Gulf Coast oil spill could eclipse Exxon Valdez
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adaydream
This is why we haven't allowed drilling off the coast for decades. In an interview with the representative from BP this morning on GoodMorn.... Robin Roberts ask the rep why they didn't use the automatic shutoff required by some countries and he said he's never heard of the equipment. His answer sounded very disingenuous.
It appears they took a shortcut and it's going to cost us big. Then we're also going to have to pay for the cleanup. < :-)
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SushiSake3
Sarah Palin's 'Drill baby, drill!' just became 'Spill baby, spill!' in a disaster that has occurred with pitch perfect timing to help president Obama and the Dems push through an energy bill packed with financing for expansion of renewable energy sources. When Sarah Palin and her misinformed followers holler 'Drill baby, drill!', the public's appetite for offshore drilling will have turned into a real bad stomach ache. Unreal timing. Just perfect for the Dems. I'm just waiting for conservatives to claim that the oil rig was sunk by 'the liberals,' perhaps even by the president himself!? :-)
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goddog
Unbelievable disaster here. Shrimp prices are going to rise for sure.
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SushiSake3
This disaster shows the GOP's 'Drill baby, drill!' mantra as just the latest in a long line of conservatives' loser ideas
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Egalityranny
Worse than Katrina. Obama has really let the country down.
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smithinjapan
"Worse than Katrina. Obama has really let the country down."
Only someone blinded by hate could make such a statement. This is a man-made disaster, first and foremost, caused by an off-shore drilling company, and it's first and foremost BP's fault. Second, it's not clear exactly what the US government can do on this issue, although already they have dispatched people to help clean up the spill, unlike with Katrina when the government only dispatched people to help evacuate the rich, then later came back -- too late -- to try and help the poor (after much criticism). Once the storm was over, it was over, and while relief efforts were hampered, there was no threat of strong winds, etc. In this case the oil is bleeding out from the bottom of the sea bed and could take MONTHS to be plugged. How is that Obama's fault?
But hey, I don't expect anyone still hurting from the 8 years previous to Obama to see the truth quite yet. Might take a generation.
Back to this disaster, it is a shame, and I hope that BP does indeed get stuck with the bill, as the Obama admin. has said they would. I'm sure they'll try to weasel out of it, but hey.
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Pump24
An unrelated statement to blame Obama. Underwater oil drilling has been going on since the late 1930`s. Accidents, too. Worse than Katrina, no. Worse than Exxon Valdez, probably.
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Egalityranny
In the meantime we can harness energy from all the nuclear reactors Liberals have graciously allowed the country to go ahead and build these last 30 years, right?
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Sarge
Sushi - "Drill baby, drill!" is not "Spill baby, spill!"
Eqalityranny - Good one. Sushi?
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nandakandamanda
This is not a 'spill'. "Oops, I spilled some milk". A spill is finite.
This is more like an uncontrolled leak, a gusher.
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GJDailleult
Good point nanda, but the word "spill" is being used everywhere. Maybe this kind of off-shore gusher has never happened before, so there is no word for the effect of one. They don't seem to have any idea how to cap it either.
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SuperLib
Oil spills, the environment, yadda yadda yadda. I just want to know how this can help me attack my rival political party.
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smithinjapan
GJDailleult: "Good point nanda, but the word "spill" is being used everywhere. "
Very true, and likely since they have no better term for it this will continue to be what we see for a bit. BUT, I think 'spill' is being used less in the literal sense than in the sense that it was a 'human error' it's a kind of 'spill'.
Still funny to watch desperate people like Egilityranny try to blame the entire disaster on Obama, though. :)
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nandakandamanda
It'll be interesting to see how they plug it. 5,000 feet down. Too deep for most divers I guess. Red Adair might have had some good ideas. Then, what shape is the fissure/crack, or is it a straight hole? You can't blow it up as that might make it worse. Could you drop a barbed weight straight down into it, to slow the leak?
This will take.... three months
Are they serious???
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nandakandamanda
Or drop some kind of stent into it?
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SushiSake3
I want to stress here that Egilatyranny is right - president Obama is directly responsible for any and all natural or manmade disasters that occur within America's EEZ during his watch.
Moderator: Back on topic please.
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SushiSake3
The GOP is going to have to kiss goodbye to their 'Drill, baby, drill!' mantra almost as quickly as BP will be saying sayonara to their carefully crafted clean green energy company image. Funny, I predicted an oil spill would change everything not even 3 weeks ago.
