but, but . . .

As I understand it the current top-end estimate is intended to place a hard cap on any further increases in the official calculated spill rate… regardless of what further discoveries may actually find.

This allows Obama to sound like he’s “getting tough” while still shielding the corporate footstools of our lords and masters from the full consequences of their malfeasance.

I say fine them for every penny and use the money to create a gulf disaster relief fund.

I’ve got a thought here, and some questions that some of us probably know the answers to.

Thought: Would our government be willing to sacrafice BP to stem the tide of public outrage against corporate elitism? I believe they would. I believe they’re going to.

Question: What is BP’s current estimated value? I can’t seem to find anything online. If anyone knows offhand, that’d be great.

Question: If BP refuses to pay for these things, what recourse does our government have? Is it as simple as the judicial system?

Of course BP’s failure is not exactly to be hoped for at this point. Better we hope that they will remain viable in order to be able to pay for this mess. But I guess that’s not looking likely at this point.

What a terrible, terrible situation.

It took the people of Alaska 20 years to get anything after the Exxon Valdez so the judicial system, which I do think it will come down to, is sorta slow.

TPM is saying that analysts at BofA (yeah, I know) are figuring BP’s total liability will be somewhere in the range of $125-130 billion. Which is enough to get BP’s attention, for real.

Rolling Stone’s Tim Dickinson on the Inside Story of How Obama Let the World’s Most Dangerous Oil Company Get Away with Murder

http://www.democracynow.org/2010/6/11/rolling_stones_tim_dickinson_on_the

I believe that this may very well be an attempt of the PTB, through Obama, to kill the Gulf for purposes other than drilling. They will declare the dispersant and oil to be a human health hazard and evacuate the shoreline, thus opening the gulf for business. They are all sociopaths, – if they can manufacture wars, they can manufacture recreating the Gulf in accordance with their quest for profit.

BP will merely become the sacrificial lamb.

I thought I saw a story that mentioned BP’s current value around 90-95 billion at it’s current stock price, which is roughly half of what it was before the spill.

The goal shouldn’t be to vindictively drive BP into bankruptcy– then the govt. would have to foot the bill for sure.

No, BP spins off crazy amounts of cash; we just need to make sure the Gulf Coast and not the shareholders are the recipients of it for the foreseeable future.

Today I heard of a new angle on BP’s response.

Locking up the mapping (GIS) data:

1) The current configuration and process allow BP to limit or slow down the flow of information about the extent of the disaster to the government, the public and law enforcement,….
2) The current process allows BP to treat GIS datasets as proprietary information.
3) The GIS information is essential to the recovery of public resources, and some data belongs to US taxpayers, not BP.
4) State Emergency Operation Center staff, Parish EOC staff, and other Emergency Responders and Recovery Specialists do not have access to these GIS datasets

Financial compensation is important and Obama should seize BP, all of its assets wherever situated, and liquidate them to fund the effort to stop the blowout, clean-up the mess, and compensate the victims for their financial losses; but let’s face it, it’s impossible to measure the destruction of the Gulf of Mexico and all of its life forms in dollars and cents.

The gulf and its extinguished species cannot be replaced, and nothing Obama does can erase his complicity in this horrific tragedy as this democracynow.org video interview of Rolling Stone’s Tim Dickinson establishes. He wrote the article in Rolling Stone’s current issue entitled, Inside Story of How Obama Let the World’s Most Dangerous Oil Company Get Away with Murder.

Don’t be silly, the judicial system is for the little people!

Our rich overlords get yachts instead!

YAHOO’s balance sheet for BP
Current total assets: $236 billion
Market capitalization: $106 billion
Outstanding shares: 3.13 billion
Number of employees: 80,000

BP is heavily invested by pensions and mutual funds in this country and of course all over the UK. Scottish Widows just effectively doubled down and bought even more BP debt after having already lost millions in stock value. Anybody that thinks this company will not cause some ripples in the world economy as it tanks is probably being optimistic.

Also note the divergence between market cap and assets.

My comment @11 says what you said @8.

Sorry, but I was composing my comment when you posted yours and I didn’t see yours until I posted mine and the page refreshed.

