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"Expropriate BP! Take over BP then use our nuclear option to solve the enviromental disaster in the Gulf.

Crisis in the Gulf Part II. The nuclear option, then and now.

http://www.larouchepac.com/lpactv?nid=14783

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"Expropriate BP! Take over BP then use our nuclear option to solve the enviromental disaster in the Gulf.

Crisis in the Gulf Part II. The nuclear option, then and now.

http://www.larouchepac.com/lpactv?nid=14783

I am all for the nationalization of the oil industry but don't be fooled by the name of the company. The majority of BP is owned by American investors.

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Governance

BP head office in St. James's, City of WestminsterThe Board Members are:[42]

Carl-Henric Svanberg – Chairman

Sir Ian Prosser – Non-executive director

Byron Grote – Chief Financial Officer

Andy Inglis – Chief executive, Exploration and Production

Antony Burgmans – Non-executive director, board of Mauritshuis, AEGON, Unilever

Cynthia Carroll – Non-executive director, CEO of Anglo American, also board of De Beers

Sir William Castell – Non-executive director chairman of The Prince’s Trust

George David – Non-executive director

Tony Hayward – CEO/MD BP Worldwide

Iain Conn

George David vice-chairman of the Peterson Institute for International Economics

Erroll Davis, board of General Motors and Union Pacific.

Douglas J Flint, CBE director HSBC

Dr DeAnne Julius, director of Chatham House

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http://www.larouchepac.com/node/14806

LaRouche: BP Actions In Gulf Are An Act of War Against the United States

June 10, 2010 (LPAC)—"There is no question that the continuation of this problem in the Gulf, is expressly the warfare-like intention of the British Empire against the United States," charged Lyndon LaRouche on June 8. LaRouche was referring to the utter failure of British Petroleum to deal seriously with the consequences of its own murderous negligence in the case of the Deepwater Horizon drilling station—including its ongoing lies about the size of the leakage, as well as its failure to mobilize anywhere near the resources required to mitigate the damage.

The British are effectively carrying out warfare against the United States, LaRouche said. In addition, "the President is a complicit traitor to the United States in this war."

Obama's traitorous behavior is demonstrated, first and foremost, by the fact that he has left the handling of the crisis in the hands of the British imperial company, refusing to exercise the sovereign powers of the United States government to expropriate them, and to take over the operations to save the United States population from further devastation of their livelihood.

Thus, by his failure to act, Obama has left the British criminal in charge of the crime scene, and subjected the American people to more destruction. Like the British agent he is, the President refuses to defend the United States against British depradations.

"Remember, BP is the personal asset of the British monarchy," LaRouche added. "It's an imperial, Anglo-Dutch imperial entity." It is carrying out "a sabotage operation against the economy and people of the United States."

The conclusion is clear: "This President must go, and must go now! He's unfit to be President, and those in elected office who support him, are not fit to be members of our government. They should git 'n scat, right now!"

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Gulf Oil Blowout 'Could Go

Years' If Not Dealt With

How The BP Catastrophe May Devastate Europe

By F. William Engdahl

Author of A Century of War: Anglo-American

Oil Politics and the New World Order

6-10-10

The Obama Administration and senior BP officials are frantically working not to stop the world's worst oil disaster, but to hide the true extent of the actual ecological catastrophe. Senior researchers tell us that the BP drilling hit one of the oil migration channels and that the leakage could continue for years unless decisive steps are undertaken, something that seems far from the present strategy.

In a recent discussion, Vladimir Kutcherov, Professor at the Royal Institute of Technology in Sweden and the Russian State University of Oil and Gas, predicted that the present oil spill flooding the Gulf Coast shores of the United States "could go on for years and years many years."

According to Kutcherov, a leading specialist in the theory of abiogenic deep origin of petroleum, "What BP drilled into was what we call a 'migration channel,' a deep fault on which hydrocarbons generated in the depth of our planet migrate to the crust and are accumulated in rocks, something like Ghawar in Saudi Arabia." Ghawar, the world's most prolific oilfield has been producing millions of barrels daily for almost 70 years with no end in sight. According to the abiotic science, Ghawar like all elephant and giant oil and gas deposits all over the world, is located on a migration channel similar to that in the oil-rich Gulf of Mexico.

As I wrote at the time of the January 2010 Haiti earthquake disaster, Haiti had been identified as having potentially huge hydrocasrbon reserves, as has neighboring Cuba. Kutcherov estimates that the entire Gulf of Mexico is one of the planet's most abundant accessible locations to extract oil and gas, at least before the Deepwater Horizon event this April.

"In my view the heads of BP reacted with panic at the scale of the oil spewing out of the well," Kutcherov adds. "What is inexplicable at this point is why they are trying one thing, failing, then trying a second, failing, then a third. Given the scale of the disaster they should try every conceivable option, even if it is ten, all at once in hope one works. Otherwise, this oil source could spew oil for years given the volumes coming to the surface already."

He stresses, "It is difficult to estimate how big this leakage is. There is no objective information available." But taking into consideration information about the last BP 'giant' discovery in the Gulf of Mexico, the Tiber field, some six miles deep, Kutcherov agrees with Ira Leifer a researcher in the Marine Science Institute at the University of California, Santa Barbara who says the oil may be gushing out at a rate of more than 100,000 barrels a day.

What the enormoity of the oil spill does is to also further discredit clearly the oil companies' myth of "peak oil" which claims that the world is at or near the "peak" of economical oil extraction. That myth, which has been propagated in recent years by circles close to former oilman and Bush Vice President, Dick Cheney, has been effectively used by the giant oil majors to justify far higher oil prices than would be politically possible otherwise, by claiming a non-existent petroleum scarcity crisis.

