UPDATE: 12:49 PM, May 26, 2010
President Obama Demands BP Oil Spill Independent Commission- May 22 , 2010
In the end this is a great speech even sounds tough but when analyzed lacking real substance
- Either Obama does not have the power to go after the oil companies because of the last 20-30 years of deregulation mania in the USA or he like Rand Paul, The Tea Party Express & GOP & Fox News believe it was just an accident and/or that the spill is just part of business as usual
- is Obama in the final analysis afraid of the Oil and Gas industry and the Coal industry- are they too big to take on or is he trapped in this neoconservative 19th century attitude towards Big Business.
Through their egregious criminal negligence 11 men have died but these men were not CEOs or other important people so you throw a wreath on the ocean and then as Obama always does move on which will just lead to more disasters of this magnitude.
Obama mentions all the miles boom that is being used yet people on the ground say much of the boom in fact has not been deployed
and secondly critics say BP is not employing properly or monitoring the booms to stop oil from coming ashore.
He talks like a typical bureaucrat about creating a commission to investigate what went wrong but he refuses to mention possible criminal charges being laid against those who are responsible he knew better and yet did not adhere to safety regulations or even Industry standards and follow protocols for capping the well properly . BP bullied engineers & Transocean and workers to do it their way which led to disaster.
Obama says the commission will get back to him in six months-surely a preliminary criminal investigation should be done first to hold those responsible for this disaster even it means jailing CEOs , Managers, rig operators & engineers working for the company who knew better and yet who went along with BPs way of doing things even if their way was the wrong way.
Chris Hedges argues that we can make a moral equivalency or according to the law that the engineers and others who are the toadies for BP are like Little Eichmanns who were merely following orders which led to the deaths of eleven men which is treated as unimportant after all no one of importance such as a CEO was killed as Fox News would say thank God for that-
As a result of this go along to get along and self-preservation and keeping one's job at any cost even the deaths of others creates some negative consequences in this case An Environmental Disaster of the first magnitude.
These Little Eichmans are comparable in fact to those other quizzlings that is the doctors , medical staff, psychologist translator who stood by while American CIA, Special Forces or hired mercenaries like Blackwater or regular soldiers abused & tortured detainees.
It is all part of the same moral decay in America where values are twisted and turned upside down to fit with the maintaining of an Empire.
As Chris Hedges explains in his article:
BP and the 'Little Eichmanns' by Chris Hedges May 17, 2010 by TruthDig.com Via Common Dreams.org
Those who carry out this global genocide-men like BP's Chief Executive Tony Hayward, who assures us that "The Gulf of Mexico is a very big ocean. The amount of oil and dispersant we are putting into it is tiny in relation to the total water volume''-are, to steal a line from Ward Churchill, "little Eichmanns." They serve Thanatos, the forces of death, the dark instinct Sigmund Freud identified within human beings that propels us to annihilate all living things, including ourselves. These deformed individuals lack the capacity for empathy. They are at once banal and dangerous. They possess the peculiar ability to organize vast, destructive bureaucracies and yet remain blind to the ramifications. The death they dispense, whether in the pollutants and carcinogens that have made cancer an epidemic, the dead zone rapidly being created in the Gulf of Mexico, the melting polar ice caps or the deaths last year of 45,000 Americans who could not afford proper medical care, is part of the cold and rational exchange of life for money.
and see my previous post : May 18, 2010 CBS 60Minutes' Expose' On Deepwater Horizon's Blowout: Profits Before Safety & Chris Hedges "Little Eichmans" & Transocean's $1 Billion Windfall
Shep smith again critical of BP Phony Clean Up Just More Slick PR
Shep criticizes the oil companies and BP for not having the equipment not just to clean up the oil but also to be able to get personnel down to the leak in a Submersible or to ask other nations to help out.
He and his guest agree that without the know how to deal with such a leak at that depth they should not have been allowed to drill for oil at that depth.
Shep and his guest also point out that the use of dispersants (which are dangerous, harmful to the environment and humans) is more like a smoke screen to cover up how big this leak is.
