A2 Politics & The Nation
Prosecution, defense paint very different pictures of Blagojevich......A5 High court rejects Fla. waterfront property owners’ argument ........A10 Indictment: Times Square bombing suspect was paid by Taliban ....A13 Nation Digest Utah readies firing squad for condemned murderer .......................A3
GULF COAST OIL SPILL
LSU, FSU experts answer questions about the oil spill ........................A7 BP hosted 53 fundraisers for lawmakers, candidates since 2008 .......A8
The World For migrants, a dangerous trip through Mexico .................................A16 Israel eases restrictions on goods bound for Gaza Strip.....................A18 Foreign Digest Ultra-Orthodox Jews protest school ruling .....................................A16
Economy & Business
On eve of G-20 economic summit, Obama seeks cooperation ..........A20 New Democrat Coalition opposed to derivatives-spinoff plan..........A22 Business Digest Demand for imports helps widen trade deficit...............................A20 Market summary....................................................................................A25
The Fed Page In the Loop Media types best congressional team in women’s softball game...A16
Opinion
L. Michael Hager: Mediating our way out of gridlock........................A27 Editorial: A dangerous squabble on Metro governance ....................A28 Eugene Robinson: A deadline to keep in Afghanistan .......................A29 Charles Krauthammer: Obama’s fuzzy vision thing...........................A29
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Hayward, came to testify before Congress. Capitol Police lined the driveway to the Rayburn building, scores of photographers staked out every corner, and aspiring hecklers slept in line overnight to be assured they would get a seat in the hearing room. But what nobody could have anticipated is that the spectacle would have little to do with the Englishman at the witness table. The radioactivity came, rather, from the top row of the dais, where Joe Barton, the top Republican on the House Energy and Commerce Committee, gave a most unusual opening statement. “I’m ashamed of what happened in the White House yesterday,” the Texan said of BP’s offer, under pressure from President Obama, to set aside $20 billion to pay damages to Gulf Coast residents ruined by the oil spill. “I think it is a tragedy of the first proportion that a private corporation can be subjected to what I would characterize as a shakedown.” Heads of the other committee members spun, cartoon-like, in the direction of Barton. Rep. Diana DeGette (D-Colo.) froze, her coffee cup suspended equidistant between tabletop and lips. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.), the panel chairman, scrunched his face and shook his head as though he had just witnessed a bloody wreck. In a sense, he had. And Barton
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wasn’t done. The $20 billion BP would pay to those who are now out of work because of the spill is a “slush fund,” he said. Then he did the unthinkable: He apologized to the man whose company is destroying a large piece of the nation. “I apologize,” he said, adding that he doesn’t “want to live in a country” that does such things to poor BP. There, in front of the cameras, one of the most senior
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KLMNO Apparently blood isn’t thicker than oil
verybody knew there would be a spectacle when BP’s chief executive, Tony
Finally, about five hours after the hearing began, Rep. Cliff Stearns (R-Fla.) came up with a question Hayward could answer. “Is today Thursday?” the congressman asked. “ ’Tis Thursday,” the Englishman answered. The performance brought a
RICKY CARIOTI/THE WASHINGTON POST Rep. Joe Barton did the unthinkable: He apologized to BP.
himself from the man who had just apologized to him. “I certainly didn’t think it was a slush fund,” the executive said. Had Barton resisted his
DANA MILBANK Washington Sketch
Republicans in the House had suffered an acute attack of Obama Derangement Syndrome. The president had just secured from a British oil company a promise to set aside $20 billion to help devastated Americans — and Barton had sided with the firm that has devastated the Gulf of Mexico. Suddenly, the hearing was not about Hayward. Rep. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) chucked his opening statement and instead gave an extemporaneous address rebuking Barton. Rep. Michael Burgess (Tex.), the ranking Republican on the subcommittee conducting the hearing, felt the need to tell Hayward: “I am not going to apologize to you.” Even Hayward distanced
instinct to apologize to BP, he probably would have lost the urge by the end of the hearing. Hayward proved himself to be a most unsympathetic witness, walking into the committee hearing room with something resembling a saunter and listening to members of the panel with something resembling a smirk. His answers suggested he thinks his American cousins are a little slow. “I’m not a cement engineer,
I’m afraid,” he said when asked about the well casing. “I’m not an oceanographic scientist,” he said when asked about the oil plumes. “I’m not a drilling engineer or a technically qualified engineer,” he replied when pressed further for answers.