Obama & BP Try to Hide

According to a report from Washington investigative journalist Wayne Madsen, "the Obama White House and British Petroleum are covering up the magnitude of the volcanic-level oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico and working together to limit BP's liability for damage caused by what can be called a 'mega-disaster.'" Madsen cites sources within the US Army Corps of Engineers, FEMA, and Florida Department of Environmental Protection for his assertion.

Obama and his senior White House staff, as well as Interior Secretary Salazar, are working with BP's chief executive officer Tony Hayward on legislation that would raise the cap on liability for damage claims from those affected by the oil disaster from $75 million to $10 billion. According to informed estimates cited by Madsen, however, the disaster has a real potential cost of at least $1,000 billion ($1 trillion). That estimate would support the pessimistic assessment of Kutcherov that the spill, if not rapidly controlled, "will destroy the entire coastline of the United States."

According to the Washington report of Madsen, BP statements that one of the leaks has been contained, are "pure public relations disinformation designed to avoid panic and demands for greater action by the Obama administration., according to FEMA and Corps of Engineers sources."

The White House has been resisting releasing any "damaging information" about the oil disaster. Coast Guard and Corps of Engineers experts estimate that if the ocean oil geyser is not stopped within 90 days, there will be irreversible damage to the marine eco-systems of the Gulf of Mexico, north Atlantic Ocean, and beyond. At best, some Corps of Engineers experts say it could take two years to cement the chasm on the floor of the Gulf of Mexico.

Only after the magnitude of the disaster became evident did Obama order Homeland Security Secretary Napolitano to declare the oil disaster a "national security issue." Although the Coast Guard and FEMA are part of her department, Napolitano's actual reasoning for invoking national security, according to Madsen, was merely to block media coverage of the immensity of the disaster that is unfolding for the Gulf of Mexico and Atlantic Ocean and their coastlines.

The Obama administration also conspired with BP to hide the extent of the oil leak, according to the cited federal and state sources. After the oil rig exploded and sank, the government stated that 42,000 gallons per day were gushing from the seabed chasm. Five days later, the federal government upped the leakage to 210,000 gallons a day. However, submersibles monitoring the escaping oil from the Gulf seabed are viewing television pictures of what they describe as a "volcanic-like" eruption of oil.

When the Army Corps of Engineers first attempted to obtain NASA imagery of the Gulf oil slick, which is larger than is being reported by the media, it was reportedly denied the access. By chance, National Geographic managed to obtain satellite imagery shots of the extent of the disaster and posted them on their web site. Other satellite imagery reportedly being withheld by the Obama administration, shows that what lies under the gaping chasm spewing oil at an ever-alarming rate is a cavern estimated to be the size of Mount Everest. This information has been given an almost national security-level classification to keep it from the public, according to Madsen's sources.

The Corps of Engineers and FEMA are reported to be highly critical of the lack of support for quick action after the oil disaster by the Obama White House and the US Coast Guard. Only now has the Coast Guard understood the magnitude of the disaster, dispatching nearly 70 vessels to the affected area. Under the loose regulatory measures implemented by the Bush-Cheney Administration, the US Interior Department's Minerals Management Service became a simple "rubber stamp," approving whatever the oil companies wanted in terms of safety precautions that could have averted such a disaster. Madsen describes a state of "criminal collusion" between Cheney's former firm, Halliburton, and the Interior Department's MMS, and that the potential for similar disasters exists with the other 30,000 off-shore rigs that use the same shut-off valves.

Silence from Eco groups?... Follow the money

Without doubt at this point we are in the midst of what could be the greatest ecological catastrophe in history. The oil platform explosion took place almost within the current loop where the Gulf Stream originates. This has huge ecological and climatological consequences.

A cursory look at a map of the Gulf Stream shows that the oil is not just going to cover the beaches in the Gulf, it will spread to the Atlantic coasts up through North Carolina then on to the North Sea and Iceland. And beyond the damage to the beaches, sea life and water supplies, the Gulf stream has a very distinct chemistry, composition (marine organisms), density, temperature. What happens if the oil and the dispersants and all the toxic compounds they create actually change the nature of the Gulf Stream? No one can rule out potential changes including changes in the path of the Gulf Stream, and even small changes could have huge impacts. Europe, including England, is not an icy wasteland due to the warming from the Gulf Stream.

Yet there is a deafening silence from the very environmental organizations which ought to be at the barricades demanding that BP, the US Government and others act decisively.

That deafening silence of leading green or ecology organizations such as Greenpeace, Nature Conservancy, Sierra Club and others may well be tied to a money trail that leads right back to the oil industry, notably to BP. Leading environmental organizations have gotten significant financial payoffs in recent years from BP in order that the oil company could remake itself with an "environment-friendly face," as in "beyond petroleum" the company's new branding.

The Nature Conservancy, described as "the world's most powerful environmental group," has awarded BP a seat on its International Leadership Council after the oil company gave the organization more than $10 million in recent years.

Until recently, the Conservancy and other environmental groups worked with BP in a coalition that lobbied Congress on climate-change issues. An employee of BP Exploration serves as an unpaid Conservancy trustee in Alaska. In addition, according to a recent report published by the Washington Post, Conservation International, another environmental group, has accepted $2 million in donations from BP and worked with the company on a number of projects, including one examining oil-extraction methods. From 2000 to 2006, John Browne, then BP's chief executive, sat on the CI board.

Further, The Environmental Defense Fund, another influential ecologist organization, joined with BP, Shell and other major corporations to form a Partnership for Climate Action, to promote 'market-based mechanisms' (sic) to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

Environmental non-profit groups that have accepted donations from or joined in projects with BP include Nature Conservancy, Conservation International, Environmental Defense Fund, Sierra Club and Audubon. That could explain why the political outcry to date for decisive action in the Gulf has been so muted.

