Sunday, June 06, 2010
Oily Coast
The gulf coast oil spill has been going on for almost 2 months with no solution in sight. The blame game is already being played by both sides. The right calling this Obama's Katrina while the left is saving their vitriol for BP.
Anyway you slice it, it's British Petroleum's negligence that should be investigated. It appears their only concern was profits. The safety of their workers, their deaths, and the death of the wildlife and livelihood of the people that depend on fishing and tourism can be laid at BP's feet. How anyone has energy to ponder anything besides stopping the leak and helping the people that were harmed by this disaster is beyond me?
The one lesson all reasonable people should have learned from this is how reckless we, as a nation have been. How could we have allowed the politicians on both sides of the aisle to allow the oil industry to dupe us into believing they had the knowledge and technology to prevent these kinds of accidents? Why didn't someone ask the right questions? The answer is the cozy relationship between the auditors and the oil companies, as well as assuming that monetary penalties for infractions would be a big enough deterrent for a multi-billion dollar company. Work has already started on separating the auditing wing of the US Mineral Management Services (MMS) from the oil leasing contract area. Will that alone be the remedy? Without putting bite into the regulations, will the oil companies meekly disclose and correct safety issues? Why were these company's leases not revoked? Why are there no criminal charges being levied when it's so obvious that BP ignored the safety regulations?
Hopefully the spill will be stanched and we will get some answers to these questions. My only concern is that we don't allow the politicizing of this accident to prevent us from implementing regulations that will make corporations and individuals culpable for their negligence. Jail time, appropriate monetary assessments and revocation of oil leases should be added to the new regulations. Without these penalties, it will be business as usual for the oil companies.
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