Obama urges tourism to aid Gulf economy post-spill

[dipsydoodle]

Source: BBC News

President Obama has urged Americans to "come on down and visit" Florida to help revive the economy stricken by the Gulf of Mexico oil spill.

Mr Obama said oil was no longer flowing into the Gulf but "our job is not finished and we are not going anywhere until it is."

>

He urged Americans to take their holidays in Florida, saying: "As a result of the clean-up effort, the beaches are clean, open and safe."

>

The dramatic drop in tourists is down to a perception that all the beaches along the Florida panhandle, as it is known, are coated in oil, our correspondent says, even though that is not the case.

Read more: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-10976896

[Lost4words]

1. gosh if I had a job Mr President,........

[crim son]

6. I was just about to post the same thing.

Sorry, I'm not able to take a vacation from my unemployment, let alone a vacation down to the Gulf.

[Angry Dragon]

2. How about all the states effected??

Just Florida needs help??

[bloomington-lib]

3. How about Indiana too. This place has been affected by...

well just being Indiana.

[Hubert Flottz]

4. I can't even put food on my family...

If it cost a nickel to sh!t I'd have to :puke:

[Hubert Flottz]

5. I still don't understand why Robert Byrd never...

Had us an ocean or at least a gulf of some kind built here in West Virginia.

[crim son]

7. Bwahahahahahahahah!

That's a bitter laugh.

[EFerrari]

8. I remember vacations. You got them with jobs. n/t

[ProSense]

9. Yes, and the President has one. n/t

[Lorien]

11. As usual, your reply has nothing to do with the post you've repied to

try being relevant.

[EFerrari]

12. How nice for him, indeed.

[Lorien]

10. He could also urge BP to pay up ; clean up their mess and reimburse people

whose lives they've destroyed and whose health they've ruined..but we all know the likelihood of that ever happening.

[EFerrari]

13. Dahr Jamail was on Hartmann's show yesterday

and he says more stuff is washing up on the Gulf coast this week than the last two months put together. It doesn't sound like somewhere you'd tell tourists to go hang out.

Maybe some of our Gulf Coast DUers will give us an update. :(

[suzie]

15. Would you believe them in they did?

[EFerrari]

17. Would I believe my friends?

Yes. :)

[suzie]

18. The guy on Hartmann's show may have been talking about Louisiana shores, where

the tropical storm has likely been bringing in more oil.

That hasn't been true on the part of the Gulf Coast where Obama is visiting.

[EFerrari]

20. Here's his article from the 9th:

August 9th, 2010 7:34 PM
Out of Sight, Out of Mind (Even when it’s not out of sight)

By Dahr Jamail

Since BP announced that CEO Tony Hayward would receive a multi-million dollar golden parachute and be replaced by Bob Dudley, we have witnessed an incredibly broad, and powerful, propaganda campaign. A campaign that peaked this week with the US government, clearly acting in BP’s best interests, itself announcing, via outlets willing to allow themselves to be used to transfer the propaganda, like the New York Times, this message: “The government is expected to announce on Wednesday that three-quarters of the oil from the Deepwater Horizon leak has already evaporated, dispersed, been captured or otherwise eliminated — and that much of the rest is so diluted that it does not seem to pose much additional risk of harm.”

The Times was accommodating enough to lead the story with a nice photo of a fishing boat motoring across clean water with several birds in the foreground.

This message was disseminated far and wide, via other mainstream media outlets like the AP and Reuters, effectively announcing to the masses that despite the Gulf of Mexico suffering the largest marine oil disaster in US history, most of the oil was simply “gone.”

http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/mike-friends-blog/out-sight-out-mind-even-when-its-not-out-sight

[suzie]

21. So you simply asked a rhetorical question, because you didn't care at all what DUers who live on

the Gulf responded?

Nice.

Then your answer to my question should have been "No, I have no interest at all in what any DUers who live on the coast have to say. Nor would I believe them, because they're not international journalists."

The OP is about tourism along the Florida coast, near Panama City Beach. I assumed that we were talking about that.