Of course those organizations are not going to be the ones to solve this catastrophe. The central point at this point is who is prepared to put the urgently demanded federal and international scientific resources into solving this crisis. Further actions of the likes of that from the Obama White House to date or from BP can only lead to the conclusion that some very powerful people want this debacle to continue. The next weeks will be critical to that assessment.

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The British public are very angry at the way Barack Obama has attempted to blame the British for the Gulf of Mexico oil disaster. Obama and other American politicians have called it British Petroleum where in fact, since it merged with Amoco (formerly Standard Oil of Indiana) in December 1998,it changed its name to BP. In fact, BP, in terms of its investors and employees, is more an American company than a British company. The rig that caused the problem is owned and operated by Transocean. An American company with a terrible safety record. Our old friends, Halliburton, was responsible for cementing the plug in the oil well, the original cause of the blowout. I am afraid that Obama has lost a lot of support in Britain by the way he has dealt with this crisis.

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The British public are very angry at the way Barack Obama has attempted to blame the British for the Gulf of Mexico oil disaster. Obama and other American politicians have called it British Petroleum where in fact, since it merged with Amoco (formerly Standard Oil of Indiana) in December 1998,it changed its name to BP. In fact, BP, in terms of its investors and employees, is more an American company than a British company. The rig that caused the problem is owned and operated by Transocean. An American company with a terrible safety record. Our old friends, Halliburton, was responsible for cementing the plug in the oil well, the original cause of the blowout. I am afraid that Obama has lost a lot of support in Britain by the way he has dealt with this crisis.

We know what happens to American Presidents when the British become angry with them :D Lincoln, Garfield, McKinley and JFK.

QUOTE

LAROUCHE: Yeah, well, the thing is, at this point, we have

to assume that either the entire British establishment is

hopelessly stupid, and incapable of finding its way to the

toilet!

SPANNAUS: Could be!

LAROUCHE: Or else, there are elements of this sabotage, by

BP against the United States, which is willful. Now, BP is,

historically, from its first incarnation in one form or another,

was the oil -- what happened, is the British Empire, in

preparing for what it planned to be World War I -- and they

pretty much got what they wanted -- at that point, they took a

part of Turkey, because Turkey was in a weakened conditioned at

that time. They took an area of Turkey, which is now called

Kuwait, and adjoining areas. And they set up the British

monarchy's private oil patch.

This thing went through a number of evolutions, including

the Arab Iranian Oil Company and so forth, but it was always the

British monarchy itself which controlled it. And the purpose was

to convert the capital combat ships of the British Navy from coal

burning, to {oil burning}. That was the original purpose. And

that succeeded in that respect: The British {did} develop capital

ships, which were oil-burning rather than coal-burning. They

oriented themselves to that more advanced technology, and then

built what became the oil industry in the north, the Anglo-Dutch

oil industry became a product of that process. So what we we're

dealing with, we're dealing with, actually, the British royal

family's, in the sense of the title of what the royal family

does, the British royal family's personal control, which is BP.

There are other things, because it's also the British-Dutch

connection, which is part of the same thing.

So, these two monarchies, typified in the recent past by the

Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, and then also Prince Bernhard

of the Netherlands: These two guys actually organized much of

this stuff. And we're now going through, again, this same group

is again organizing new kinds of horror shows for the world in

general.

So we have to recognize, on that kind of basis, and on the

basis of what the Inter-Alpha Group is also, which is another

part of the British Empire, we have to recognize that this force,

that controls BP, as its own instrument, that this thing is

attacking the United States people, and so forth. Therefore, are

we not subjected to something tantamount to warfare against our

nation and people? And what's the role of our President, who,

apart from appearing like a reincarnation of the Emperor Nero on

health-care and other policies, is also kowtowing, essentially to

the British. He may attack Hayward and other people about BP!

But the fact is, he's done everything to prevent the United

States from launching the effective measures which this crisis

would demand. So he's sitting there, and while he's talking, and

talking about this and that, he is actually {blocking} what

should be the United States defense {against} the implications of

this oil crisis, this out-of-control oil crisis. And I think

therefore, we have to say, something tantamount to a state of war

exists between the British Empire, and most of the citizens of

the United States, apart from a few people who kissing the bottom

of some British this or that.

So, I treat it {very} seriously. This is typical of the

fact -- I don't think the United States is going to survive,

unless we, very soon, boot this guy out of the Presidency!

HOEFLE: Well, you have to wonder, given the fact that the

British monarchy lost the fight at Copenhagen, and Obama was very

much in support of the British monarchy at that point, if this

might not be in some way a response to that defeat, to create a

global crisis, environmental crisis.

LAROUCHE: No. I don't think so. I don't think so.

Because, I don't believe in event-driven history. I believe in

policy-driven events. And therefore, the British determination

to destroy the United States has been planned, it's been on the

launching pad for a very long time. It's been the intention --

Look, go back a bit. Look how this works. And the problem

with many of our people, citizens and even some in my own

organization, is they think in short-term, hit-and-run

operations. But when you're dealing with an empire, and the

empire thinks in the long term -- the British Empire is not the

people of the United Kingdom; it's an international financial

power, it's an imperial financial power, which is the hands of a

small group, held together around a rallying point of the British

monarchy. Now this organization, ever since its foundation, back

in the Seven Years' War, this organization has always proceeded

with calculation, and they've proceeded with long-term

calculation, and they've succeeded because their victims were

always thinking in short terms. The victims were always thinking

in terms of reacting to events! The British respond, as an

empire does, to long-term planning.

For example, how were we destroyed? The actual destruction

of the United States, occurred when the British were confronted

by the Presidency of John F. Kennedy. What did they do? Well,

they first went after the steel industry, and John F. Kennedy

beat them! Then, they wanted to get him into a war Southeast

Asia, in Vietnam. What did they do? They pressed for it.

