Bruce Vincent, chairman of the Independent Petroleum Association of America and president of Houston-based Swift Energy, said Feldman was right to block a "misguided, hastily implemented moratorium" that "fundamentally failed to recognize how critical America's oil and natural gas industry is to the livelihoods of so many Gulf families." (Houston Chronicle, 6/23/10)

Bruce Vincent, chairman of the Independent Petroleum Association of America, said: "Today's ruling is important for America's independent oil and natural gas producers, for our nation's energy security, and for the Gulf Coast's struggling economy." (Politico, 6/22/10)

"Our real concern in this whole process, with seemingly every day bringing new changes, is the uncertainty that happens," said Dan Naatz, vice president of political affairs at the Independent Petroleum Association of America. "What the practical impacts are going to be, how people are going to move forward in this uncertain legal and regulatory environment, is still out there." (Platts' Gas Daily, 6/24/10)

Judge Feldman also recognizes something that the Obama administration hasn't seemed to grasp: how vital this industry is to our region's economy. The judge called it "quite simply elemental to the Gulf communities.''

"The effect on employment, jobs, loss of domestic energy supplies caused by the moratorium as the plaintiffs (and other suppliers, and the rigs themselves) lose business, and the movement of the rigs to other sites around the world will clearly ripple throughout the economy in this region,'' the judge wrote.

Judge Feldman's ruling validates what Louisianians have been arguing for weeks: that the administration's broad drilling ban isn't justified and stands to cause even greater economic harm to this state than the devastating oil spill itself.

The administration's determination to fight the preliminary injunction is disappointing. Judge Feldman's ruling offered an opportunity for the White House to reconsider its action and take a more targeted approach to ensuring safety on deepwater rigs. Instead officials are digging in their heels, and while they might ultimately lose this legal battle, thousands of Louisianians could still be left without jobs.

If allowed to continue, the deepwater moratorium and the de facto shallow water moratorium could throw between 100 and 200 offshore boats out of work. A downturn like that would in turn throw our U.S. maritime business into chaos. This is not just my company's story but the story of hundreds of companies like ours up and down the Gulf coast. According to a study of the offshore work boat industry early this year, more than 100,000 families rely on our industry for their livelihood and the impacts of the moratorium are already being felt.

The economic pain from the ban on drilling will be felt nationwide. ... In addition, our nation's dependency on foreign oil will continue to grow as we turn our back on our country's own natural resources.

The work we do provides jobs for hundreds of thousands of Americans. It pays for food, clothes, medicine, school and taxes. Our employees are proud professionals whose only request of their federal government is to allow them to do the job they are trained for. They do not want welfare or subsidies or special treatment. Just let them do their jobs.

No one in the White House seems to understand how devastating the moratorium on drilling is, but it is understood all too well by the mariners and shipyard workers, their families, the grocery stores that provision the boats, the electrical supply stores that sell the boat equipment, the banks and the local governments that rely on our industry's taxes. 

There are as many as 10,000 people that work on deepwater oil rigs in the Gulf of Mexico. These are jobs that could soon begin to disappear because of the temporary ban on such drilling. 

But not only those jobs are at stake. From helicopter pilots to offshore catering chefs, another 25,000 jobs could be affected by the six-month ban imposed by President Obama while the investigation into the BP accident is underway, according to David Dismukes, a professor at Louisiana State University's Center for Energy Studies. ... All told, the ban could cost local economies between $3 billion and $5 billion a year, said Dismukes.

Our interior secretary plans to reinstate the offshore drilling moratorium struck down by a federal judge. But if deep-water drilling is so unsafe, why are we helping Brazil drill nearly three times as deep?

Maybe Secretary Ken Salazar can explain why Britain and others can safely drill in the North Sea and no other nation has suspended its offshore drilling. Yet there he was Tuesday saying he'll reissue a reworded moratorium that will make it clear to dunces like U.S. District Judge Martin Feldman why offshore drilling is unsafe.