The Inside Story of How Obama Let the World’s Most Dangerous Oil Company Spiral out of Control

Though George W. Bush paved the way for the catastrophe, it was Obama who gave BP the green light to drill.

Democracy Now! / By Amy Goodman and Tim Dickinson

An extensive new investigation into the Obama administration’s handling of the BP oil spill disaster reveals that it was government mismanagement, delays and absence of oversight that allowed the crisis to spiral out of control. In the article "The Spill, the Scandal, and the President," Rolling Stone’s Tim Dickinson writes, "Though George W. Bush paved the way for the catastrophe, it was Obama who gave BP the green light to drill." Dickinson explores how Interior Secretary Ken Salazar kept in place the oil industry-friendly environmental guidelines that Bush had implemented and ultimately let BP, an oil company with the worst safety record, to get away with murder.

JUAN GONZALEZ: New government estimates have found the BP oil spill may be spewing twice as much oill into the Gulf of Mexico as previously thought. On Thursday, the Flow Rate Technical Group released its new estimate of 25,000 to 30,000 barrels of oil a day based on information gathered last week, before BP installed a new capture device. Some scientists have warned that the flow rate sharply increased after BP cut the pipe, known as the riser, to install the new device last week. The current estimates from the government panel suggest that an amount equivalent to the Exxon Valdez disaster could be flowing into the Gulf of Mexico every eight to ten days. The new numbers were released shortly after a scientist on the Flow Rate Technical Group publicly warned that the oil may be spewing out at a rate of more than 100,000 barrels a day, a figure BP once called its worst-case scenario.

As public anger over BP continues to grow, President Obama was questioned on NBC’s The Today Show earlier this week about why he had not yet directly spoken to BP CEO Tony Hayward. This was his response when asked what he would do if Hayward was a part of his administration.

PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA: He wouldn’t be working for me, after any of those statements. First of all, we’re going to have to find out why this thing went in the first place. And the fact of the matter is, is that there’s going to be a thorough review, and I don’t want to prejudge it. But the initial reports indicate that there may be situations in which not only human error was involved, but you also saw some corner cutting in terms of safety, and that BP is a multibillion-dollar corporation. It’s talking about paying $10.5 billion in dividends just for this quarter. We are going to have to make sure that not only do they shut down the cap, we are not only going to have to make sure that any deep well drilling process that’s out there is, in fact, failsafe and oil companies know what they’re doing, but we also have to make sure that every single person who’s been affected by this is properly compensated and made whole.

AMY GOODMAN: Well, President Obama might now have some harsh words for BP, but an extensive new investigation into his administration’s handling of the disaster reveals it was government mismanagement, delays, and absence of oversight that allowed the crisis to spiral out of control. The article is called "The Spill, the Scandal, and the President." It’s published in the latest Rolling Stone.

To read the complete article HERE.

CONDENA MUNDIAL A LA BRITISH PETROLEUM

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yxoIZIG7IZY

BP Deepwater Disaster and Gulf Oil Spill
United States — The Deepwater Horizon accident and oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico is a disaster unfolding before our eyes. Eleven lives were lost in the initial explosion, and that incalculable loss is compounded daily as oil continues to flow.
Greenpeace welcomed President Obama's sensible and encouraging first step in ensuring that the BP oil spill disaster can never happen again - but the "never" will only last for the next six months while his commission reaches a conclusion.

PREVENTING THE NEXT DISASTER

The President's six month suspensions of new drilling are a welcome reprieve for the communities and animals that rely on those pristine waters, but we need a permanent ban on all new offshore drilling, not just in the Arctic but in all US waters. A ban on all new oil drilling is the only way to avoid another spill disaster.

BP Deepwater Disaster and Gulf Oil Spill

LIVE COVERAGE of the oil leak

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

A BP cleanup crew removes oil from a beach on Saturday, May 23, at Port Fourchon, La. Officials say it may be impossible to clean the hundreds of miles of coastal wetlands affected by the massive oil spill that continues gushing in the Gulf of Mexico.




United States — The Deepwater Horizon accident and oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico is a disaster unfolding before our eyes. Eleven lives were lost in the initial explosion, and that incalculable loss is compounded daily as oil continues to flow.

