Money Talks

The fact of the matter is, we can keep asking the question, "Why did it take a natural disaster such as this before we started taking on big oil?" until the cows come home, but the answer will never be readily available.

My own speculations include answers such as, "We are a society of consumption" (see earlier post), "We only think in the moment", "We are creatures of habit", and I'm sure I could come up with a few more vague, unspecified answers that don't do much to alleviate my, or others', concerns about our reliance on oil to function (and I'm not just talking about driving; see that plastic bottle you're drinking water out of? Oil made it. Check out those new kicks! Oil made them. Feel the cool air in your house after a long day in the humid summer weather...ahhhhh...Oil gave that to you.)

What it boils down to is not a matter of answering the tough questions, but rather finding ways to make those questions go away. Follow my logic here: If we had started to invest, seriously invest as a country, in alternative forms of energy a decade ago, would we be asking the question of "Why?" now? Watching Planet Green makes me wish Green homes and forms of travel weren't the exception but the rule.

But we are stuck, watching an oil spill that will, no doubt, cast a dark, ruddy shadow over environmental disasters of the past. We are stuck watching a loser like Tony Hayward act like he can't find his ass to wipe it when confronted with questions such as "Why", "How", and "When".

And I, amongst others, are stuck wondering why it's just BP that is taking the blame. Sure, they made the decision to build a crappy well to save money and they are the ones who have had far more violations than other companies, thus paying more fines (credit for these facts goes to the link at the end of this post). But I thought the "free hand of the market" was just something we learned about in Econ 101 - I never realized we actually let these guys do what they want, when they want, and how they want. And then I saw this simple video from MoveOn.org.

We like to pretend that we are watching the big oil companies; we also like to pretend that when we aren't there to enforce standards and regulations that they are working ethically. I'm going to get a little passionate here: Anyone that thinks any big company (whether it's oil, tobacco, medical supplies, whatever) that has an established environmental, ethical, or anything of the like policy does this for the good of the people is fooling themselves. Big companies like that hire outside vendors to "create" these policies so they can then publish them, making them sound so awesome, awesome enough to buy their crap. Hello?! BP used to stand for British Petroleum, and up until recently they were marketing themselves as "Beyond Petroleum". If they were so concerned about finding alternative methods of energy so as to "rename" themselves, why are they drilling "hundreds of wells a year around the world" - these words coming DIRECTLY from Hayward's mouth (again, citation for all facts and statements at the end of this post).

So for our government to loosen their regulations, by doing the despicable thing of appointing a BP chum to oversee said regulations, it is implied, at least by my logic, that we assume these companies will act ethically. It's the age-old question: If you found 20 dollars on the street, and no one was around, would you turn it in? Same idea applies to big oil: If the cat's away, the mice will play.

How can we be so ignorant so as not to point some of the blame at our government? Our senators and congressmen and even our own president accept so much money from these guys each year, it's sickening. So to be naive enough to NOT find some fault in our governing forces is like accepting the big oil money ourselves.

No one started this mess, except for BP. I'll concede on that. But this mess would've never started if our government (and not just the reigning forces) hadn't allowed money to talk.

(Citation: BP chief says he wasn't in the loop, enraging Congress)