One question: How much oil leaked from ONE FRIGGIN WELL in the gulf in 100 days?

With production ramped up in Alaska and offshore, not 5 miles offshore, along our coastlines, we could be energy free from the middle east TODAY except for these liberal idiots playing politics with our energy policies. We should have hundreds of nuclear plants under construction right now to power these stupid smart cars they are forcing on us.

Approval to use dispersants granted 74 times over 54 days.

Obama and BP were getting hammered about oil on shore and they wanted it to go away but they didn’t want the enviromentalists to know how much dispersant was being used so they say they are “restricting its use”. Oil goes away. Now they get to hold their breath and see what, if any, damage the dispersant does to the gulf region short/long term.

Should be interesting.

Da white house ain`t doing nothing right, unless left is right (which it is not).

Heck, we can`t even get Polanski`s butt back over here to face the sweet music.

Shall I be a conspiracy theorist and submit to you that da white house knew about the wiki leaks thing much earlier than we thought? Or perhaps knew and took no action? I guess not. But I guessed wrong about this regime several times as my tongue dropped at the regime`s sheer perfidious perfidity.

One thing. We need a proper Constitutional mechanism to remove fawlty prezdents.

The amendment would merely require the president to adhere to the Constitution on occasion. Or perhaps not have terrorist friends or be buddies with folks who want our Democracy turned into socialisme. Or someone who adheres to free market principles or even a semblance of capitalism. Or someone who writes?? a book describing his fun with a variety of drugs . . . .

Maybe I am asking too much?

Dasher on July 31, 2010 at 1:09 AM

I know they have ships but do they have ships dedicated just to the oil rigs? And it would also have offices/rooms for the other agencies that inspect the rigs also. They wouldn’t be “in New Orleans” partying it up and forgetting to do their jobs.

600 million- it would be quite an investment- but could a scaled down version be built for less and like I said funded partly by having the scientific community and tourists who like to rough it?

And it would have all the fire fighting equipment/ oil containment equipment there, not on paper, not in some “imaginary” warehouse, but physically present.

Exhibit Fannie and Freddie. If they had been stopped in 2005, there may have never been a financial meltdown. And surely if there had never been a CRA 1977, the pursuit of the mythical red-line, it assuredly would have never happened.

So it follows if the Coast Guard had called on a FLOATING oil rig firefighting expert, as their regulations state, they would have deployed foam, and the sinking or the drill rig by the firefighters and leaking oil may have never happened. It was the sinking of the rig that caused the problem, turned a fire into a giant oil spill catastrophe.

If it were my billion dollar rig, you can bet I would get to the bottom of it.

This all isn’t rocket science (its pretty simple). BP was cutting corners. The CG responded badly. Obama was not interested enough to care. The overall result was a major disaster instead of a minor one. At this point, the finger pointing should stop and we should improve procedures to avoid a repeat of the problem. We should also drop the gulf drilling ban which is the start of a long term disaster.

duff65 on July 30, 2010 at 8:51

You cant improve procedures if you don’t know what happened. A cold sober review of all the facts involved are vital. Sounds like there is light being shined on the situation.

I have a question- does the Coast Guard/MMS etc have their own floating rig to be more intimate/project force into the Gulf or do they only have land based operations?

Would it help if they did- have a rig with offices, fire fighting equipment and a small helo pad. Maybe it could be funded by having some rooms that the scientific community/tourists could rent out?

That way they could fly over/snap photos/ come in for surprise inspections etc etc. And the fire fighting equipment would be closer to the actual drilling rigs?

Just an idea.

journeyintothewhirlwind on July 30, 2010 at 11:46 PM

The Coast Guard does have plenty of those little things … what are they.. oh yeah — Ships, and they also have helicopters and airplanes. They just don’t have any oil rigs.

BTW oil rigs are like floating cities. They are upwards of 300 ft x 400 ft and cost $600 million or more.

The U.S. financial system remains fragile and banks subjected to additional economic stress might need as much as $76 billion in capital, according to the results of International Monetary Fund stress tests.

Fortunately they can just write a check for it. We hear that China is good for it.

The rig sank on DAY FOUR.

Why are we blaming BP again?

Would it help if they did- have a rig with offices, fire fighting equipment and a small helo pad. Maybe it could be funded by having some rooms that the scientific community/tourists could rent out?

That way they could fly over/snap photos/ come in for surprise inspections etc etc. And the fire fighting equipment would be closer to the actual drilling rigs?

Just an idea.

That also has a relation to the administration’s insistence on imposing a moratorium on all new drilling in the Gulf. If the issue was that previous inspections by the MMS couldn’t be trusted, it wouldn’t take a blanket moratorium to fix it.

Ed, Didn’t the Interior Dept send Swat Teams to inspect each rig, after the explosion? I don’t think they found anything major that would warrant imposing a moratorium. We’ve heard very little about the Swat Team, why is that?

Let’s also remember that according to the ‘94 Spill Response plan, the oil companies paid into a fund to purchase equipment to manage and fight a spill. The money was collected, but the equipment was never bought and prepositioned. When BP called for the equipment to manage the spill, they were told “No” because the equipment simply wasn’t there.

Jason Coleman on July 30, 2010 at 9:18 PM

Haver you heard of MSRP???