Friday, June 04, 2010

BP CEO: "I want my life back."


"I want my life back."

That's what BP CEO Tony Hayward CEO said the other day about his company's oil disaster. Can you believe it?

It's this kind of reckless, selfish greed that led to millions of gallons of oil spewing into the Gulf of Mexico in the first place. 

Enough. We need to make it clear that BP should pay for every dime of its massive oil disaster - not just the cleanup, but the lifelong damage done to fishermen and coastal communities that live and die by the ocean. Anything less is just a BP bailout.


Let's be clear about the destruction BP brought to the Gulf. It goes beyond the images of oil gushing from the ocean floor. Beyond the oiled beaches and birds. BP has already killed not just thousands of miles of ocean, but entire cultures and economies on the Gulf Coast.

We spoke with fishermen and their families in Louisiana last week. There was one common feeling from everyone to whom we spoke about the oil disaster:

"How are we going to live?" the fishermen asked. "What do we do now?"

Some know nothing else but how to harvest the ocean's bounty. Thanks to the greed of BP, the ocean is full of thick, black oil that chokes life from everything it touches. Now these fishermen have nothing.

And yet BP CEO Tony Hayward says he wants his life back?

It's clear now, more than ever, that BP needs to pay dearly for its destruction of the Gulf of Mexico and its people. Join our call to the Senate to lift the cap on BP's liability for this disaster


Thanks for all you do to hold BP accountable.

Michael Whitney
Firedoglake.com

Blogger's Addition: In the video below, Amy Goodman of Democracy Now! visits the Gulf Coast, talks her way aboard a Coast Guard patrol plane that flies over the spill, and links up with a fisherman who gives her a tour of the nearby wet lands on his launch before explaining how his livelihood -- which he inherited from his parents and grandparents -- is now totally wiped out, likely for the rest of his life.

1 comment:

Unknown said...

Dave,
I estimate the damage as five trillion. The present 75 million cap on liability for BP places a value on people's lives of about one cent each. At the 10 billion cap the Democrats pushed for it would have meant BP paying 1 dollar for each 500 in damage. Republicans shot it down. I'm not sure how you retroactively change the cap under which they took the deal. But other laws may allow something beyond the small limits. For p.r. purposes I think they will pony up 5 billion, we pay the other 4 trillion and 995 billion.
Ken