The flow from the pipe is lot higher than BP/Govt/Scientist are coming up with. A 20 inch pipe under normal conditions is capable of discharging more than 350,000 Barrel a day of crude. Published reports indicated the damaged pipe is 19-21 inch diameter. BP or Government should be able to check the figures from the design Data or information submitted to State and Governmental Agencies. Whatever the system was designed for it operating at those conditions. Of course some is recovered by BP (a tiny percent) and the remaining going into the ocean.

Blue Texan’s regularly scheduled post is ready: Palin Viewed Unfavorably by Nearly 40% of Iowa Republicans

and fuckno @ 8. Thanks so much for emphasizing that RS article and the video. I’ve been trying to call attention to it, but you two made much more effective efforts.

I agree that vindictive bankruptcy is not the way to go here. I envision a government seizure of BPs assets to auction off to the highest bidder, thus generating funds to pay reparations and cleanup costs. That’s probably unconstitutional, but it’d be awesome to see.

So Obama’s going to meet with the top brass at BP next week in order to get his talking points and be given lessons on how to better shill for BP??

Not expecting BP to ever really “pay” for this unmitigated and criminally negligent disaster. Now the media is “all over” the fact that many British pensioners rely on BP shares as part of their pensions. So wait for the us v. them wars to begin: now you DFH’s wouldn’t want British granny to face starvation and a death panel because you expect BP to, you know, clean up the mess the made? How could you DFH’s be so horrid to British granny??? Nazi!

Does anyone here know if the BP American operations are a separate entity? Are they guaranteed by the British company?

Bankrupting the BP american operations will have repercussions that will likely harm the administration – higher gas prices ala President Carter, lost BP jobs as the administration is trying to increase jobs (other than the census bureau), no one responsible for the clean-up and the like.

Granted that bp owes for what they did, but what about the other two, transocean and halliburton, participating in the payments?

One thing that I haven’t seen discussed is the homeowners along the Gulf coast. How much longer can they hold out without being forced to evacuate? When the hurricanes come and spread the oil over everything many people are going to lose their homes. Who will pay for those?

Much of the Gulf will be forever dead now. How can that be replaced? This was in no way an accident; the well owners and drillers cheated and cut corners. Since corps are now the same as individuals under our supreme court, the ceo and top admin of each company should be tried for murder. That would get everyone’s attention.

Don’t count on the courts. Judges in Texas,Louisana,etc
are considered “oily”. Our conservative activist
Supremes changed 250 years of maritime law to cap the
“penalty” judgement in Exxon Valdez to be not more
than the actual damages. Check the interview with Brian
O’Neill on C-SPAN (he was a lead lawyer for those
damaged).

Absolutely excellent point!

now there is some question about whether a production platform is safe:

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=amqC6AxvW.l4&pos=9

There was some talk that BP was going to attempt to hive off their American operations. I suspect that our corporate friendly Administration did something uncomfortable and made some references to snowballs and hades, recognizing some of the peril it would represent. Personally I think that the U.S. must put some sort of overriding lien against the current company’s assets before the company is put into strategic bankruptcy. Without that in place the company is worth more purchased and chopped into pieces than it’s stock value. We also need to be in front of bondholders so that we can fund the cleanup for the ongoing ecological destruction.

And why hasn’t Salazar been forced to resign? And, yes, BP execs need to be tried for murder. We need some head rolling.

This is a worst terrorist attack than 9/11. Should we call this 4/20?

I, too, have been wondering how TransOcean and Haliburton factors into all of this! Both companies have been quite notable by their absence from ANY of the discussions that I’ve heard so far about liability, paying for the clean up, etc. It seems as if both TransOcean and Haliburton *should* be at least partially liable, but why are they never mentioned?? I’m so sure that Dick Cheney has nothing to do with this silence… /s

Those with properties close to the Gulf must really be tearing out their hair; not a good thing at all. Wish them all well. I’m sure it’s gonna be a real mess when the big storms come along.

Mason, don’t be silly.;-)

Good questions, and I agree with your proposals. Indeed. Would love to see Salazar run out town on a rail and replaced by someone competent, who has the right principles. Does such a person exist inside the Beltway, though???

in response to 24. The pipe size is not a secret. Such information could be easily checked from public records. There should not be two phase flow at such high pressure within the pipe.

sorry about cross posting;

The biggest and most secretive gathering of ships in maritime history lies at anchor east of Singapore. Never before photographed, it is bigger than the U.S. and British navies combined but has no crew, no cargo and no destination

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/home/moslive/article-1212013/Revealed-The-ghost-fleet-recession-anchored-just-east-Singapore.html#ixzz0qZCnDkbi

then:

BP summons more ships to capture spilled oil

http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/environment/2010-06-11-oil-spill_N.htm

Obama deserves to be impeached for this.

