You did what?!?!! To my future!?!?! For short-term profits!?!?!?!

Up at five, par usual and scanning the headlines, reading the articles and I don’t know where to begin, what to write about. Brain’s feeling foggy and there’s a whole lotta misery out there:

We got birds falling out of the sky, massive fish kills on the rivers and coasts and the bees, the pollinators of a third of our food supply are dying off, 96% of some populations. Another insurance company out in California wants to raise the premiums 59% on individual policy holders while out in Arizona, the state has decided to save money by denying life saving organ transplants to the poor. In the south, FEMA has been ordered by the courts to go after individual fraudsters post-Katrina to recoup funds, but nobody is going after all of those no-bid government contracts that made executives wealthy at the expense of the people. In Pennsylvania, politicians are allowing “fracking” water, loaded with salt and pollution to be dumped into the drinking water for thousands of residents while the EPA studies how dangerous this water might be and coal companies in the Appalachians continue to destroy whole mountain tops while the government sits idly by. Congress is proposing a new SHIELD Act which would make it a crime for any person to knowingly and willfully disseminate any classified information… concerning the human intelligence activities of the United States which would put most newspaper editors in prison for telling us what the government is doing, with our money. Our financial troubles? According to the new GOP, this has occurred not because of Wall Street’s shakedown or the Banks malfeasance, it’s the fault of union pensions and the size of government, and global warming? A myth, because God said so.

On the Gulf Coast, the Oil Spill Commission released its findings, and pretty much doomed a declaration of gross negligence on the part of BP, by not blaming BP’s rogue management style and their dozens of cost/time cutting moves at the expense of safety, instead blaming it more on systemic management problems, oh and more oil is washing ashore on Grand Isle, Louisiana. No worries though, BP’s stock went up over reports that Shell Oil had considered a takeover and Feinberg, the neutral arbitrator of the escrow fund again publicly stated that only half that fund will be necessary despite the fact class action suits have not been heard and final payments have not been processed, presumably said to assist his bosses stock prices.

And to top it off, another goddamned Kardashian is getting another reality television show.

So what’s a disgruntled social worker to do at this point?

Call in sick to work? Smash my car into a telephone pole? Bitch endlessly about all this to my office-mate, a person who thankfully shares my gloom and doom worldview? (Thankfully, because otherwise I might be considered quite depressing). I could send a letter to the editor. Maybe I could write my congressman? The President? Or organize a march, a demonstration, a rally…?

Nah, how about revolution?

Perhaps a bit extreme…but maybe something to think about anyway, and I’m sure I’ll be thinking about it next week when the TSA gives me a choice of having a naked photo taken or my genitalia fondled, just to get on a fucking plane, you know…so I can feel safe.

Yeah…thinking, and thankfully my feelings of being overwhelmed tend not to last too long, even though my anger does and revolution, why not? Couldn’t be any worse than what we got right now…yeah, or maybe I’ll just go watch Law and Order reruns or perhaps, check out some internet porn.

Something…

Have a nice day.

Is this you? It sure looks like you. Liar! Stay out of Chandeleur Sound!

I thought we had a deal.

When we released our pie chart back on August 4th, that prop we used to show everybody watching the networks just how 75% of the oil had been removed from the Gulf, we did so under terms of a certain agreement, one that it disappoints us to find you have not kept. You know, we didn’t ask you to hide forever, but we did discuss how you might take things a bit more “low profile,” at least for awhile, and for about a half a day we were pleased with the arrangement. We felt that all parties were on the same page.

Remember?

The nice lunch we had, which we paid for I might add, we didn’t even ask you to leave a tip, not that we’re trying to say you’re cheap, far from it, if anything you’re more expensive than any of us could have ever imagined, but at the end of that lunch we felt our arrangement was formalized. We agreed to stop hitting you with so many dispersants, and you agreed to stay out of sight.

We shook on it, remember? And we still can’t get the stain off our hands.

So, what happened?

Why do you continue to so viciously flaunt yourself all over the Gulf? Did we not keep our word? Did we not fulfill our part of the bargain?

We believe we did.

