Oil spill

[Phil]

We haven't really talked here about the British Petroleum oil spill.

Of course we only know what the powers that be and the press are interested in telling us. We don't know and probably will never know the whole story although it will be investigated and theorized for the rest of our lives what made what happen.

Its mostly explained that arrant drilling on the part of BP was the cause. Others criticize the government, BP and the EPA, not just for the spill but for not doing more to clean it up faster.

There's a ton of trickle down suffering. The beaches are unswimable for at least this season and perhaps a couple more by the time that the mess is cleaned and the rest is naturally washed by waves and rain.

Fish, ducks and other wild life have been made ill and even killed as a result of this. Its an endless saga. Local businesses like hotels and restaurants, clubs, and others are suffering big because the beach is not in use for the season. Even car rental facilities it's just a tragedy that is as far as the eye can see.

Who is to blame? BP? Yeah, then again accidents do happen. I tend to me more upset that more wasn't done sooner to fix it than the fact that it was misdrilled. That's not to say I would absolve the engineers and drillers who clearly made a bad calculation either in the design of the program or the execution of it.

My feeling is I wish more had been done sooner to resolve this.

I remember I was about 8 years old there was a nuclear accident on Harrisburg's 3 mile island. Harrisburg is only about 2 1/2 hours from where I live.

That got all kinds of news attention but shortly after that hostages were seized in Iran and Harrisburg got to hide for a while and eventually got more or less forgotten.

They say that over the course of 15 years they cleaned it up but who knows if they really did or if 3 mile island is really safe?

My father always says those things are below the surface of the earth and could be leaking anyway without us knowing.

I wish I could subscribe to his 'don't worry about it' explanation.
He will be 77 next month so I guess its worked for him

I worry about these things. I have 3 children and they're going to have to drink the water and breathe the air. I realize we need to do some things for energy but we could be a little more careful doing it.

[Jersey]

I don't normally participate in political discussions here that much anymore, but I'll add to this one. First, I'll say that U.S. dependence on foreign oil is at such a disgusting level that drilling for more oil domestically would be one of my top priorities if I were President. Offshore drilling would be one of my top venues, with much of the revenue going towards reliable alternative fuels once we do in fact run out of oil. (And it wouldn't be a private company controlled by the government, this would be a government entity all on its own so there wouldn't be any socialism.)

Now that that opinion is plain, I have to say the response by both ends, the federal government and BP, was horrendous. First, I'll hammer BP. This company was irresponsible from the get-go, because safety inspections that resulted in clear failures were passed over in favor of continuing to gain revenue instead of losing it to make them right. Their response was piss-poor, and instead of doing it quickly to save all the animals and help the gulf coast businesses, they took their time with the cap and made up a bunch of excuses about why it was taking them so long. And their CEO going to a yacht show or race (I forget which)? That about explains it all.

But my biggest hammer comes down on the federal government. Not only did Obama cross his arms and refuse to aid BP in any way shape or form, he also made sure to take plenty of vacations and gulf outings while gulf shore Americans lost revenue and jobs. If I were President, I would have had my behind down there day one, laid the cards out on the table with BP on how to fix it TOGETHER on day two, and it would have been capped and taken care of by the end of the week. This experience should show the American public just how weak, arrogant, and how utterly USELESS Barrack Obama actually is. But I digress, since there will still be many out there that continue to "lubs dem sum Obama."

That's about the end of this for right now. The oil spill was in one sentence, an annoying showing of total ineptitude for all parties involved.

[Classicblast]

That's just one disaster after another. I can't believe it was for all intents and purposes unattended to for three months.

Obviously it wasn't unattended fully. There were people investigating the situation but action was limited until recently. To me it looks as if there were more people trying to take the not me position than there were people trying to cap it.

I realize it was a drilling attempt that went wrong. It was suggested to drill smaller holes in the system to relieve the pressure. That was not really a solution but it may have slowed the spill from coming right out of the ground. Even that would have been a sign of some effort I don't see that even that happened. I also agree with Jersey the CEO of the company needed to arrive there and get a motel on shore near the problem and supervise it until the maximum restitution was made.

[Jason O'Lewa]

i hope they realy have made progres and theyre not just saying they have

[Classicblast]

I saw that clip before the press hasn't had much fun with it nor has Jay Leno that I am aware of.

[Classicblast]

I don't know how business that big is insured. I know that if my family business suppose Thunderbird or one of his guys was excavating and hit a natural gas line and blew up a building. Lets even say nobody was seriously injured or killed, there's enough insurance carried to replace the building.

Even though they're supposed to have the gas company survey the land and put stakes in pattern of natural fuel there's no way to be certain they have it right. If it gets damaged and an explosion happens they're insured for that. That actually happened to a construction company we know and are friends with. Because they took the right steps and something still went wrong the company was absolved but again the insurance was there to remedy the property damage fortunately nobody was in the house when it went up.

There doesn't seem to be a similar net for BP's oil spill.

[Slayzie]

I believe BP's stance on it from day one was that they were prepared to fully cover all costs involved in repairing the damage caused. I don't understamd why Obama felt the need to give them extra.

I also don't understand why he didn't put more pressure on BP to get on with repairing said damage, instead of letting it go on and on for months, FUBAR-ing the Gulf of Mexico in the process.

Throwing money at big companies, turning a blind eye to their irresponsibility, and not seeming to care about the environment? I thought you had a liberal president?

[thunderbird]

I'm actually taking a little break and practicing use of my droid phone I wont have much time to respond to this as much as I wish I could.

Slayzie raises a good point about environmental issues. I think sometimes they get a little carried away with that but I still think that a disaster of that size didnt have to get this bad had more care been done with it.

And I also agree that Obama as President could use to lean on them further. Sadly Slayzie no matter who our president is democrat or republican liberal or conservative that's the one thing they're all going to look the other way a little where it comes to big business. Big business funds major government projects and has a strong influence on how people vote.

BP might financially pay for the clean up but some of the damage is unrepairable. I don't know much about pollution but I know a lot about construction and sometimes once you've damaged part of the earth you have to allow it to reform on its own. Sometimes I can't fix things with concrete, blacktop and blocks.

I have refused to dig or build if the ground wasn't suitable. Off topic but hopefully explaining something that I work with and most people are unfamiliar with.

[Classicblast]

Hey as long as you're reading once in a while, When Rocky hit that gas line that blew up the house what ended up happening? I started to explain it here but I did not have all of the details. Can you fill us in?