Pat Dollard

Tweet

The Wall Street Journal:

PENSACOLA, Fla.—President Barack Obama will use an Oval Office address Tuesday night to outline his plans for cleaning up the Gulf oil spill, compensating victims, getting tough on the offshore oil industry and enacting new policies to reduce U.S. oil dependence.

He also named a new leader to overhaul the agency that regulates oil drilling.

Obama’s visit to the Gulf launched a critical week for an administration buffeted by one of the worst environmental disasters. Tonight, he will deliver remarks on the crisis from the Oval Office. Joe White discusses. And Jon Hilsenrath discusses why Federal Reserve officials are beginning to debate quietly what steps they might take if the recovery surprisingly falters or if inflation falls more.

Tonight’s speech will be the first time Mr. Obama has delivered a speech from the Oval Office, the backdrop his predecessors used to address the nation in times of crisis. The address comes at what White House aides say is an “inflection point” in the disaster—although it could be another two months before a relief well can stop the undersea gusher.

Testing out themes he will use tonight, Mr. Obama spoke Tuesday in Florida of “an assault on our shores” and said he will make sure BP PLC, owner of the leaking well, “pays for the damage it has done” as his administration ensures “you have the resources you need.”

In Florida, Mr. Obama unveiled a new command structure, under Coast Guard Admiral Thad Allen, the national incident commander. He appointed deputy incident commanders in Mississippi, Alabama and Florida, as well as a new command center in Tallahassee.

“The sand is white and the water’s blue, so folks who are looking for a good vacation, they can still come to Pensacola,” he said. “But that doesn’t mean people aren’t still angry. …The plumes of oil are off the coast. Tar balls are coming on shore, and everybody’s bracing for more.”

“We’re going to fight back with everything we’ve got, and that includes mobilizing the resources of the greatest militaries in the world,” he told Marines and Naval aviators in Pensacola, Fla., who cheered and shouted the traditional Marine hooah.

The White House said Tuesday it was naming Michael Bromwich to overhaul the Minerals Management Service, the much-maligned agency that the president has promised to break up and reform. Mr. Bromwich is a former assistant U.S. attorney and Justice Department inspector general. The White House called him “a national leader in taking broken agencies, applying rigorous reforms and oversight and seeing positive results.”

Critics say the White House has been too reactive in responding to the spill, and recent polls indicate the administration is getting poor marks from many voters for its response.

The White House hopes the combination of Mr. Obama’s fourth trip to the region, the Oval Office address and a high-profile meeting with BP executives on Wednesday will turn the tide.

One big uncertainty underlying Mr. Obama’s strategy is how far BP will go to meet his demands that the company fund an independently administered, multibillion-dollar escrow account to quickly pay off claims by Gulf residents for economic and environmental damages.

White House aides have said the administration and BP are in discussions on how the fund would be structured, but BP officials have also signaled they will resist demands to subsidize the wages of people put out of work by a drilling moratorium ordered by Mr. Obama.

The president will also press for the passage of legislation to move the nation away from fossil fuels, the one piece of his ambitious domestic agenda that has stalled, but it’s unclear what that legislation will ultimately look like.

The president said recently that he wants legislation that puts a price on carbon, and vowed to help round up the votes for it in the Senate.

Democratic Senate aides said this week that there is little appetite for pursuing ambitious legislation to combat climate change this year, and predicted a smaller package that directly addresses the oil spill is more likely.

The legislation may also include incentives for alternative energy, they said.

The White House appears to be aiming higher. A senior administration official outlined an expansive set of goals that go well beyond a direct response to the BP oil spill, including efficiency improvements and a development of new energy sources, such as expansion of nuclear power as well as oil and gas drilling.

The official said it was too early to know whether energy legislation would ultimately include a price on carbon or a cap-and-trade system like the form passed by the House. But he said the president wants comprehensive legislation that addresses a range of energy issues and pointed to a half-dozen bills now pending in the Senate that address various aspects of the energy problem.

“The test for him is: Does it reduce America’s carbon pollution? Does it set America off on a course of energy independence? Does it meet the objective to see that America is leading in the alternative energy field? Does it lead to the creation of economic growth and jobs? Does it lead to the United States being a leader on alternative energy? Does it help the country wean itself off dependence on foreign oil?” the official said. “Those are the questions the president will ask in evaluating any legislation.”

Any effort to put a price on carbon—effectively raising the costs of gasoline at the pump or electricity—will face strong opposition from Republicans and some Democrats.

After a meeting with Mr. Obama last week, the top congressional Republicans emerged to say they would support legislation specifically related to the oil spill but would not abide using the spill as an excuse for an “energy tax.”