"When we found this dolphin it was filled with oil. Oil was just pouring out of it."

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2010/6/3/872625/-Midday-open-thread?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+dailykos%2Findex+%28Daily+Kos%29

• Who in the hell put BP in charge of press access in the Gulf?

  Here's what President Obama didn't see when he visited the Gulf Coast: a dead dolphin rotting in the shore weeds.

  "When we found this dolphin it was filled with oil. Oil was just pouring out of it. It was the saddest darn thing to look at," said a BP contract worker who took the Daily News on a surreptitious tour of the wildlife disaster unfolding in Louisiana.

  His motive: simple outrage.

  "There is a lot of coverup for BP. They specifically informed us that they don't want these pictures of the dead animals. They know the ocean will wipe away most of the evidence. It's important to me that people know the truth about what's going on here," the contractor said.

  "The things I've seen: They just aren't right. All the life out here is just full of oil. I'm going to show you what BP never showed the President."

  BP is doing its damnedest to keep the worst of the stories from seeing the light of day. That has to end. Obama is going to be back in Louisiana on Friday. Maybe he can find the BP contract worker and whistleblower to get a fuller tour of the damage done.

• It's always interesting when Nixon is back in the news. Yesterday it was remembering Darrell Issa's fictional "elite Army bomb unit" that protected Nixon at the 1971 World Series which Nixon didn't attend.

  This one is worse:

  Take Fred Malek, for example. Malek is now one of "Washington's wealthiest Republican power brokers," despite his role in enforcing "ideological and religious purity" for Nixon, including the disgraced former president's "crusade against Jews."

  Nixon was concerned about officials at the Bureau of Labor Statistics, which he thought was controlled by a Jewish "cabal." Malek became known as Nixon's "Jew counter," responsible for identifying Jewish BLS employees.

• Graph-o-rama. Krugman proves, again, that low-income housing loans did not cause the housing bubble. Buying into the carefully constructed Republican myth that it's all ACORN's fault for getting undesirables into homes is counterproductive, at best.
• Unemployment benefits for a wave of Americans expired yesterday, because once again the Senate blew it and didn't vote on an extension before going on recess. In light of that, via TWI, here's an excellent, five-part series at Change.org on the plight of the 99ers--the millions who've exhausted benefits, and all hope of every finding employment again.
• The good news? Ted Haggard is starting a new church in which gays will be welcome (but not their marriages). The bad news? Ted Haggard is in the news. Some people should just have the decency to go away.
• Speaking of which, the Daily Show might not have been the smartest venue for Larry Craig's re-entrance on the national stage.
• Heartbreaking. Poor old Detroit just can't catch a break.
• And Happy Retirement, Junior.