The Baltic Dry Index, is about where it was then, so plenty of idle ships available for sucking up the surface oil, instead we’re pouring rivers of questionable dispersant into the gulf.

Salazar certainly should have already been shown the door but there are a lot of Interior and MMS employees that should share in that fate. For that matter the current PR spokesman wearing a Coast Guard uniform as been a bit of a disappointment but he may simply be following orders.

Whether this disaster was intended (huge stock dumping before the drill by BP, Goldscrew and others, unless backdated), or not, these are more things coming out of underground news, although most of it has already been on the MSM, just not picked up (no surprise). My Senator Nelson even mentioned the condition of the entire seabed is unstable now.

There are BP informants saying that BP was drilling from about 25,000 to 30,000 feet deep in approx 5,000 feet of water. They hit a catastrophic area. BP knew what they had done, immediately, hence the rushing of BP helicopters immediately to the site. The explosion burst all safety valves and damaged underground pipes, which means that leakage is going everywhere, not just through the initial pipe.

No pressure readings are being disclosed but estimates are that the pressure of the spill now is around 20,000 to 70,000 lbs. per square inch. This is an impossible amount of pressure to deal with and was NEVER considered even possible. IT IS BEYOND ALL KNOWN TECHNOLOGY. This is why everyone is acting funny and so secret.

Workers on the rig have been reported as saying that the fail safe valve was already damaged, before the explosion, but were told not to replace. Not that it would have helped.

There are currently about 4 million gallons shooting out per day, plus FISSURES from the explosion, also leaking tremendous amounts of oil, but since they are cracks, there is really NO HOPE in stopping those. This is where the PLUMES are coming from, that BP denies, but Senator Nelson already spoke about on MSNBC.

This means that parts of the STRATA are ruptured, not due to the drilling, but because of the explosion, with some plumes and cracks 5-20 MILES AWAY from the explosion site. Russians and other scientists have advanced this theory that some oil is actually connected to hydrothermal vents deep within the earth, and what they call, “mud volcanoes”, or a sort of mud-oil-magma bubble. (sound familiar to the Gulf?)

The worst of this kind of oil (abiotic oil?) is not the oil itself, but the chemicals that are also being released, which we are not hearing the MEASUREMENTS OF, but we know that NOAA is measuring them right now, for some reason. Some of the chemicals, known to be totally lethal in even small doses, are becoming airborne right now, in doses that are unimagineable. Hydrogen sulfide is allowed at about 5-10 parts per billion, is NOW BEING MEASURED AT 1200 PARTS PER BILLION. Benzyne, a poison not safe at ANY level, is now being RELEASED AT 3000 PPB. Methaline chloride, somewhat safe at 61 ppb is NOW BEING MEASURED AT 3000 – 3400 PPB. And other chemicals, suspected of being lethal, such as Vanadium, are not even being accurately measured or evaluated. ALL THESE CHEMICALS ARE BECOMING AIRBORN AND CAUSE LEUKEMIA, BIRTH DEFECTS, STERILITY AND MORE. This is a LIFE-KILLing contamination with NO BOUNDS.

Because of the nature of the intrusion and CRACK, DEEP into the ocean floor, the Russians, for one group, there are others, claim that the only solution is a nuclear explosion, or several, at the right places, which would cause the sea floor to turn to a dead glass. That would be the positive result. The negative one would be that it would cause a complete underwater volcano, never to be capped, which would destroy, well, the entire area for thousands of miles.

All of this has been implied or suggested or outright stated on the MSM. I wish the press would find a way to do its job and investigate. We will see.

This is an entirely different scenario that we are being told by BP and O-Stupid.

This reminds me: what happened to the ships that Kevin Kostner(?) was sending to mop up the oil, and the sweep arms that the Dutch were sending by airfreight about two weeks ago? Also, someone said that separating the oil from the water on a ship and dumping the water back into the Gulf would have violated some EPA rules about making sure that the water was clean. What kind of nonsense is that? Anything that would have separated the oil was better than nothing under such extreme circumstances.

moderate and approve all you want but please someone do more investigation!!!