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SushiSake3
Yet another GOP campaign plank sinks beneath the waves. Is the GOP going to get ANY votes this November?
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Badsey
Seems like more terrorism against the US populace. Surprising this industry does not have regulations on emergency shutoff or safety valves.
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smithinjapan
Badsey: "Seems like more terrorism against the US populace."
Bizarre logic, although arguably the oil industry is composed of a bunch of eco-terrorists. I think the industry DOES have certain regulations, and the emergency shut-off is, from what I gathered, supposed to be standard. As one poster said above, his excuse didn't sound very genuine ("I never heard of that"). In any case, the heads of BP ought to be criminally prosecuted, or at the very least those responsible for the rig and lack of emergency shut off.
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SushiSake3
Manna from heaven.
The only reason Obama offered to open up parts of the U.S. to offshore drilling was to bait GOPpers to support the Dem's energy bill (good politics).
Now, offshore drilling isn't looking like such a hot idea after all. Importing black gold is an even worse idea.
What's left?
Oh yeah - renewables.
Just what doctor Obama was ordering in the first place.
Brilliant politics.
Thanks to BP, the GOP has been totally and utterly nuked on this issue.
Looks like the Community Organizer from Chicago (whose skills handed the GOP their biggest butt whipping in decades) has done it again.
Sweet. :-)
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adaydream
This is a disaster created by the same people that want to drill and drill and more drilling offshore.
You'd think that BP would take the necessary steps to ensure that this wouldn't happen. This shows the stupidity of the drilling company for not installing the shutoff valve when putting in the well. This accident is the very reason why off shore drilling was stopped before.
Where's Sarah Palin now with her "Drill baby Drill?" < :-)
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Sarge
This is a disater created by the same people who provide the oil that keeps adaydream warm in the winter.
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SushiSake3
It's turning into a tough climate for conservatives as the wheels of their election campaign continue to fall off. My bets are on seeing environmental groups actually >thanking< BP for letting this disaster unfold (despite the totally unnecessary loss of life) - who'd have seen that coming? We are now witnessing the end of the debate on offshore drilling.
All good. Bring on the renewables.
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adaydream
I don't think so Sarge. I stay warm from natural gas and electricity. This is crude oil that might become gasoline.
I bet you support drilling off shore don't you Sarge. So give me an up-side to this disaster. Tell me what BP is doing right.
Besides being sarcastic about this disaster, got any honest comments? < :-)
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SushiSake3
Has anyone heard any news of victims' families bringing a class action lawsuit against BP? Or did the GOP under bush legislate to prevent lawsuits from being brought against Big Oil?
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Sarge
adaydream and Sushi, like everyone else, depends on Big Bad Oil to provide the gasoline and electricity that everyone uses.
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adaydream
I may depend on big oil, but I've never been an advocate of drilling off shore. I understood this kind of disaster could happen, but we're talking real ecological damage from this disaster. More than I even considered. I never imagined an amount of oil coming into the shore that we're going to be seeing.
I would have thought that BP and their drilling contractor would have used the proper equipment that would avoid this kind of accident. But no. Instead of using the type of equipment that would have avoid this kind of accident, especially when they want to drill off shore. They know they are being scrutinized. Dumb asses.
SuperLib, how is SushiSake being creepy? < :-)
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smithinjapan
sarge: "This is a disater created by the same people who provide the oil that keeps adaydream warm in the winter."
Really? Maybe they use electricity generated by nuclear power, as do a lot of people in the modern age.
"adaydream and Sushi, like everyone else, depends on Big Bad Oil to provide the gasoline and electricity that everyone uses."
I noticed you didn't answer adaydream's question. It's piqued my curiousity, so for all our benefits could you answer it? or are you just going to assume that everyone is still using ancient Paloma 'stoves' in their living spaces?
Anyway, both he and Sushi are bang on on this issue -- this is a major set-back for the 'drill-baby-drill!' crowd, as well as for BP and oil in general. Sadly it's clearly going to take destroying the ecology of the area as well as making hundreds unemployed to get the point across, and even then there will be the right-wing deniers and people scrambling to see the 'good' in this. But they are a very sad lowly facet of humanity.
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adaydream
I'd like to remind you that BP is the same company that faked the Prudo Bay corression (sp) problem and replaced their 36 inch transport pipeline to an 18 inch pipeline. < :-)
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Good_Jorb
Not everyone is that dependent on O&G, after working contract for a few big O&G companies, I try to do my best not to be put over the (oil) barrel so to speak. O&G companies know they run a fine line between lower production costs and environmental safety but governments and consumers are willing to turn a blind eye as long as they get their petrol/petrol dollar fixes.
