So, I receive this from Sen. Leahy today, as follows:
Dear …….
Figuratively speaking, what BP has done to the communities and ecology of the Gulf Coast is downright criminal.
Eleven workers lost their lives in the Deepwater Horizon rig explosion. Countless more have lost their livelihoods. The environmental devastation to marine life and coastal wetlands is unfathomable.
Yet under current law, if a jury finds BP criminally negligent, the company would not necessarily have to pay any restitution to the victims of the spill — not even to the families of rig-workers who perished or to the fishermen put out of work. Furthermore, criminal penalties are currently too lenient to adequately deter corporate wrongdoers from authorizing risky schemes that damage the environment.
That’s why this week I introduced the Environmental Crimes Enforcement Act (ECEA) to make restitution for violations of the Clean Water Act mandatory and increase criminal sentences for violators.
Urge your members of Congress to support the Environmental Crimes Enforcement Act (ECEA) to start treating preventable environmental catastrophes as serious criminal acts.
This legislation takes important steps towards deterring criminal conduct that leads to environmental and economic catastrophe.
Too often, big oil companies treat criminal fines and penalties as a mere cost of doing business. But passing ECEA would change all that, sentencing corporate wrongdoers to serious prison time and mandating restitution payments be made to the victims of corporate malfeasance.
So please, take a moment to support this important legislation by clicking here.
I fully support lifting the miniscule $75 million liability cap on corporations responsible for environmental disasters like the Deepwater Horizon spill, but I believe we must also go further to treat such acts as serious crimes against our communities, our economy, and our environment.
If you agree, please support the Environmental Crimes Enforcement Act (ECEA) today.
Thank you for taking action to hold corporate wrongdoers accountable and ensure something like this never happens again.
Sincerely,
Patrick Leahy
I appreciate any and all efforts made on behalf of our so-called governmental authorities, though I, frankly, hold little or no faith in what they say — and why should we?
Anyway, I responded, and included within the text of the Leahy letter appeal, the following (edited) inclusion:
As you know, BP has literally been “rolling” in massive profits for years, at our expense. Just take the 1st quarter of 2009 — PROFITS were $6.8 billion. Oh, and we mustn’t forget that BP has been the main supplier of oil for our criminal, illegal wars, again, at the expense of the taxpayers.
BP was, for a long time, well aware of its Federal and internal violations in connection with the Deepwater Horizon rig and chose NOT to spend the money for the necessary repairs to it. Resultantly, 11 human lives have been lost and a toll, the extent of which we do not yet know, to the Gulf ocean “life” (undoubtedly, dead by now), the coastal “life,” the amphibious “life,” the livelihoods of all coastal business have all suffered innocent and needless deaths — the worst environmental/ecological catastrophe ever. And no one seems to talk much about the “food chain.” Once the “food chain” becomes “broken,” it takes years and years for anything to restore itself, and some of the life cannot be restored period. Everyone seems to forget about the delicate ecological balance. This is a crime that will extend into generations to come. Just like our wars using depleted uranium (the dust of which remains in the air ad infinitum) and white phosphorous, causing cancer, serious deformities in babies, the same for which will likewise extend into generations. All of these chemicals, plus all the oil that is used is for these obscene wars contributes heavily to the global warming and unhealthy environment, without mention of the death to innocent people, maiming, torturing, destruction to these countries in our bogus “war on terra'”.
As you sit around on C-Span discussing this and that and our fates, generally, maybe, everyone should really look at the grander scenario, hard and serious, to what is being done to this planet by us.
BP should be absolutely enforced to pay for the entire mess they created — and, of course, that’s just talking money to clean-up. They can never repay what we have lost because of their greed and criminal negligence.