Posts Tagged ‘Bob Dudley’
What’s ten billion dollars between friends?
A thought on the negotiations: put this on the table between Eric Holder and Bob Dudley and then let them negotiate away…
Despite the continued insistence of public relations hacks employed by the oil company hell known as British Petroleum that all in the Gulf is either well, or quickly on the mend, troubles persist:
“Researchers are trying to determine whether more than 100 dolphins stranded on the Texas coast, most of them in Galveston, died because of the BP oil spill, a deadly algal bloom or some undetermined cause.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration ruled last month that the dolphin deaths qualified as an “unusual mortality event,” said Blair Mase, NASA southeast region marine mammal stranding coordinator.
The strandings also come after a NOAA study found that dolphins in Barataria Bay on the Louisiana coast were in poor health because of exposure to oil. Dolphins in the bay, severely affected by the spill, had low weight and liver and lung ailments.”
And then there’s this:
“Gloom infects the hard-working shrimp and crab docks of this gritty fishing town as the second full year of fishing since BP’s catastrophic oil spill kicks into high gear.
Usually folks are upbeat and busy in May, when shrimpers get back to work in Louisiana’s rich waters. This spring, though, catches are down, docks are idle and anxiety is growing that the ill effects of the massive BP oil spill may be far from over.
An Associated Press examination of catch data from last year’s commercial harvest along the gulf — the first full year of fishing since the 2010 spill — reveals merit in the fishermen’s complaints. According to the analysis of figures obtained through public-records requests, seafood crops hit rock bottom in the Barataria estuary, the same place where some of the thickest waves of oil washed in when a BP well exploded in the Gulf of Mexico.”
So color my less cynical side surprised to read this:
“BP is pushing for a $15bn (£9.7bn) settlement with the American authorities to resolve all civil and criminal claims relating to the 2010 Gulf of Mexico oil spill, substantially less than the $25bn demanded by the US department of justice.”
Okay, so an immediate question springs to mind:
What the fuck is there to even be negotiating about?
This damned company, by way of error kills eleven people and screws an ecosystem, then goes about obscuring flow rates during the response…is in negotiations to lower the dollar amount on penalties they’ll incur as a result of their very costly shenanigans…nice. This is the company taking responsibility. This is the company with all them fancy television commercials. This is the company whose smiling (dick)head Bob Dudley looks on warmly to reassure everyone not living on the Gulf Coast just how righteous, humble and truly sorry he and his corporation truly are…while on the Gulf, where people continue to pay attention, the facts do not bear this out…this guy…I tell ya.
He’s in negotiations with the justice department and reports are these talks are “accelerating.”
Yeah, but accelerating to what?
One more screw-job for the Gulf? One more in a really long list of shenanigans shoved onto a region, poisoning its environment for decades and almost destroying New Orleans, one of this nation’s great cities?
Unlike the Corps, BP must be held accountable, completely.
Maybe for the first time in what, who knows how long anymore, it’s time for the government to stop listening to what’s good for a company and pay closer attention to the people said company screwed.
Idealistic?
Maybe.
But after watching these GOP fucks this past year…it would seem idealism is the only thing they want us to have anymore.
Have a nice day.
In no way an attack on science…
BP’s version…
Most who have followed the story of the BP Catastraphuk are familiar with the company’s enlisting of scientists and university research departments to silence them with non-disclosure requirements explore what has happened to the Gulf environment, to do the research so all the Gulf States can be made whole, well, complete, fixed like a motherfucker while Dudley sails off to the shareholders meeting, to Texas, into the sunset whilst nodding humbly to the throngs of his adoring fans beach-side…
However, Christopher Reddy and Richard Camilli will not be standing on them sands.
In an op-ed for the Boston Globe, these two Massachusetts scientists from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute had some sharp words for British Petroleum…the same company they came to help at said oil company’s request, volunteering their time for the good of the Gulf:
“We responded by leading on-site operations using robotic submersibles equipped with advanced technologies that we had developed for marine science. We applied them to measure the rate of fluid release from the well and to sample fluids from within the well. We then volunteered our professional time to scrutinize this data and published two peer-reviewed studies in a respected scientific journal. We determined an average flow rate of 57,000 barrels of oil per day and calculated a total release of approximately 4.9 million barrels. BP claimed that it needed to better understand our findings because billions of dollars in fines are potentially at stake. So we produced more than 50,000 pages of documents, raw data, reports, and algorithms used in our research — everything BP would need to analyze and confirm our findings. But BP still demanded access to our private communications.