The oil company also is reluctant to talk about let alone deal with the massive underwater oil plumes which are doing untold damage to organisms beneath them
Bob Cavnar on FNC's Studio B With Shepard Smith re: BP Oil Spill 05-25-2010
In this video we discover that BP & others in charge of laying the BOOMS to hold back the oil is not being deployed properly and is not being monitored properly- BP also does not have the quantity of Boom they told the government they did have.
Be WARNED video contains harsh /foul/vulgar language but appears to be right on the money for criticizing the clean up in the Gulf-It seems appearances and looking busy is more important than doing a good job.
BP Fails Booming School 101 Gulf Oil Spill
May 19, 2010 — I thought this was important and that more people should see it. Thank you jakluk4 for bringing this to my attention. Who knows maybe if enough people see it we can change it. Please mirror.
BIG OIL Deregulation and Corruption within the government agency overseeing the oil industry
Government Workers Tasked With Gulf Oil Industry Oversight Accepted Gifts Environmental News Service,via Cmmon Dreams .org May 25, 2010
WASHINGTON, DC - Staffers in the Lake Charles, Louisiana district office of the Minerals Management Service accepted sport event tickets, lunches, and other gifts from oil and gas production companies and used government computers to view pornography, finds a report by the Department of the Interior Inspector General released today.
Some of these same staffers were tasked with inspections of offshore drilling platforms located in the Gulf of Mexico, states the report on ethical lapses at the MMS between 2000 and 2008 written by Acting Inspector General Mary Kendall.
"The Inspector General report describes reprehensible activities of employees of MMS between 2000 and 2008," said Secretary Salazar. "This deeply disturbing report is further evidence of the cozy relationship between some elements of MMS and the oil and gas industry."
Salazar has also asked the Inspector General to investigate whether there was a failure of MMS personnel to adequately enforce standards or inspect the Deepwater Horizon offshore facility and look into whether there are deficiencies in MMS policies or practices that need to be addressed to ensure that operations on the Outer Continental Shelf are conducted in a safe and environmentally sensitive manner.
...Meanwhile, the nonprofit Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, which represents government workers in natural resource agencies questions whether anyone in a responsible capacity even read BP's official response plan for oil spills in the Gulf of Mexico.
The plan is "studded with patently inaccurate and inapplicable information but was nonetheless approved by the federal government," PEER said today, suggesting that no regulator ever read it.
The plan lists "Sea Lions, Seals, Sea Otters" and "Walruses" and "Otter, Beaver" and "Mink" as "Sensitive Biological Resources" in the Gulf of Mexico. While none of these animals live in the gulf, they do live in the Arctic, so PEER suggests that this portion of the BP plan was "cribbed from previous Arctic exploratory planning."
In fact, according to Louisiana's Department of Wildlife and Fisheries 600 animal species are at risk from the massive Deepwater Horizon oil spill - 445 species of fish, 45 mammals, 32 reptiles and amphibians, and 134 bird species.
The plan does not contain information about tracking sub-surface oil plumes from deepwater blowouts. It lacks any oceanographic or meteorological information, despite the relevance of this data to spill response.
"This response plan is not worth the paper it is written on," said PEER Board Member Rick Steiner, a former University of Alaska marine professor and conservationist who tracked the Exxon Valdez spill.
In 2009, Steiner lost a $10,000 grant from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration for being an outspoken critic of the oil industry's activities in the Bristol Bay region. Steiner filed a grievance and, in October, lost. He then resigned from the university.
Steiner observes that the BP plan is almost 600 pages largely consisting of lists, phone numbers and blank forms. "Incredibly, this voluminous document never once discusses how to stop a deep water blowout even though BP has significant deep water operations in the Gulf," he said.
