Every oil blowout, we'll care a bit less, and less, and less...

[Bragi]

I think that's the plan.

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

1. Because there'll be a lot less of us.

:think:

[HereSince1628]

2. We might care less but the other nations that end up affected will

It's mostly a matter of time til it's not in just BP's or the US' hands.

[Bragi]

6. I agree, it's a global industry /nt

[Ozymanithrax]

3. Oil blow outs are expensive to investors...

I don't think there is a plan to desensitize the world.

We are part of an oil civilization that is marked by a hyper utilization of petro chemicals. The easy oil to get is gone. Now, companies have to dig for the very difficult stuff. Since this is a civilization that literally affects almost every person on the planet, a framework of international regulations and monitoring will be necessary. The world is simply not going to quit drilling because oil is what allows human to exceed the carrying capacity of the planet by about 2 to 3 billion human beings.

[Bragi]

5. Except there WILL BE more blowouts

Using official industry and government risk estimates, we know there will be rare but real blowouts in the future. We know we cannot guarantee safety, and that if we continue to allow, and expand, ultra-deep sea oil extraction, there will be some "accidents". These accidents will be rare, but their cumulative effect will be real: a lot of ocean and a lot of coastline will become toxic dead zones.

Obviously, this will happen only if industry-friendly laws that allow such extraction are maintained, which is why I think that PR matters so much here to the industry, and ultimately to the government. Up to now, the rest of the oil industry can't be thrilled about how BP has handled this "incident", nor can they take much comfort from the fact that the President damaged himself by not responding to this catastrophe in a FDR-thunderous manner from the outset.

The fact that the blowout came weeks after the President announced his support for increased ultra deep oil extraction was a total political clusterfuck for the White House, from which they haven't really recovered. I fear he may do himself additional harm when he goes to the Gulf this week to emote, but I hope he has a rabbit he pull out of his hat.

Anyway, the most important question here arising from all this is this: when the full extent of this catastrophe is finally known, and when the circumstances that brought it about are understood, will we continue to engage in oil excavation that risk analysis shows will, over the coming decades, kill off huge ocean spaces and coastlines?

If this is our plan, then the responsible thing to do would be to figure out and cost how to cope with toxic oceans. Halliburton is probably already on this.

[HughMoran]

4. Disagree

I think this has opened a lot of eyes. I think you have it 100% backwards.

[dionysus]

7. it's fail porn at it's highest.