINE
LITTER, A GLOBAL CHALLENGE 176 (2009), available at
http://www.unep.org/regionalseas/marinelitter/publications/docs/
Marine_Litter_A_Global_Challenge.pdf.
(38.) JONATHON L. RAMSEUR, CONG. RESEARCH SERV., RL 33705, OIL
SPILLS IN U.S. COASTAL WATERS: BACKGROUND, GOVERNANCE, AND ISSUES FOR
CONGRESS 4 (2010), available at
http://fpc.state.gov/documents/organization/142741.pdf.
(39.) Id.
(40.) Id.
(41.) Id.
(42.) How Much Water is There on, in, and above the Earth?, USGS:
SCIENCE FOR A CHANGING WORLD, WATER SCIENCE FOR SCHOOLS,
http://ga.water.usgs.gov/edu/earthhowmuch.html (last modified Dec. 14,
2010); see also Oceanic Heat Budget, OCEAN WORLD,
http://oceanworld.tamu.edu/educators/heat_budget/background/
sys_struc/HB_sys_concepts.htm (last visited Mar. 14, 2011) (noting that
oceans effectively capture a major portion of the sun's radiated
energy and transfer much of it to the atmosphere).
(43.) INTERGOVERNMENTAL PANEL ON CLIMATE CHANGE, CLIMATE CHANGE
2007: SYNTHESIS REPORT (2007), available at
http://www.ipcc.ch/publications_and_data/ar4/syr/en/mainsl.html#11-1.
(44.) Christopher L. Sabine et al., The Oceanic Sink for
Anthropogenic C02, 305 SCI. 367, 367-71 (2004) (reporting that since the
industrial revolution, the ocean has absorbed roughly one-quarter of the
carbon dioxide produced by burning fuels).
(45.) Id.
(46.) Ken Caldeira & Michael E. Wickett, Anthropogenic Carbon
and Ocean pH, 425 NATURE 365,365 (2003), see also Richard A. Feely et
al., Evidence for Upwelling of Corrosive "Acidified" Water
onto the Continental Shelf, 320 Scl. 1490, 1490-92 (2008) (noting that
water showing up off the coast of northern California was acidic enough
to dissolve seashells); James C. Orr et al., Anthropogenic Ocean
Acidification over the Twenty-First Century and Its Impact on Calcifying Organisms, 437 NATURE 681, 681--86 (2005).
(47.) KRISTINA M. GJERDE, U.N. ENV'T PROGRAMME, UNEP REGIONAL
SEAS REPORT AND STUDIES No. 178, ECOSYSTEMS AND BIODIVERSITY IN DEEP
WATERS AND HIGH SEAS (2006) [hereinafter UNEP ECOSYSTEMS], available at
http:// www.unep.org/pdf/EcosystemBiodiversity_DeepWaters_20060616.pdf:
see also Elizabeth M. Griffith et al., A Dynamic Marine Calcium Cycle
during the Past 28 Mil6on Years, 322 SCI. 1671, 1671-74 (2008). As one
author notes, "[c]oral reefs will go the way of the dodo unless we
quickly cut carbon-dioxide emissions."
(48.) W. Cai et al., Enhanced Ocean Acidification in the Northern
Gulf of Mexico Hypoxic Bottom Waters 1 (Am. Geophysical Union, Abstract
No. OS22A-07, 2010), available at
http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2010AGUFMOS22A.07C (reporting increased
ocean acidification in northern Gulf waters that could eventually make
the waters unfit for carbonate shell bearing organisms).
(49.) See, e.g., Coastal Watershed Factsheets-Nearshore Waters and
Your Coastal Watershed, U.S. ENVTL. PROT. AGENCY,
http://water.epa.gov/type/oceb/fact3.cfm (last updated Jan. 22, 2010)
(noting that nearshore waters provide habitat for 80% of the fish
species in the United States).
(50.) SYBILLE VAN DEN HOVE & VINCENT MOREAU, U.N. ENVT'L
PROGRAMME, DEEP-SEA BIODIVERSITY AND ECOSYSTEMS" A SCOPING REPORT
ON THEIR SOCIOECONOMY, MANAGEMENT AND GOVERNANCE 3 (2007) [hereinafter
UNEP BI()DIVERSITY], available at
http://www.unep.org/regionalseas/publications/reports/
RSRS/pdfs/rsrs184.pdf.
(51.) Id. at 26. These ecosystems are important contributors to
ocean primary production, nutrient cycling, gas and climate regulation,
waste absorption and detoxification, biological control of invasive
species, and other processes important to humans. Id. at 26-27.
