Barack Obama is Engaged & in Charge of BP Oil Spill … Yet Not Sure if the MMS Director Birnbaum was Fired or Resigned

Once again we are witness with the Obama Administration that talk is cheap …

President Barack Hussein Obama and his crack staff have been on the BP Oil spill since day one, or so they say in their talking points. No amount of spin and double talk is going to be able to get Obama out of this one. No teleprompter speech will save him, the visuals of this oil spill and his obvious lack of leadership is far too powerful.

We need to look no further than yesterday’s presser by Obama, the first one in 308 days, to understand why the BP oil spill is considered his Hurricane Katrina. After his minions going out on the talk shows and telling us that they have been on this since day one and Obama yesterday telling us that he is engaged and thinks about this situation from the time he wakes up until the time he goes to sleep, we are presented with the following.

If President Obama is so engaged in the BP oil spill and it’s his every consuming thought … why didn’t he know whether MMS Director Birnbaum was fired or resigned when asked yesterday at the press conference? This is exactly the lack of leadership that has both the LEFT and the RIGHT criticizing you, and rightfully so.

After solemnly insisting that “the federal government is fully engaged and I’m fully engaged,” The One admits he’s … not quite sure what happened with the head of MMS this morning because he was busy with a bunch of other important stuff at the time. Like, for instance, meeting with the Duke basketball team. In fairness, it’s not entirely clear even now whether Birnbaum jumped or was pushed: Officially she resigned but sources tell CNN she was fired. Even so, given the growing public contempt for MMS’s embarrassingly shoddy oversight, I’m amazed he didn’t seize this as an opportunity for a “damn right I ordered the code red on Birnbaum” moment. On a day when the public’s desperately looking for authority and accountability, he’s flatly admitting that he’s out of the loop. Great work, champ. No wonder critics as far afield as Karl Rove and USA Today are whispering the dreaded K-word.

Chris Matthews took him to task, VIDEO. Matthews said, “this is more important than a Presidency … He does not seem to be taking ownership.”

The Politico writes that Obama critics don’t know the facts, really? Funny, Obama did not know whether his MMS director was fired or resigned. Wouldn’t those be the facts as well? Obama claims that he knew from the beginning of the potential enormity of the situation and this is how he dealt with the problem. Imagine if he didn’t realize the enormity how he would have conducted himself?

“Those who think that we were either slow in our responses or lacked urgency don’t know the facts. This has been our highest priority since this crisis occurred,” Obama said during a rare news conference in the White House East Room. “We understood from day one the potential enormity of this crisis and acted accordingly.”

Amid escalating complaints of buck-passing between the well’s owner, BP, and federal officials, Obama also said that he understands that, when it comes to ending the spill, the buck stops with him.

“In case you were wondering who’s responsible? I take responsibility. It is my job to make sure everything is done to shut this down,” Obama said, directly addressing criticism that he hasn’t been more personally involved.

“There shouldn’t be any confusion here: the federal government is fully engaged and I’m fully engaged,” he said.

Engaged indeed … no one on the LEFT, RIGHT or CENTER believes that.