Kennedy resisted; he had the backing of MacArthur, he was

stubborn. And as long as he remained President, the United

States was not going to the Indo-China War. So what did they do?

The obvious thing, they killed the President, and later killed

his brother, just to make sure they had safety in this thing.

They intimidated and terrified Johnson, the Vice President who

became President, and got him into that war. That war, in that

form, went on in Indo-China for ten years. And between the time

Kennedy was killed and the war was started, and ten years later,

the United States was no longer the same. We had the

developments, for example, the youth eruptions, the wild

eruptions going into '68, all the things that happened were

planned, consistent policy. And that's what they're doing now.

These guys are out to destroy us. Many of our people who

are foolish, are waiting for an event, a {casus belli}; well,

the British laugh at that, because they function on a status

situation, not a casus belli. What are they doing, for example,

in Afghanistan? What the hell are we dong in Afghanistan?

SPANNAUS: Getting killed!

Edited by Terry Mauro
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and creating divisions between working people the world over as Nationalism asserts itself.

Wage slaves of the World Unite.

Fight the real Enemy.

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The British public are very angry at the way Barack Obama has attempted to blame the British for the Gulf of Mexico oil disaster. Obama and other American politicians have called it British Petroleum where in fact, since it merged with Amoco (formerly Standard Oil of Indiana) in December 1998,it changed its name to BP. In fact, BP, in terms of its investors and employees, is more an American company than a British company. The rig that caused the problem is owned and operated by Transocean. An American company with a terrible safety record. Our old friends, Halliburton, was responsible for cementing the plug in the oil well, the original cause of the blowout. I am afraid that Obama has lost a lot of support in Britain by the way he has dealt with this crisis.

John, It isn't the B in the BP that is the problem. It is the corporate P, the guys who are saying they don't know how to fix the problem, the guys who want to be handed a bill for the damages and get on with business as usual, the guys who in the end, just might go belly up like eron and out of business and let the tax payers pay it all off.

The anger of the British public will never reach the level of anger expressed by the people who live along the Gulf Coast.

It's the second battle of New Orleans.

BK

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The British public are very angry at the way Barack Obama has attempted to blame the British for the Gulf of Mexico oil disaster. Obama and other American politicians have called it British Petroleum where in fact, since it merged with Amoco (formerly Standard Oil of Indiana) in December 1998,it changed its name to BP. In fact, BP, in terms of its investors and employees, is more an American company than a British company. The rig that caused the problem is owned and operated by Transocean. An American company with a terrible safety record. Our old friends, Halliburton, was responsible for cementing the plug in the oil well, the original cause of the blowout. I am afraid that Obama has lost a lot of support in Britain by the way he has dealt with this crisis.

Unfortunately John got most of his facts wrong. Let`s see BP is HQed in London and its board of Directors and management are dominated by Brits, it has 5 top managers who joined BP before the merger 4 of whom are on the board it has only 2 managers who came from Amoco only one of whom is on the board. One of the only 6 Americans on the board is married to a Brit and has lived in London for almost 30 years another has worked for BP since 1988. The company was briefly called BP-Amoco 12/31/99 – 5/1/2001 but now is just BP, while Amoco`s HQ was in Chicago BP America`s is in Texas, the Chairman and President of BP America is NOT on the parent company board. According to the NY Times “about 40 percent of its shares are held by American investors” presumably most of the rest are held by British ones. According to The Times before 2009 BP has never had a chairman “from outside the British Isles”.

BP safety record in the US is appalling. The Guardian reported that:

In the months before BP's Deepwater Horizon rig sank in a ball of fire in the Gulf of Mexico, the company had four close calls on pipelines and facilities it operates in Alaska, according to a letter from two congressmen obtained by ProPublica.

In that letter, dated Jan. 14, 2010, Reps. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., and Bart Stupak, D-Mich., noted that the company's efforts to cut costs could imperil safety at BP facilities

[…]

BP has a recent history of disasters stemming from incomplete maintenance and faulty equipment, including the 2005 blast at a refinery in Texas City, Texas, where 15 workers died after a fuel tower was powered up without following protocol. Then there was the 2006 Alaskan pipeline spill, which occurred four years after BP had been warned about corroded pipelines. The company pleaded guilty to felony counts in the first incident and a misdemeanor charge in the second, tallying fines in excess of $62 million.

According to The Times (2):

A series of internal BP documents published by ProPublica — an investigative website that won a Pulitzer prize this year — claimed last week that senior BP managers had repeatedly warned over the past decade that safety and environmental rules were being disregarded.

“These documents portray a company that systematically ignored its own safety policies across its north American operations — from Alaska to the Gulf of Mexico to California and Texas,” stated ProPublica.

A string of accidents prior to the Deepwater Horizon explosion — including a fatal 2005 explosion at a Texas City oil refinery and a 2006 leak from an Alaska pipeline — had already prompted US officials to consider banning BP from federal contracts or new drilling leases. “That inquiry has taken on new significance in light of the Gulf accident,” the study said. It added: “One key question ... is whether the company’s leadership can be trusted and whether BP’s culture can change.”

One of BP’s internal inquiries was said to have found a pattern of workers who raised safety or environmental concerns being intimidated into keeping quiet. A 2004 report said BP managers adopted a policy of “run to failure”, under which maintenance costs were reduced by using equipment until it fell apart.

A BP study of the Texas City disaster, which killed 15 workers and injured 170 others, said that significant safety issues existed at all five of the company’s US refineries. Flaws included “a lack of operating discipline, toleration of serious deviations from safe operating practices, and apparent complacency toward serious safety risk”.

