Uh, BP, fire that Public Relations firm you hired to make a new commercial.
They gave you some good advice and some rotten advice.
We wanted some empathy from BP – Check
We wanted assurances that they’d pay out claims. – check, but what the hell do you mean by ‘legitimate’ claims? Is this legitimate enough for you?
We wanted to look at and hear the voice of CEO Tony Hayward, the Simon Cowell of oil spills, for several more minutes onscreen – Not!
re “legitimate claims”
Do not blame the messenger!
I suspect BP’s legal department is the guilty party.
CEOs do not get fired for disastrous oil spills.
They get fired for paying out unnecessary monies.
Poor poor Tony Hayward, he’s suffering so and must needs “get his life back.” Well gosh, at least Hayward doesn’t have Israeli commandos climbing up his colon.
That dying bird? An “Obamabird,” because he opted for news management instead of bringing the full resources of the federal government to bear.
BP should be put right on that oil covered creature.
A picture Before BP and After BP
BBP and ABP
Natural gas was discovered 20 nm off the coast of Gaza. Israel closes off sea access. Go figure.
If you believe in Karma, then this is the Karma. British Petroleum is the very company that Americans went to help and save by their coup against Iran’s Mohammad Mosadegh.
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Does anyone on this board actually believe that BP would make everything right, even if they could ?
Historically, the oil industry has been profitable, and profits were limited only by the amount of capital that could be invested. Last Quarter, BP made about $2 Billion per month.
The undersea BP Gusher is adding another 10,000,000 gallons or so to the mix every day, in my estimation. Roughly an Exxon Valdez per day. The crud will be washing up on Myrtle Beach in less than a month. The total damage will be in the multiple Trillions, as costly as, say, the Iraq War.
BP will never in 100 years make enough money to pay all legitimate claims. It just isn’t possible.
So what does the future hold for BP ? Reorganization. Bankruptcy.
Right now, and for the last month, BP has been preparing for this unavoidable eventuality. Assets are being hidden or removed. Severance agreements are being rewritten. Though Tony Hayward won’t be the one to tell us this bad news; BP will hire some lackey to take the slings and arrows of an outraged public.
Too bad our federal Government doesn’t step up to the plate before BP is liquidated.
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It’s really hard to believe that they are not doing everything they can to mitigate this tragedy. A great deal of commentary on this tragedy seems to be of the “I told you so” variety, and not very constructive.
It’s almost more painful to see people almost gloating over this accident as some kind of vindication of their beliefs. No matter how much we rag on BP the spill will not get any better. My thoughts and prayers are to the men and women who aren’t Tony Hayward and who are working night and day to mitigate this horror.
Remember — we’re all in this together. We have one rock to live on. Even Tony Hayward has to live here with us. We’ll fix this. We have the technology and the willpower. We can’t wait for Daddy President to fix it for us. Would you have wanted George W. Bush to “fix” this?
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To fix just the oil leak portion of this problem, setting aside the clean-up portion, would cost at least $2 Billion, if BP started off assuming the worst and resolved to stop any further contamination.
But what we have seen are half-measures that assume the best.
BP is trying every inexpensive approach, no matter how unlikely to solve the problem, on the outside chance that it will work. What has been attempted so far, from trying to shut the valve with a submersible, to the first containment structure, to top kill, to junk shot, to insertion tube, to the current top hat, BP has spent about $500K + $1 M + $1 M + $2 M + $4 M + $12 M. This has really been a matter of Public Relations for them, not a serious effort to stop the leak.
From Day4, their only serious effort has been the “relief wells,” which aren’t so much to stop the leak as to establish a functioning wellhead so they can capture and sell the oil.
There’s one proprietary approach known to BP that they are sure will work, but it would take a boatload of money to implement.
So BP says wait and see if the relief wells do the trick.
But even BP gives them less than even odds of working.
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“It’s really hard to believe that they are not doing everything they can to mitigate this tragedy. A great deal of commentary on this tragedy seems to be of the “I told you so” variety, and not very constructive.”
Really? The fact that everything BP have done since the realisation 4 days into this mess that the only way to stop the spill was by was of drilling another well (completion mid August), so all of the ‘straws’ and ‘top kills’ and the 57 other soundbite friendly charades BP have been distracting with were just PR flackery- how does that reality fit into your naive self deception?
Where does that cynical abuse of amerikan gullibility fit into the allegedly unconstructive “I told you so” meme that has been the sub-text of so much of the twaddle Oblamblam and BP hve been peddling?
It is important to remind fellow earthlings that some people accurately predicted the likely outcome of deep ocean oil drilling long before this disaster occurred.
Not because it makes any of those saying it happy or any else other than angry and frustrated that no one listened.
The thing is you see, some of us imagine that the spotted lard ass consumer will eventually waken from his/her consumption fatigue inspired somnolence and think “Hmm maybe it would make more sense to pay attention to those who have been telling it like it really is from day one, instead of standing in dribbling slack-jawed, glassy-eyed wonder while lapping up the latest spiel outta the mouths of those who have consistently called it wrong.”