It's high time that all the President's friends in liberal places raise a toast to his excellent handling of the Gulf Oil Crisis. With amazing aplomb the President has turned an oil spill into just the type of political problem he relishes. He's used the tragedy to reduce off-shore drilling, castigate big business and push for a whole new set of rules and regulations to glom onto those that haven't worked and in the nick of time sent in the attorneys. Of course little cleaning has been done and the horrible mess grows worse.

All the while, the media has paid scant attention to the willful refusal of his administration to protect the American people and their environment. Rather than embracing all possible efforts to contain and clean the spill, his administration seems to enjoy the sight of oily birds. New information from the Houston Chronicle would seem to buttress the argument that something scandalous is afoot.

Three days after the explosion of the Deepwater Horizon in the Gulf of Mexico, the Dutch government offered to help.

It was willing to provide ships outfitted with oil-skimming booms, and it proposed a plan for building sand barriers to protect sensitive marshlands.

The response from the Obama administration and BP, which are coordinating the cleanup: “The embassy got a nice letter from the administration that said, ‘Thanks, but no thanks,'” said Geert Visser, consul general for the Netherlands in Houston.

Now, almost seven weeks later, as the oil spewing from the battered well spreads across the Gulf and soils pristine beaches and coastline, BP and our government have reconsidered.

U.S. ships are being outfitted this week with four pairs of the skimming booms airlifted from the Netherlands and should be deployed within days. Each pair can process 5 million gallons of water a day, removing 20,000 tons of oil and sludge.

At that rate, how much more oil could have been removed from the Gulf during the past month?

It's high time congressional republicans begin demanding answers as to why the administration has blocked the clean-up. While the administration wants to deflect the blame for the mess to British Petroleum the evidence is mounting that it's been a willing accomplice. The public deserves to know who in the administration has been making these decisions. Who specifically rebuffed the Dutch? And on who's authority did they act? Indeed, what did the President know, and when did he know it? This and dozens of other clean-up measures have been wantonly thrown under the bus. Not even Hollywood's own Kevin Costner could get his oil separation product the attention it deserves.

What if, instead of oil, the nation were under a military attack? How would this administration respond? Would it conscious a few destroyed cities if that fit nicely into a political narrative? Would it retaliate with bombs or lawyers? Or lots of speeches, whining, foot-dragging and blaming?

Bill Weckesser