And surprising as it may seem to you, I do know the difference between Florida and Louisiana Gulf Coasts.

[EFerrari]

22. My giving you the article shows I don't care about you?

Okay. :crazy:

[suzie]

23. Gosh, your original response seemed like just one more of your daily opportunities

to look for any chance to bash Obama.

But you were really so concerned that because I live on the Gulf Coast, I'm not only so stupid that I do not know the difference between Florida and Louisiana....but I can't read or listen to people talking about the waters of the Gulf myself?

Why thank you, thank you, thank you!

And we Floridians, gosh we should demand that our tourism people should be flogged for wanting President Obama to come here and try to correct the impression that the beaches of Florida are covered with oil, that it's worse than ever...because Californians say so!

Thank you so much, we dumb Southerners always do require the assistance of others like yourself.

[EFerrari]

24. I have friends all along the Gulf Coast

and most of them are here at DU.

And I can't speak to how stupid you are but you seem to be attacking me because you thought I was doing something I was not in fact doing. Hope the rest of your day goes a little better.

[suzie]

25. No, I just value honesty.

And if you'd simply answered my question "Would you believe them?" with an answer that said "No. Because that doesn't fit my my anti-Obama meme," I'd have been fine with that.

[LTX]

31. For context,

I live on the Gulf coast as well, and when I said exactly the same thing the President is saying, EFerrari told me to "run along" because he/she was "already bored with me." The condescension was touching.

[primavera]

14. Don't forget about the wildlife

Apart from all of the dead dolphins, sea turtles, pelicans (including the already endangered Brown Pelican), oysters, shrimp, and so on and so on, the Gulf used to have one of the highest concentrations of differing species of plants and animals. Since many of those species hadn't even yet been classified, we'll never know how many species became extinct because of the oil spill, but, given the extent of oil contamination and the size of the dead zones that have formed in the Gulf of late, in which the oxygen-producing plankton has all died, taking with them all life in that vicinity with them, it's a safe bet that quite a number of species were snuffed out of existence this summer. I know, they have no commercial value to humans so nobody cares, but as an apparently very lonely treehugger, I still feel it to be my quixotic duty to read their epitaphs too.

[pitohui]

28. plenty of people care and plenty are at work on this problem

you may be surprised to learn that lsu is one of the leading places to study bio-diversity, best ornithologists in the world, and students come from all over the world to learn, at least abt the birds -- IF any bird species are lost, which i no longer think likely, it will be well documented, and BP will have to pay damages based on the total number of birds/eggs lost

there are good, independent people looking at the impact right now, the aba (american birding association) specifically collected $ independently of what BP is giving, to make sure there is an independent look at the impact on bird species

even a bird w. "no commercial value" like the brown pelican is greatly beloved, and there was a large investment in their rescue

i don't know much about other kinds of wildlife, but BP is going to fund some marine animal studies, hundreds of millions of dollars pledged is my understanding, much of it going to lsu (academia) if you know anything about wildlife type profs, they're an ornery crew, they'll call it like they see em, they're not going to file a wrong paper just to please BP -- if they wanted to be rich, they wouldn't have gone into wildlife studies in the first place, they're sincere abt the outdoors (broad brush, but as a general rule true)

i'm seeing the pelicans around OK in new orleans, i was concerned that we would lose this year's breeding season but let's not fear for the worst just yet

there will be a lot of eyes tracking the wildlife and the story won't go untold

[primavera]

29. Now that's music to my ears!

It seems like all I ever hear in the media - and here on DU as well, I'm disappointed to say - is concern about the economic impact of the spill, upon jobs, upon tourism, etc.. Obviously, I share those concerns as well, but I haven't been hearing any attention being paid to wildlife. I'm glad to hear you've seen some brown pelicans, they're one of my favorites as well. Whereabouts in nola are you seeing them? I live over by Audubon Park but haven't spotted any down by the levee of late.

