Buying off Responsibility

Responsibility, not in the terminology of BP. Oh remember we were supposed to get out our crying towels last year because poor BP was treated unfairly. Yeah all them little old ladies in England would be destitute if BP were held accountable for the disaster in the Gulf. Hell I lost some friends over it arguing about it.

What some of us didn’t realize is BP had an inside friend. This administration was on their side from the start. Ken Salazar was their bitch from the day he could say Oil. Well BP is doing just fine and has been caught recently still trying to get away with murder. That’s right, people died that day. Guess what? They still are getting sick and dieing.

Recently, Greenpeace has come up with internal Emails from BP, showing their attempts to control research into the impact of the oil disaster of last year. I’m so surprised!

Documents obtained under the Freedom of Information Act show BP officials discussing how to influence the work of scientists. Thank you Greenpeace!
Read the BP Internal meeting notes here.
Photograph: Gerald Herbert/AP
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A clean-up operation on Queen Bess Island, June 2010. BP pledged a $500m fund for independent research into the consequences of the Gulf of Mexico oil disaster.

BP officials tried to take control of a $500m fund pledged by the oil company for independent research into the consequences of the Gulf of Mexico oil disaster, it has emerged. Link
Documents obtained under the Freedom of Information Act show BP officials openly discussing how to influence the work of scientists supported by the fund, which was created by the oil company in May last year.
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Russell Putt, a BP environmental expert, wrote in an email to colleagues on 24 June 2010: “Can we ‘direct’ GRI [Gulf of Mexico Research Initiative] funding to a specific study (as we now see the governor’s offices trying to do)? What influence do we have over the vessels/equipment driving the studies vs the questions?”.
internal notes
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greenpeace

Those concerns go far beyond academic interest into the impact of the spill. BP faces billions in fines and penalties, and possible criminal charges arising from the disaster. Its total liability will depend in part on a final account produced by scientists on how much oil entered the gulf from its blown-out well, and the damage done to marine life and coastal areas in Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama. The oil company disputes the government estimate that 4.1m barrels of oil entered the gulf. retracks
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On 4 August, Jane Lubchenco, the NOAA administrator, demanded that the White House issue a correction after it claimed that the “vast majority” of BP oil was gone from the Gulf.
A few days earlier, Lisa Jackson, the head of the EPA, and her deputy, Bob Perciasepe, had also objected to the White House estimates of the amount of oil dispersed in the gulf. “These calculations are extremely rough estimates yet when they are put into the press, which we want to happen, they will take on a life of their own,” Perciasepe wrote.
Another email, written by Karen Ragoonanan-Jalim, a BP environmental officer based in Trinidad, contains minutes of a meeting in Houma, Louisiana, in which officials discussed what kind of studies might best serve the oil company’s interests.
Under agenda item two, she writes: “Discussions around GRI and whether or not BP can influence this long-term research programme ($500m) to undertake the studies we believe will be useful in terms of understanding the fate and effects of the oil on the environment, eg can we steer the research in support of restoration ecology?”
Ragoonanan-Jalim acknowledges that BP may not have that degree of control. “It may be possible for us to suggest the direction of the studies but without guarantee that they will be done.”
The email goes on: “How do we determine what biological/ecological studies we (BP) will need to do in order to satisfy specific requirements (legislative/litigation, informing the response and remediation/restoration strategies).”

Now if you don’t think they’re all in bed with each other, let me ask you this, why has permits been issued this year for more deep water drilling without dealing with that notorious shut off valve? Why was it just announced that there will be no more press releases for issuing permits?

It would seem as in everything this administration is involved with, it caved to the pressure’s of big Oil. Do you really think we’re safer? Have the people of the Gulf been enumerated to what was agreed to? Is there a real effort to keep all things drilling under wraps? The answer to all these questions is a big YES. When our people are throw away so that Oil can do it’s dirty work, our country deserted us. We know were we stand, on the bottom of the ocean floor with the dispersant and oil that’s still there.

Read more at Tim’s Scared Stiff