Saddest thing about the media TV coverage of the BP oil spill has been MSNBC’s coverage.

While CNN’s coverage has shone (especially Anderson Cooper’s), MSNBC’s coverage has been hobbled by its symbiotic relationship with the Obama Administration.

CNN is a bigger, more experienced news organization…but, it’s been CNN’s willingness to speak truth to power regarding the Gulf oil spill that’s given them a huge edge. CNN has been telling the truth about the Administration’s response to the Gulf oil spill…MSNBC has not. Perhaps they cannot…I don’t know. But MSNBC’s lack of criticism of the Obama Administration has been jarring.

Yesterday, at a time when the big story was the NY Times article suggesting collusion in managing the news coverage of the spill by BP and the Obama Administration, and the continuing confusion on the spill’s actual flow rate…Rachel Maddow spent the opening segment of her show talking about ACORN. Yes, that’s right…ACORN.

The only direct criticism I’ve seen from an MSNBC contributor on a prime-time show came from Howard Fineman on Countdown.

If MSNBC doesn’t step it up, they’re going to lose the progressive audience that they still have in the wake of their health care “reform” coverage.

though you have to take into account the containment dome taking in some of the oil, meaning the spill is more like 4,000-25,000 barrels a day at this point

This is incorrect. This is a comment I wrote for a bmaz thread last night.

You know all this does is bring us back to the 25,000-30,000 range a lot of us were using as a guesstimate from almost the beginning. Similar wells in the area were producing at around 50,000-60,000 bbls/day. Figure in about 50% for various crimps in the pipes and you got the number above. No rocket science involved. Now since they cut off the riser, the LMRP is siphoning off about 10,000-15,000 bbls/day. But this is off the full flow rate (no crimps) so the blowout is spewing around 35,000-50,000 bbls now. Again no rocket science involved. It will be interesting to see how refinements in USGS analyses track with this.

Blogger Dian L. Chu compiled some interesting bits of information around the clean up effort.

Separately, Belgian newspaper De Standaard also reported Belgian and Dutch dredgers have technology in-house to fight the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, but the Jones Act forbids them to work in the U.S.

A Belgian group–DEME– contends it can clean up the oil in three to four months with specialty vessel and equipment, rather than an estimated nine months if done only by the U.S. The article noted there are no more than 5 or 6 of those ships in the world and the top specialist players are the two Belgian companies- DEME and De Nul – and their Dutch competitors.

The U.S. does not have the similar technology and vessel to accomplish the cleanup task because those ships would cost twice as much to build in the U.S. than in the Far East. The article further criticizes this “great technological delay” is a direct consequence of the Jones Act.

Of course in order to pursue this path BP would have to be playing second fiddle to an Administration in charge.

Salazar certainly should have already been shown the door but there are a lot of Interior and MMS employees that should share in that fate.

I can not emphasize enough that the Obama Administration backs offshore drilling in a big way. Salazar and the MMS were simply executing Obama policy. Obama is not so much protecting BP because it is a big corp, although there is undoubtedly some of this due to the overwhelmingly corporatist nature of this Administration, as he is protecting offshore drilling, especially drilling in deeper and more dangerous areas.

From Alexander Cockburn at counterpunch:

As BP’s initial 5,000 barrels-a-day number, successfully sold to the Obama administration and the press, sank onto disrepute against the current very moderate estimate of 30,000 bpd, (equivalent of an Exxon Valdez spill every 8 days or so, with a higher calculation running nearer 100,000bpd) , the tar balls started sticking to Obama’s elegant footwear.

I’ve been thinking the same thing for weeks.