As the criticism flies, there is little mention of the failings of US regulators who approved BP’s operations.

BP spokesmen have insisted that Hayward became chief executive in May 2007 with a mission to improve safety procedures, and that claims of continuing problems are “essentially groundless”.

Yet last year BP was fined $87m for failing to make safety upgrades at its Texas plant, and Jeanne Pascal, a former US Environmental Protection Agency lawyer who investigated BP, last week denounced the company as “a recurring environmental criminal”.

She added: “At what point are we going to say we are not going to do business with BP any more? None of the other [multinational oil companies] has an environmental criminal record like they do.”

[…]

Halliburton warned BP in an April 18 report that more work was needed to prevent the cemented pipe from developing fissures that could allow gas to escape. Without special devices to secure the cement the well could have “a severe gas flow problem”, the report said.

Halliburton recommended using 21 of the cement-sealing devices; BP ordered six.

Other alleged lapses included a procedure known as “bottoms up”, which circulates drilling mud through the system to check for escaping gas. Engineers quoted by The Wall Street Journal said the procedure should have taken between six and 12 hours, but on Deepwater Horizon it was completed in just 30 minutes. Then there’s the saga of the blowout preventer, the now-notorious device that was designed to cut off the flow of oil in the event of any mishap. It failed to activate after the explosion and has since resisted all BP’s attempts to make it work.

The Telegraph reported that:

BP has been handed a record $87m fine for "outstanding life-threatening safety problems" at its Texas City refinery where an explosion killed 15 workers and injured 170 in 2005.

Hilda Solis, the US Labor Secretary, said authorities had found 439 current "wilful and egregious" safety violations which "if unaddressed could lead to another catastrophe".

[…]

"There were some serious, systemic safety problems within the corporation and specifically within this refinery," said Jordan Barab, acting assistant secretary of labor for OSHA. "Just the fact that there are so many still outstanding problems, life-threatening problems, at this plant, indicates that they still have a systemic safety problem."

What ever the role of Halliburton and Transocean BP was the contractor and thus bears ultimate responsibility. The latter is a Swiss company not an American one according to the WSJ its board “eliminated executive bonuses last year over concerns about the company's safety practices” even though it already had a better than average safety record. The former “cemented into place the casing for the well” I have yet to see anyone but BP say the casing was the primary cause of the failure. Let’s not forget that BP ordered less than a third the number sealing devices Halliburton recommended and ignored the American company's saftey warning. According to the Guardian (2), “…the House of Representatives's energy and commerce committee said documents and company briefings suggested that BP, which owned the well; Transocean, which owned the rig; and Halliburton, which cemented into place the casing for the well, ignored tests in the hours before the 20 April explosion that indicated faulty safety equipment… The failures included a dead battery in the blowout preventer, suggestions of a breach in the well casing, and failure in the shear ram, a device of last resort that was supposed to cut through and seal the drill pipe in the event of a blowout.”

Though one might assume the head of BP America, an American, had a primary role according to the Times (3) Englishman who is based in Houston “has been credited with many of BP’s biggest recent successes — leading the group’s charge into deepwater exploration with a string of big discoveries in the Gulf of Mexico…[and] has also played a key role in crafting BP’s strategic push into deepwater drilling technology” Another top company executive described him as “BP’s chief engineer”

So BP is most accurately described as a British company. It is a company with a history of poor safety record the US that was warned shortly before the incident that its cost cutting was perilous and along with its Swiss and American partners ignored problems with the rig. So Obama quite rightly is holding BP responsible for the disaster, I have seen no evidence he blamed the British people. If John and other Brits object, it’s their problem

NY Times http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/11/business/11bp.html?hp

Guardian http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/may/05/congressman-bp-safety-oil-spill

Times http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/industry_sectors/natural_resources/article6499083.ece

Times 2 http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article7148986.ece

Telegraph http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/energy/oilandgas/6470162/BP-fined-record-87m-for-life-threatening-safety-failings.html

WSJ http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703969204575220552092667436.html

Guardian 2 http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/may/12/deepwater-gulf-oil-spill-hearing

Times 3 http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/movers_and_shakers/article7113275.ece

BP Executive Management on the board (3 Brits, 2 Americans)

Tony Hayward

Group chief executive

Executive member of the BP board of director

Scottish – BP since 1982

Iain Conn

Chief executive, Refining and Marketing

Executive member of the BP board of directors

Scottish - BP since 1986

Robert Dudley

Managing director

Executive member of the BP board of directors

American - Amoco since 1979

Byron Grote

Chief financial officer

Executive member of the BP board of directors

American - Standard Oil, BP since 1988

Andy Inglis

Chief executive, Exploration and Production

Executive member of the BP board of directors

English - BP since 1980

Executive Management (not on the board) 2 Americans, 1 Brit, 1 South African

Total Management 4 Brits, 4 Americans, 1 South African (who worked for BP since before the merger)

Rupert Bondy

Group General Counsel, BP plc

Member of the BP executive management team.

British - SmithKline BP since 2008

Sally T. Bott

Executive Vice President, Human Resources

Member of the BP executive management team.

American - Marsh & McLennan BP since 2005

Lamar McKay

Chairman and President BP America, Inc.

