Not long after oil began pouring into the Gulf of Mexico from the Deepwater Horizon oil rig — a disaster that may be approaching its conclusion — people around the country started assigning blame. BP, which was doing the drilling, was an obvious target. Some environmental activists called for the resignation of Interior Secretary Ken Salazar, while others hammered President Obama for not taking a harder line against BP.
Now, the first casualty of the crisis — aside from the Gulf’s marine life and the livelihood of fishermen and others along the coast — has emerged. The Obama administration has fired Elizabeth Birnbaum, the head of the Mineral Management Service, the office of the Interior Department responsible for overseeing oil and gas development. Birnbaum has led MMS since July 2009.