By the end, the Q&A had become little more than a collection of “I don’ts” (55 mentions), “I’m nots” (42), “I can’ts” (28) and scores more “I wasn’ts,” “I haven’ts” and the like.
rare convergence of opinion from Republicans and Democrats alike as condemnations rained down: “I find that irresponsible. . . . You’re copping out. . . . You’re stalling, you’re insulting our intelligence.” Hayward spun his pen with his fingers and flapped his knees back and forth under the table as if doing a frog kick. This was not an ideal day to be apologizing to BP and its CEO. In recent days, Republicans had begun to side with the company against the Obama administration’s efforts to hold it accountable. Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Minn.) said BP “shouldn’t have to be fleeced.” Sarah Palin said “we can’t afford to demonize” the firm. At Thursday’s hearing, Rep.
Parker Griffith (R-Ala.) gamely asserted that the spill “is not going to be the worst thing that’s ever happened to America” and mentioned that “the greatest environmental disaster in America has been cigarettes.” But efforts to defend BP ceased during the hearing, as Hayward squandered any goodwill that had been shown to the company after Wednesday’s decision to set up the escrow fund. Barton, who departed the room shortly after his apology and was later rebuked by GOP leaders, returned late in the hearing to revise and extend his remarks. “If anything I’ve said this morning has been misconstrued,” he said, “I want to apologize for that misconstrued — misconstruction.” The Texan shouldn’t have been so hard on himself. It’s no small feat to turn Tony Hayward into the second-least-popular person in the room.
danamilbank@washpost.com Gates reassures lawmakers on new arms treaty with Russia by Walter Pincus Defense Secretary Robert M.
Gates told lawmakers Thursday that the United States continues to encourage Russia to join a Eu- ropean missile-defense system intended to counter the threat posed by Iranian missiles. He also sought to reassure Republicans that the United States would not agree to Russian efforts to limit the U.S. missile-defense capabili- ty.
“Whatever talks are going on are simply about trying to elicit their [Russian] willingness to partner with us, along with the
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Europeans, in terms of a regional missile defense,” Gates said, ap- pearing before the Senate Armed Services Committee to support ratification of the recently signed U.S.-Russian Strategic Arms Re- duction Treaty. “But there is noth- ing in the approaches that have been made to the Russians that in any way, shape or form would im- pose any limits whatsoever on our plans.” Gates was responding to a question from Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) about a press report of secret negotiations with Moscow involving missile defense. Republican senators have voiced concerns that the new
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treaty limits U.S. missile defense programs, a theme repeated at other hearings as the administra- tion works to gain GOP support to reach the 67 votes needed for ratification. The treaty’s critics on the mis-
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CORRECTIONS
publican on the committee, said he needs “to be confident that the treaty in no way limits the admin- istration’s ability and willingness to deploy missile defense capabil- ities, regardless of the statements made by the Russian govern- ment.” Gates sought to ease McCain’s concern. “The Russians can say what they want. If it’s not in the treaty, it’s not binding on the United States,” he said. Secretary of State Hillary Rod-
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ham Clinton, who also appeared at the hearing, pointed out that Russia remained part of the origi- nal START agreement even after the administration of President George W. Bush withdrew from a missile-defense pact. Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told lawmakers the U.S. had no intention of using current ICBM launchers as part of any missile defense system, ar- guing that the treaty article had no impact on the program. Sen. Saxby Chambliss (R-Ga.) called the missile-defense issue more important than the agree- ment on nuclear weapons be- cause of the threats from a nu- clear-armed rogue nation or ter- rorist group. He sought an assurance that 10 years from now, the United States would deploy a missile interceptor in the planned European system that could knock down an ICBM even if the Russians objected. Gates assured Chambliss that he would recommend deploying the interceptor, “especially if we’re unsuccessful in stopping Iran from building nuclear weap- ons.”
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