(52.) Id. at 34. These traits explain why deepwater demersal trawling is so devastating to deepwater communities. Id.
(53.) Id. at 34.
(54.) UNEP ECOSYSTEMS, supra note 47, at 7.
(55.) Id.
As human activities, such as fishing and oil, gas and mineral
exploration and exploitation, move into deeper waters both within and
beyond national jurisdiction, the relative lack of data on deep seabed
ecosystems and biodiversity makes it difficult to predict and control
their impacts. (56)
(56.) Id.
(57.) U.S. ENERGY INFO. ADMIN., DOE/EIA-0383, ANNUAL ENERGY OUTLOOK
2010 WITH PROJECTIONS TO 2035 2--3 (2010), available at
http://www.eia.doe.gov/oiaf/archive/aeol0/pdf/0383(2010).pdf.
(62.) Gulf of Mexico Fact Sheet, U.S. ENERGY INFO. ADMIN.: INDEP.
STAT. & ANALYSIS,
http://www.eia.gov/special/Gulf_of_mexico/index.cfm (last updated Dec.
30, 2010).
(63.) Id.
(64.) Id.
(65.) See, e.g., Monthly Federal Offshore--Gulf of Mexico Field
Production of Crude Oil, U.S. ENERGY INFO. ADMIN.: INDEP. STAT. &
ANALYSIS, http://www.eia.doe.gov/dnav/pet/hist/LeafHandler.ashx?n=pet&s=mcrfp3fml&f=m (last updated Dec. 30, 2010)
(66.) See, e.g., Imports by Area of Entry, U.S. ENERGY INFO.
ADMIN.: INDEP. STAT. & ANALYSIS,
http://tonto.eia.doe.gov/dnav/pet/pet_move_imp_a_EP00_IM0_mbbl_m.htm
(last updated Dec. 30, 2010).
(67.) See B.P. Discovers Vast Oil Reserve in Gulf of Mexico,
ASSOCIATED PRESS, Sept. 6, 2009,
http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2009/09/03/bp-discovers-vast-oil-reserve-gulf-
mexico/ (reporting that a production platform costs more than $1
billion to build. Drilling a deep-water well can add another $100
million, and if crude is located, it could cost another $50 million to
bring the oil to the surface).
(68.) See, e.g., Annual Gulf of Mexico Federal Offshore Percentage
of Crude Oil Production from Greater than 200 Meters Deep, U.S. ENERGY
INFO. ADMIN.: INDEP. STAT. & ANALYSIS,
http://tonto-eia.doe-gov/dnav/pet/hist/LeafHandler-ashx?n=
PET&s=RCRR73R3FM_4&f=A (last updated Dec. 30, 2010).
(69.) Id.
(70.) NIXON, supra note 8, at 10.
(71.) KIM B. RITCHE & BRIAN D. KELLER, NAT'L OCEANIC &
ATMOSPHERIC ADMIN., NMSP-08-04, A SCIENTIFIC FORUM ON THE GULF OF
MEXICO: THE ISLANDS IN THE STREAM CONCEPT, MARINE SANCTUARIES
CONSERVATION SERIES 8 (2008), available at
http://sanctuaries.noaa.gov/science/conservation/pdfs/gom.pdf.
(72.) Campbell Robertson & Clifford Kraus, Gulf Spill Is the
Largest of Its Kind, Scientists Say, N.Y. TIMES, Aug. 3, 2010,
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/03/us/03spill.html; Maureen Hoch. New
Estimate Puts Gulf Oil Leak at 205 Million Gallons, PBS NEWSHOUR, Aug.
2, 2010, http://www.pbs.org/newshour/rundown/2010/08/
new-estimate-puts-oil-leak-at-49-million-barrels.html# (noting that of
the 4.9 million barrels of oil released from the oil well during the
eighty-seven day release, 800,000 barrels were captured by containment
devices).
(73.) HOPKINSON, supra note 11 (stating that independent scientific
evaluations of the data released by the National Incident Command on
Aug. 2, 2010 revealed that as much as 90% of the oil remains either at
or below the surface of the Gulf).
(74.) Dispersants are blends of surfactants and solvents designed
to prevent oil slicks by breaking up the oil. See Rebecca Rennet, US Oil
Spill Testing Ground for Dispersants, CHEMISTRY WORLD, June 2010,
available at http://www.rsc.org/chemistryworld/Issues/2010/June/
USOilSpillTestingGroundForDispersants.asp.