And the New York Times reports Less Toxic Dispersants Lose Out in BP Oil Spill Cleanup via The Real Liberal Christian Church - NYTimes.com by Tom Usher , May 23, 2010
Less Toxic Dispersants Lose Out in BP Oil Spill Cleanup -and: "Gulf Oil Spill: Frustration Mounts As Congress Can't Even Get BP's Liability Cap Raised by Sam Stein via Huffington Post May 25,2010
BP continues to stockpile and deploy oil-dispersing chemicals manufactured by a company with which it shares close ties, even...
Tom Usher wrote or added | "...according to EPA data, Corexit ranks far above dispersants made by competitors in toxicity and far below them in effectiveness in handling southern Louisiana crude.
"Of 18 dispersants whose use EPA has approved, 12 were found to be more effective on southern Louisiana crude than Corexit, EPA data show. Two of the 12 were found to be 100 percent effective on Gulf of Mexico crude, while the two Corexit products rated 56 percent and 63 percent effective, respectively. The toxicity of the 12 was shown to be either comparable to the Corexit line or, in some cases, 10 or 20 times less, according to EPA.
"EPA has not taken a stance on whether one dispersant should be used over another, leaving that up to BP."
It's been more than three weeks since Sen. Robert Menendez (D-N.J.) unveiled a proposal to raise the liability cap to $10 billion for oil companies involved in economically damaging offshore spills. And despite two efforts to pass the legislation through the Senate, the backing of the president and an ever-dire crisis in the Gulf of Mexico, there currently exists no clear path forward for getting the idea into law.
Under normal circumstances, the inaction would be chalked up to the normal lethargy of the Senate chamber. Three weeks, after all, is a relative blip in a legislative calendar that often sees bills and nominations debated well beyond that. But disasters -- such as the expanding oil spill in the Gulf -- usually spur quick, populist-stoked legislative action. The mere fact that Congress has been unable to accomplish something as politically obvious as asking companies like BP to pay more for the spills they create has some on the Hill shaking their heads.
"Beyond anything else," said one Senate Democratic aide, "it's frustrating."hat was so unsettling in the Gulf was that when I was down there I couldn't tell where President Obama began and BP ended. Greenpeace boats full of reporters were physically blocked by the coastguard and forbidden to take pictures of the oil on the beach. When asked why, the coast guard staff replied: "It's not our policy. It's BP's policy." The President's response to the spill, until the other day when Lisa Jackson demanded that the toxic dispersants be replaced (kudos to her for this), has seemed like a page out of BP's playbook of focusing on image damage control as much as oil spill damage control. He has not batted an eye in defending further off-shore oil drilling and has withheld from the public the scale of the problem.
I was heartened to hear that the President called for truck mile per gallon standards to be upgraded and that fuel economy standards should be strengthened in the long-run for regular cars. The big question is if the President will virtually phase out the use of oil in cars by 2030 or continue down Ken Salazar's misguided drill baby drill policy.
Obama To Aides: 'Plug The Damn Hole' VIA AP/Huffington Post , May 25, 2010
With the oil flowing and spreading at a furious rate, President Barack Obama has accused BP of a "breakdown of responsibility." He named a special independent commission to review what happened.
But the administration seems to want to have it both ways - insisting it's in charge while also insisting that BP do the heavy lifting. The White House is arguing that government officials aren't just watching from the sidelines, but also acknowledging there's just so much the government can do directly.
"[T]o those tasked with keeping the president apprised of the disaster," the Washington Post reported, "Obama's clenched jaw is becoming an increasingly familiar sight. During one of those sessions in the Oval Office the first week after the spill the president who rarely vents his frustration cut his aides short, according to one who was there. 'Plug the damn hole,' Obama told them."
"They are 5,000 feet down. BP or the private sector alone have the means to deal with that problem down there. It's not government equipment that is going to be used to do that," Coast Guard Commandant Thad Allen told a White House briefing on Monday.
"They are the responsible party. But we have the authority to direct them," he added.
And the Rand Paul connection: A Rpublican Senator criticizes him for his defense of BP & his insensitive remark "Accidents Happen"
Rand Paul and Fox News are the few who are still buying BP's PR bilge.
