Hiya Boomers. I guess it's time for me to get all cultural again. No tech this time. I've worked amongst BP and other corporations like them. I'm going to be discussing BP executives here, the tippity toppest of them who are the primary problem -- but I need to start with a warning:
DO NOT research where anyone lives or anything about their lives as a result of what you read here today. DO NOT picket, protest or go anywhere near the private homes of anyone. ANYONE! Doing so is stupid, overwhelmingly counterproductive and if you do it I will denounce you with language more foul than any I've used so far. My crap is being read outside Daily Kos quite a bit and I cannot control that. So I include this warning, not for Kossacks, who don't need such a warning, but for those outside of the DKos community, a very few of whom might lack common sense. You may hate corporate culture as much as I do. Maybe even more. But we effect change in Congress and in print. Not in person. You want to picket BP Headquarters, fine. Wish I could join you. I can't. I have a big opiate addiction family to support.
Here we go. Continued below.
This is from HERE:
"These people are b---ing, but BP is dumping tons of cash around here," said a contractor from north Louisiana who declined to give his name because he was violating company rules against talking to the media.
"I don’t get how they’re complaining. You think these Podunk people are going to see money like this again?"
That's a BP contractor, but I guarantee you, this same sentiment ehoes amongst BP's executives. People affected by the oil are "Podunk". BP executives believe themselves to be genetically superior. Non-BP-execs are Podunk. That BP contractor who said that? I got news for him. He's Podunk too, and he'll figure that out sooner or later.
There are perhaps five BP upper execs in Houston right now. Those who live in Houston reside in huge lavish homes. They have drivers and security details. Those from out-of-town stay in the most expensive hotel suites in Houston. They also have drivers and security details. These guys (there are no girls here) eat at the finest restaurants in Houston. The rest of the people working in BP's Houston operation can guess this from the way these elite pick at their catered meals when they bless the underclass by eating with them.
These elite make the decisions. ALL the decisions. Do we still have to wonder at their response to the problems affecting Gulf Shore communities?
YES! President Obama! TAKE their money! Don't ask for it. TAKE IT!.
Give it to the Podunks.
But there's nothing in The Constitution that allows that, Fishgrease!
Fuck you! These assholes have destroyed the Gulf of Mexico and are in the process of destroying hundreds of communities, large and small along the Gulf Shore. You want to tell me we can't make them pay for it? I won't listen. The citizens of Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Florida won't listen. Republicans, Democrats and Independents won't listen. This is by far, the largest human and ecological disaster brought upon the United States of America by a single corporation and it is a corporation that just happens to have obscene quarterly profits. God Damn It they can pay! We can MAKE them pay! We just want small businesses to be paid before they go under. Not after. We can account later. In the end, nothing will be paid by BP they don't owe. Leave it up to BP and it will be too late for most folks. Closing a business is more expensive than starting one up. Family businesses that have lasted decades -- the domino effect on local economies. Who has a lot of money in reserve these days? I don't. Most people don't. BP does.
What about BP employees? No. I dissagree, Bill Maher. Right now, we need the natural gas and oil these fine men and women produce. We need it badly. BP emloyees' jobs and wages should be protected in all of this. Whatever that takes, do it. I personally know some BP employees and they're fine folks. You want to know who is pissed off at BP executives right now? I mean really pissed off at BP executives? BP hands are! Most deep offshore work is done by contractors. Very few BP people are involved and almost no non-executives are. You have a few Deep Offshore Glory Boys risking the livelihoods and reputations of the vast majority of BP employees and let me tell you... these folks know this. They may not feel free to talk about it but they know it. In BP facilities there is zero tolerance for spills. A spill is defined as ANY non-dirt substance being spilled upon the dirt. If a BP employee drips a single drop of oil, glycol, lubricant, inhibitor or any other substance on the ground, they have to report it and they have to do whatever it takes, immediately, to clean it up. There's paperwork involved and they fill it out, that day. That shift. Failure to do any of this is cause for termination. This is a no-shit policy and it is enforced rigorously. I've SEEN it enforced rigorously! Imagine what these good men and women think of what is being done in the Gulf of Mexico by a few greedy, self-important exploration executives.
A buddy of mine who is a BP employee turned me on to this. It is perfect for this diary:
I like it a lot. I like my buddy a lot. I want him to keep his job and to be able to feed his lovely little family and to continue to go fishing with me. Make BP pay, but don't make him pay. He helps create the means by which BP can pay. This Gulf of Mexico disaster isn't his fault (he's never been there) and he thinks the same as you do about it.
Back in the day, BP executives were not like they are now. Back when it was Amoco, I had an Amoco Senior VP (upstream facilities, I believe) hold a hammer wrench for me while I beat loose a flange, in a huge snowstorm, at 0200 hours. This really happened. I was careful with that hammer, lemme tell ya! He worked with our crew all that night and I mean he fucking worked! When we were done, he drove himself back to the airport in a piece-of-shit economy rental. Those days are gone. Ask any former Amoco hand about how it was. You'll hear the same thing.
Nowdays big corporations don't have executives like that. Nowdays they have Corporate Royalty. The only place they draw a sweat is in their private gym. They destroy ecosystems. They destroy communities. They destroy families. They don't give a shit. They can't even act convincingly like they give a shit.
Kossack jamess posted this. It's part of an interview Amy Goodman did with one of my heroes, Riki Ott, about the Exxon Valdez (continuing) disaster:
AMY GOODMAN: The mayor committed suicide?
RIKI OTT: One of our mayors, right after the spill, he did, and it was 1993, when the fish runs were collapsing. And I literally-- call that year as bad as it gets. Up to that point, we had been victims. We had been waiting for Exxon to pay us. Exxon promised to make us whole. You know, "You’re lucky you have Exxon." We hadn’t even gone to court by 1993. We had fish run collapses, bankruptcies, divorces, suicides, you know, domestic violence spikes, substance abuse spikes. The town was just unraveling. And we were waiting for somebody to help us: the State of Alaska, the federal government, the court system, Exxon. Nobody. And--
AMY GOODMAN: There were 33,000 plaintiffs.
RIKI OTT: There are 32,000 claims, 22,000 plaintiffs.
...
AMY GOODMAN: You’ve said that is not just an environmental disaster, but a crisis in democracy.
RIKI OTT: It is a democracy crisis. The question we started asking as our lawsuit went on and on and on, and we didn’t get paid, was how did corporations get this big, where they can manipulate the legal system, the political system? What happened here?
Kossack jamess has three diaries that discuss this stuff corporate stuff in superb detail. I find them prophetic (look at the dates!):
Happy 20th anniversary (Exxon) ... Corporations still make the rules -- Mar 25, 2009
Chalk it up as Incidental Costs -- 4 Days Profit is a Bargain -- May 01, 2010
When Oil Drilling results in Oil Spilling -- WHO is Responsible? -- Apr 01, 2010
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All you people reading me via links from off-site, if you want THE BEST, MOST UP-TO-THE-MINUTE RESOURCE on the entire internet (or anywhere else) regarding the current Gulf of Mexico crisis, Daily Kos is now hosting a record-breaking liveblog. The link below is for the Mothership that is active as of the publishing of this diary. If you're reading this after the morning of June 14th, 2010, just look on the Daily Kos Rec List for the current one. People there are well versed in deep-sea bottery and there's activity 24 hours per day, every day.
Remember the BP Catastrophe Liveblog Mothership - To Keep It Holy
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