And in return, what did you do? In just the past week alone, you go ahead and show up in St. Bernard, Plaquemines, Jefferson, Lafourche and Terrebonne Parish, you let your picture get taken from the beaches of Fourchon to Grand Isle to East Bay. We already removed the boom from there…we barely have skimmers anymore! That was just two days ago and you are such an asshole!

Okay, sorry…sorry…but you know, what about Mississippi? Horn Island? More pictures? This is what you call “lying low,” “taking a break,” “going on vacation?” You chose Barataria Bay to go on vacation?!

It’s like you don’t remember our conversation at all. Picture after picture after picture…meanwhile, we still try to pretend a deal is in place, that your behavior is just an aberration, a last hurrah so to speak. We get everybody on board to talk about how damage in the Gulf is winding down. The oil is gone. We get the damned NOAA to say how they don’t see any oil on the surface, and then you start popping up everywhere.

People are going to start thinking there’s still a huge mess down here, and that was not part of the deal.

We are getting tired of waking up and reading quotes like this:

“The government, both state and federal, is pushing to open all these fishing areas back up and say it is OK, but this is a load of shit,” said Clint Guidry, a Louisiana fisherman from Lafitte, Louisiana, “It’s not OK. They claim 75 percent of the oil is gone or accounted for, but there’s still oil coming in. There is more oil in many of our bays, right now, than there has ever been.”

This is unacceptable.

We’ve been talking amongst ourselves. The consensus is we suspect you think you have us beat, that enough people have found out about the danger of dispersants that we wouldn’t try spraying anymore, but see it from our side. Your actions are making us look defensive and this is something we cannot have. British Petroleum is the only bad guy here, it’s what we said. It’s what we laughed about over hurricanes at that bar on Grand Isle, remember, that little place on the beach?

This is intolerable.

You, are a liar.

You think we won’t resume using disperants but you need to understand, as long as we claim we aren’t using them anymore the press will believe us, at least the important press, because as you will quickly find out if you do not cease and desist, the important press is losing interest in you. The reporters want stories to cover in a climate that isn’t so goddamned hot. Besides, what else can they report about you and your ilk. Look, oil. Look, clean it up. Look, it’s killing birds, marshlands, and getting people sick. It’s getting old and the American public has an even quicker attention span than the media, so dispersants?

No problem.

We deny it. They’ll believe it. You’ll die, along with what’s left of the ecosystem, yes…but more importantly, we get you…first. The long term affects are anyone’s guess and we’ll just have to worry about that later.

So keep that in mind before you continue on this errant path.

We’ll be watching, and we’ll be doing our damnedest to make sure nobody else is.

Honor the deal.

Sincereley,

The Administration…you know which one.

Have a nice day

Seriously yes, free access...seriously. As sure as I am at the World Economic Forum, the press will have access to the World Economic Forum...oh, what about the Gulf?

A great comprehensive article from the Gambit covering all aspects of the journalists’ plight in Southern Louisiana…an article that appears to think reporters are still having some troubles with access to the Gulf…craziness, perhaps we should just ask the big guys…the men in charge what the truth really is:

Thad Allen issued this statement: “I put out a written directive and I can provide it for the record that says the media will have uninhibited access anywhere we’re doing operations, except for two things, if it’s a security or safety problem.  That is my policy.  I’m the national incident commander.”

Doug Suttles of BP is on record saying the company “fully supports and defends all individuals’ rights to share their personal thoughts and experiences with journalists if they so choose.”

Course, then there is the reality of press access:

• On June 5, sheriff’s deputies in Grand Isle, La., threatened an AP photographer with arrest for criminal trespassing after he spoke to BP employees and took pictures of cleanup workers on a public beach.
• On June 6, an AP reporter was in a boat near an island in Barataria Bay, off the Louisiana coast, when a man in another boat identifying himself as a U.S. Fish and Wildlife employee ordered the reporter to leave the area. When the reporter asked to see identification, the man refused, saying “My name doesn’t matter, you need to go.”
• According to a June 10 CNN video, one of the network’s news crews was told by a bird rescue worker that he signed a contract with BP stating that he would not talk to the media. The crew was also turned away by BP contractors working at a bird triage area — despite having permission from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to enter the facility.
• On June 11 and 12, private security guards patrolling in the Grand Isle area attempted repeatedly to prevent a crew from New Orleans television station WDSU from walking on a public beach and speaking with cleanup workers.
• On June 13, a charter helicopter pilot carrying an AP photographer was contacted by the Federal Aviation Administration, which told the pilot he had violated the temporary flight restriction by flying below 3,000 feet. Both the pilot and photographer contend the helicopter never flew below 3,000 feet. However, the federal government now says helicopters in the restricted area are allowed to fly as low as 1,500 feet.

