I THOUGHT THIS MOVIE WAS OVER – AT 9:29 A.M. ET:  The Obamans don't take no for an answer, even when it's a federal court that says it.  For them, "Drill baby drill" becomes "Cease and desist, equal person, cease and desist!"  From Fox:

WASHINGTON -- The Obama administration issued a new moratorium Monday on deep-water offshore drilling that is no longer based on water depth and stresses new evidence of safety problems, hoping the revised ban will pass muster with the courts after the initial one was rejected.

"More than 80 days into the BP oil spill, a pause on deep-water drilling is essential and appropriate to protect communities, coasts, and wildlife from the risks that deep-water drilling currently pose," Interior Secretary Ken Salazar said in announcing the new moratorium. "I am basing my decision on evidence that grows every day of the industry's inability in the deep-water to contain a catastrophic blowout, respond to an oil spill, and to operate safely."

The new moratorium was panned by industry groups and supported by environmentalists.

Last week, a federal appeals court rejected the government's effort to restore its initial offshore deep-water drilling moratorium, which was issued after the catastrophic Gulf oil spill in April. The moratorium was blocked first last month by U.S. District Judge Martin Feldman.

The Justice Department said Monday that it will file a motion with the U.S. District Court seeking a dismissal of that case, because the old moratorium is no longer operative, making the challenge moot. The department also will ask the appeals court to set aside Feldman's order of last month.

COMMENT:  There doesn't appear to be much science or engineering behind the administration's obsession with a ban.  The ban appears designed more to pacify a political constituency than to meet a need.  What else is new with this crowd? 

No one denies the horror of the Gulf oil spill, and BP will be paying big time.  But we need petroleum.  The administration has been trying to sell us on "new energy sources," and that's fine.  But those new sources won't be doing the job for decades, and many will probably never pan out. 

The drilling moratorium will make us even more dependent on foreign oil, a dependence the Obamans say they're trying to lessen.  Drilling policy should be determined by hard calculations and engineering studies, not by political favoritism and ideological zeal. 

Oh wait, this is the Obama administration, isn't it?

July 13, 2010