Scandal at the Department of the Interior
Wow, this is one heck of a scandal at the Department of the Interior’s Minerals Management Service. Here’s a taste:
Two other reports focus on “a culture of substance abuse and promiscuity” and unethical behavior in the service’s royalty-in-kind program. That part of the agency collects about $4 billion a year in the form of oil and gas rather than cash royalties.
Modeled on a private-sector energy company, the decade-old royalty-in-kind program transports, processes and resells the oil and gas on the open market. But while its officials interact with energy company executives, they are subject to government ethics rules, such as restrictions on taking gifts from sources with whom they conduct official business.
One of the reports says that the officials viewed themselves as exempt from those limits, indulging themselves in the expense-account-fueled world of oil and gas executives.
There’s much more beyond that. Note that I’m pretty sure these are the guys who will be supervising our new paradise of continental shelf drilling. But I’m sure that electing a new chief executive from the same political party as the current one, who shares the same close ties to the same oil and gas companies that make the donations that allow them to hire the same political operatives, will be just the thing to turn this kind of problem around. You know what they say — if it first you don’t succeed, try again with a different guy who has the same ideas and associates.
28 Responses to “Scandal at the Department of the Interior”
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September 10th, 2008 at 8:52 pm
Clearly we need Todd Palin in there to clean this all up.
September 10th, 2008 at 8:57 pm
The oil deposits belong to the US Taxpayer. Ask the Indians what happens when you depend upon the Great White Father in Washington to handle your royalty checks.
September 10th, 2008 at 8:59 pm
You only say that because you are from New York. If you came from a small town–small towns full of people with honesty and sincerity and dignity–then you’d know better.
September 10th, 2008 at 9:02 pm
Man, how did I miss that job posting?
September 10th, 2008 at 9:05 pm
You know, I thought the administration was in bed with the oil industry. But I didn’t realize that they were, literally, in bed with the oil industry.
September 10th, 2008 at 9:21 pm
Teapot Dome ‘08!
This time it’s personal!
September 10th, 2008 at 9:23 pm
sounds like someone was laying a lot of pipe and checking a lot of oil!
might be best to rename it the Department of Interiority
September 10th, 2008 at 9:42 pm
I just hate seeing substance abuse and promiscuity linked to unethical behavior.
September 10th, 2008 at 9:45 pm
This is just the start I bet. this just started coming out…
September 10th, 2008 at 9:49 pm
Jeesh — and I thought we in the public were getting f***ed by the oil industry…
September 10th, 2008 at 9:58 pm
This scandal involves career civil servants, not political appointees. Matt would know that if he bothered to glance at the reports. He’d rather just make shit up.
September 10th, 2008 at 10:04 pm
Blaming this on the politicals at Interior is not totally accurate. This one ends up being mostly about how some ridiculously fucking stupid career people acted when they got a taste of the big oil corporate culture. It’s also not totally innacurate, in that the republican political leadership at Interior has not exactly set the highest ethical bar over the last few years (*cough* GaleNortonJStevenGriles *cough*.)
September 10th, 2008 at 10:08 pm
I have worked in the oil industry for 27 years and believe me that is not the norm for well run companies either. Random drug testing for all employees is common in most major oil companies and gifts from supplies is subject to many well enforced rules and firing do happen. Not like the early 80’s when I was starting out when things were much more”relaxed”.
September 10th, 2008 at 10:45 pm
I just found out that the top bidder for a US offshore drilling lease is Statoil, the Norwegian state-oil company. I guess it’s OK for the people of Norway to take the lion’s share of the profits from oil offshore the US but not for the people of the US to do the same. I’m thinking the concept of the nation-state isn’t working so well here in America. We’re militant about national resources going to third parties like Exxon, so militant that we’ll fight wars of choice to defend that right. Then we lease our own oil to the people of Norway.
http://www.canada.com/edmontonjournal/news/business/story.html?id=daaa3ae0-43e8-4bc5-acb5-17fe84e8ce64
September 10th, 2008 at 10:58 pm
When I was young it was “sex, drugs, rock & roll”.
Now those hip Bush/Cheney folks have turned it into a 21st century/Haliburton version ….. “sex, drugs, gas & oil”.
Simply amazing!!!
September 10th, 2008 at 11:01 pm
I worked at the Interior Department as an attorney from 1982-1986. It was kind of weird that I got hired because once I was there I learned that the department even then (under James Watt) was pretty thoroughly politicized. They were forcing out people who didn’t share their political views, and hiring new people who did. What is weird is that my political views are quite liberal so I don’t know how I passed the political test. I think it’s because the guy who hired me thought it elevated him to hire lawyers with big law firm experience.
It was clear even then that career people who really cared were on the way out. I had some really smart bosses who had been there a while and really knew their stuff. Within 5-6 years they were all gone and replaced by people who were more malleable. I know there was a shift again during Clinton, but I don’t think the Department fully recovered from the rotten politicization.
The other thing is that the field offices were always like little kingdoms. Most people hated being assigned to Washington. They always did pretty much what they wanted in the field.
It’s so many years I no longer have any friends who work there, but I’m not surprised to see this corruption. The seeds were there twenty years ago, and the processes and people who would have kept it in check have been long gone.From what I’ve seen, the rot in the Federal bureaucracy has actually grown much worse during the Bush years.
September 10th, 2008 at 11:03 pm
Two quotes from the NYT article on this
1. “In discussions with investigators, the report said, Mr. Smith acknowledged buying cocaine from his secretary ”
2. “A Justice Department spokeswoman, Laura Sweeney, declined to explain why prosecutors chose not to bring charges against Ms. Denett or Mr. Smith, citing departmental policy.”
Can somebody explain that to me?
September 10th, 2008 at 11:22 pm
Can somebody explain that to me?
It was CIA coke?
September 11th, 2008 at 2:08 am
I guess it’s OK for the people of Norway to take the lion’s share of the profits from oil offshore the US but not for the people of the US to do the same.
Well, given that the Norwegians (and the British) are the ones with the most expertise and infrastructure in offshore development, they’re basically the only people available if you want to drill here, drill now, drill baby drill, etc. Plus, they have the advantage of exchange rates to make competitive bids.
I mentioned this at Ezra’s place last month. Most of the Norwegian and British riggers who aren’t working the North Sea are busy working off the coast of Nigeria, pretty much every US-based drill-ship is booked solid, and there’s a long wait for new rigs.
The GOP seems to be under the belief that you can suck all the oil out from under the seabed with a long drinking straw.
September 11th, 2008 at 7:41 am
Why the heck isn’t Obama on the air, like, yesterday with an ad shamelessly pinning this on McCain / Palin, or at least on Bush/Republican and going back to the line of “more of the same”? That’s how you get coverage, that’s how you shape the narrative. Press conferences by every democrat in state legislatures–_especially_ in Colorado.
September 11th, 2008 at 8:11 am
Wait till they start going thru the BIA in some level of detail. I thought this would come out years ago.
September 11th, 2008 at 10:26 am
Matt, you missed the money quote:
anon, got a link or explanation?
September 11th, 2008 at 4:13 pm
pseudonymous in nc – GRRRREAT links. Thanks.
September 11th, 2008 at 4:42 pm
joejoejoe: you’re welcome. There are a couple of big unmentionables around the ‘drill here, drill now’: that the infrastructure capacity isn’t there right now, and even if it was, those best positioned to supply it at short notice aren’t American. There’s a good discussion at The Oil Drum on the pros and cons, also.
(You’ll find a lot of Brits and Norwegians in Houston and thereabouts connected to the offshore arms of US oil companies, on account of their expertise: 30-odd years’ focus on the North Sea matters here.)
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