(75.) INT'L TANKER OWNERS POLLUTION FED'N LTD. (ITOPF),
THE USE OF CHEMICAL D1SPERSANTS TO TREAT OIL SPILLS 1-2 (2005),
available at http://www.itopf.com/_assets/documents/tip4.pdf.
(76.) Operations and Ongoing Response July 22, 2010,
RESTORETHEGULF.GOV (July 22, 2010, 5:01 AM),
http://www.restoretheGulf.gov/release/2010/07/22/operations-and-ongoing-
response-july-22-2010.
(77.) Shahunthala D. Ramachandran et al., Oil Dispersant Increases
PAH Uptake by Fish Exposed to Crude Oil, 59 ECOTOXICOLOGY & ENVTL.
SAFETY 300, 300 (2004).
(78.) Anita George-Aires & James R. Clark, Acute Aquatic
Toxicity of Two Corexit Dispersants, 40 CHEMOSPHERE 897, 901 (2000).
(79.) COASTAL RESPONSE RESEARCH CTR., DEEPWATER HORIZON DISPERSANT
USE MEETING REPORT MAY 26-27, 2010 15 (2010) [hereinafter DEEPWATER
REPORT], available at
http://www.crrc.unh.edu/dwg/dwh_dispersants_use_meeting_report.pdf.
(80.) NIXON, supra note 8, at 28.
(81.) NOAA Stocks, supra note 21.
(82.) Spawning Habitat of Bluefin Tuna in Gulf of Mexico: Critical
Area Intersects Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill, SCIENCEDAILY (May 31,
2010), http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/05/100528210726.htm.
(83.) Id.
(84.) Id.
(85.) NOAA Stocks. supra note 21.
(86.) Id.
(87.) Seth Borenstein & Cain Burdeau, AP Enterprise: Scientists
Lower Gulf Health Grade, ASSOCIATED PRESS, Oct. 18, 2010,
http://www.journalgazette.net/article/20101018/APA/1010180877 (quoting
Ernest Pebbles of University of South Florida) (reporting that results
from seventy-eight core samples of sea floor sediment contained oil and
no living organisms).
(88.) Id.
(89.) NOAA Stocks, supra note 21.
(90.) Id.
(91.) Id.
(92.) Sea Turtles, Dolphins, and Whales and the Gulf of Mexico Oil
Spill, NOAA FISHERIES: OFF. OF PROTECTED RES.,
http://www.nmfs.noaa.gov/pr/health/oilspill/ (last visited Mar. 14,
2011).
(93.) Id.
(94.) Impacts of Oil on Marine Mammals and Sea Turtles, NOAA
FISHERIES SERV., http://www.nmfs.noaa.gov/pr/pdfs/health/oil_impacts.pdf
(last visited Apr. 18, 2011) (noting that long term chronic effects such
as decreased survival and lowered reproductive success may occur to
wildlife after an oil spill). See also EPA Response to BP Spill in Gulf
of Mexico--Questions and Answers on Dispersants, ENVTL. PROT. AGENCY,
http://www.epa.gov/bpspill/dispersants-qanda.html#q7 (last updated Jan.
10, 2011) (noting that the long term effects of dispersants on aquatic
life are unknown).
(95.) U.S. FISH & WILDLIFE SERV. ET AL., DEEPWATER HORIZON
RESPONSE CONSOLIDATED FISH AND WILDLIFE COLLECTION REPORT 1 (2010),
available at http://www.restoretheGulf.gov/sites/default/files/documents/pdf/ Consolidated%20Wildlife%20Table%20101410.pdf.
(96.) Id.
(97.) Id.
(98.) NAT'L OCEANIC & ATMOSPERHIC ADMIN., NOAA's OIL
SPILL RESPONSE: FISHING INDUSTRY IN THE GULF OF MEXICO 2 (2010),
available at http://www.noaa.gov/factsheets/new%20version/fishstocks_gulf.pdf.
(99.) Id.
(100.) Brown Pelican Removed from Endangered Species List, U.S.
DEP'T OF INTERIOR (Nov. 11, 2009),
http://www.doi.gov/news/Brown.Pelican_Off_Endangered.Spe_cies-List.cfm.
(101.) Id.
(102.) RAMSEUR, supra note 38, at 33.
(103.) Id. at i.
(104.) Id. at 32.
(105.) Id. The report notes that there have been six spills. Since
the report was published, the Deepwater Horizon spill occurred.
Additionally, an oil well platform caught fire in the Gulf. The Coast
Guard initially reported that oil sheen a mile long and 100 feet wide
had begun to spread from the site, but retracted this statement later
when it could not find the sheen. It is unclear whether the oil was
actually released or not. Id.
