Carl Hiaasen: Now You Don't Trust BP, But It's Too Late

[flpoljunkie]

Imagine a so-called regulatory process that allows oil companies to sink a drill 5,000 feet or even 10,000 feet through a living ocean without any reliable backup for when a blowout preventer fails to prevent a blowout.

Duh, let's build us a big ol' steel dome and drop it on the leak.
If that don't work, we'll blast us some golf balls and shredded tires into the hole.
Or maybe a giant sody straw might do the trick!

Obviously these boneheads didn't have a workable Plan B. Worse, nobody in government figured that out until it was too late.

This is what millions of dollars in campaign contributions buys -- a free pass from Washington. The federal Minerals Management Service basically worked for Big Oil.

(Doesn't it always seem to come down to this! Campaign contributions, or as Molly Ivins, called them 'legalized bribery.)

more...

http://www.miamiherald.com/2010/06/12/1677598/now-you-dont-trust-bp-but-its.html

[NC_Nurse]

1. The exact same situation as the financial crisis. Trusting the banks to "do the

right thing". I remember Greeenspan saying he trusted them. Big mistake. But then, the whole Randian theory of life might fall down. The Repubs have spent their lives defending that worldview, so they'll never admit that it complete BULLSHIT.

[Brother Buzz]

2. More discussion on Hiaasen's piece here:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=389&topic_id=8546718