American - Amoco since 1980

Steve Westwell

Executive Vice President

Member of the BP executive management team and Group Chief of Staff

South African - BP since 1988

Non executive board members 4 Americans, 4 Brits, 2 Europeans

Total board 7 Brits, 2 Europeans, 6 Americans

Carl-Henric Svanberg

Chairman

Swedish - Assa Abloy Group / Erickson BP since 2001

Paul Anderson

Non-executive director

Member of the chairman's and the safety, ethics and environment assurance committees

American - BAE Systems PLC, Spectra Energy Corp BHP Billiton and Duke Energ BP since 2/2010

Antony Burgmans, KBE

Non-executive director

Member of the chairman’s, the remuneration and the safety, ethics and environment assurance committees

Dutch - Unilever BP Since 2004

Cynthia Carroll

Non-executive director

Member of the chairman’s and safety, ethics and environment assurance committees

American - Anglo American BP since 2007

Sir William Castell, LVO

Non-executive director and senior independent director

Chairman of the safety, ethics and environment assurance committee, member of the chairman's and nomination committees

English - Wellcome Trust/GE BP since 2006

George David

Non-executive director

Member of the chairman's, the audit and the remuneration committee

American - Otis/UTC BP since 2006

Ian Davis

Non-executive director

Member of the chairman's, the audit and the remuneration committees

English - McKinsey & Company BP since 4/2010

Douglas Flint, CBE

Non-executive director

Chairman of the audit committee, member of the chairman's and nominations committees

English - HSBC BP since 2005

Dr DeAnne Julius, CBE

Non-executive director

Chairman of the remuneration committee, member of the chairman’s and nomination committees

American - based in London since “the early 1980s” English husband Bank of England/Chatham House BP since 2001

David Jackson

Company secretary

David Jackson was appointed company secretary in 2003. A solicitor, he is a director of BP Pension Trustees Limited, and a member of the Listing Authorities Advisory Committee.

English

The list above and most of the info on it comes from the BP website some additional information obtained by Googling the names on it principally from Wikipedia and Forbes. The other companes listed are ones the people worked for before joining BP or still work for regarding non-executive board members.

http://www.bp.com/managedlistingsection.do?categoryId=9021801&contentId=7040608

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Unfortunately John got most of his facts wrong.

Could you list the facts that I got wrong and I will then address them.

I dealt with that in my previous post but here’s the “Cliff Notes” version.

“The British public are very angry at the way Barack Obama has attempted to blame the British for the Gulf of Mexico oil disaster. Obama and other American politicians have called it British Petroleum”

No he rightly blamed BP all he did was call the company by its historic name. I’ve seen no evidence he or other American politicians are trying to blame the British people can you point to any?

“…where in fact, since it merged with Amoco (formerly Standard Oil of Indiana) in December 1998,it changed its name to BP.”

It seem to have been more of takeover than a merger. The name remained BP, the HQ remained in London, the HQ of BP America was moved to a city over 1000 miles from the HQ of Amoco the chairmen continued to be British as did most of the upper management.

“ In fact, BP, in terms of its investors… is more an American company than a British company.”

Only 40% of the shares are held by Americans, presumably most of the rest, or close to 60 % are held by Brits.

“BP, in terms of its …employees, is more an American company than a British company.”

Perhaps true if you count the people who work the oilrigs and pump gas but the upper management and board are predominantly British. The top level American executives tend to head secondary departments like marketing and HR

“The rig that caused the problem is owned and operated by Transocean. An American company with a terrible safety record.”

Actually it is a Swiss company with a better than average record. But if you claimed were true it would be another sign of BP’s irresponsibility because they’re the ones who hired them. BP is the company with the poor saftey record.

“ Our old friends, Halliburton, was responsible for cementing the plug in the oil well, the original cause of the blowout.”

They cemented the casing in place. I have yet to see anyone outside BP say that Halliburton’s work caused the leak. According to the Times (of London) leaked BP documents indicate “Halliburton warned BP in an April 18 report that more work was needed to prevent the cemented pipe from developing fissures that could allow gas to escape. Without special devices to secure the cement the well could have “a severe gas flow problem”, the report said…Halliburton recommended using 21 of the cement-sealing devices; BP ordered six.” BP repeatedly cut corners on the project

“I am afraid that Obama has lost a lot of support in Britain by the way he has dealt with this crisis.”

He lost a lot of support in the US as well, he has been too laidback, Brits who are upset by him calling the company by its historic name should refocus their anger against the company whose irresponsible actions led to disastrous consequences in the Gulf and potentially serious economic setbacks in Britain. I imagine the problem is that many Brits are worried about losing dividends and equity

Edited by Len Colby
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SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

THE NUCLEAR OPTION AGAINST BRITISH SABOTAGE IN OUR GULF

by Laurence Hecht

June 13--It appears increasingly likely that recourse to use of a

peaceful nuclear explosive (PNE), may become the only available

option to seal the damaged BP well in the Gulf of Mexico, 41

miles off our coast.

Such a measure can be carried out with virtually zero danger

of radioactive release, according to experts, including Milo

Nordyke, a former chief scientist on the U.S. Operation Plowshare

program for peaceful use of nuclear explosives.

A 10- to 15-kiloton nuclear device would be placed within 20

to 30 feet of the well bore, at a depth below 6,000 feet, where

no danger of wave formation from deformation of the sea floor

could occur. The explosion would produce a shock wave that would

push rock horizontally against the well bore, sealing it shut.

That would close the hole, well below the probable cracks that

may exist in the upper 1,200-foot layer of mud and soft rock. In

a worst-case scenario in which the well failed to seal, the

minimal amount of radioactive material that might escape up the

well would be so diluted upon mixing with seawater as to render

it harmless. Smaller nuclear devices, carried by projectiles of a

classified nature which could be injected directly down the well

bore, are also possible.

Whether or not it becomes necessary to use such a device, it

is urgent that preparations be made now for such an eventuality.

There is growing evidence that the well is releasing oil at a

rate of 90,000 barrels per day or greater, while the likelihood

of success of the relief wells has been called into question.

Stratigraphic studies, design and building of the device, and

preparations for deployment all take time, time which has been

lost by the Administration policy of denial. Expertise in these

matters resides among specialists at the Lawrence Livermore and

Los Alamos national laboratories.