(106.) See U.S. DEP'T HOMELAND SEC., U.S. COAST GUARD,
CALIFORNIA SONS 04: AFTER ACTION REPORT 46 (2004), available at
http://www.documentcloud.org/documents/2614sons_2004 aar 10sep2004.html.
Oil spill response personnel did not appear to have even a basic
knowledge of the equipment required to support salvage or spill
cleanup operations .... There was a shortage of personnel with
experience to fill key positions. Many middle-level spill
management staff had never worked a large spill and some had never
been involved in an exercise. As a result, some issues and complex
processes unique to spill response were not effectively addressed.
Id. at 52.
(107.) U.S.: 3,500 Unused Gulf Wells Must Be Plugged, MSNBC (Sep.
15, 2010, 5:45 PM), http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/39195347/ns/us_news-environment/.
(108.) 40 C.F.R. [section] 1508.4 (2010).
(109.) JAY E. AUSTIN ET AL., ENVTL. LAW INST., JUDGING NEPA: A
"HARD LOOK" AT JUDICIAL DECISION MAKING UNDER THE NATIONAL
ENVIRONMENTAL POLICY ACT 2 (n.d.), available at
http://www.endangeredlaws.org/downloads/JudgingNEPA.pdf; see also
Nat'l Envtl. Pol'y Act of 1969, 42 U.S.C. [section][section]
4321-4347 (2006); CONG. REC. S4141 (daily ed. Mar. 24, 1992) (statement
of Sen. John Chafee).
(110.) 42 U.S.C. [section] 4321 (2006).
(111.) 42 U.S.C. [section] 4331(b)(3) (2006).
(112.) See Kleppe v. Sierra Club, 427 U.S. 390, 410 n.21 (1976)
(noting that an agency is required to take a "hard look" at
the potential environmental impacts of a proposed action before
proceeding).
(113.) 42 U.S.C. [section] 4342 (2006).
(114.) 42 U.S.C. [section] 4344(3) (2006).
(115.) 42 U.S.C. [section] 4344(4) (2006).
(116.) See S. Rep. No. 91-1196, at 43 (1970).
(117.) Clean Air Act, 42 U.S.C. [section] 7609 (2006).
(118.) 40 C.F.R. [section] 1500.6 (2010).
(119.) 42 U.S.C. [section] 4332 (c)(i) (2006).
(120.) 40 C.F.R. [section] 1508.27 (2010).
(121.) 40 C.F.R. [section] 1508.9 (2010).
(122.) Id.
(123.) Id. [section] 1508.9(a)(1) (noting that in the event the
agency determines through its EA that an EIS is not necessary, the
Agency must prepare a Finding of No Significant Impact (FONSI)).
(124.) 40 C.F.R. [section] 1508.4.
(125.) Nancy H. Sutley, Memorandum for Heads of Federal Departments
and Agencies: Establishing and Applying Categorical Exclusions under the
National Environmental Policy Act, COUNCIL ON ENVTL. QUALITY, 10 (Feb.
18, 2010), http://ceq.hss.doe.gov/nepa/regs/
Categorical_Exclusion_Draft_NEPA_Guidance_FINAL02182010.pdf (noting that
the administrative record for establishing the categorical exclusion may
be considered sufficient documentation for applying the categorical
exclusion to future actions).
(126.) Id.
(127.) See, e.g., Sw. Ctr. for Biological Diversity v. U.S. Forest
Serv., 100 F.3d 1443, 1446 (9th Cir. 1996) (finding Forest Service did
not violate NEPA by issuing a categorical exclusion where there were no
extraordinary circumstances that would prohibit the issuance of a
categorical exclusion).
(128.) Kleppe v. Sierra Club, 427 U.S. 390, 410 (1976).
(131.) Suffolk County v. Sec'y of the Interior, 562 F.2d 1368,
1375 (2d Cir. 1977).
(132.) Bicycle Trails Council of Matin v. Babbitt, 82 F.3d 1445,
1456 (9th Cir. 1996).
(133.) Mississippi ex rel. Moore v. Marsh, 710 F. Supp. 1488, 1504
(S.D. Miss. 1989) (finding that Army Corp of Engineer's decision to
categorically exclude a river maintenance from NEPA review was
unreasonable).
(136.) 43 U.S.C. [section] 1802(1) (2006). The Outer Continental
Shelf is an area of submerged lands, subsoil, and seabed that lies
between the outer seaward reaches of a state's jurisdiction and
that of the United States. 43 U.S.C. [section] 1331(a) (2006).
(141.) Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act Amendments of 1978, Pub.