Our concern is not simply invasion of privacy, but the erosion of the scientific deliberative process.”
And so British Petroleum goes to the judge, seeking the writings that contain much of the deliberative process, one where scientists question and challenge each other, push their colleagues to go deeper, be even more accurate, playing devil’s advocate against their colleagues and their own conclusions…you know, communications ripe with fragmented ideas.
And…BP wants…
“BP was able to use the federal courts to gain access to our private information. Although the presiding judge magistrate recognized the need to protect confidential e-mails to avoid deterring future research, she granted BP’s request.”
BP gets.
And now that they’ve gotten, what do you think might happen to those e-mails in court, as the topic turns to that magic flow-rate number of 57,000 barrels of oil per day? Or the total of 4.9 million barrels released into the Gulf, when that little fact comes up?
One might think a BP lawyer could obscure conclusive facts by reading off fragments from these e-mails…taking the smallest part to impugn the conclusions of the whole.
One might…
Yes, those more realistic about the sham that is the court of law cynical could certainly think this, but personally, I hardly think it possible, what with BP’s long history of integrity, sound science, culture of openness, safety and responsibility to not only their shareholders, but to the environment both land and sea, and all the people of this earth and beyond…
However, Reddy and Camilli have a different opinion:
“Our experience highlights that virtually all of scientists’ deliberative communications, including e-mails and attached documents, can be subject to legal proceedings without limitation. Incomplete thoughts and half-finished documents attached to e-mails can be taken out of context and impugned by people who have a motive for discrediting the findings. In addition to obscuring true scientific findings, this situation casts a chill over the scientific process. In future crises, scientists may censor or avoid deliberations, and more importantly, be reluctant to volunteer valuable expertise and technology that emergency responders don’t possess.”
No way. BP overreaching on information control, gearing up to discredit the science, the very people they turned to for help, all in order to serve their own interests? Utter insanity…and to prove this point, up to the microphone marched another BP spokesperson who said the company’s subpoena was, “in no way an attack on science.”
Well of course not, that would be ridiculous…and entirely irresponsible.
Have a nice day.
Didn’t you hear BP has settled? That’s right, you can go away now…
The brown pelican says...
Here comes the Bob:
“From the beginning, BP stepped up to meet our obligations to the communities in the Gulf Coast region, and we’ve worked hard to deliver on that commitment for nearly two years,” said Bob Dudley, BP’s CEO, in a statement issued Friday night. “The proposed settlement represents significant progress toward resolving issues from the Deepwater Horizon accident and contributing further to economic and environmental restoration efforts along the Gulf Coast.”
And collectively, four states threw up their hands in cheers.
Thank you’s, in unison, were heard echoing throughout Louisiana, Alabama, Mississippi and Florida…and if one were to sit down by the Mississippi river, become very still, very quiet…right at dusk, that pristine moment where all is a finer shade of grey, not quite daytime and not yet the night, one could focus, listening, and maybe even hear a single brown pelican gliding above the silent, always flowing river as it opens its beak and calls: “Fuck you! Fuck you!”
And that would be right about the time I stood up from those steps heading down to said river, off the Moonwalk near Jackson Square, where I take another strong sip from the strong vodka-tonic I got walking from Flanagan’s Pub and say out loud, to nobody in particlar, “Jesus Christ, I don’t care how many times you BP guys in all your varying titles go on and on about how you are meeting your responsibilities to the Gulf…just cause you say it, and say it all the fucking time, this don’t make it true…”
Yeah…
So, did you hear the one about the fair and equitable settlement yet?
I’m sure you have, but if you haven’t, I’m sure Bob Dudley and any number of “Official BP Spokesperson”(s) would love to tell you all about it. They’d love you to believe quotes like Bob’s above too…but really, what they would love more than anything else is for you all, you know, to go away and let them get back to their business of record profits and record safety violations…after all, taking risks to make profit is what British petroleum does best…so…settled…settlement…everybody’s wealthy now…everybody’s happy…right right?
$7.8 billion dollars to individual claimants in the lawsuit…settled, we’re all good…right right?
Buy our stock and give us more drilling rights…yes?
