Obama administration behaving with BP exactly as it did vis as vis the banksters in early 2009

[Karmadillo]

http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2010/05/why-is-the-deepwater-horizon-oil-spill-an-information-dead-zone.html

Why is the Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill an Information Dead Zone?
Posted by Yves Smith at 3:49 am

<edit>

Now let us get to part 2: why is Team Obama enabling this nonsense? I come up with two possibilities:

1. Team Obama believes the BP BS

2. Obama does not want to look impotent. Revealing that the leak is really bad and not having a quick solution is an Obama PR disaster. Obama has to work through BP unless he can implement an action plan using only government resources or by working with another oil company with deep ocean expertise. Given the lead times for government contracting, this would take quite a while.

If the leak is as serious as I fear, this is environmental equivalent of the Iran hostage crisis. Team Obama recognizes this, and therefore wants to create the impression as long as possible that everything that could possibly be done is being done. Note that the Administration is behaving with BP exactly as it did vis as vis the banksters in early 2009: believing that the problem is too complex and scary for them to assert control, casting its lot in with the people who caused the problem in the first place (while calling them bad names often enough to create plausible deniability). And enabling BP’s coverup of how bad the leak means, as Obama did with the financial services industry, of having to support, or at least not undermine too much, its PR efforts.

more...

[Zen Democrat]

1. I heard today that we don't have the equipment to do anything about it.

Why is that fact Obama's fault. It's no secret that crooked oilmen Cheney and Bush gave the oil companies carte blanche without any regulations and cursory inspections on in infrequent basis. When Obama came in office he was facing a pending economic collapse and depression and then took up health care as a "now or never" endeavor. The media and public opinion thought Obama was taking on too much as it was. But now he's blamed for the BP debacle? I heard today that four countries have the capabilities to go down and check out this spill, the United States isn't one of them. China is, Russia is, and there are two others.

This is just one more in a long list of reasons to try George W. Bush and Dick Cheney in federal criminal court.

[glitch]

6. We can contract with people who do like we do with many many other jobs.

We don't have to rely solely on Halliburton, Transocean and BP. And why not call in Russia and China? Obama owns a part of this debacle for not hitting the ground running on the catastraphe and TRUSTING corporations that were well known for their negligence (Halliburton and BP). If he didn't know that, or if he relied on advisors that didn't tell him that, then that is his responsibility and his mistake.
He's the President of the United States for God's sake, he's reputed to be quite intelligent, quit treating him like he's an idiot Bush.

Although I do agree with trying George Bush and Dick Cheney in federal criminal court.

[xchrom]

2. Hey obama is in bed with BP deep.

You're a part of the problem if you
think other wise.

[unkachuck]

5. yep, BP, one of Obamas' many corporate masters....n/t

[Foo Fighter]

8. Oh c'mon now. Obama will deal with BP every bit as harshly as he dealt

with Wall Street, like by bringing back Glass-Steagall and...oh wait...

[Canuckistanian]

3. They'd better not offer BP any money to help defray "cleanup costs"

I think that would push people over the edge.

[inna]

4. Interesting, thanks for posting this.

I (sort of) dig Yves and her site.

[glitch]

7. And pharma and insurance before HCR.

I sense a pattern.

[Karmadillo]

9. Kick

nt