McDonnell — a staunch proponent of drilling off of Virginia's coast — was asked yesterday by conservative radio host Laura Ingraham how he would rate the Obama administration's response.
"I think there's lapses probably across the board," McDonnell said, taking a measured stance amid criticism from members of both political parties of the Obama administration's response to the worst oil spill in the nation's history.
"Obviously there wasn't a good back-up plan for BP or any of the industry . . . for when these blowout preventers don't work. They're scrambling for alternatives right now," he said.
The Republican governor maintains that there needs to be an investigation into what went wrong in the Gulf and how to keep it from happening again. Subsequent to necessary changes, he thinks the Obama administration should reconsider allowing Virginia to drill for oil and natural gas 50 miles off its coast.
This state was first in line on the Atlantic Coast until Thursday, when the Obama administration canceled the proposed lease sale and zapped a potential funding source for McDonnell's plan to fix the state's roads.
McDonnell said yesterday that there were insufficient requirements imposed by the federal government on companies for how to clean up a massive deepwater spill.
"There is a probably collective failure across the board from the public and the private sector response," he said. And I think the job right now is to get that done without excuse and without delay."
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