On April 20th, 2010 in the Gulf of Mexico, an explosion engulfed the Deepwater Horizon exploratory drilling platform, leased and operated by BP, leading to its collapse and sinking days later. The wellhead, nearly a mile below the surface of the ocean, is spilling between 210,000 and many millions of gallons of oil into the Gulf everyday, where it is being mixed with highly toxic chemicals that keep the oil hidden from view. 11 people died in the initial accident. Hundreds of species and the economies of the Gulf states are under dire threat.

Greenpeace is on the Gulf Coast bearing witness to the destruction and conducting independent assessment of the environmental impacts. But even as the scale of devastation becomes clearer in the Gulf, Shell Oil is moving closer to beginning a new exploratory drilling program in pristine Alaskan waters this July.

Neither the disaster unfolding in the Gulf nor the one that is imminent in Alaska are necessary to maintain a strong economy. Renewables like wind and solar, paired with energy efficiency, have the potential to meet all of our energy needs. We are calling for an immediate stop to new offshore oil drilling.

VIDEO FROM THE OIL SPILL



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kj9DA5N6GP4

Break the Addiction

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aquaNj9J0l0

OIL RIG DISASTER - HALIBURTON SABOTAGED THE RIG !

Was the disaster on the BP rig off the coast of mexico actually an act of terrorism?

Listen to this report from TruthFrequencyRadio.com to learn more

Is there a split in the Bilderberg Group members.... Was this the work fo Dick Cheyney, with the help of Xe, previously known as Blackwater, in an attempt to prevent The Dutch Royals from tapping into this huge oil field?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NbyEeMS10cs

Greenpeace team shows what's really happening on the Gulf Coast

Since oil started gushing into the Gulf of Mexico nearly a month ago, BP has been doing everything it can — to protect its profits, image, and reputation. Even as their oil is destroying the Gulf of Mexico’s unique ecosystems and the marine animals and local economies that depend on them, BP has launched a public relations campaign to try and minimize the fallout of this disaster to their bottom line. But no matter its efforts to rebrand itself or downplay the significance of this disaster, BP, can't hide from this.

Posted by: joesmyth

BP is certainly trying though. The company withheld video evidence that revealed that much more oil was pumping into the Gulf than the official estimates – perhaps 10 times as much or even more. And it's executives have been trying to deflect the blame onto someone else at congressional hearings.

They’ve been injecting thousands of gallons of toxic dispersants to keep the oil from reaching the surface, even though no one knows what the effects of this massive experiment will be on fish and other organisms. Independent scientists and Louisiana fisherman understand why — it’s not about cleaning up the oil, it’s about hiding it from public view on the surface, even though spreading it throughout the Gulf could just be exacerbating the damage. Indeed, independent scientists have found that the use of dispersants may be causing the oil to form massive underwater plumes, which could harm sperm whales, bluefin tuna, and other creatures that live in the open ocean.



But don’t bother BP's CEO Tony Hayward with that news, who recently said: “Everything we can see at the moment suggests that the overall environmental impact will be very, very modest."

That's not what we're seeing.

We’re pretty skeptical of claims by the oil industry and the government officials who still seem to be doing more to protect polluters than to hold them accountable for the devastation they are causing. That’s why Greenpeace’s team on the Gulf Coast has been bearing witness to the disaster and conducting an independent assessment of the impacts. On board the Greenpeace boat “Billy Greene,” we’ve sought to bring oil spill experts and media to see what is really happening to the Gulf and the Mississippi Delta, no matter what the latest spin from BP.

This is the cost of our reliance on dirty and dangerous energy.

Rachel Maddow- Confronting the Gulf oil disaster

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v7bTQXhWc5E

BP's Oil Disaster: The Numbers Will Shock You

At best 20% of the oil spill may be recoverable. Though we don't yet know the full extent of the disaster, one thing is for sure: regulatory failures paved the way.

AlterNet / By Daniela Perdomo

When it comes to British Petroleum's Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, questions about the extent of the damage -- and how to quell it -- are spreading as quickly as the oil slick.
No one is quite sure just how many gallons of crude oil have been flowing freely into the Gulf since April 20, when the Deepwater Horizon oil rig exploded, killing 11 workers and allowing for an entirely indefinite amount of oil to gush from a damaged well as well as from the rig itself. (Is it any wonder that Halliburton was involved?)

