BF2S Forums BP hearing a public lynching? Barton apologizes to BP?

Macbeth wrote:

I don't understand why people are even blaming Tony Hayward for the spill. He didn't do anything wrong and BP is trying everything they can to stop the leak.

The only people who are at blame for this are the 11 dead rig workers who tried to cut corners.

Sarcasm is fail.

Why are we spending time berating BP right now?  We should all be working on containing the spill and plugging the hole.  They'll be plenty of time later for the lawyers to extract compensation from BP.

Congress are idiots, the public wants a hanging and Congress would give it to them because its an election year. Congress just wants to look like they are doing something. But it goes to the larger problem with the US in that people like to talk and talk and talk. /present company excepted
we have a nation of talkers and have gotten away from being a nation of doers.

As far as Barton, well go figure that he is the beneficiary of 1.2 million dollars from big oil. He doesn't have any credibility to make any statement about BP. In fact, he's bought and paid for, he represents the other thing that is wrong with Congress and that's rampant corruption. Barton is obviously corrupt and he should resign.


And in this spinny world we now live in, I've heard commentors saying that the BP spil happened because there is too much regulation. What BS.

To put it really simply, you either have to have tight regulation and regualtory penalties OR you have to have minimal regulation, no regualtory penalties but you permit lawsuits and you don't cap damages. You need one system or the other to deter people from cutting corners and causing disasters in the name of quick profits. A collage of no regulation and capping damages results in recekless behavior whether its the BP spill or the financial meltdown. Go figure that both disasters occurred after the regualtory reigns were loosened after 6 years of industry friendly GOP rule. This is exactly why reaganomics and the "no red tape" rhetoric = fail. To me this is the only reason why the govt can be faulted on this disaster, and that really does stem from the problem of garbage idiology and corruption so in that light Barton really does represent the cause for govts fault in all of this... so he really needs to STFU... and the GOP facing an election this year was right to tell him exactly that, rather than let him tar the entire GOP in BP's oil and dead pelican feathers.

Even more simply... pure reagonomics is not a eutopia... rather is more like hell on earth
Revelation 8:8 "The second angel sounded his trumpet, and something like a huge mountain, all ablaze, was thrown into the sea. A third of the sea turned into blood"
Yes, this little disaster is bibilical in proportions all caused by a lack of regualtory enforcement.

BP needs to burn for this, but once again we find another Corporation that is "too big to fail" because they are worth more if let the cow live and milk it rather than slaughter it and burn it diseased carcass. But I am sure that we won't do the right thing and so we will probably get the third sign in due course... any one for a huge meteor hitting China or Brazil or where ever the third largest river is. Revelation 8:10 "The third angel sounded his trumpet, and a great star, blazing like a torch, fell from the sky on a third of the rivers and on the springs of water--" 2012 here we come

JohnG@lt wrote:

Turquoise wrote:

JohnG@lt wrote:

Barton was right.

Barton is a fucking sellout.  He's only right in the minds of the exceedingly corporatist.

C'mon John, I thought you were better than this.

Look, it's unpopular to say anything in BPs defense right now, I get that. Fact of the matter is there are a whole bunch of newly minted armchair engineers who feel that they know what BP can or should do. They're wrong. Does BP deserve to get blasted in the press? Sure. Is it on the hook for cleanup costs and loss of wages to fishermen? Yes. But it's not like local, state and federal government wasn't complicit in the mess themselves. They happily watched as the gulf became a boomtown and they happily took in the tax receipts. Now, because people are mad, they're publicly blasting the hand that feeds them. It would be laughable if it wasn't so very sad.

I'm not saying BP is innocent by any means but as with any corporation or individual, if you dig deep enough you can expose all kinds of things that will embarrass them, no matter how irrelevant it is to the current situation. That's whats happening now, a bunch of people who are shitty journalists are earning their pay by digging as deeply into BP internal matters that they don't understand, but look salacious in print. I call them shitty reporters because they're nothing more than ambulance chasers, where were they when BPs accident history wasn't an easy front page news story? Probably taking digs at the Bush administration.

Tell me, how exactly do you defend a series of memos expressly showing just how much BP is willing to do to cover things up in local media?  How do you defend being negligent in maintenancing your safety valves and such?

I'm really not "understanding" how these things only "look" salacious.

JohnG@lt wrote:

As I said in other threads (and possibly this one, I don't remember), BP has already lost half its value, has canceled its dividends, has had its credit rating lowered, is on the hook for billions of dollars in cleanup costs, lawyer bills, etc. Instead of piling on them like a pack of hyenas, one man took a stand, and it was the right stand. He stood in the face of the emotional storm surrounding the issue and spoke logically. I commend him (even if he was prodded by the donations he's accepted in the past).

Edit - It would be really interesting to find out who in the media and in Congress owns Exxon stock... and then match that against who wants BP dissolved...

John...   I mean this in the nicest way possible, but you're fucking delusional if you actually believe that.

BP should be made an example of, because apparently, the only way any real change is accomplished in this system is to scare the shit out of any would-be negligent corporate assholes.  We clearly weren't harsh enough towards Exxon for its negligence in the Valdez spill, so "piling on" is about the only option we have left, unless you'd like to chance another disaster.

Last edited by Turquoise (2010-06-20 21:45:04)

The US oil industry negotiated a $75m cap, why doesn't this apply?
And also why are Halliburton and Transocean not getting nailed....

JohnG@lt wrote:

Sure it's piling on. As Mek mentioned, there is almost no mention of Transocean and Halliburton, the people that were actually at the scene of the accident, not BP. It was Transoceans rig and Halliburtons cap that failed. The government and the media just went after the company involved with the deepest pockets.

Of course they did.  And if they leave out Transocean and Halliburton, that's corrupt as hell.

Look, I'm still not getting how not suing them makes BP anymore innocent.  Explain that one to me.

Turquoise wrote:

JohnG@lt wrote:

Sure it's piling on. As Mek mentioned, there is almost no mention of Transocean and Halliburton, the people that were actually at the scene of the accident, not BP. It was Transoceans rig and Halliburtons cap that failed. The government and the media just went after the company involved with the deepest pockets.

Of course they did.  And if they leave out Transocean and Halliburton, that's corrupt as hell.

Look, I'm still not getting how not suing them makes BP anymore innocent.  Explain that one to me.

I never said BP was innocent. As the lessee they are ultimately responsible for the spill.

If I lease a car and go to a shoddy mechanic who causes my car to catch fire the dealer I leased the car from doesn't care about my sob story, it's coming out of my own pocket. In this analogy, the US govt is the dealer, I am BP and the mechanic would be Transocean/Halliburton. The dealer will obviously try to recoup its money in any way that it can, and it isn't going to go after the mechanic, that would be my responsibility. This is why BP is getting blasted, and I get that, but all the talk of destroying BP that politicians and the media are doing is ridiculous. They're feeding on the publics emotions and fanning them into a firestorm because it sells ad space and brings in votes in the upcoming election.

Accidents happen. BP will pay for the cleanup, has already incurred a serious financial penalty with more to come, and its reputation is now tarnished for as long as it exists. You honestly don't feel that losing $120B plus future revenue is a serious enough hit to ensure that they take more precautions in the future? Wow.

Last edited by JohnG@lt (2010-06-20 22:37:00)

JohnG@lt wrote:

You honestly don't feel that losing $120B plus future revenue is a serious enough hit to ensure that they take more precautions in the future?

Heh, there's an oil spill in Egypt now. Probably not BP even though officials have declined to reveal the name of the liable companies... which is interesting enough. But this is quite ironical time for any company to have oil spills now.

Link to some site about this.