I'm hopeful that you're right and that most bird species will have been able to fly away from contaminated areas. I worry more about odd species of lowly sea slugs, or jellyfish, or algae, or whatever, that had a localized habitat somewhere in the Gulf, that even marine biologists may not yet have had the chance to classify as a species, but who still lived in contaminated areas and were too slow-moving to get out of the way. I don't know how one could begin to ascertain such damage, if it occurred, since there is/was so much life in the Gulf that we hadn't even discovered yet.

[pitohui]

30. seeing brown pelicans around the causeway, lake pontchartrain area

haven't been around audubon park recently, nice area, but i go there more often in cool weather

in days gone by, i have seen bald eagles in your area, in addition to the bald eagles that have become common on the northshore, of course it's the wrong time of year for a fly by from a bald eagle...will be checking again in the winter :-)

i have always seen more brown pelicans in city park area and toward/on the lake or on the causeway rather than over the river front, but i am not sure how much of this is just where i happen to be looking most often...

in the 1970s prob. several years into the 80s i don't think i EVER saw a brown pelican in new orleans proper and even now i would see most that i've seen have been around bayou st. john/city park rather than audubon park...don't know if that's sampling bias (i'm much more often in city park than aubudon park) or if they are in fact more common in city park than audubon park

as you say, we can't know what we don't know, it's amazing how little we DO know when you stop and think abt it, even a well studied bird like brown pelican i'm thinking...why does this bird go here and not there? hmmm

[lib2DaBone]

16. Mr. Obama.. How can I go on Vacation to the Gulf when I can't afford gas in my car?

My house is in foreclosure, my kids are hungry and I am thinking survival day-to-day.

You have proved that you are so out of touch with America.. YJDGI (you just dont get it)

[pitohui]

27. i think YOU just don't get it -- what he's doing helps save/create jobs

you won't put america back to work by wallowing in negativity

you won't put america back to work by telling people to "stay calm and remain in your homes"

you put america back to work by giving americans useful things to do

florida was for the most part untouched by the oil, lots of people have been put out of work based on rumor and fear=mongering in the press, gleeful exaggerations about the oil, and wild claims that the oil would spread all over florida and eventually all over the eastern seaboard

by going to swim, with his young family, by showing the water is safe, that the place is open and ready for business, he IS helping to save jobs -- people in tourism can't work if the tourists won't come

this is a small specific but VERY telling thing that obama did, swimming w. his young daughter in the beautiful blue waters provides a magnificent image

obama doesn't think -- NO ONE thinks -- that everyone in america has a job or can take a vacation to the same spot at the same time, HOWEVER, it's important to get rid of people's fears and prejudices so that those people who would enjoy a cheap vacation in the gulf (the gulf is far cheaper than say, miami, hawaii, etc.) won't be afraid to do so

if you have only a little money for vacation, you might only be able to afford the gulf coast or maybe no vacation at all, being aware it's safe to return to most beaches gives you good information you can use to get a nice, cheap vacation out of your money

if you are unemployed, no one expects you to take a vacation, but keep in mind...if you are unemployed, you are NOT helped when a lot of other people are unemployed at the same time

this is a small quick thing obama could do today to help people

why crap on it?

now on a personal note, if your kids are hungry, i understand your anger and i'm a little frustrated, i don't have much, but i don't like to hear of anyone being hungry...is there something DU can do?

[TEXASYANKEE]

33. I agree.

Him promoting tourism in Florida is the right thing to do. I sincerely do not understand all the anti-Obama rhetoric I'm seeing on here these days. :-(

[riskpeace]

19. Thank you President and Mrs. Obama!

I saw them playing putt-putt yesterday evening when Sasha got her hole-in-one on the first hole. President Obama got one a couple of holes later!

Panama City Beach is clean and open for business!

[pitohui]

26. wow that's really cool!

that's a story to tell the grand children :-)

[ixion]

32. Mr. Obama's "Go Shopping" moment

How very inappropriate and ill-timed and inconsiderate of the millions of people out of work.

[IBEWVET]

34. Report from the coast

I am west of where the President visited, (Pensacola) I went to the beach last weekend and swam and walked the beach. There is no oil washing ashore that I could detect and could see different species of fish. That does not mean all is well, but I could not see any problem.