Federal Judge Slaps Down Obama's 6 Month Drilling Ban

New Orleans - District Judge Martin Feldman overturned a
Presidential order that imposed a 6-month moratorium on
deepwater drilling in the Gulf.

He held that President Barack Obama acted "rashly" when he
assumed that because Transocean's Deepwater Horizon exploded
and sank as the reult of a blowout of a British Petroleum
well, 33 others in very deep water would, too.

The President also cancelled permits for any new deepwater
wells.

Companies that service, supply and transport personnel and
goods to the platforms asked for injunctive relief to
overturn the President's moratorium.

Their grounds consisted primarily of the argument that he
had reacted arbitrarily after the blowout and explosion that
has so far resulted in varying estimates of crude in the
neighborhood of between 60 and 120 millions of gallons
spewing into the water unchecked.

In siding with the companies, the judge wrote, "What seems
clear is the the federal government has been pressed by what
happened on the Deepwater Horizon into an otherwise sweeping
confirmation that all Gulf deepwater drilling activities put
us all in a universal threat of irreparable harm."

The White House promised an immediate appeal.

Petroleum executives meeting in London earlier in the day
warned that the moratorium will cripple the industry and
cause undue economic hardship throughout the world.