I use biodiesel and 2 micro wind turbines, no dependence on Big Bad Oil for me (although they were paid with money earned from O&G shares).
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Madverts
Bah, we're all dependent on the damned stuff. What's important is that these kinds of things don't happen.
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Taka313
The thing to remember about this spill is that the market will correct itself.
There is no need for government regulation because surely everyone is so upset with this that they will buy their gas elsewhere.
Market correction - Check!
Screw the fish. Seriously, they're only our food.
Taka
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Molenir
Hmm, yeah totally understandable. I mean oil rigs explode all the time. I mean, every other week at least. And all the cutoff values are at 5k feet. Yeah, totally understandable. My question is, since you hate big Oil so much, whats Big Gov's role in this? I mean, isn't Big Gov supposed to be overseeing this? Managing this? Or are they, as usual, completely blameless. No doubt, despite their total and complete failure, they should be given even more authority to manage things.
Myself, I'm still in the drill crowd. In fact, definitely in the drill crowd. I do however want there to be an investigation into what caused this, and how it could be prevented in the future. Then once again I'll be pushing drilling in the gulf, and elsewhere.
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SushiSake3
Molenir, despite your overwhelming urge to want to blame president Obama personally for this disaster, it's primarily BP's problem. And it's looking pretty clear they didn't have a plan B in place to deal with a gusher. Your desparate attempts to blame big government are laughable at best.
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Molenir
Sushi, my reaction to blame everything on Big Gov, is in reaction to your insistence on blaming everything on "Big Oil". As if BP is some monolithic giant that should be condemned. To be completely fair, we don't know what caused this. Oil Rigs don't just explode. So while I definitely support drilling for Oil, I also support finding out what went wrong here, whether it was intentional or accidental, and finding a way to avoid this in the future.
Don't kid yourself, the ones who are hating this more then anyone else, is BP. They're not in the business to create an environmental disaster. They're in this to put food on their families tables. This is going to cost them, and their shareholders billions of dollars. All in lost profits. Quite frankly, that makes me happy. Thats why I like the capitalist system. Because when a company screws up this badly, they pay for it. And they, all their competitors make damn sure it never happens again. What happens when Big Gov screws up though? Who pays?
Since you are so intent on blaming everything on BP, despite there having been no investigation as to the cause, ask yourself this... Why is it just now that the Federal Government is finally getting involved? We've known for days now about the leak. Obama has known for days, and where the hell has he been? Apparently criticizing a law in Arizona is much more important then protecting the wildlife and ecosystem in the Gulf.
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Taka313
BP is only one player in this epic cock-up. And whenever you mention epic cock-ups, halliburton's filth stained name is soon to follow.
Taka
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Molenir
Why do I have this sneaking suspicions that the Obama administration is about to give Halliburton another no bid contract?
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Taka313
I hope you're wrong molenir.
It's sickening that halliburton got away with doing the same thing here that they're being investigated in the Timor Sea for. Those pig-fornicators have no shame.
And I have to admit a little surprise that you would immediately go for the Obama angle. I thought more highly of you than that.
Kind of missing the point, aren't you?
Wow. Forest. trees. see-through. not. so. much.
Taka
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Molenir
I personally have no problem with no-bid contracs, so long as they're short term, and its opened up for competitive bidding later. On a short term basis, you grab the first company available to help. I thought a lot of the furor over Halliburton was a bunch of nonsense anyway. No Bid contracts have been awarded to lots of companies going back to well before Carter. Reagan, Bush, Clinton, Bush 2, all these Presidents saw companies get no bid contracts during their time in office. The problem was one of perception. Because Cheney at one time was the CEO of Halliburton, people thought it smacked of corruption, that that company was getting them.
As for my mentioning Obama, its mostly a reaction to the hysteria over Halliburton and the supposed corruption. Drawing a link between Obama and Halliburton, and pointing out the fact that Obama too is giving no-bid contracts, suggests that its not corruption. Its a matter of rapid reaction. Halliburton has all the tools in place to immediately respond in cases of emergency. Other companies can do so as well, but generally not as quickly as them. Which is why they're so big, and employ so many people. Cause so many of the contracts, even when there is competitive bidding, end up going to them.
0
annphilip
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