And these are only a handful of incidents.

The article in the Gambit cites so many more which would suggest Thad and Doug are not telling the truth about reporter access. It would also appear that when it comes to accessing to the oil spill, the marshlands and beaches, the law is on the reporters’ side…

Kelly McBride, ethics group leader at the Poynter Institute, a Florida-based school and resource for journalists, says BP doesn’t have any right to restrict citizens from anything other than BP’s private property.

“They can keep you off the oil rig, but they cannot keep you from a beach or a wetland, and it doesn’t matter how much they’re spending on the cleanup — they don’t own the property,” McBride says.

Course then there is the BP law…and British Petroleum law is in an alternate reality where, in fact, well, basically just take everything Kelly Mcbride says and reverse it…because as everyone has learned these past few months, what BP says, goes. It’s been this way since April 20th and the government, despite their assurances to the contrary, are still allowing it.

After all, those who control the information, control the perceptions of reality…

Read the article…

Blackout: Media Shutout on the Louisiana Coast

Have a nice day, but don’t talk to any reporters about it.

That might be illegal.

Oh yeah...oil in the marshes...but does the cap work?

Maybe it’s me, maybe I have been so focused on the pressure readings from the well and all they entail, that for a moment I forgot about the fisherman, the wildlife, the beaches and all those industries still being contaminated by the oil from British Petroleum’s catastraphuk.

What? Can’t see the forest through the trees? Yeah, something like that.

Here’s an article from the Washington Post about a recent protest in Grand Isle, Louisiana where we are all reminded that yes, people are getting sick, oil is washing up on the beaches, the booms still aren’t working and again…where are all the skimmers?

Case you missed it, the Big Whale, the huge skimmer from Taiwan was retired, it doesn’t work. Why? Because BP has used too many dispersants and the oil is too thin, but not thin enough to keep ruining the marshes and beaches and thousands of people’s livelihoods…

Read on…

Signs of the Times: Oil Spill Victims on Grand Isle Protest

And have a nice day…

Perspiration from the forehead of BP's PR Department, very toxic

British Petroleum released, quietly…oh so quietly, new information today about their results from chemical testing. What? You mean the PR department didn’t try to splash that one all over Google, Facebook, MySpace, Sarah Palin’s forehead and Texas Congressman Joe Barton’s ass?

Nope.

Turns out that 20% of the Gulf Coast cleanup crews have been sickened by a chemical that sickened cleanup workers involved in Exxon’s Valdez mess. The villain is a chemical called 2-butoxyenthanol a chemical released when BP initially used the dispersant, Corexit 9527. Apparently, Tony Hayward was wrong when he initially suggested sick workers probably just had food poisoning.

Wikipedia says:

“Moderate respiratory exposure to 2-butoxyethanol often results in irritation of mucous membranes of the eyes, nose and throat. Heavy exposure via respiratory, dermal or oral routes can lead to hypotension, metabolic acidosis, hemolysis, pulmonary edema and coma…U.S. Employers are required to inform employees when they are working with this substance...”

That this chemical is still showing up in air quality testing is called “worrisome,” “troubling,” and according to Natural Resources Defense Council Senior Scientist Gina Solomon, “the air quality if anything, seems to be deteriorating.” Considering that 2-butoxyethanol is supposed to biodegrade in a few days and British Petroleum claims they stopped using Corexit 9527 in favor of Corexit 9500 a month ago, it is curious this chemical keeps showing up. Perhaps BP is just covering up the labels on the canisters, slapping 9500 on 9527s like they cover up oily beaches with more sand. This company continues to release selective results from their air quality testing with no penalty and it’s getting old, really freaking old, but who is there to keep them in check? Who can we rely on, who will give us the facts in this, our time of need?

