Pirates of the Gulf of Mexico

Deeply frustrated by the fact that oil continues to gush into the Gulf of Mexico five weeks after the [Deepwater Horizon] accident, President Barack Obama has traveled down to Louisiana for the second time to see the efforts on the ground to combat the spill.

“If we find they’re not doing what they’re supposed to be doing, we’ll push them out of the way appropriately,” declared United States Secretary of the Interior, Ken Salazar, who is responsible for overseeing the country’s natural resources. “I am angry, and I am frustrated,” he stated.

He’s frustrated, because every effort by the oil company responsible for the spill, British Petroleum (BP), to stop the spill has failed. He’s angry, because BP continues to use a highly toxic chemical called Corexit 9500 that dilutes the oil on the surface of the water. The Environmental Protection Agency has ordered them to stop using it or to find an alternative less damaging to the environment. But BP has responded by saying that Corexit is the least toxic product made and, at the moment, continues to use it.

But what bothers the government the most is that they are obligated to depend on the private sector to contain the spill, because only BP has the deep water technologies to stop it. It is known as “top kill” and consists of shooting mud and cement at high pressure at the leak. When the mud and cement solidify, they should slow down the flow of oil and gas to, as a last resort, allow the well to be sealed. Technical reports maintain that the new effort has between a 60 and 70 percent chance of success.

Although a CBS News poll reveals that 70 percent of Americans disapprove of the British oil company’s efforts to stop the spill as it reaches Louisiana’s coasts, Obama’s approval ratings are at 45 percent. Several ongoing investigations have revealed that on April 20, BP ignored three warnings in the moments prior to the explosion of the Deepwater Horizon platform, which took the lives of 11 people. The [Obama] administration is showing signs of impatience and, for the first time, is making reference to the possibility of a criminal investigation.

The aggressive growth of BP, their enormous profits, and their history of oil-related disasters reveal its true nature. In 2005, an oil refinery owned by BP in Texas exploded, leaving a total of 15 dead and 170 injured. In 2006, a BP oil pipe in Alaska spilled 200,000 gallons of crude oil, provoking what the EPA called “the largest oil spill in the North Slope, [Alaska].” BP received a fine of $60 million for each disaster. Later, in 2009, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) fined BP another $87 million for the [Texas] refinery explosion.

In their lucrative efforts to provide petroleum to a population whose demand for the explosive liquid increases fivefold each year, the oil companies decided 20 years ago to design and put into place the exploitation of oil reserves that exist beneath the ocean floor. The first platform was in the British North Sea, due to its shallowness; in only a few years, underwater drilling commenced in other sites.

It’s a dirty job that always leaves residue, and, because of that, certain places like California prohibit drilling. But the desire for profits carries a great intensity, and the companies have decided to share the other drilling areas. In the Gulf Coast of the U.S., there are 3,858 underwater oil rigs in operation. Today, they are waiting to drill off the coasts of Latin America, especially Brazil and Cuba. All of the sites are managed by Anglo-Saxon companies.

But, all of a sudden, this catastrophe in the Gulf of Mexico has broken out, and everything is paralyzed. Even Obama has found himself obligated (for his own health) to cancel his plans to allow deep-sea drilling in new sites, hoping for the resolution of what is now considered one of the worst oil spills in the history of the U.S. BP is one of the most powerful companies operating in the U.S. Their revenue of $327 billion in 2009 is enough to classify it as the third largest company in the country.

And to think that 60 years ago, as [journalist] Amy Goodman shows, BP was called Anglo-Iranian Oil Co. (AIOC). A popular and progressive Iranian government had asked AIOC to share more of its earnings with the Iranian people. AIOC refused, which provoked Iran into nationalizing its oil industry. This did not set well with the U.S., which had the CIA organize a coup d’etat against Prime Minister Mohammed Mossadegh. After [the Iranian government] was overthrown, AIOC changed its name to British Petroleum.