L. No. 95-372, 92 Stat. 629 (1978).
(142.) id. (emphasis added).
(143.) 43 U.S.C. [section] 1802(1) (2006).
(144.) 43 U.S.C. [section] 1340(c)(1) (2006).
(145.) Id. [section] 1340(g)(3).
(146.) On May 19, 2010, the MMS was reorganized and renamed Bureau
of Ocean Energy Management, Regulation and Enforcement. See INTERIOR
ORDER, supra note 12.
(147.) EXEC. OFFICE OF THE PRESIDENT, COUNCIL ON ENVTL. QUALITY,
REPORT REGARDING THE MINERALS MANAGEMENT SERVICE'S NATIONAL
ENVIRONMENTAL POLICY ACT POLICIES, PRACTICES, AND PROCEDURES AS THEY
RELATE TO OUTER CONTINENTAL SHELF OIL AND GAS EXPLORATION AND
DEVELOPMENT 17 (2010), available at
http://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/default/files/microsites/ceq/20100816ceq-mms- ocs-nepa.pdf.
(148.) Id. at 22.
(149.) U.S. DEP'T. OF INTERIOR, 516 DM 15, DEPARTMENTAL MANUAL
15.4 (A)(1)-(3) (2004) [hereinafter DEP'T MANUAL], available at
http://206.131.241.18/app DM/act_getfiles.cfm?relnum=3625. For a
detailed review of MMS review process, see KRISTEN ALEXANDER, CONG.
RESEARCH SERV., RL 41265, THE 2010 OIL SPILL: THE MINERALS MANAGEMENT
SERVICE (MMS) AND THE NATIONAL ENVIRONMENTAL POLICY ACT (NEPA) (2010),
available at http://fpc.state.gov/documents/organization/145106.pdf.
(150.) DEP'T MANUAL, supra note 149, at 15.4(B).
(151.) Id. at 15.4(C)(10) (emphasis added).
(152.) See ALEXANDER, supra note 149, at 13 (suggesting the 1978
amendment may have been the basis for categorically excluding
exploration plans in the Gulf).
(153.) U.S. DEP'T OF INTERIOR, MINERALS MGMT. SERV., 2007-2012
OUTER CONTINENTAL SHELF OIL AND GAS LEASING PROGRAM: FINAL ENVIRONMENTAL
IMPACT STATEMENT (2007), available at
http://www.boemre.gov/5-year/2007-2012FEIS.htm.
(154.) Id.
(155.) Id. at IV-75.
(156.) Id. at IV-29.
(157.) Id. at IV-28.
(158.) National Environmental Policy Act: EIS Data, U.S ENVTL.
PROT. AGENCY, http://yosemite.epa.gov/oeca/webeis.nsf/EIS01/
EC6890E22546695F8525768C005C0579?opendoeument (last updated Mar. 24,
2011).
(159.) Ctr. for Biological Diversity v. U.S. Dep't of the
Interior, 563 F.3d 466 (D.C. Cir. 2009).
(160.) Id. at 475-76.
(161.) Id. at 489; see also 43 U.S.C. [section] 1344(a)(2)(G)
(2006) (requiring agencies to consider "the relative environmental
sensitivity of ... different areas of the outer Continental
Shelf").
(162.) U.S. DEP'T OF INTERIOR, MINERALS MGMT. SERV.,
PRELIMINARY REVISED PROGRAM OUTER CONTINENTAL SHELF OIL AND GAS LEASING
PROGRAM FOR 2007-2012 3 (2010), available at
http://www.boemre.gov/5-year/PDFs/PRP20072012.pdf.
(163.) Id. at 4.
(164.) U.S. DEP'T OF INTERIOR, MINERALS MGMT. SERV., GULF OF
MEXICO OCS OIL AND GAS LEASE SALES: 2007-2012; WESTERN PLANNING AREA
SALES 204, 207, 210, 215, AND 218; CENTRAL PLANNING AREA SALES 205, 206,
208, 213, 216, AND 222; FINAL ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT STATEMENT (2007)
[hereinafter LEASE SALES EIS], available at
http://www.gomr.boemre.gov/PDFs/2007/2007-018-Vol1.pdf; BP EXPLORATION
& PROD. INC., OCS-G 32306, INITIAL EXPLORATION PLAN: MISSISSIPPI
CANYON BLOCK 252 [section] 14.2.1.5 (2009), [hereinafter INITIAL
EXPLORATION PLAN] available at
http://www.gomr.boemre.gov/PI/PDFImages/PLANS/29/29977.pdf.
(165.) LEASE SALES EIS, supra note 164, at 4-232.