Oh good, it’s the EPA.

Turns out somebody in the EPA went rogue, releasing a report stating the air, especially around Venice and Grand Isle, Louisiana is now a “moderate health risk.” Moderate, right. In case you’d like a reminder of another time the EPA monitored a Catastraphuk of a disaster site and said things were safe, consider this gem:

“Our tests show that it is safe for New Yorkers to go back to work in the financial district”

Oops.

Their bad.

Also interesting is that though California lists 2-butoxyethanol as a hazardous substance, back in ’94, the EPA removed it from their list of hazardous air pollutants. So what is it, dangerous or not? EPA? BP? Obama? Somebody please give us a straight message so we don’t have to resort to independent scientists. Talk about troublesome, these guys, the ones without a financial stake in this mess, they call this stuff a cancer causing carcinogen that can be absorbed through the skin. That don’t sound too good at all, but nothing really does when so many messages are mixed.

So, for those of you haven’t been following the news of recent: BP comes to the Gulf of Mexico to get a bit of oil, totally fucks up the water, and not to be content with this they fuck up the air while they’re not cleaning up the water. BP is not really cleaning up anything but the savings accounts of everyone in the Gulf Coast States who relied on the Gulf for their source of income…and life. Meanwhile the government says they are in charge but accede to every BP demand. Obama makes a lot of promises, provides great reassurance to the American people and then disappears.

Oh…he sent his wife to visit.

Oops.

My bad.

How about another quote from round the time of 9-11, this one from Charles Schumer D(ick)-NY, “If the public loses faith that things are safe when the government says so, we’ll have more damage than a pointed statement the week after 9-11 would have.”

You think?

Hey Obama, I think he might have been talking about you!

Read the following articles:

New BP Data Show 20% og Gulf Spill Responders Exposed to Chemical That Sickened Valdez

From the EPA: Moderate Health Concerns With Gulf Air

And as always,

Have a nice day.

Facing the Future as a Media Felon on the Gulf Coast

Is this photo worthy of a felony conviction?

The United States Coast Guard considers me a felon now, because I “willfully” want to obtain more photos like these to show you the utter devastation occurring in Barataria Bay, Louisiana, as a result of the BP oil catastrophe. If the Coast Guard has its way, all media, not just independent writers and photographers like myself and Jerry Moran, will be fined $40,000 and receive Class D felony convictions for providing the truth about oiled birds and dolphins, in addition to broken, filthy, unmanned boom material that is trapping oil in the marshlands and estuaries. We don’t have $40,000 to spare, and have had to scrape the bottoms of our checkbooks as is to hire boats to take us to the devastation the Coast Guard, under the direction of BP, does not want you to see.

Absorbent boom reality

Here is what PB wants you to believe–kayakers enjoying a peaceful paddle in pristine waters. Does the new boom law apply to them, as well? If so, it is time for BP to redo its public relations photography, unveiled at a community meeting in Houma, or we will have a ton of kayakers as well as journalists clogging Louisiana courts and prisons.

One to five years in prison is a definite possibility for “willful violation” of the latest Coast Guard directive that flies in the face of the First Amendment. And, I guarantee you that writers and photographers will continue to try our best to use cameras and words to explain to those who have not been there exactly what is happening on our Gulf Shores. If we don’t continue to try, Americans will no longer see the images and read the words that have been a voice for the voiceless fishermen and women, coastal residents of the Delta, and the battered wildlife.

What BP and Coast Guard does not want you to see

Working and reporting from American Gulf Coast is starting to remind me of working in Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of Congo, where photos and recordings must be hidden on secreted flash drives at border crossings, and where interrogation by drunken border patrols certainly follows if one does not provide a proper “explanation” for visits to certain regions. In 2007, I was accused of being a “spy” and held by the secret police in Goma, DRC, for having video of illicit “conservation” activities. Now the same sick feelings of fear, anger, and helplessness is stalking my mind as I try to plan for the next round in south Louisiana. Never in my lifetime could I imagine that a foreign company could dictate my ability to move freely and openly in American territorial waters.

