President Obama's oversight of the Gulf of Mexico oil spill may have been hampered by his relationship to BP, former Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin said Sunday in the opening salvo of a verbal cage match with White House spokesman Robert Gibbs.
Appearing on "Fox News Sunday," Palin suggested that the White House is too cozy with the oil industry because of contributions to candidate Obama during the 2008 presidential race.
"I don't know why the question isn't asked by the mainstream media and by others if there's any connection with the contributions made to President Obama and his administration and the support by the oil companies to the administration,” Palin, a Fox News Channel contributor, said on "Fox News Sunday."
“If there's any connection there to President Obama taking so doggone long to get in there, to dive in there, and grasp the complexity and the potential tragedy that we are seeing here in the Gulf of Mexico -- now, if this was President Bush or if this were a Republican in office who hadn't received as much support even as President Obama has from B.P. and other oil companies, you know the mainstream media would be all over his case," she said.
Gibbs fired back that the former Alaska governor needs a lesson in how the oil industry works.
"Sarah Palin was involved in that election but, I don't think she was paying a whole lot of attention," Gibbs said on CBS' "Face the Nation."
"I'm almost sure that the oil companies don't consider the Obama administration a huge ally," he said, adding, "My suggestion to Sarah Palin would be to get slightly more informed as to what's going on in and around oil drilling in this country."
Palin used Twitter shortly thereafter to respond to Gibbs.
"Obama is the top recipient of BP PAC & individual money over the past 20 years. Dispute these facts," she wrote, linking to a Politico article citing campaign finance reporting showing more than $3.5 million given to candidates by BP since 1990.
The largest single donation by BP -- $77,051 -- went to Obama. - Fox News Story
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