Paralleling this: does anyone know the status of the Federal Flood Insurance Program? It lapsed on 5/31/10, and without its resumption (requiring an act of Congress, and the president’s signature) all coastal property is in limbo, and cannot get a mortgage. This is in effect an economic condemnation of all homes along the Gulf of Mexico. If people have to move away to gain employment, they will not be able to sell their homes, should anyone want to buy them who cannot pay cash. If people are to be evacuated, how will compensation be evaluated? Will Kelo be hauled out to use eminent domain to hand the coast to Big Oil for ‘national security’ purposes? Will the value of the homes be considered nil, seeing as the banks won’t write mortgages on them, circular reasoning, etc. Will the people be permitted to move of our own accord……

Showing parts of Team Obama the door, for the love affair with offshore drilling, may take just a bit longer given that so few Ds acknowledge that this has been anything but a rousing success. The above story mentions that Obama will meet with BP execs next week. I wonder what the hurry is? After 50 plus days, why start to get excited now?

That just can’t be right. Obama has studiously avoid photo-ops where oil might get on the bottoms of his togs.

Insist on marking the value of assets just like Wall Street. Mark to myth.

If Dick Cheney had still been in charge before BP started this operation, he’d have invoked the 1% doctrine to prevent such a risky enterprize.

Since the federal flood insurance program was allowed to lapse as of the end of May, it is now impossible to buy a home on the Gulf of Mexico unless one can afford to pay cash. Banks won’t mortgage coastal property without flood insurance, and the private insurers got out of that business after Katrina (in hurricane-prone areas). So if those whose livelihoods have been destroyed by the oil spew need to move elsewhere to gain employment, they will not likely be able to sell their homes.

Any and all funds from fines or what ever must go to remediation and recovery as well as compensation to those directly affected by this disaster. All too often these types of funds seem to somehow disappear some where in the fog of controversy. Exxon fought their fines for years in an effort to shirk their responsibility and they were succesful for the most part. Eventually, they got away for pennies on the dollar. By the time they finally had to actually put up, many of the people who had legitimate claims died. I imagine this is what BP will ultimately do also. They will look for loopholes and manuever to bring their costs down. After all, this is what big business does at the expense of the rest of us. They are all about exploitation. They will be hurt by this but not too much. I think it is time that our government also start to look into a public oil drilling company with all procedes going into the federal budget. There is just too much money out there to let it all go into the pockets of big corporations. I feel that these resources belong to the U.S. in general and I can see no reason to just put it all in the hands of people who’s only motive is to enrich themselves. This why Transocean messed up. They were looking for shortcuts and these are the consequences. BP is not the only guilty party here. As far as our government is concerned the only thing I expect from them is to stay on top of this until it can be put to rest. This will be a problem for years to come. I remember reading somewhere that one drop of oil will significantly change the color and taste of one gallon of water. You can try and do the math.

It looks like the “assets” part of the chart conveniently overlooks the liabilities for the gusher. Typical corporate bullshit to ignore liabilities which, in this case, not even counting fines, should really be in the $500 billion range. The excuse will be that the liabilities are contingent and not subject to close estimate at present. To which I call bullshit: BP knows damn well what its potential exposures are, but it won’t tell any of us serfs.

Somewhere, I think on an earlier FDL thread, I read that the potential for BP fines, if Holder has the cojones and desire to impose them, and if honest figures are used as to the # of barrels gushed out, is something on the order of a full Trillion, with a “T.” So, go figure, Scottish Widows!

Do you have any links for these speculations?

Here’s one from teh googly:

Obama’s meeting:
http://rawstory.com/rs/2010/0610/doubles-oil-gusher-estimate-top-bp-brass-summoned-obama/

The nuclear option:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3036677#37500376

The depth they were drilling to:
http://oilprice.com/Environment/Oil-Spills/White-House-Covers-Up-Menacing-Oil-Blob.html

Other than watching the video, it took 1 query and less than a minute.

Some more:

Chemical exposure in gulf:
http://www.nytimes.com/gwire/2010/06/11/11greenwire-tests-raise-questions-about-cleanup-workers-ch-42215.html

Plume discovery:
http://www.nature.com/news/2010/100518/full/465274a.html

More than one plume:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/05/27/gulf-oil-spill-new-plumes_n_591994.html

Many plumes:
http://www.wdsu.com/news/23748517/detail.html

Hi all,

I found this impressive calculation of the percentage of the Gulf’s waters already replaced by oil

http://oilspillfigures.wordpress.com

Frightening!

The Obama administration making a corporation pay for their fuckups? I’ll believe it when I see it.

More likely he’ll latch onto Boner’s corporate welfare idea and roll with it in the spirit of “bipartisan cooperation.”