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Spill, Baby, Spill!

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LJL

New member
Not looking to make this any more political that it is already, but I agree with your comments on a lot of fronts. The entire concept of deregulation was assuming that the markets would correct things naturally. Ain't gonna happen. Then the argument about how costly it is for government agencies to staff up enough to do the proper job, so let the industries, who supposedly know more plus all the ins and outs, do it with just government oversight. Well, that is not working either. Then there is the false belief that industries have the interest of the general public in mind. Nonsense. They answer only to shareholders, and when they fail to show sufficient profits, shareholders will move on to something/somebody else. It should be in the interest of companies within an industry to be stewards to both the shareholders AND the rest of the environment in which they are being permitted to operate. However, reality is company and profits first, end of story. Not even a second place thing without being forced by regulations, and held accountable by serious oversight. We do not need a total government control, as one side of the extreme argument goes, but where the resources, livelihoods, health and other critical things of millions are concerned, and environmental impact can be devastating (this applies to energy and financial stuff alike), we do need a stronger hand regulating things, and not just paying lip service, being bought off, or litigated to diminishing returns.

Most folks do not really want more government intervention on some things like this until it really messes with their lives and such. Well, we are at that point once again. We cannot trust any industry to practice self-regulation and policing. It just does not work without there being some independent oversight that also has some "teeth" with respect to penalties for breeching regs. BP may not have really done anything "wrong" with respect to the economics and plans it built for approval of the project. At issue is just how lax those plans may be to close scrutiny before approval. I am not against harvesting the resources we may need, but we must do it, and a lot of other things much more safely, environmentally securely, and if it costs more, so be it, or find those other energy sources that will cause less damage.

Just my thoughts....

LJ
 

bensonga

Well-known member
100% agreement from me LJ. I don't want to see a government takeover of private industry either.....I just want them regulated so that the public interests are protected.

Depending on how bad the environmental and economic consequences of this spill ultimately become, there is simply no amount of money that BP could pay to truly make people and the environment whole again....so it's better to do everything possible on the front end to avoid these problems before they happen. And sometimes, the only "adult in the house" is the government (when it is truly functioning to protect the public interest).

Gary
 

M5-Guy

New member
Not looking to make this any more political that it is already, but I agree with your comments on a lot of fronts. The entire concept of deregulation was assuming that the markets would correct things naturally. Ain't gonna happen. Then the argument about how costly it is for government agencies to staff up enough to do the proper job, so let the industries, who supposedly know more plus all the ins and outs, do it with just government oversight. Well, that is not working either. Then there is the false belief that industries have the interest of the general public in mind. Nonsense. They answer only to shareholders, and when they fail to show sufficient profits, shareholders will move on to something/somebody else. It should be in the interest of companies within an industry to be stewards to both the shareholders AND the rest of the environment in which they are being permitted to operate. However, reality is company and profits first, end of story. Not even a second place thing without being forced by regulations, and held accountable by serious oversight. We do not need a total government control, as one side of the extreme argument goes, but where the resources, livelihoods, health and other critical things of millions are concerned, and environmental impact can be devastating (this applies to energy and financial stuff alike), we do need a stronger hand regulating things, and not just paying lip service, being bought off, or litigated to diminishing returns.

Most folks do not really want more government intervention on some things like this until it really messes with their lives and such. Well, we are at that point once again. We cannot trust any industry to practice self-regulation and policing. It just does not work without there being some independent oversight that also has some "teeth" with respect to penalties for breeching regs. BP may not have really done anything "wrong" with respect to the economics and plans it built for approval of the project. At issue is just how lax those plans may be to close scrutiny before approval. I am not against harvesting the resources we may need, but we must do it, and a lot of other things much more safely, environmentally securely, and if it costs more, so be it, or find those other energy sources that will cause less damage.

Just my thoughts....

LJ
+1
Well stated
 

M5-Guy

New member

bensonga

Well-known member
We've got to give these rig workers alot of credit for doing a very dangerous job....as with the coal miners etc.

Hard to appreciate that when we just pull up to the local pump for gas or flip the swith for electricity from a coal fired power plant.....it's all so far removed from most of our lives.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/08/us/08rig.html?hp

Gary
 
V

Vivek

Guest
To put things in perspective:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/magazine/8664684.stm

The 1979 blow out remains the largest ever. Why isn't anyone talking about it since there must have been measurable impact of what had happened? This isn't new at all.