Um…not so fast, Bob.
Sure, $7.8 billion dollars seems like a lot of money and all, like one big mea culpa, except that this money is coming from that $20 billion dollar escrow fund you already pledged over a year and a half ago, and as mentioned in this good Propublica article there be a number of problems with this, or at least some questions that need answering, such as:
The lawsuits were filed in Carl Barbier’s court mostly by people who felt they weren’t getting enough money from Feinberg’s GCCF, and now that the settlement will be paid from this same fund, which has only a little more than half left in it, how much are the plaintiffs going to receive, and what happens if that fund runs dry, $7.8 billion dollar estimate or not?
And for that mater, what happens to the people who were still working on claims with Feinberg?
And, tell me again, Bob, how is it fucking fair that people who sued because they were dissatisfied with this fund now wind up back in it, only this time with lawyers getting a percentage…and as for the new overseers of the disbursements, the one’s who are promising a new level of generosity…hmm, where did we hear that before?
Oh that’s right, Feinberg once said that when he took over the disbursements from BP, right before he pissed off everybody with all his “generous” offers.
Oh, and those lawyers from the PSC…
How influenced were they to settle with Bob and BP because of the big fat fees they were looking at? Really Bob? The PSC never took that into consideration their fees at all? You sure? The PSC was only serving the interests of their clients you say…uh-huh and the other attorney, Ken Feinberg was only being neutral…right? But hey, I’m sure these are all details…just more shit for lawyers to work out amongst themselves, locked in a room while the plaintiffs stand around outside wondering from which way they’re going to get screwed this time.
Yes screwed, because of this settlement… for example, the plaintiffs just lost their chance at punitive damages.
As Greg Palast writes in Truthout:
“I was stunned that there is no provision, as expected, for a punishment fee to by paid by BP for it’s willful negligence. In the Exxon Valdez trial, a jury awarded us $5 billion in punitives – and BP’s action, and the damage caused in the Gulf, is far, far worse. BP now has to pay no more than proven damages. It’s like telling a bank robber, “Hey, just put back the money in the vault and all’s forgiven.”
And what else did BP do, or didn’t do that very well could have entitled plaintiffs to punitive damages?
BP didn’t have emergency oil spill containment equipment at the ready as they so promised, in writing and under oath. And as a condition of drilling the Macondo Well, they were to have any oil from a blowout contained within five hours, but it took them five days just to get equipment in place. BP also mixed nitrogen into the cement which capped the well, something already proven to fail and yes, this saved them money, but it also contributed to the deaths of eleven men and this entire catastraphuk…
But hey! No punitive damages, because the Plaintiff Steering Committee settled with British Petroleum…and just like BP, the PSC only had the Gulf Coast’s interests in mind.
Again…details…right Bob?
And now that we’re all settled, we should just go away now…go watch American Glee X Factor, starring the Voice…right right?
Hmm, but you know what else is details…
Tar balls are still coming into shore. Dolphins are still dying. Experts say we won’t know the extent of the damages for years to come.
And, as a result of this settlement, British Petroleum stocks rose three percent and it’s predicted to quickly rise another five percent more and with all this new profit, I just gotta ask, how much more money did that just make Tony Hayward? Or you, Bob…how much more money did that just make for you?
Was it more than some of the plaintiffs got?
Was it as much as the attorney fees the members of the Plaintiff Steering Committee are going to see as a result of this settlement?
Right.
Well…as you said Bob, from the beginning, BP has done all they can to step on up and meet your obligations. Yeah, but your obligations to who?
Answer me that…
Bob, you can go ahead and repeat your mantra about all the good you’ve done in the Gulf, ever since you did all that bad…go ahead, repeat it until there’s no one left to listen…fine. Knock yourself out. I’ll still be down by the river listening for the pelicans, listening to what they have to say and nodding my head in agreement: Fuck you.
Have a nice day.
The fear of not knowing…
"Boy...glad that's over..."
“We all knew we were experiencing health problems, but if you don’t have money and access to health care, it’s a win for BP,” said Carol Farmer, 52, of Milton. “No one knows about us, and BP can brush it under the carpet.”
Not knowing.
The country remains largely unaware of health problems occurring to cleanup workers and others in the Gulf of Mexico and those that are sick, don’t know for sure the extent of their illness…or what they can do about it.
