Obama: It’s way too early for optimism

PRESIDENT Barack Obama said progress apparently is being made in fighting the enormous Gulf oil spill.

But the president said it is “way too early to be optimistic” about BP’s latest attempt to staunch the spill by capping the well and siphoning off some of the crude oil.

Obama spoke yesterday as he visited Louisiana on day 45 of the catastrophic spill that has unleashed tens of millions of gallons into the Gulf of Mexico.

He criticised BP for spending on advertising and shareholder dividends, saying the company must not do that if it’s “nickeling and diming” local businesses and workers.

Obama got a briefing on the spill and headed to a barrier island to visit local workers affected by the catastrophe.

Stormy skies greeted the president as he arrived at the Gulf of Mexico to encourage residents and get a fresh look at the horrifying oil spill that is testing his presidency.

The president huddled in a small airport building with Coast Guard Admiral Thad Allen, the top federal official on the spill, along with the governors of Louisiana, Florida and Alabama and other officials.

Stressing his personal leadership of the federal response, Obama headed to Grand Isle, a barrier island that’s been affected by the spill and where nearby beaches are being lapped by oil.

The president’s third visit to the Gulf came as engineers with British oil company BP worked to settle a funnel-like cap over the deep-sea leak to try to collect some of the crude now fouling four states. Oil continued to spew, generating frightening photos of seabirds clogged in the muck.

Underscoring the mounting political implications, Obama abruptly cancelled plans for his trip to Indonesia and Australia later this month. Ahead of the Gulf visit, he declared himself furious at a situation that “is imperilling an entire way of life and an entire region for potentially years.” He criticised BP for not responding more quickly.

But polls show the public growing more negative toward the president’s own handling of the spill, and he was aiming to demonstrate he was staying on top of the situation yesterday – without getting in the way. Obama visited the Gulf region twice in May, and this tour surely will not be his last.

“You never want to take resources away from the response and recovery efforts, so we’re certainly mindful of that,” said spokesman Robert Gibbs. “At the same time ... I think he’ll go as often as he thinks that is productive in aiding those response efforts.”

Somewhere between 22 million and 47 million gallons of crude oil have been disgorged into the Gulf since the Deepwater Horizon oil rig exploded on April 20, according to government estimates. Eleven workers were killed in the blast.

Obama told CNN’s Larry King on Thursday he was furious that “someone didn’t think through the consequences of their actions,” and he tried to deflect criticism that he hasn’t shown enough emotion about the epic dimensions of the problem.

“I would love to just spend a lot of my time venting and yelling at people,” the president said, “but that’s not the job I was hired to do. My job is to solve this problem.”

His administration on Thursday handed BP a $69 million bill for recovery costs to date – a figure sure to grow in the weeks and months ahead.

BP senior vice president Kent Wells said last night he was “quite encouraged” by the early results of the cap procedure.

Engineers were in the process of drawing oil and gas to the surface while slowly closing the cap’s chimneys.

They cannot immediately shut the outlets in case the pressure beneath lifts the cap off.