should we do? i think it s going to have a significant impact on the mid terms. to say that it s obama s katrina, what do you say that to that? certainly that is on the mind of senior administration officials. they want to be very active. they have various agencies as molly was reporting, down there. they want to be as responsive as they can. i think it s too early for that. this is going to be very bad and prolonged story for the white house. they have to make sure they can do everything they can. this is bad news for them because they didn t act as swiftly as they could have. some are suggest the way to stave off problems is basically to federalize for the government to jump in quickly but. what is your reaction to that? the federal government still has significant authority. when this happens, certainly bp has to pick up the price tag, but the federal government as of
one, we need funding approval from bp. second, we need authorization from the incident commander. let me tell you what i m talking about. the contingency plans to be approved by the coastguard and bp so we re not in position to request booms in one place or the other. we have to empower the locals on the ground. they have the know-how to protect their communities. i ll goif you two specific examples. bp and coastguard proved that parish s president plan in absence of an effective plan. we got the approval today. we literally asked secretary napolitano to expedite approval of this plan. we and congressman made a request to bp and directly to secretary napolitano to approve the plan for another parish, as well. let me detail you the plan. it s in a place where they are going to jack up barges that can serve as stable go areas to
understandable to some people out there. gregg: everybody has a bad round. i was watching some of it yesterday. he missed the cut by eight strokes. it s totally unlike him. everybody has a bad day. it s been a touch year for him. it was 9 collapse of this platform, take a look at that, that started an environmental emergency in the gulf of mexico. coming up, we re going to directly hear in bp the company that says they are going pay for the cleanup. they don t have any choice, it s federal law. should they pay penalties on top of that? i have diabetes, and sometimes i wonder
worry. let s go live to jonathan in day finish island, alabama. a bp representative met with commercial fishermen this afternoon. what happened? reporter: that s right. that meeting took place at the nearby town and you had commercial fishermen, some local elected officials meeting with the bp representative. she was updating them on the situation and also letting them know how they could get involved and also how they could recover losses. at times, the meeting was contentious. let me say this, as your friend, if you take one penny from bp, you make sure you don t sign a release form cause if you take a dollar from them, they make you sign a release form, if this thing lasts for ten years, you can forget about it. reporter: during that meeting, the company representative enlisted the help of fishermen to use their boats to help lay some of the protective oil containment booms, as well as getting
oil spill. take a listen. one of the things the president wants to make sure is that we re not going to rest until these leaks are stopped, the well is killed, and oil is cleaned up. reporter: the president already has sent his homeland security secretary, his interior secretary, and the epa administrator to the region to oversee the federal response. gregg: the department of defense, are they part of the national guard? yes. defense secretary robert gates mobilized the louisiana national guard to go to the region as well. defense spokesman says the guard will, quote, help in the ongoing efforts to assist local communities in the cleanup and removal of oil, and to protect critical habitats from contamination. as the responsible party in this incident, the government will hold bp accountable for the cost of this deployment. and we ve also learned that the pentagon will send two c 130 aircraft to the gulf region on request of the coast guard to help spray a chemical to try to