I’ll get back to blogging in a day or two, I promise. Meanwhile — how about that Rep. Joe Barton, R-TX? Barton, who takes a whole lot of money from the Petroleum Industry, got his “shakedown” line from a GOP press release, btw.

Meanwhile, Tony Hayward went to Congress and did an Alberto Gonzales imitation. Didn’t go over well, though.

Comment away.

Update: Underwhelmed. I was expecting more.

The President is supposed to take charge of the oil spill in a major speech tonight, but until then let’s just gossip about Rand Paul.

First off, I hope you didn’t miss the juicy bit about Rand not being a board-certified ophthalmologist, as he had claimed. He’s certified by a board, the National Board of Ophthalmology. But the National Board of Ophthalmology is a board Rand set up himself about ten years ago and runs out of a post office box in Bowling Green, Kentucky. He is not certified by the American Board of Ophthalmology, which is the official board that certifies ophthalmologists.

Apparently he had claimed to have been certified by both boards, but fibbed. When asked about this, the best excuse he could come up with was “what does that have to do with the election?”

The other juicy bit was brought up by Dave Neiwert over the weekend. It’s been a few years since I’ve been to Kentucky, but I’ve always found it beautiful in its way. But what is making it not so beautiful is mountaintop coal mining, the kind of mining that takes off the tops of mountains and doesn’t put them back.

So here’s our boy Rand on mountaintop removal:

PAUL: I think whoever owns the property can do with the property as they wish, and if the coal company buys it from a private property owner and they want to do it, fine. The other thing I think is that I think coal gets a bad name, because I think a lot of the land apparently is quite desirable once it’s been flattened out. As I came over here from Harlan, you’ve got quite a few hills. I don’t think anybody’s going to be missing a hill or two here and there.

And some people like having the flat land. Some of it apparently has become quite valuable when it’s become flattened. And I think they do a good job at reclaiming the land, and you know, adding back in topsoil, bringing in help. So the bottom line is, it’s not just me pandering to coal. It’s me believing in private property.

Now, the part about “some people” liking the flat land and claiming it becomes “quite valuable” when it is flattened is hallucinatory. Yes, the excuse the coal companies trot out for leaving the former mountain tops barren is that the flattened land is ready to be “developed.” Developed by whom, pray tell, and for what? Many of these mining areas are too sparsely populated, and too far off the beaten path, to support a bunch of shopping malls or housing developments. And the land doesn’t offer much else in the way of resources, except that it used to be pretty. Dave has some graphics showing how much of the land has not been “reclaimed,” and data that says only 4 percent of “flattened” land in Appalachia has been “developed” in any way.

The thing is, how can you live in Kentucky and not know this? Put another way, how far up his ass has Rand shoved his head?

The other major factor of mountain removal is that the mining operations pollute water for miles around. Rand is in denial about this, saying that if it were true, “local judges” would stop it. But the fact is that “local judges” have no authority to do anything about it, and many hundreds of miles of mountain creeks and streams have been polluted.

Are you hearing this, Kentucky?

I’m not feeling up to writing much, but I want to note this news article in the New York Times —

President Obama for the first time will address the nation about the ongoing oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico on Tuesday night and outline his plans to legally force BP executives to create an escrow account reserving billions of dollars to compensate businesses and individuals if the company does not do so on its own, a senior administration official said on Sunday.

This is good, because claims against BP are going to be tied up in court for years and years, and the people whose livelihoods are being ruined don’t have years and years to wait for compensation.

I understand that Republicans are still pushing for continued drilling and are trying to make the lost jobs of the rig workers an issue. But what about the lost jobs of shrimp boat workers, hotel cooks, and most of the state of Florida?

I don’t think “drill, baby, drill” is workin’ for folks around here, but what’s it like where you live?

Now they’re complaining that President Obama hasn’t picked up the phone, or the blackberry as it were, and called BP CEO Tony Hayward.