As to Robert's side addendum- untrue. This is the first time in the post WW II era, the US actually are pursuing a foreign policy that is consistent with they say (still excludes the oil rich Arab countries). The long running Arab-Israeli conflict has little to do with the US interests than what happens in the Af-Pak region.
 

monza

Active member
Vivek, my comment was referring to government incompetence preventing terror attacks. Alllowing someone on the terror watch list to board a plane and relying on luck and civilians to prevent an explosion; ignoring all the obvious warning signs regarding the Ft Hood terrorist; and were it not for the luck of miswiring, the Times Square bomb attempt. The govt has given me no reason to have confidence in their abilities; more regulations with regards to oil would not do so, either. The free pass thru regulations in the Gulf? Amazing. That's the nature of bureaucracy. I have more confidence in private industry, even BP. There is no way to regulate human error.
 

jlm

Workshop Member
one might say that since the gov pays so poorly, the more talented will move to industry. industry however is not motivated to self regulate, in fact the opposite as industry will spend huge amounts to lobby against regs and with more money and more talent...how we get what we have now.
the role of gov should be to define and enforce the regs; who else? i don't think it is a question of human error, more of acceptable risk and proper safeguards.

with respect to government incompetence preventing terror attacks, what do you suggest, Halliburton?

i'm no fan of government, but ultimately there can be no other agency to do it. the problem is really the first line of my post.
 

monza

Active member
Have you seen how much federal employees are paid compared to private industry? Poorly paid govt employees are a myth: http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2010-03-04-federal-pay_N.htm Look at the benefit differential, too.

Why would BP or any other oil company not be self-motivated to prevent such an event?

The government has proven it isn't enforcing existing regulations. Not sure what more regulations are going to do...

Acceptable risk and proper safeguards. It appears everyone from the government to BP thought that standard was met.

With respect to the govt and terror, first, we need a govt that actually calls terror terror, and stops bending to political correctness. Second, stop taking credit that the 'system worked' when it's clear it did not...but that is a whole 'nother discussion.
 

stephengilbert

Active member
"Why would BP or any other oil company not be self-motivated to prevent such an event?"

BP certainly was motivated to prevent such an event. The questions is the lengths and expense they were willing to go to do so. I imagine they'd calculated the cost of prevention, and the cost and likelihood of accidents; and opted for what seemed to be lower (and more cost effective for BP.)

When Ford was designing the Pinto, they calculated that it was better (for Ford) to save the ten dollars a car it would have cost to make a gas tank fire less likely to kill the car's occupants (to keep the car's price below $2000) than it would be to pay damages when people in the cars were burned. Later, after people died, memos on the decision leaked, and Ford paid millions in damages.

BP may well pay out more in damages than it would have cost to be safer, but, as in the Pinto case, the damages won't make the people injured by the accident whole.
 

monza

Active member
Whether cost cutting occurred in exchange for greater risk is speculation.

More Government regulation at greater expense would not guarantee 100% safety either, unfortunately. Even existing regulations were waived...

My sympathies to the families of those BP employees that perished.
 

stephengilbert

Active member
Why were regulations waived? Are you suggesting that BP wanted more safety but the regulators didn't? I don't think the "lobbyists" and government officials involved in deciding the right level of safety for the people of the Gulf are likely to tell us exactly what was involved in their decision making; in pressed, they'd likely invoke their Fifth Amendment protection against self-incrimination.
 
V

Vivek

Guest
I don't think the "lobbyists" and government officials involved in deciding the right level of safety for the people of the Gulf are likely to tell us exactly what was involved in their decision making; in pressed, they'd likely invoke their Fifth Amendment protection against self-incrimination.
Well said.

If there are rules and regulations and enforcement of them to the letter then the lobbyists churn out media propaganda like "anti business". The FDA is toothless. The EPA was obliterated several years ago. The list is endless.

Sadly, it will take more disasters and time to overcome all this.
 

bensonga

Well-known member
Lax enforcement of existing regulations by government agencies or refusal to pass laws and regulations in the first place (by congress and/or an administration) does not mean government can't do the job.....it indicates a government that is unwilling to do the job of protecting the public interest. The solution to bad government isn't less government or no government, it's good government.

No food safety regulations or enforcement of regulations? No thanks.

No airline safety regulations or enforcement of regulations? No thanks.

The list goes on and on......things we take for granted until something like this happens. I don't think the risks of accidents like this can be completely eliminated....but they should be reduced to the minimum, especially when concerns were raised for the past 10 years by technical experts in the MMS about a failure of this very type.

The fact that decision makers in the MMS (often political appointees) refused to enforce the regulations, issued waviers, succumbed to lobbying pressure or came into the job thinking government should leave it to industry to regulate itself (as was often the case with Bush appointees) is not evidence that government can't regulate to protect the public interest.

It is evidence of decision makers in a government agency putting the oil industry's interests ahead of the public interest.

Gary
 
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bensonga

Well-known member
My sympathies to the families of those BP employees that perished.
None of the 11 people who died were BP employees. I think they were all from Transocean, the owner and operator of the rig. We hear so little about those 11 people in the news. Their families must be reliving this nightmare everyday.

Gary
 
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