We just don't know how much more "competence" we can take

Do you remember when they told us that if we voted for McCain, sensitive technical and scientific matters would continue to be politicized? Well, they were right.

File the following under: "What else can they screw up?"

A federal judge overturned the Obama administration's six-month moratorium on deep-water drilling on Tuesday and in the process exposed Interior Secretary, Ken Salazar, as a liar.

Here's the money paragraphs from judge Martin Feldman's ruling:

In the Executive Summary to the Report, (Salazar) recommends “a six-month moratorium on permits for new wells being drilled using floating rigs.” He also recommends “an immediate halt to drilling operations on the 33 permitted wells, not including relief wells currently being drilled by BP, that are currently being drilled using floating rigs in the Gulf of Mexico.”

Much to the government’s discomfort and this Court’s uneasiness, the Summary also states that “the recommendations contained in this report have been peer-reviewed by seven experts identified by the National Academy of Engineering.” As the plaintiffs, and the experts themselves, pointedly observe, this statement was misleading. The experts charge it was a “misrepresentation.” It was factually incorrect.

Judge Feldman, you're being too kind. Salazar lied. The panel experts explicitly disagreed with the moratorium but in entirely predictable fashion, "no" became "yes".

As Michael Barone aptly put it: thuggery is one thing, incompetent thuggery is entirely another.