Murkowski Contradicts Paul: Anyone Not Mad At BP Spill 'Has No Emotion' by Sam Stein via Huffinton Post May 25, 2010
Kentucky Senate candidate Rand Paul stirred up controversy last week when he chastised the Obama White House for being "un-American" in its harsh treatment of BP. Sometimes, "accidents happen," said the Tea Party darling in reference to the massive oil spill in the Gulf.
On Tuesday, one of the Senate's biggest defenders of the oil industry fully disagreed with Paul, saying that if people aren't mad with the BP-caused spill, they don't have a pulse.
Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK.) was not asked about Paul's comments directly. But the question posed to her left little room for interpretation as to its genesis. Was she concerned about the rhetoric coming from the administration, most notably Interior Secretary Ken Salazar's repeated claim that the government is putting its boot on the neck of BP?
"I will tell you," the Alaska Republican replied, "We flew over the spill yesterday. Anybody who flies over that and sees the devastation out there in the Gulf and doesn't get angry at what has happened has no emotion. And I can see where the Secretary is coming from. Those who have polluted will be held responsible and I agree with him. So how we make that all happen, how we see that all play out is going to be important. Now if I felt like BP was back-peddling in terms of its responsibility, you might hear me use a little more harsh rhetoric myself."
Murkowski also insisted that there is no question that BP is liable for the cost of cleanup and economic damages caused by the spill. The debate surrounds whether legislation is needed to ensure the company comes through on its payments.
Since then EPA ordered BP to use a less toxic dispersant and BP's CEO s being the Lords of the manor as it were ignored these silly commoners.
See original article at New York Times online By PAUL QUINLAN of Greenwire May 13,2010
On Estimates of the volume of BP Oil Leak from 1,000 to 5,000 barrels Daily according to BP but outside experts say it is more likely 70,000 to 95,000 Barrels daily. That an Exxon Valdez Spill every four days and so far this BP spill is 8 times larger than the BP/ Exxon Valdez disaster.
also see: New oil leak in well of sunken drilling rig Via AP/Yahoo News April 29, 2010
NEW ORLEANS – Five times more oil a day than previously believed is spewing into the Gulf of Mexico from a blown-out well of a sunken drilling rig, the Coast Guard said Wednesday, an estimate the oil company trying to contain the massive spill disputes.
and by May 1st the estimation on volume of oil leaking was increased to 25,000 barrels per day yet BP said it was only 1,000 to 5,000 barrels daily at most.
Estimate: Gulf oil leak may be 25,000 barrels per day Via BostonHerald .com Blogs May 1, 2010
Ian D. MacDonald, an oceanography professor at Florida State University, estimated Friday that oil may be leaking from the breached well at a rate of approximately 25,000 barrels a day, or between 8-9 million gallons already. That’s about 5 times the government estimate.
“I hope I’m wrong. I hope there’s less oil out there than that. But that’s what I get when I apply the numbers,” he told the AP.
Amount of Spill Could Escalate, Company Admits by John M. Broder, Campbell Robertson and Clifford Krauss.via New York Times May 5, 2010
WASHINGTON — In a closed-door briefing for members of Congress, a senior BP executive conceded Tuesday that the ruptured oil well in the Gulf of Mexico could conceivably spill as much as 60,000 barrels a day of oil, more than 10 times the estimate of the current flow.
Extent of Oil Spill Remains Unclear By: Lea Winerman via PBS Network May 14, 2010
Nearly a month after BP's Deepwater Horizon oil rig exploded and sank in the Gulf of Mexico, one question remains unanswered: Exactly how much oil is spilling into the Gulf from the unchecked leak?
and one expert says:
"Astrophysicist Eugene Chiang, an expert in fluid mechanics at the University of California-Berkeley, said that he'd put the flow at 25,000 to 100,000 barrels per day, judging from the apparent velocity of the oil, gas and water mixture escaping from the pipe."
"If that YouTube video reflects conditions that have persisted since late April, there is little question in my mind that the amount of oil spilled has already well exceeded that of the Exxon Valdez accident," he said in an e-mail.
And so it goes,
GORD.
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