(166.) Id.
(167.) Id. at 4-233.
(168.) Id. at 4-240-4-241.
All evidence to date indicates that oil discharges that occur at
the seafloor from a pipeline or losses of well control would rise
in the water column, surfacing almost directly over the source
location. Therefore, a subsurface oil spill would have to occur
very close to a benthic community for rising oil to contact the
benthic organisms. (citation omitted).
Id. at 4-240.
(169.) Id. at 4-292.
(170.) LEASE SALES EIS, supra note 164, at 4-291.
(171.) Id. at 4-75.
(172.) Id at 4-232.
(173.) Id. at 4-243.
(174.) Id. at 4-260, 4-239.
(175.) Letter from Anne Norton Miller, Dir., Office of Fed.
Activities, U.S. Envtl. Prot. Agency, to James F. Bennett, Branch of
Envtl. Assessment, Minerals Mgmt. Serv. (May 25, 2007),
http://yosemite.epa.gov/oeca/webeis.nsf/(PDFView)/20070157/$file/
20070157.PDF?OpenElement.
(176.) U.S. DEP'T OF INTERIOR, MINERALS MGMT. SERV., MMS
2007-059, PROPOSED GULF OF MEXICO OCS OIL AND GAS LEASE SALE 206,
CENTRAL PLANNING AREA: ENVIRONMENTAL ASSESSMENT (2007) [hereinafter
LEASE EA], available at
http://www.gomr.boemre.gov/PDFs/2007/2007-059.pdf.
(177.) Id. at ii. (noting that based on the analysis in the EA, no
new significant impacts were identified for proposed lease sale 206).
(178.) Id. at 14.
(179.) Id. at 27.
(180.) Id. at 31, 34.
(181.) Id. at 34, 37, 39.
(182.) LEASE EA, supra note 176, at 22.
(183.) INITIAL EXPLORATION PLAN, supra note 164, [section]
14.2.1.5.
(184.) Id. [section] 2.7.
(185.) Id. [section] 2.7.
(186.) Id. [section] 7.1.
(187.) Id. After the well exploded, BP estimated that 100,000
barrels per day were leaking from the well. Official estimates later
reduced this to 60,000 barrels per day. Ernest Scheyder, BP Estimates
Oil Spill Up to 100,000 Barrels Per Day in Document, REUTERS (June 29,
2010, 7:19 PM),
http://www.reuters.com/article/2010/O6/20/us-oilspill-idUSN1416392020100620;
Justin Gillis, Estimates of Oil Flow Jump Higher,
N.Y. TIMES, June 15, 2010,
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/O6/16/us/16spill.html (noting that as much
as 60,000 barrels a day were flowing from the well).
(188.) LEASE SALE EIS, supra note 164, at 4-232.
(189.) INITIAL EXPLORATION PLAN, supra note 164, [section] 14.5.
(190.) Id. [section][section] 7.1, 14.6.
(191.) Id. [section] 142.1.6-8.
(192.) Id. [section] 14.2.2.1.
(193.) See, e.g., Letter from Margaret D. Laney, Senior Fed.
Affairs Dir., BP America Inc., to Nancy Sutley, Chair, Council on Envtl.
Quality (Apr. 9, 2010),
http://media.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/nation/pdf/BP_letter_050410.pdf.
(194.) NIXON, supra note 8, at 31.
(195.) See Press Release, Ctr. for Biological Diversity, MMS
Approved 27 Gulf Drilling Operations After BP Disaster, 26 Were Exempted
From Environmental Review, Including Two to BP (May 7, 2010),
http://www.biologicaldiversity.org/news/
press_releases/2010/post-disaster-permits-05-07-2010.html; see also MMS
Approved Drilling Plans 4/21/2010-5/7/2010, CTR. FOR BIOLOGICAL
DIVERSITY,
http://www.biologicaldiversity.org/programs/public_lands/energy/dirty
energy_development/oil_and_gas/gulf_oil_spill/pdfs/
MMS_Approved_Drilling_2010-0S-07_v2.pdf (last visited Jan. 26, 2011)
[hereinafter MMS Drilling Plans].
(196.) MMS Drilling Plans, supra note 195.
(197.) U.S. DEP'T OF INTERIOR, MINERALS MGMT. SERV., NTL No.
2010-N04, NOTICE TO LESSEES AND OPERATORS OF FEDERAL OIL AND GAS LEASES
IN THE OUTER CONTINENTAL SHELF REGIONS OF THE GULF OF MEXICO AND THE
PACIFIC TO IMPLEMENT THE DIRECTIVE TO IMPOSE A MORATORIUM ON ALL
DRILLING OF DEEPWATER WELLS 1 (2010), available at
http://www.doi.gov/news/pressreleases/loader.cfm?csModule=security/
getfile&PageID=33716.