Already we have been challenged by the private security firm, Talon, on the oiled beaches of Grand Isle, and hassled by the Coast Guard and Louisiana Wildlife officials for not wearing flotation devices when it was not necessary. The law was on our side then, now the “law” is being used to limit free speech.

God forbid you should see this

What’s next? Will media be totally shut down? Will we face assassinations like journalists do in Rwanda? I realize assassination is over-the-top, but when it crosses your mind, even for a moment, you know something is terribly wrong.

On June 30 there was an uptick in press releases flowing from “Unified Command.” The notice of the Coast Guard felony directive was buried along with EPA test results on Corexit, Thad Allen’s “official” retirement from the Coast Guard, notices about NOAA, oiled wildlife– at least nine press releases in the space of a few hours.

Ordinarily, these propaganda pieces go in the file folder. The media ban disguised as a safety rule jumped out, but there was much analysis to do regarding the EPA test results on that day. So, the bogus 20-meter (65 feet) “safety zone” surrounding all Deepwater Horizon booming operations and oil had to wait until I could wrap my head around the implications. Frankly, I wanted to ignore it.

It is now a felony to take more photos of birds like this, wading through oil that broken booms have trapped in rookeries

The Coast Guard directive states, “The safety zone has been put in place to protect members of the response effort, the installation and maintenance of oil containment boom, the operation of response equipment and protection of the environment by limiting access to and through deployed protective boom.”

That statement is the most egregious smokescreen we have encountered on this story. No one is maintaining the boom in Barataria Bay. Boom must be anchored, cleaned, and replaced. This is not happening, and the Coast Guard, which reports directly to President Obama, does not want you to see this.

Why aren’t boom maintenance laws enforced? Instead, reporters now become felons for showing the American public the utter mess the Coast Guard, federal officials and BP have created in our once-beautiful waterways.

Here is one boom plan that is not being implemented.

“The boom is not working … it is a joke,” says Billy Nungesser, president of Plaquemines Parish, Louisiana, at a Thursday Senate hearing. “It washes up on the shore with the oil, and then we have oil in the marsh, and we have an oily boom. So we have two problems.”

Senator Mary Landrieu (D-LA) has said that the boom only works in open ocean.

BP Public Relations photo displayed at community meeting in Houma in early June

Another under-reported aspect of this story is that the dispersant Corexit has done its job of hiding the catastrophe so well that booms cannot stop the oil. It slips, snakes, and slides under the booms, which are inherently worthless in shallow waters, as Landrieu says.

Here is what the Ports and Waterways Safety Act directs. Is the Coast Guard ensuring the environmental protection of Barataria Bay? It is not, and Thad Allen and BP and the federal government do not want you to see the images that bring that fact home.

The Coast Guard has a statutory responsibility under the Ports and Waterways Safety Act of 1972 (PWSA), Title 33 USC §1221to ensure the safety and environmental protection of U.S. ports and waterways. The PWSA authorizes the Coast Guard to “…establish, operate and maintain vessel traffic services in ports and waterways subject to congestion.

Copyright Jerry Moran

In fairness to beleaguered information officers at Unified Command, there is one woman who has been trying to be helpful on several information fronts. I sent her this question:

Have you heard about the Coast Guard regulation (new) about booms and staying 20 meters away. Does this apply to unmanned booms? There is a felony penalty. Does this mean no boat traffic in Barataria Bay? It is hard to stay that distance if you are near the boomed islands.

Her response was immediate and we cannot hold PIO officers accountable for the regulations. She did sum it up in no uncertain terms.

The safety zone applies to ALL boom. In the case of Barataria Bay, the statement made in the press release,” In areas where vessels operators cannot avoid the 20-meter rule, they are required to be cautious of boom and boom operations by transiting at a safe speed and distance,” would apply.

Do you want to see more photos like this oiled dolphin in Barataria Bay, taken by Jerry Moran?

Permission to enter any safety zone must be granted by the Coast Guard Captain of the Port of New Orleans by calling 504-846-5923. Perhaps the American public should start calling him and demand that our rights of free speech and expression be reinstated in Gulf waters.

Note: I am removing all copyrights on my work. Spread these photos far and wide.

Georgianne Nienaber