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What BP Really Owes for Disaster
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For an eye-opening book of the corporate negligence and GOTUS police state collusion that went into the 'BP Disaster,' I recommend a quiet read of Ms. Juhasz' groundbreaking expose, Black Tide. Irrespective of whether you're a 'drill, baby, drill' cheerleader or a 'save the baby pelicans' bleeding heart, you will have a hard time walking away from and dismissing the wholesale criminality at BP and within the federal government that her hard-hitting journalistic account reveals. The following is excerpted from Antonia's article in HuffPost, 6/11/12:
On Friday (6/8/12), the Financial Times reported that BP is hoping to reach an agreement with U.S. authorities which would require it to pay under $15 billion to settle all criminal and civil penalties arising from the 2010 Gulf oil disaster. The Department of Justice is reportedly seeking $20 to $25 billion. Negotiations between the DOJ and BP are accelerating and "an agreement could be reached before the Democratic party's convention in September," the FT reported.
While $15 billion sounds like a lot of money -- and it is -- it is a far cry from what BP owes for the many costs associated with the largest offshore oil spill in history. To date, a full accounting of exactly what BP should owe for its crimes in the Gulf has not been made public. Such an accounting is vital if we are to ensure that justice and restoration are delivered to the Gulf Coast and that such a catastrophe never occurs again. A straightforward application of just the most pertinent U.S. laws yields a fine of $192 billion. (For simplicity sake, I only address BP's fines.)
Sound high? Here's why it's not.
The Gulf oil spill is the largest ecological disaster in U.S. history and the world's largest offshore oil spill. The failures that led to this disaster are not only endemic of BP, Transocean, Halliburton, and their other Macondo partners, but they permeate the entire offshore oil industry, which has pushed beyond its own technological capacity in pursuit of profit. Fortunately, we have laws that not only punish these actions, provide for restoration and restitution, but are also designed to deter such risky and destructive activities in the future. If BP is not held to the law, then the costs of such dangerous operations will invariably be once again outweighed by the benefits.
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2012 June 11
Copyright Antonia Juhasz c/o Huffington Post
Black Tide | BP Oil Spill | Antonia Juhasz | Deepwater Horizon | Valdez
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