BP has publicly admitted that 5,000 barrels are likely being injected into ocean waters each day -- but at a closed-doors congressional hearing on Tuesday, executives admitted that as many as 60,000 barrels may be contaminating the Gulf daily. If the last big spill -- Exxon Valdez in 1989 -- is any indication, experts say the best clean-up scenario is to recover 20 percent of the spilled oil. (Only 8 percent of the crude oil deposited in the ocean and coastlines off Alaska were recovered in the 1989 spill clean-up.)

On Wednesday afternoon, BP touted its having capped one of the three leaks in the pipe from the mangled oil well as a great success. But a Coast Guard spokesman told the Washington Post that having stopped that leak would not reduce the rate of oil spillage, it would merely make the oil come out stronger from the other two.
BP is also hyping up three giant steel containment domes that will be used to collect oil streaming into the Gulf and transfer it to a waiting tanker. But the domes look rather flimsy in the face of what may very well end up being the worst environmental disaster in U.S. history. And then there's the question of whether the domes could make things worse -- some experts fear that they may further damage the underwater oil pipes.

Tyson Slocum, the energy program director at Public Citizen, is worried about the chemicals being used to try and remedy the damage. "We're injecting a whole suite of chemical mixtures in an effort to neutralize the oil spill," he says. "This has the potential to make an ecological disaster worse."

Environmentally speaking, the worst effects of the BP spill have yet to be felt. Most of the known damage wreaked by Exxon Valdez came when the spill contaminated 1,300 miles of shoreline. But the extent of the damage it caused to marine life is not totally known, even 20 years out. Indeed, each day will give us a clearer picture of what short-term ecological destruction Deepwater Horizon has wrought -- on- and off-shore -- but environmental experts believe the damage made to the Gulf of Mexico will be very long-term.

On the economic side of things, estimated damages are slightly easier to tally. According to the Harte Research Institute for Gulf of Mexico Studies, approximately $1.6 billion in annual economic activity and services are at risk. Compare this number to the current cap on BP's liability for economic damages like lost wages and tourist dollars, which is $75 million. And compare that further to the first-quarter profit BP posted just one week after the explosion: $6 billion.

CRIMINOIL CONDUCT?

Rachel Maddow- Seeking justice for Gulf oil disaster (1)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=amY3munNRjk

Rachel Maddow- Seeking justice for Gulf oil disaster (2)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=69zN8_iw-NE

Bush Environment Officials now work for Oil Companies

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o5w5R2GSGYY

So Long Worst President Ever; 10 Reasons History Will Hang You

By Bernie Horn, Campaign for America's Future.

AlterNet

There are probably a hundred examples where Bush conservatism failed; here are the top 10.