(198.) Decision Memorandum from the Sec'y of Interior Ken
Salazar to the Director of Bureau of Ocean Energy Management,
Regulation, and Enforcement (Oct. 12, 2010),
http://www.doi.gov/news/pressreleases/
loader.cfm?csModule=security/getfile&PageID=64767.
(200.) See generally CEQ FINAL RECOMMENDATIONS, infra note 238.
(201.) Id.
(202.) Viii. of False Pass v. Clark, 733 F.2d 605 (9th Cir. 1984);
see also Natural Res. Def. Council v. U.S. Dep't of Navy, No.
CV-01-07781, 2002 WL 32095131, at "10-12 (C.D. Cal. 2002) (holding
that presumption against extraterritoriality did not bar the application
of National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) to Navy sea tests having an
effect in United States Exclusive Economic Zone).
(203.) See generally Keith C. Clarke & Jeffrey J. Hemphill, The
Santa Barbara Oil Spill, A Retrospective, 64 Y.B. ASS'N PAC. COAST
GEOGRAPHERS 157, 157-62 (2002), available at
http://www.geog.ucsb.edu/~kclarke/Papers/SBOilSpil11969.pdf.
(204.) 40 C.F.R. [section] 1502.20 (2010); see also County of
Suffolk v. Sec'y of the Interior, 562 F.2d 1368, 1378 (2d Cir.
1977).
(205.) Id. at 1378.
(206.) See, e.g., Kleppe v. Sierra Club, 427 U.S. 390, 410 (1976).
(210.) U.S. DEP'T OF INTERIOR, MINERALS MGMT. SERV., MMS
2000-001, GULF OF MEXICO DEEPWATER OPERATIONS AND ACTIVITIES,
ENVIRONMENTAL ASSESSMENT iv (2000) [hereinafter GULF EA], available at
http://www.gomr.boemre.gov/PDFs/2000/2000-001.pdf.
(211.) Id. at II-16.
(212.) Lisa P. Jackson, Adm'r, Envtl. Prot. Agency, Statement
on Dispersants (May 12, 2010), available at
http://yosemite.epa.gov/opa/admpress.nsff8d49f7ad4bbcf4ef85
2573590040b7f6/cefda3e057e5dded852577220071dalb!OpenDocument.
(213.) DEEPWATER REPORT, supra note 79, at 15.
(214.) Id.
(215.) Lisa P. Jackson, Adm'r, Envtl. Prot. Agency, Statement
on Dispersants (May 12, 2010), available at
http://yosemite.epa.gov/opa/admpress.nsf/8d49f7ad4bbcf4ef85
2573590040b7f6/ccfda3e057e5dded852577220071da1b!OpenDocument.
(216.) National Contingency Plan (NCP) Subpart J-Product Schedule,
U.S ENVTL. PROT. AGENCY EMERGENCY MGMT.,
http://www.epa.gov/emergencies/content/ncp/ index.htm (last updated Mar.
3, 2011).
(217.) Questions and Answers on Dispersants, U.S. ENVTL. PROT.
AGENCY EMERGENCY, http://www.epa.gov/bpspill/dispersants-qanda.html#application (last updated Jan. 10, 2011).
(218.) 40 C.F.R. [section] 1508.4 (noting that prior to issuing a
categorical exclusion, an agency must consider extraordinary
circumstances present that may have a significant impact).
(219.) See Pub. L. No. 95-372, 92 Stat. 629.
(220.) Pub. L. No. 95-372, 92 Stat. 629.
(221.) 43 U.S.C. [section] 1340(c)(1) (2006).
(222.) DEP'T MANUAL, supra note 137.
(223.) 30 C.F.R. [section] 250.227 (2010).
(224.) 30 C.F.R. [section] 250.232(c).
(225.) 40 C.F.R. [section] 1508.4.
(226.) Id.
(227.) 548 F.3d 815 (9th Cir. 2008).
(228.) Id.
(229.) Id.
(230.) Id.
(231.) Alaska Wilderness League v. Salazar, 571 F.3d 859, 859 (9th
Cir. 2009).
(234.) Exec. Order No. 13547, 75 Fed. Reg. 43,023 (July 19, 2010)
[hereinafter EO], available at
http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/executive-order-steward-ship-
ocean-our-coasts-and-great-lakes.
(235.) Id.