Such a program can be carried out only under U.S. government

authority. The urgent need for preparing the nuclear option thus

provides one more reason why BP must be expropriated under

national security emergency measures, its records seized, and its

top executives jailed and held for trial on crimes including the

criminally negligent homicide in the death of 11 oil rig workers.

That will require the removal of the British tool presently

occupying the master bedroom at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

A greater challenge might arise, if BP actually drilled to

30,000 feet, or below, and is tapping into a deep formation at

very high pressures (see below)--another reason why we must take

over, and gain control of the situation.

- The Other Nuclear -

Apart from such immediately required measures, the unfolding

crisis in the Gulf brings to the fore a more far-reaching, yet

most urgent necessity.

The underlying cause of the Gulf Oil Crisis has been our

failure to go nuclear. Supporting the present world population of

6.8 billion persons at a decently human living standard cannot be

accomplished with the present mix of energy and

raw-material-extraction technologies.

The widespread introduction of high {energy-flux-density}

power sources, starting now with nuclear power, and moving on to

controlled thermonuclear fusion, and later, to matter-antimatter

reactions, is essential to ensuring our future survival.

For now, nuclear power is the key to replacing our present

dependence upon fossil-based fuels. The energy contained in 1.86

grams (0.07 ounces) of processed uranium is equal to 1,260

gallons of petroleum and 6.15 tons of coal. Comparing these

ratios of energy output, per weight of fuel, provides an

approximate sort of measure for the concept of energy

flux-density. By such measure, the advantage of nuclear comes to

2.16 million to 1, as compared to oil, and 2.98 million to 1, as

compared to coal. Mastery of the thermonuclear fusion reaction

will allow us to raise those ratios by several orders of

magnitude, and make manned interplanetary space flight a reality

for coming generations.

The temperature and energy flux-density of the nuclear

fission reaction permits the production of cheap electrical

power, and of industrial process heat needed for processing ore

and the desalination of seawater.

Nuclear power can also replace fossil fuels in

transportation, eliminating completely the dependence upon

imported oil and deep offshore drilling. The temperature and high

energy-flux of a nuclear reaction permits us to economically

separate water into its constituent atoms. The hydrogen so

produced can be burned as a fuel, either directly, or by

recombination in fuel cells. Synthetic hydrocarbon fuels and

various types of hydrogen carriers, such as ammonia, may also be

produced to supply specialized needs for liquid fuels. The

abundant electricity produced by nuclear power will supply

battery-powered vehicles, and more importantly, provide the power

to a nationwide grid of magnetically levitated high-speed rail.

To bring the present world population up to acceptable

standards of living will require the production of at least 6,000

new nuclear power plants within the next generation. Wind and

solar energy installations not only cannot meet that need, but

cost more, in actual physical economic measure, than they

contribute to an economy.

A more precise definition of {energy flux-density} is

transformative power. Beyond the already cited advantages, a

nuclear reaction produces a change in the structure of the atomic

nucleus such as will never occur in a windmill, solar cell, or

oil-, gas-, or coal-fired power plant. The next phase of our

economic development, the isotope economy, will involve the

production of new materials, including those of varied isotopic

composition, for use in industry, agriculture, medicine, and

space colonization. We will get a start on this through our

gear-up for mass serial production of nuclear plants, including

new design types, such as the high-temperature gas-cooled

reactors, integral fast-flux reactors which breed more new fuel

than they consume, and similar proven designs. With the

development of thermonuclear fusion reactors, other capabilities

become possible. Mastery of the low-energy nuclear reactions

(``cold fusion'') will also contribute to the isotope economy,

adding new dimensions to our understanding of nuclear

transmutations.

The intentional suppression of that just-described economic

future has been the central feature of British imperial policy

over at least the past half century. The specifically stated

intention of leading British figures, including Prince Philip,

the late Lord Bertrand Russell, and former H.G. Wells

collaborator Julian Huxley, has been to carry out a drastic

reduction in human population, to fewer than 2 billion persons.

- What Caused the Blowout? -

Lacking nuclear power, the push to ever deeper drilling for

oil and gas resources was inevitable. Whether the blowout of the

Macondo well was due to the greed and utter incompetence of BP

officials, or, as also appears possible, it was a willful act of

sabotage, such an event was, in any case, inevitable, sooner or

later.

It may be that the blown-out BP well is not at the

18,000-foot depth cited in the company's public relations

efforts, but at 30,000 feet, or that other deep wells in the

vicinity have tapped into formations, known as oil migration

channels, at this depth. There is evidence that the theory of

Russian geologist Vladimir Kutcherov, according to which oil is

continuously formed deep within the Earth's crust, at depths of

30,000 feet or greater, may have been secretly adopted by the oil

cartel, at the same time that the theory was publicly discredited

and dismissed.

Under this theory, drilling on the cracks between

continental plates, or in such formations as are found in much of

the Gulf of Mexico, would tap into these rich reserves. Soviet

oil and gas production may have already exploited such deep

faults, possibly below 30,000 feet. Kutcherov, in collaboration

with scientists from the Russian of Academy of Sciences,

experimentally demonstrated the production of methane, and

heavier hydrocarbons of the alkane series, from a mixture of

calcium carbonate, iron oxide, and water, maintained at extremely

high pressures and temperatures, such as are found deep within

the Earth. The origin of deep oil would thus be abiogenic,

confirming the earlier hypotheses of Alexander von Humboldt,

Dmitri Mendeleyev, and Marcelin Berthelot. The biological

signature found in oil is a result of dissolved organic matter in

the abiogenic petroleum, according to the Russian-Ukrainian

theory. The action of deep-dwelling life forms upon the already

produced hydrocarbons may also play a part.

