"In the last three years, according to the Center for Public Integrity, BP accounted for '97 percent of all flagrant violations found in the refining industry by government safety inspectors' — including 760 citations for 'egregious, willful' violations (compared with only eight at the two oil companies that tied for s...econd place). Hayward’s predecessor at BP, ousted in a sex-and-blackmail scandal in 2007, had placed cost-cutting (and ever more obscene profits) over safety, culminating in the BP Texas City refinery explosion that killed 15 and injured 170 in 2005. Last October The Times uncovered documents revealing that BP had still failed to address hundreds of safety hazards at that refinery in the four years after the explosion, prompting the largest fine in the history of the Occupational Safety and Health Administration. (The fine, $87 million, was no doubt regarded as petty cash by a company whose profit reached nearly $17 billion last year.)"
Op-Ed Columnist - Don’t Get Mad, Mr. President. Get Even. - NYTimes.com
"If Obama is to have a truly transformative presidency, there could be no better catalyst than oil."
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/06/opinion/06rich.html
Rich leaves out the war in Afghanistan, which has become Obama's war by his embracing it. At a press conference recently O indignantly fired back at Helen Thomas (sp?), a doubter, that we certainly do have enemies over there. Well, we have enemies in London, Paris, and Moscow too. But we haven't descended into a military and political quagmire over there. Can someone explain the practical reasons for this war to me? Besides "world peace."
ReplyDeleteSo we have the financial meltdown, and now this huge ecological disaster. And two wars brought about on specious grounds. A lot to ask one man to solve. But O ran on "yes we can," so let's see him do it. That's what he promised.
And who is the alternative to Obama? A rightwing candidate who would feel at home with Sarah Palin? That appears to be our real-world choice now, which only means, once again, we're screwed. Unless O has a change of character, and we have some luck.
Let's hear it for Joseph Gao - he suggested that BP execs commit sepiku, to their faces, in front of Congress! The Louisiana Gulf Coast will not recover in my lifetime - people responsible for crimes of this enormity deserve to die!!
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