(236.) Id.
(237.) Id.
(238.) COUNCIL ON ENVTL. QUALITY, EXEC. OFFICE OF THE PRESIDENT,
FINAL RECOMMENDATIONS OF THE INTERAGENCY OCEAN POLICY TASK FORCE 14
(2010) [hereinafter CEQ FINAL RECOMMENDATIONS], available at
http://www.whitehouse.gov/files/documents/OPTF_FinalRecs.pdf. 239. Id.
at 2.
(240.) Id. at 30.
(241.) EO, supra note 234.
(242.) EO, supra 234.
(243.) Id.
(244.) 40 C.F.R. [section] 1508.8 (b) (2010).
(245.) 40 C.F.R. [section] 1508.8.
(246.) MMS Launches "Grid Environmental Assessment"
Program to Implement Environmental Reviews Efficiently, U.S. DEP'T
OF INTERIOR, MINERALS MGMT. SERV., (Oct. 25, 2001),
http://www.gomr.boemre.gov/homepg/whatsnew/newsreal/2001/011026f.html
[hereinafter MMS Grid]; see also Grid EA and ROV Survey Status Report,
BUREAU OF OCEAN ENERGY MGMT., REGULATION, AND ENFORCEMENT,
http://www.gomr.boemre.gov/homepg/regulate/environ/ea_grid/ea_grid.asp
(last updated Feb. 2, 2011) (indicating that as of Feb. 12, 2010, the
grid system expanded to include twenty-one grids of biological
similarity.)
(247.) MMS Grid, supra note 246.
(248.) NIXON, supra note 8, at 23.
(249.) MMS Grid, supra note 246.
(250.) NIXON, supra note 8, at 31-32.
(251.) The Oceans are the Very Foundation of Human Life, UNITED
NATIONS, DIV. FOR OCEAN AFFAIRS AND THE LAW OF THE SEA,
http://www.un.org/Depts/los/oceans_foundation.htm (last visited Feb. 2,
2011).
(252.) Id.
(253.) United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, Dec. 10,
1983, 21 ILM 1261, 1833 U.N.T.S 3.
(254.) Id. at art. 193.
(255.) Id. at art. 194(1).
(256.) Id. at art. 194(2).
(257.) Id. at art. 208(1)-(2), 214.
(258.) See id. at art. 197, 208.
(259.) See United States v. Royal Caribbean Cruises, Ltd., 24 F.
Supp. 2d 155, 159 (D. P.R. 1997).
(260.) EO, supra note 234.
(261.) Agreement Regarding Pollution of the Marine Environment by
Discharges of Hydrocarbons and Other Hazardous Substances, U.S.-Mex.,
June 26, 1980, T.I.A.S. No. 10,021.
(262.) See Convention for the Protection and Development of the
Marine Environment of the Wider Caribbean Region, Mar. 24, 1983,
T.I.A.S. No. 11,085, 1506 U.N.T.S.157.
(263.) Id.
(264.) A Protocol Concerning Co-operation in Combating Oil Spills
in the Wider Caribbean Region art. 3, Mar. 24, 1983, T.I.A.S. No.
11,085, 1506 U.N.T.S.157.
(265.) As the DWH spill continued, U.S. and international
authorities became increasingly concerned with the possibility that oil
from the spill would migrate beyond U.S. waters to cause harm in foreign
territories. Howard LaFranchi, International Sensitivities: What If BP
Oil Spill Heads for Cuba?, CHRISTIAN SCI. MONITOR, June 11, 2010,
http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Foreign-Policy/2010/0611/International-
sensitivities-What-if-BP-oil-spill-heads-for-Cuba. NOAA administrators
were concerned with the possibility that oil would migrate from the
spill site into the Loop Current, which could transport the oil through
the Florida Straits and into the Atlantic Ocean. See Press Release,
Nat'l Oceanic & Atmospheric Admin., NOAA Sends Two Ships to
Study Loop Current and Coastal Florida Waters (June 30, 2010),
http://www.noaanews.noaa.gov/stories2010/20100630_ships.html (noting
that two NOAA dispatched two ships to conduct biological and chemical
surveys of waters in the eastern Gulf of Mexico and the Florida Straits
to determine the movement of the oil from the Deepwater Horizon spill
site).
(266.) NAT'l Oceanic & Atmospheric Admin., Gulf of Mexico
Science Forum, A Scientific Forum on the Gulf of Mexico: The Islands in
the Stream Concept 4 (2008) (quoting Ernest D. Estevez), available at
http://sanctuaries.noaa.gov/about/pdfs/se_gom.pdf.
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