President Barack Obama's most recent piece of performance art has him saying his meetings on the oil spill crisis are to figure out "whose ass to kick." According to Louisiana's LaFource Parish President Charlotte Randolph, he's already started kicking and the target is not the hindquarters of any oil company exec, contractor or corrupt government official - it's the people he's supposed to be helping.

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Asked Thursday about the administration's recent decision to place a six month moratorium on deepwater offshore oil drilling, Ms. Randolph said, "The other morning I heard he was looking for some butt to kick. What he doesn't realize is that he is kicking our butts right now. We can recover from all the storms we have had in the past. We are managing the oil. We can't over come this overriding issue this moratorium now." (source)

Yet another example of President Obama's uncanny ability to deal with any problem by making it worse (see health care reform, the unemployment rate, the political careers of his fellow Democrats, etc).

Parish President Randolph was one of the local officials who toured the oil damaged area with the president last week and believes she and her constituents are being used to push the Obama energy agenda. While she agrees with the idea of shifting to alternative energy sources, she is calling for a more realistic approach than that of the administration, "Don't penalize the entire industry. Don't paint it with a broad brush and say everyone is evil out here. These people are my friends. These people are my neighbors. I know that they care about the environment...Be realistic about this. You're hurting people."

"Yeah," she added, "I think we are being used to push their agenda."

In addition to using the people directly affected by the oil spill as legislative pawns and props for photo ops, President Obama attempted to use the deaths of the eleven crewmen killed when the Deepwater Horizon rig exploded to show his warm fuzzy side. As usual, he couldn't quite pull it off.

While he did eventually meet with the victims' families at the White House, the president did not attend the May 25 memorial service in Jackson, Mississippi. Was he too busy with the duties of his office? Not exactly. According to his official schedule, at the time of the memorial service he was en route to a San Francisco fundraiser for Senator Barbara Boxer (D-California). (source)

A slap in the face of victims' families, kicking the butts of Gulf coast residents and business owners...this is the Obama brand of leadership in a crisis.