Obama Aministration Ruled In Contempt Of Court

This is a rather amusing coincidence in timing, given my earlier posting saying that Obama is in contempt of Judge Vinson's ruling even if no such contempt ruling has been made. But judge Vinson didn't rule Obama in contempt of court, Louisiana Judge Martin Feldman did.

You remember Judge Feldman, right? He's the judge who tossed out Obama's ban on offshore drilling... which Obama promptly ignored. Well, it's taken long enough, but Judge Feldman has finally had enough and cited the Interior Department for contempt.
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0211/48745.html

A federal judge in Louisiana held the Interior Department in contempt late Wednesday, citing the agency for “dismissive conduct” by blocking offshore oil drilling during last year’s Gulf of Mexico oil spill.

Judge Martin Feldman of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana last summer blocked the Obama administration’s first attempt to place a moratorium on offshore drilling, only to have Interior come back with a second ban.

That didn’t go over well with Feldman, who Wednesday also ordered Interior to pay attorneys’ fees for oil companies challenging the drilling ban.

“Such dismissive conduct, viewed in tandem with the reimposition of a second blanket and substantively identical moratorium and in light of the national importance of this case, provide this Court with clear and convincing evidence of the government’s contempt of this Court’s preliminary injunction order,” Feldman wrote in his eight-page order.

If you'd like to read the entire eight page order, you can find it here:
http://www.politico.com/static/PPM191_feldman.html

Isn't this just lovely?


Our Federal government ignored the order of a Federal court to the extent that a judge could clearly and without hesitation affirm their civil contempt for the court order.

Personally, I think this is FAR too late to do any good, as all the rigs have packed up and moved elsewhere. It will be a LONG time before drilling will resume in the Gulf, simply for that reason. The Obama administration wants to do things their way, and to HELL with the courts or anybody else who wants to stop them.

I wonder if Vinson will act in a more timely fashion, or if he, too, will wait months before recognizing Obama's contempt, which is quite clear to everyone else.