Call me crazy, but I think a POTUS outranks a CEO, and as the person responsible for fowling fouling up U.S. waters and beaches I think protocol calls for Tony Hayward to phone President Obama, or whoever in the White House will take the call, not the other way around. And apologizing. Profusely. A little abject groveling wouldn’t have hurt, either.

Agence France Presse reports that BP’s chairman, Carl-Henric Svanberg, has been summoned to the White House to discuss the spill. Rightie Don Suber complains, “instead of talking to the man in charge, he will be talking to the chairman of the board that oversees the man in charge.”

Um, yes.

Suber, by the way, thinks President Sarah Palin would have done a better job dealing with the oil spill. So much for Suber.

Not that President Obama is blameless in this mess. He’s been caught flatfooted by the whole thing, obviously. I have been reading the Rolling Stone article by Tim Dickinson, “The Spill, the Scandal and the President,” and think on the whole it’s a fair assessment, although I haven’t made it all the way through the thing yet.

A couple of days ago some rightie bloggers were high-fiving each other over the Dickenson piece. They especially liked the word “scandal” in the headline. But what has struck me is that Obama has reacted too much as a conservative would have reacted.

First, the White House seems to have assumed BP knew what it was doing and could stop the leak.

Second, the Obama Administration had not cleaned house at the US Minerals Management Service (MMS), but had left in place way too many Bush appointees, people who are too cozy with the oil business to supervise them.

The White House is allowing BP to continue drilling at another deepwater site off the coast of Louisiana, and there is reason to believe that rig is just as likely to have a meltdown as Deepwater Horizon was.

For once, the people who say Obama is “no better than Bush” aren’t too far off the mark, as far as Deepwater Horizon is concerned. The only difference is that Obama has publicly taken responsibility for government’s response to the disaster, and there is no Karl Rove-type operative in the White House trying to use the mess for political advantage. Oh, and so far, President Obama hasn’t posed for a camera wearing a tool belt.

Update: Unrelated to the oil spill — William Kristol has learned that the Obama Administration will support an anti-Israel statement at the UN next week. Alas, if Kristol says this, just the opposite will happen.

I’m short of blogging time this week, but there are some short bits. First, I like this ad —

More stuff to read — “The Case for Calling Them Nitwits“; billionaire criminals as the new political outsiders; the anti-tax Right wants taxpayers to pay for the oil spill.

Today is a primary day, so there will be much to talk about tonight. TPM has a primary primer.

Today’s Obama Outrage: Two junior White House staffers were caught playing beer pong on Sunday! And they were shirtless (and male, note)! (See photo if the link works.)

Update: I am really tired and will not be sitting up for returns, but keep talking among yourselves. I will catch up in the morning.

“Israel and the psychology of ‘never again‘” by Sandy Tolan describes the wrong turn Israel has been making for several years.

Why does Israel continue to act against its own interests?

Over the years, and especially since 2006, the Jewish state’s deadly, over-the-top military actions in response to provocations from Hamas and Hezbollah — and now from a flotilla ferrying humanitarian aid to Gaza — have backfired. And in each case, the Jewish state has grown less secure by increasing its international isolation and fueling fury much closer to home.

From here Tolan lists the many hand-handed attempts Israel has made over the years to wipe out its enemies through military force, but which makes its enemies stronger. Tolan then gives an explanation —

None of this is in Israel’s interest, of course. So why does Israel persist in such behavior?

One answer: The country is stuck in the political psychology of “never again.” The Jewish state appears so trapped by the wounds of its own terrible history that it keeps repeating its past mistakes of excessive force, even though it knows these will only isolate it and therefore weaken it further. In this way, the politics of trauma drive the nation ever further from the safe harbor that ordinary Israelis have so long craved and never enjoyed.

I’ve believed this for some time. It’s the only rational explanation for Israel’s irrational policies. See also “Chosen, but Not Special,” by Michael Chabon.

More: Mark Halperin, “How Obama’s Enemies May Help Give Him a Boost.”