red states rule
05-03-2010, 06:47 PM
Any any cause been determined for the explosion and spill - or are liberals just being liberals and attacking?
Does anyone know the background Donna Brazile has in the oil exploration business - besides her experience she has gained by gasing up her car at a gas station
Greed, negligence behind BP oil spill
By Donna Brazile, CNN Contributor
(CNN) -- I spent a restless night, worrying that another man-made disaster might devastate my beloved hometown, New Orleans, just as its post-Katrina motto "Recover, Rebuild, Rebirth" was becoming real.
The oil spill couldn't come at a worse time. Everybody was so up, waiting for the inauguration of our newly elected Mayor Mitch Landrieu.
The BP oil spill threatens New Orleans and the entire Gulf Coast in a way that's more insidious than Hurricane Katrina. After all, the failure of the levees and the response from the previous administration, widely criticized for incompetence and indifference, followed an act of nature: the destruction, immediate; the impact, obvious; and the pain and suffering, visible to all.
The BP disaster has only one cause: human greed, and the almost inevitable result, negligence. The immediate tragedy was that 11 people died. But the destruction that will result from BP's "crude river" will be long-term and the impact far from obvious. The "crude river" will spawn streams of suffering: economic, environmental and emotional.
So as the "Big Muddy" fights the "Big Cruddy," how do we assess the players? And what actions should be taken against rigged disasters, both once and future?
First, we must hold BP accountable and responsible. Was it an accident? Only if we define "accident" as negligence.
The failure of the "shear ram," the set of steel blades intended to slash through a pipe at the top of a well and close off the flow of crude, should not have surprised BP or the corporations that work for it. Eight years ago, the Minerals Management Service found that 50 percent of the shear rams tested failed. So calling the failure of the "last resort device" an accident is like calling the damage caused by a drunken driver an accident. Failure to take the proper precautions is not an accident; it's negligence.
http://www.cnn.com/2010/OPINION/05/03/brazile.oil.new.orleans/
Does anyone know the background Donna Brazile has in the oil exploration business - besides her experience she has gained by gasing up her car at a gas station
Greed, negligence behind BP oil spill
By Donna Brazile, CNN Contributor
(CNN) -- I spent a restless night, worrying that another man-made disaster might devastate my beloved hometown, New Orleans, just as its post-Katrina motto "Recover, Rebuild, Rebirth" was becoming real.
The oil spill couldn't come at a worse time. Everybody was so up, waiting for the inauguration of our newly elected Mayor Mitch Landrieu.
The BP oil spill threatens New Orleans and the entire Gulf Coast in a way that's more insidious than Hurricane Katrina. After all, the failure of the levees and the response from the previous administration, widely criticized for incompetence and indifference, followed an act of nature: the destruction, immediate; the impact, obvious; and the pain and suffering, visible to all.
The BP disaster has only one cause: human greed, and the almost inevitable result, negligence. The immediate tragedy was that 11 people died. But the destruction that will result from BP's "crude river" will be long-term and the impact far from obvious. The "crude river" will spawn streams of suffering: economic, environmental and emotional.
So as the "Big Muddy" fights the "Big Cruddy," how do we assess the players? And what actions should be taken against rigged disasters, both once and future?
First, we must hold BP accountable and responsible. Was it an accident? Only if we define "accident" as negligence.
The failure of the "shear ram," the set of steel blades intended to slash through a pipe at the top of a well and close off the flow of crude, should not have surprised BP or the corporations that work for it. Eight years ago, the Minerals Management Service found that 50 percent of the shear rams tested failed. So calling the failure of the "last resort device" an accident is like calling the damage caused by a drunken driver an accident. Failure to take the proper precautions is not an accident; it's negligence.
http://www.cnn.com/2010/OPINION/05/03/brazile.oil.new.orleans/