George W. Bush presented his valedictory last night, desperately seeking thanks and congratulations. So here goes: Thanks and congratulations, W, for showing the world that today's conservatism is an abject failure.
Thanks to Bush, we know that conservatives are not fiscally responsible, they are not for small government, they don't stand up for moral values and they won't make Americans one bit safer. Conservatives aren't even true defenders of "free markets" -- having presided over the biggest market bailout in the world.
After eight long years, Bush can no longer fool the public. Polls show that he is the most unpopular president in the history of survey research. When the 2006 and 2008 elections are considered together, Bush policies resulted in the landslide rejection of his party at both the federal and state levels. There are probably a hundred examples where Bush conservatism failed, but let's stick with the top 10.
1. The worst recession since the 1930s. The current recession will be the deepest and longest downturn since the Great Depression. And unlike other recessions, this one was directly caused by conservative anti-regulatory policy. In fact, recent evaluations show that Bush policies never created any real growth -- the ephemeral financial upswings of the past eight years were based on market bubbles and economic Band-Aids.
2. The worst financial crisis since the 1930s. The Bush administration, flacking an "ownership society," helped manufacture the housing bubble. When it burst, Americans lost $6 trillion in housing wealth (so far), fueling a market crash that has cost Americans $8 trillion of stock wealth, according to economist Dean Baker. On a grand scale, we've been mugged.
3. The worst foreign policy mistake in the history of this country. That's what Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., correctly called the Iraq war. This pre-emptive war -- based on phony pretenses -- is now the second longest in our nation's history (after Vietnam). Some 35,000 Americans are dead or wounded, as well as an enormous number of innocent Iraqis. And even today, more than five years later, can anyone explain why Bush marched us into this quagmire?
4. Unprecedented rejection of human rights. Recently, a Bush administration official finally admitted that the U.S. government engaged in torture at Guantanamo Bay detention center. Bush admitted that he personally authorized waterboarding. While these clear violations of the Geneva Conventions would have been unthinkable a few years ago, today we're not surprised. From Abu Ghraib and extraordinary rendition, to years-long detention of innocents and the unrestrained killing of civilians by U.S.-paid mercenaries, this administration has systematically squandered our nation's moral standing in the world, making us less able to protect Americans and American interests worldwide.
5. Watergate-style abuses of power. As the House Judiciary Committee staff has documented, Bush used the politics of fear and division to justify warrantless wiretapping of innocent Americans (including U.S. soldiers fighting overseas), spying on peaceful domestic groups and the use of national security letters to pry into the private records of millions of Americans. He also presided over illegal politicization of the Justice Department and retribution against critics. In fact, Bush claimed the authority to disobey hundreds of laws -- as if Richard Nixon were right when he famously said: "When the president does it, that means it's not illegal."
6. Unprecedented increases in inequality. The Economic Policy Institute reports, "For the first time since the Census Bureau began tracking such data back in the mid-1940s, the real incomes of middle-class families are lower at the end of this business cycle than they were when it started." That's because Bush policy was designed to increase economic inequality. The richest 1 percent of the population received 36 percent of the Bush tax cuts; the least-affluent 40 percent received only 9 percent. While the rich got exponentially richer, the poverty rate and the percentage of uninsured dramatically increased.
7. A culture of sleaze. This was an administration without shame. Kicked off by Vice President Dick Cheney's secret energy task force, the administration fostered a "greed is good" culture. The subsequent conservative money scandals (Jack Abramoff; White House officials J. Steven Griles and David Safavian; Republicans Rep. Bob Ney of Ohio, House Majority Leader Tom DeLay of Texas, Rep. Duke Cunningham of California and Sen. Ted Stevens of Alaska) and other lawlessness (Cheney's Chief of Staff O. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, Sen. David Vitter of Louisiana, Sen. Larry Craig of Idaho) have toppled the conservative "moral values" façade into the gutter, where it belongs.
8. Blind rejection of science. The Bush administration thumbed its nose at scientific evidence that contradicted conservative political goals. The resulting lies about global warming, endangered species, toxic chemicals and consumer products threaten the health and safety of every American. And the virtual outlawing of stem cell research has delayed important medical advances by years, causing immeasurable suffering and loss of life.
9. Utter refusal to protect the health, safety and legal rights of Americans. Following the conservative business-is-always-right philosophy, Bush dismantled the agencies and rules designed to protect consumers from unscrupulous businesses, workers from reckless employers and small companies from anti-competitive large companies. If conservatives didn't like a federal law, they blocked, hindered or defunded agency enforcement.
10. Presiding over our nation's worst natural disaster, and not caring. Hurricane Katrina was transformed from a calamity into a national disgrace by the sheer incompetence and indifference of the Bush administration. Before the hurricane struck, Bush had downsized the Federal Emergency Management Agency and placed in charge a political crony with no relevant experience. When Katrina ripped through Mississippi and Louisiana and inflicted nearly $100 billion in damages in New Orleans to become the costliest hurricane in U.S. history, FEMA was unprepared to help, and thousands of Americans suffered the consequences. More than three years later, New Orleans still has not recovered.
So, congratulations for being the worst president in American history. That's not just my personal opinion; that's the opinion of 109 historians polled by the History News Network. Fully 61 percent ranked Bush as the "worst ever;" 98 percent labeled his presidency a "failure." And this poll, taken in early 2008, predated the cataclysmic housing and banking crashes. Bye-bye W -- history will not be kind.