The Soviet use of peaceful nuclear explosives for oil and

gas exploration may have been operating on this view. This was

the same program which pioneered the technique for sealing

runaway gas-well fires, using small nuclear charges placed in

slant wells which intersected the runaway well several thousand

feet down. That program was successful in all its attempts,

closing five wells and reducing pressure in a sixth, according to

a report, published in 2000, by Milo Nordyke of Lawrence

Livermore Laboratory.

There is some indication that advanced thermal imaging

techniques, using satellites, may have been carried out by U.S.

government agencies, beginning in the 1980s, in an attempt to map

these formations in the Gulf. It is possible that BP obtained

access to that classified data for use in its Gulf exploration

campaign.

There is also indication that BP is presenting the public a

Hollywood-like scenario of its operations on the sea floor.

Engineering experts point out that the Cameron Blowout Preventer,

the five-story tower which sits, or once sat, on the sea floor at

the well outlet, was designed for a maximum pressure of 15,000

pounsd per square inch (psi), while the explosion appears to

trained observers to have produced pressures in excess of 30,000

psi. In that case, the blowout preventer would have been damaged

beyond functionality. The device we see in the live video streams

may be a second blowout preventer, which is getting its oil by

piping from the main well, or a nearby production facility. The

main well may be completely open, according to some industry

insiders.

Thus the Macondo blowout may be the result of having struck

into extremely high-pressure migration channels of deep oil. Or,

there may be an element of willful sabotage in creating the

disaster, directed by British interests against the United

States. In either case, the time for expropriation, and

preparation of the nuclear option, is now.

<pa{The author is the Editor of }21st Century Science &

Technology{. He can be reached at hecht3@verizon.net. ..

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“The British public are very angry at the way Barack Obama has attempted to blame the British for the Gulf of Mexico oil disaster. Obama and other American politicians have called it British Petroleum”

No he rightly blamed BP all he did was call the company by its historic name. I’ve seen no evidence he or other American politicians are trying to blame the British people can you point to any?

How can he be right to call it by his “historic” name? He called it “British Petroleum” because he was trying to shift the blame to some foreign power. His attempts to play on America’s xenophobia is despicable. So much for the “new politics”.

We saw several clips on BBC News including Nancy Pelosi using the name British Petroleum. .

“…where in fact, since it merged with Amoco (formerly Standard Oil of Indiana) in December 1998, it changed its name to BP.”

It seem to have been more of takeover than a merger. The name remained BP, the HQ remained in London, the HQ of BP America was moved to a city over 1000 miles from the HQ of Amoco the chairmen continued to be British as did most of the upper management.

The point is that its name changed when the two companies joined forces. At that point it became a multinational rather than a British company. To portray it as a British company is ridiculous. The only reason for this is that it is an attempt to shift blame from himself. This is in itself an irrational idea but I suppose he has concluded he has an irrational electorate.

“ In fact, BP, in terms of its investors… is more an American company than a British company.”

Only 40% of the shares are held by Americans, presumably most of the rest, or close to 60 % are held by Brits.

“BP, in terms of its …employees, is more an American company than a British company.”

Perhaps true if you count the people who work the oilrigs and pump gas but the upper management and board are predominantly British. The top level American executives tend to head secondary departments like marketing and HR

My original statement is correct. I did not say anything about the different types of job they did.

According to the European financial database Amadeus, J.P. Morgan Chase is the No. 1 holder of stock in BP. It owns 28.34% of BP. Next, at 7.99%, is Legal and General Group, a British-based financial services company with assets of more than $350 billion. Another U.S. investment firm, BlackRock Inc., owns 7.1% of BP. Other owners include the governments of Kuwait, Norway, Singapore and China.

Anyway, according to some financial experts, BP is about to be takeover by PetroChina Ltd. I am sure the US public will be happier that the Chinese will be in charge.

“The rig that caused the problem is owned and operated by Transocean. An American company with a terrible safety record.”

Actually it is a Swiss company with a better than average record. But if you claimed were true it would be another sign of BP’s irresponsibility because they’re the ones who hired them. BP is the company with the poor saftey record.

It might have its headquarters in Geneva but that is the only Swiss thing about the company.

BP does indeed have a terrible safety record. My intention is not to defend BP. In my opinion it is a typical multinational company.

“I am afraid that Obama has lost a lot of support in Britain by the way he has dealt with this crisis.”

He lost a lot of support in the US as well, he has been too laidback, Brits who are upset by him calling the company by its historic name should refocus their anger against the company whose irresponsible actions led to disastrous consequences in the Gulf and potentially serious economic setbacks in Britain. I imagine the problem is that many Brits are worried about losing dividends and equity

Maybe Obama should address the problem of Union Carbide that killed an estimated 15,000 Indians at Bhopal in 1984. Why is Obama not interested in bringing the Chairman and CEO of Union Carbide, Warren Anderson, to justice? Maybe, it is because only Indians died.

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John,

I think our late President Franklin Roosevelt would dispute your characterization of JP Morgan as an American institution. FDR described the likes of JP Morgan as the "American Tory" faction.

Historically, the term Tory has been applied in various ways to supporters of the British monarchy

The term was applied particularly to the isolated bands of guerrillas resisting Oliver Cromwell's nine-month 16491650 campaign in Ireland, who were allied with Royalists through treaty with the Parliament of Confederate Ireland, signed at Kilkenny in January 1649.[4]

English Tories from the time of the Glorious Revolution up until the Reform Bill of 1832 were characterized by strong monarchist tendencies, support of the Church of England, and hostility to reform, while the Tory Party was an actual organization which held power intermittently throughout the same period. The term remains in occasional use to refer to the modern Conservatives that evolved from this party.

And don't forget the genocide committed in Indian by the British East India company.

Edited by Terry Mauro
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