That’s a whole hell of a lot of not knowing, and that makes a whole lot of fear. Hoping to help, the National Institute of Health is doing a long-term study of health problems in the Gulf, especially focussed on the clean-up workers and at a recent workshop in Gulf Breeze, 100 or so people showed up to take part, including Carol Farmer. The goal of the workshops and community meetings is to enroll up to 55,000 of the 150000 cleanup workers. Individuals participating in the health screenings will be told of any health problems and referred to doctors or clinics who can treat them at low or no cost.
The goal of the study is to better determine how to handle oil spills in the future.
That way, hopefully, there will be fewer problems such as:
Eddie Casanova 46, of Fort Walton Beach, said the whole left side of his body has rashes and bumps that came up after he began working the oil spill on Pensacola Beach, Fort Pickens, Johnson Beach and Pensacola Naval Air Station in 2010 and 2011.
Or…
Charles Everhart, 60, was on one of the first cleanup teams to hit the beaches in the summer of 2010 when the air was full of noxious fumes from the oil washing in from the Gulf of Mexico. Since then, he’s been having eye, respiratory and throat problems, “I used to jog three miles a day,” he said. “Now, I can’t run a block without huffing and puffing.”
Or…
Many others in the crowd who worried about immediate health problems…problems they say are being dismissed by doctors or left untreated because they can’t afford medical treatment or don’t have insurance…
Yes, money…again, money…always, money…
Money’s the reason BP won’t entertain too much discussion about health problems as it might open their company up to litigation or liability, and money’s likely the reason why Feinberg, unlike his fund for Agent Orange and 9-11, is demanding proof of causality in order to make a health claim against the GCCF, something very, very difficult to do…
But, not everybody is dealing with so many worries as BP CEO, Bob Dudley reports:
“BP added exploration prospects equivalent to an area the size of Italy, an unlikely outcome given the firm’s role in the Deepwater Horizon disaster. ‘One of the surprises is that I thought we would have a more difficult time taking on exploration roles,’ the American said. It’s been the best year in 30 years for increasing exploration acreage for BP’, he added…”
Yessir…
BP and Bob Dudley crow away about how they’re back in business, making big profits, expanding…while many of the people their spill hurt, or made sick are still in the dark waiting…wondering…unable to afford medical treatment or the peace of mind contained in knowing when it will also be their time to finally get their lives back…
You know, just like Bob.
Read the article:
BP oil cleanup workers focus of health study
Have a nice day.
Merry Christmas all…
Yeah Santa...Bob lives in that house right over there and then two blocks west, you'll find Ken...
Hey everybody…
Yeah, I’m still around, preparing to launch back into things on the 1st of the year, but I couldn’t let the days get by without some holiday wishes to all in New Orleans and along the Gulf Coast…
Best to everybody this season…Christmas, New Years and everything else everybody celebrates…
Me, I’ll be driving even further north than I already am to spend time with family and on Monday night, take over the television to watch the Saints destroy the Falcons in the Dome!
Merry Christmas!
Go Saints!
And of course, screw British Petroleum…I’d wish the Claus’d put coal in every one of your stockings but you’d just turn around and try to sell it anyway…
– Drake
Halliburton responds to accusation: “BP’s just pissed they didn’t think of it first…”
So...disappointed...
Okay, not really…
But you were thinking it, weren’t you?
In case you don’t know what this is about, British Petroleum has accused Halliburton of intentionally destroying test results showing samples of the cement they used to seal the Macondo Well were unstable, in addition to the suppression of computer models that might have also showed them at fault.
In truth, Halliburton said they are reviewing the filing…
And that’s about all the truth you’re going to get, especially from companies like British Petroleum who, lest we forget, fought to keep the press out of the Gulf, has made it next to impossible for independent scientists to get the oil samples they need to do testing in the Gulf, as well as buy up scientists throughout the Gulf region.
Now, British Petroleum would maintain the latter was done so the cleanup wasn’t affected, that they are just following procedures and were trying to find the best and the brightest to help them with the expertise needed to make the cleanup a complete and rousing success…except of course, for the obvious, which is no pictures, no evidence, no way a scientist can testify against us now that you’re entire science department signed the confidentiality clause…
Yeah, BP’s full of it, duh…but nonetheless it leaves me to scratch my head and say, when it comes to accusing Halliburton of concealing or destroying evidence in the Gulf:
Jealousy will get you nowhere.
