The Gulf of Mexico Foundation‘s website says it was “founded in 1990 by citizens concerned with the health and productivity of the Gulf of Mexico.” Its site shows it has sponsored conservation and educational programs and partnered with the likes of the Environmental Protection Agency and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. The site also says the group represents a “wide range of interests,” including “agriculture, business, fisheries, industry, tourism, and the environment.”

But as it turns out, industry appears to be the most represented of those interests.

At least half of the 19 members of the group’s board of directors have direct ties to the offshore drilling industry. One of them is currently an executive at Transocean, the company that owns the Deepwater Horizon rig.

The Gulf of Mexico Foundation’s slogan is:

America’s Sea … Keep It Shining

There’s only one thing left to say to these dirtbag oil companies and their pukishly ingratiating servants in Washington….

Slick Operator: The BP I’ve Known Too Well

Greg Palast

I’ve seen this movie before. In 1989, I was a fraud investigator hired to dig into the cause of the Exxon Valdez disaster. Despite Exxon’s name on that boat, I found the party most to blame for the destruction was … British Petroleum (BP).

That’s important to know, because the way BP caused devastation in Alaska is exactly the way BP is now sliming the entire Gulf Coast.

Tankers run aground, wells blow out, pipes burst. It shouldn’t happen, but it does. And when it does, the name of the game is containment. Both in Alaska, when the Exxon Valdez grounded, and in the Gulf last week, when the Deepwater Horizon platform blew, it was British Petroleum that was charged with carrying out the Oil Spill Response Plans (OSRP), which the company itself drafted and filed with the government.

What’s so insane, when I look over that sickening slick moving toward the Delta, is that containing spilled oil is really quite simple and easy. And from my investigation, BP has figured out a very low-cost way to prepare for this task: BP lies. BP prevaricates, BP fabricates and BP obfuscates.

That’s because responding to a spill may be easy and simple, but not at all cheap. And BP is cheap. Deadly cheap.

There have been many predictions that the oil leak from British Petroleum’s Deepwater Horizon catastophic oil well blowout will enter the Gulf Stream since the well is at the end of one branch of the stream.

There hasn’t been much talk so far about what happens if it does get into the Gulf Stream.

Here’s a visual of where it can go from there…

Click image to view full size

According to Cassandra LaRussa writing on May 01, 2009 at CommonDreams.org British Petroleum (BP), like most of the oil industry, enjoys enormous lobbying strength and very close ties to the lawmakers who are responsible for regulating oil industry practices as a federal investigation looms over them in the wake of the Deepwater Horizon debacle in the Gulf of Mexico.

Cassandra pointed out in her article that:

During the 2008 election cycle, individuals and political action committees associated with BP — a Center for Responsive Politics’ “heavy hitter” — contributed half a million dollars to federal candidates. About 40 percent of these donations went to Democrats. The top recipient of BP-related donations during the 2008 cycle was President Barack Obama himself, who collected $71,000.

And make no mistake, a debacle it is, and one that makes all other industrial ‘accidents’ in history pale by comparison.

As Political Spin Examiner Maryann Tobin noted  back on March 31 after President Obama announced his plans to lift the longtime ban on offshore drilling:

The shores off America’s coast had been safe from oil drilling – until now. President Obama has announced plans to allow oil companies to drill in areas that were previously protected.

The newly opened oil fields will span from Delaware to Florida, the Gulf of Mexico and parts of Alaska.

“In a reversal of a long-standing ban on most offshore drilling, President Barack Obama is allowing oil drilling off Virginia’s shorelines and considering it for a large chunk of the Atlantic seaboard,” according to the AP.

Environmental group, The Sierra Club, believes that more drilling will not stop US dependence on foreign oil. According to a statement to MSNBC, offshore drilling will only serve to end another boundary of protection for the environment.

The beneficiaries of offshore drilling will be the oil companies. Exxon Mobile and Chevron posted more than $50 million in profits last year.  After President Obama’s announcement this morning, oil stocks began to rise.

Lifting the ban on offshore drilling will erase a prohibition that has been in place for more than 20 years.

By Dan Swenson,  New Orleans Times-Picayune

This animation of the Gulf of Mexico oil spill was created using actual overflight information and forecast models from the NOAA and Unified Command.

The red dot is the location of the Deepwater Horizon oil well, which exploded on April 20, releasing oil into the Gulf near the Louisiana coast that has yet to be contained. Eleven rig workers are missing and are presumed to have died in the explosion.

The animation begins April 22, the day the first image of the spill via flyover was released.

All Antemedius stories about BP’s Deepwater Horizon Gulf of Mexico spill are here.

From Youtube user golefttv  –  April 30, 2010:

The Gulf of Mexico oil spill is becoming worse by the day, with over 200,000 gallons of crude a day. Environmental Attorney Mike Papantonio appears on MSNBC’s The Ed Show to discuss the disaster and the legal ramifications of it.

Mike Papantonio is an American attorney and radio talk show host. A prominent trial lawyer, he co-hosts Ring of Fire Radio, a nationally-syndicated weekly radio program, with Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.

I didn’t know. It wasn’t me. I’ve never done that. It’s outside my scope. I didn’t do it. I had no idea. I was nowhere near the place. I don’t know how important it was. I never thought of it. I don’t know what drove the business.

I n-n-n-never… I didn’t. It wasn’t. I couldn’t. I wasn’t. It couldn’t. I wouldn’t.

Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!

Nooooo….. pleeeeze. You must believe me. I only run the place, Senator. I was in the executive washroom counting money and punching the clown with the big red nose. What the fcuk do you expect from me?

Snicker. I’m an idiot, you fool.