Shares of British Petroleum (NYSE: BP) continued to topple last week into Wednesday as the US government further enflamed an already ridiculous pissing match. Everyone already knows the tragic situation unfolding in the Gulf of Mexico, not to mention the loss of 11 workers who died trying to make a better life for themselves and their families. That said, the government has gone out of its way to seemingly throw gas on a bonfire. Among the culprits, one Ken Salazar, who audaciously made the assertion that BP should have to pay for all oil workers jobs in the Gulf that are lost due to the disaster and the coming moronic halt of drilling in the Gulf by the U.S. government, which can only be described as the ultimate in micro-mismanagement and nearsightedness. A knee jerk reaction to a serious problem, but one that makes little common sense once you look at the situation. Certainly the continuing flow of oil in the Gulf is a major problem. The death of many forms of marine life and plant life due to poisoning and suffocation from the oil is a horrible situation as well. Obviously BP needs to not only stop the oil from spilling into the Gulf, but they also need to compensate people whose incomes have been affected or destroyed by the situation and show some remorse, not make commercials to try and sway opinion. The PR firm hired by BP has been one giant horror show with blunder after blunder. Of course, our own US government and the President himself have been just as out of touch with reality on the ground in Louisiana. Micro-management does not, has not, and will not work.
Taking a deeper look at the situation, several questions emerge. Why has the President not met with BP CEO Tony Heyward, nor spoken to him? Why is Halliburton, which performed the cementing work on the well hours before the explosion, and other companies involved with the situation being avoided in discussions regarding compensation to fishermen and repair of the damage to the environment? Why is the US government attempting to decide whether a non U.S. company pays its shareholders a dividend? These are just a few of the questions that need to be answered. The daily onslaught of negative news regarding BP from the media and the government has been shameful at best and borderline criminal at worst. BP has lost more than half of its value; over 100 billion dollars in market cap in less than two months due to this accident and the ensuing constant negative news highlighted by the minute. This I cannot understand. Did the government force the Banks and the financial markets to compensate all the
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