Obama Had Better Not Flub Hurricane Isaac

You may want to top your tank off tomorrow. It could be that cutting short the convention by one day as the Republicans have done will nothing compared to the damage Hurricane Isaac may inflict on Obama. The hurricane damage inflicted by Katrina caused oil prices to increase from the mid-$60s per barrel to over $70/bbl and gasoline prices at the pump rocketed to near $5 a gallon in some areas of the country. Now oil prices are already trending up and a barrel of WTI crude is trading in the $97 range. For certain Bill O'Reilly will soon begin his usual tirade against big oil and Obama will have a ready excuse to release crude from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve.
Regardless of the damage done to the offshore rigs, and it should be minimal, they will have to be evacuated and out of production for a week so the price of oil will surge in the short term. What should make Obama queasy is the possibility that Isaac will hit New Orleans but it could be worse. Considering the lack of competence endemic in this administration even a category one hurricane may be more than it can deal with. Most likely team Obama is lighting vigil candles and praying that Isaac hits deep red Louisiana instead battleground Florida. Flubbing a recovery in Pensacola-Destin with Governors Jeb Bush and Rick Scott pointing out each misstep to Gator State voters might make Obama long for the outrage his administration received after the BP oil spill. If hurricane damage is not addressed and addressed promptly Florida voters won't give a damn about Sandra Fluke's condoms when she speaks in Charlotte.
Hurricane, oil, and Obama have played a large part in permanently changing the political geography of Louisiana. Even after Katrina Louisiana gave John McCain 58.6% of its vote. Part of the reason for that was New Orleans, a Democratic stronghold lost population after Katrina-about 140,000. Then came the BP oil spill, this administration's only chance to date to prove that Barack Obama is a good man to have around in an emergency. As a professor of communications at LSU put it; “I don’t hear anyone talk as bad about BP as they do about the moratorium,” he said. “People in Louisiana, Democrats and Republicans, saw it as an intrusion into their way of life.” After the 2010 elections the Democrats still maintained a majority in the legislature but that changed when one representative switched parties and gave Republican control of the Louisiana House for the first time since Reconstruction. Good show Obama! On to Florida!
Even though there are 1.2 million Democrats and 879,000 Republicans Senator Mary Landrieu is the only Democrat presently holding statewide office. That's change we can believe in!