Read the articles:
Halliburton Unit Destroyed Evidence in Gulf Oil-Spill Case, BP Tells Court
BP says Halliburton destroyed Gulf spill evidence
Have a nice day.
Revoke BP’s probation: patterns don’t lie…
The problem, and it ain't getting better...
In Alaska, whereas they have not suffered a spill as extreme as the one the company unleashed on the Gulf Coast, they have become quite familiar with this oil company’s pattern of negligence, their complete focus on profits and the willingness to let lawyers attempt to clean up the messes left behind by their poor safety conduct. Now, federal prosecutors are asking a judge to revoke BP’s probation from a conviction in 2007, stating the company is a recidivist offender and repeatedly, negligently discharges oil into the environment.
The hearing will be on November 29th in Anchorage…where surely they will examine:
Prosecutors said in their brief that BP’s history of environmental crimes in Alaska began in February 2001 when it pleaded guilty to releasing hazardous materials at its Endicott facility on the North Slope. The company was fined $500,000, placed on probation for five years and ordered to create a nationwide environmental management program, prosecutors said.
The March 2006 spill of 200,000 gallons of crude (in Prudhoe Bay) was caused by corrosion, and BP’s leak detection system failed to notice it, prosecutors said. The company’s guilty plea to a misdemeanor violation of the Clean Water Act in 2007 resulted in three years of probation, a $12 million fine, and restitution and community service payments totaling $8 million to the state of Alaska and the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation, BP attorneys said.
Prosecutors contend BP violated the conditions of its probation by allowing the 2009 spill from an 18-inch pipe moving oil, water and gas from drill pads to BP’s Lisburne Processing Center. That spill, prosecutors said, leaked 13,500 gallons of oil onto tundra and wetlands. “This rupture was the result of a predictable and preventable freezing of produced water within the pipeline that caused the pipe to over-pressurize and burst,” prosecutors said. It was eerily similar to the 2006 spill, prosecutors alleged, because BP ignored alarms that warned of the pipe’s eventual rupture and leak. The 2009 spill also followed a similar pipe freezing and rupture in 2001, they said, and BP failed to put in place preventative measures that their own experts recommended.
Prosecutors said the spill site directly abuts Prudhoe Bay and the damaged wetlands are covered by the Clean Water Act. They also contend the spill criminally violated state pollution laws because of BP negligence.
It should be noted for those in Louisiana and the Gulf Coast, it is expressly this type of pattern that BP recently requested be rendered inadmissible in the trial for the events concerning the explosion of the Deepwater Horizon, asking Judge Barbier to exclude not only these convictions, but the convictions surrounding the explosion of their oil refinery in Texas City which killed several workers…because such facts are, you know, prejudicial and shows British Petroleum’s irresponsible and unsafe actions to be well, irresponsible and unsafe.
Barbier has yet to give his decision on the matter, but along with hoping BP’s probation is revoked, here’s hoping Judge Barbier recognizes it’s time for this company, finally, to really pay for their horrendous actions, for their record to be laid bare in the court and for them to pay not only through the nose, but every other available orifice, two times.
But you know, I fear even that won’t be enough.
Eleven men died on the Deepwater Horizon. Fifteen died and over 170 were injured in the explosion of BP’s refinery at Texas City.
Some court of law, somewhere, some time needs to send some of these bastards to prison: two explosions – twenty-six people dead.
Jail does need to happen. It’s the only way BP’s behaviors will change, simply because if these pricks can afford to throw out $20 billion, (how much of which are U.S. government subsidies?) to pay damages for the consequences of their behavior, how else will they understand the criminality of their actions until the people of the Gulf Coast and Alaska can finally line-up on visiting day and take their turns spitting in the face of those convicted for the actions leading to the death of their loved ones and the destruction of their environment and livelihoods?
Because right now, the only thing BP’s getting for their behavior is more money.
So for the jail thing, I pick Bob and Tony.
I know, a no-brainer, but what can I say? I like to keep it simple, and I’m thinking rather than continue making millions of dollars in salary, these two begin to pay for their negligence, and for their lies and their pattern of violence against the people of the United States, and environment we live in.
It’s a thought…
Read the article:
BP Alaska Probation: Prosecutors Seek To Revoke 2007 Ruling
Have a nice day.
