BP: Bodacious PrePonderance

Well, here we are in the thick of it. Wouldn't you know this spill debate starts heating up about the time lots of politicians need to make themselves known in a vain effort to convince the rest of us into believe they are actually competent. So, amidst disaster we have lots of arm waiving and head bobbing. Wonderful.

All over the news you hear experts say BP is handling this all wrong, "we should use a nuke to seal the well!" one "expert" suggested. (hmmm oily shrimp for 5 years or irradiated shrimp for 50...think on that one.) Another thought an underwater avalanche should do the trick! We have movie producers calling the most talented engineers in the world morons. A president so concerned about dissing the media whilst proving to the rest of us he is capable of action that no one has quite figured out what he has done. Environmentalists crying about the tragedy, mayors crying about injustice, common folk crying about lost revenue, and Hayward griping about his own lost reality.

The two most common themes that seem to be popping up amidst heated discussion about the difference between the word "plume" and "cloud" are why isn't BP fixing this and why isn't the government making them? Every cry I've heard from a hundred interviews and commentaries is that BP MUST PAY. Fine, yes, they are responsible. I won't get into the oil economy/lifestyle aspect of this debate here. Obama and everyone else who has anything to do with this will stop at nothing to see that they wring every cent out of BP. Again, I will not absolve BP of blame. They deserve plenty of it...but amidst this cry of vengeance upon BP we would be wise to remember the BP is a finite company. The reason that their response has been haphazard and scattered is that they do not have the capacity to maintain production and clean up an oil spill. They are a for profit company that has no doubt shaved their staff right down to the bare minimum. Cleanup on this scale is simply beyond their 62 billion dollar a year capacity. The second every person who believes BP should pay them sues, and the liability cap is unavoidably lifted to astronomical amounts, BP will declare bankruptcy. If you bankrupt BP no one gets anything. The US government gets to fund the massive cleanup themselves. Other oil companies would immediately purchase BP's assets and leave a neutered, battered company with no facilities and all the debt liability. Oil companies would pull out of the US drilling market leaving us completely dependent on oil we don't control.

BP must be allowed to survive. It seems to me that BP should be required to contribute X % of annual gross to immediately fund liability claims and cleanup until both are adequately satisfied. The company continues to operate and folks get payed. Yes, this would make the time-line of compensation and cleanup stretch into 5 plus years, but at the rate we are going it will take 5 years to legally pry the money out of BP anyhow.

And to you folks who seem to think big business capitalist proprietary information is an affront to humanity get your socialist fingers out of this. The government hasn't fixed a thing in the banking market and they won't do any better trying to buy into the oil market either. People accomplish incredible things in the name of making a profit. Let these folks alone and see what they come up with. You can always sue them for fun later.