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2 Years After the BP Oil Spill, Is the Gulf Ecosystem Collapsing?

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2 Years After the BP Oil Spill, Is the Gulf Ecosystem Collapsing?

The Gulf Ecosystem Is Being Decimated

The BP oil spill started on April 20, 2010. We’ve previously warned that the BP oil spill could severely damage the Gulf ecosystem.

Since then, there are numerous signs that the worst-case scenario may be playing out:

  • A recent report also notes that there are flesh-eating bacteria in tar balls of BP oil washing up on Gulf beaches

If you still don’t have a sense of the devastation to the Gulf, American reporter Dahr Jamail lays it out pretty clearly:

 

 

 

 

 

“The fishermen have never seen anything like this,” Dr Jim Cowan told Al Jazeera. “And in my 20 years working on red snapper, looking at somewhere between 20 and 30,000 fish, I’ve never seen anything like this either.”

 

Dr Cowan, with Louisiana State University’s Department of Oceanography and Coastal Sciences started hearing about fish with sores and lesions from fishermen in November 2010.

 

Cowan’s findings replicate those of others living along vast areas of the Gulf Coast that have been impacted by BP’s oil and dispersants.

 

Gulf of Mexico fishermen, scientists and seafood processors have told Al Jazeera they are finding disturbing numbers of mutated shrimp, crab and fish that they believe are deformed by chemicals released during BP’s 2010 oil disaster.

 

Along with collapsing fisheries, signs of malignant impact on the regional ecosystem are ominous: horribly mutated shrimp, fish with oozing sores, underdeveloped blue crabs lacking claws, eyeless crabs and shrimp – and interviewees’ fingers point towards BP’s oil pollution disaster as being the cause.

 

Eyeless shrimp

 

Tracy Kuhns and her husband Mike Roberts, commercial fishers from Barataria, Louisiana, are finding eyeless shrimp.

 

“At the height of the last white shrimp season, in September, one of our friends caught 400 pounds of these,” Kuhns told Al Jazeera while showing a sample of the eyeless shrimp.

 

According to Kuhns, at least 50 per cent of the shrimp caught in that period in Barataria Bay, a popular shrimping area that was heavily impacted by BP’s oil and dispersants, were eyeless. Kuhns added: “Disturbingly, not only do the shrimp lack eyes, they even lack eye sockets.”
Eyeless shrimp, from a catch of 400 pounds of eyeless shrimp, said to be caught September 22, 2011, in Barataria Bay, Louisiana [Erika Blumenfeld/Al Jazeera]

 

“Some shrimpers are catching these out in the open Gulf [of Mexico],” she added, “They are also catching them in Alabama and Mississippi. We are also finding eyeless crabs, crabs with their shells soft instead of hard, full grown crabs that are one-fifth their normal size, clawless crabs, and crabs with shells that don’t have their usual spikes … they look like they’ve been burned off by chemicals.”

 

On April 20, 2010, BP’s Deepwater Horizon oilrig exploded, and began the release of at least 4.9 million barrels of oil. BP then used at least 1.9 million gallons of toxic Corexit dispersants to sink the oil.

 

Keath Ladner, a third generation seafood processor in Hancock County, Mississippi, is also disturbed by what he is seeing.

 

“I’ve seen the brown shrimp catch drop by two-thirds, and so far the white shrimp have been wiped out,” Ladner told Al Jazeera. “The shrimp are immune compromised. We are finding shrimp with tumors on their heads, and are seeing this everyday.”

 

While on a shrimp boat in Mobile Bay with Sidney Schwartz, the fourth-generation fisherman said that he had seen shrimp with defects on their gills, and “their shells missing around their gills and head”.

 

“We’ve fished here all our lives and have never seen anything like this,” he added.

 

Ladner has also seen crates of blue crabs, all of which were lacking at least one of their claws.

 

Darla Rooks, a lifelong fisherperson from Port Sulfur, Louisiana, told Al Jazeera she is finding crabs “with holes in their shells, shells with all the points burned off so all the spikes on their shells and claws are gone, misshapen shells, and crabs that are dying from within … they are still alive, but you open them up and they smell like they’ve been dead for a week”.

 

Rooks is also finding eyeless shrimp, shrimp with abnormal growths, female shrimp with their babies still attached to them, and shrimp with oiled gills.

 

“We also seeing eyeless fish, and fish lacking even eye-sockets, and fish with lesions, fish without covers over their gills, and others with large pink masses hanging off their eyes and gills.”

 

Rooks, who grew up fishing with her parents, said she had never seen such things in these waters, and her seafood catch last year was “ten per cent what it normally is”.

 

“I’ve never seen this,” he said, a statement Al Jazeera heard from every scientist, fisherman, and seafood processor we spoke with about the seafood deformities.

 

Given that the Gulf of Mexico provides more than 40 per cent of all the seafood caught in the continental US, this phenomenon does not bode well for the region, or the country.

 

***

 

“The dispersants used in BP’s draconian experiment contain solvents, such as petroleum distillates and 2-butoxyethanol. Solvents dissolve oil, grease, and rubber,” Dr Riki Ott, a toxicologist, marine biologist and Exxon Valdez survivor told Al Jazeera. “It should be no surprise that solvents are also notoriously toxic to people, something the medical community has long known”.

 

The dispersants are known to be mutagenic, a disturbing fact that could be evidenced in the seafood deformities. Shrimp, for example, have a life-cycle short enough that two to three generations have existed since BP’s disaster began, giving the chemicals time to enter the genome.

 

Pathways of exposure to the dispersants are inhalation, ingestion, skin, and eye contact. Health impacts can include headaches, vomiting, diarrhea, abdominal pains, chest pains, respiratory system damage, skin sensitisation, hypertension, central nervous system depression, neurotoxic effects, cardiac arrhythmia and cardiovascular damage. They are also teratogenic – able to disturb the growth and development of an embryo or fetus – and carcinogenic.

 

Cowan believes chemicals named polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), released from BP’s submerged oil, are likely to blame for what he is finding, due to the fact that the fish with lesions he is finding are from “a wide spatial distribution that is spatially coordinated with oil from the Deepwater Horizon, both surface oil and subsurface oil. A lot of the oil that impacted Louisiana was also in subsurface plumes, and we think there is a lot of it remaining on the seafloor”.

 

Marine scientist Samantha Joye of the University of Georgia published results of her submarine dives around the source area of BP’s oil disaster in the Nature Geoscience journal.

 

Her evidence showed massive swathes of oil covering the seafloor, including photos of oil-covered bottom dwelling sea creatures.

 

While showing slides at an American Association for the Advancement of Science annual conference in Washington, Joye said: “This is Macondo oil on the bottom. These are dead organisms because of oil being deposited on their heads.”

 

Dr Wilma Subra, a chemist and Macarthur Fellow, has conducted tests on seafood and sediment samples along the Gulf for chemicals present in BP’s crude oil and toxic dispersants.

 

“Tests have shown significant levels of oil pollution in oysters and crabs along the Louisiana coastline,” Subra told Al Jazeera. “We have also found high levels of hydrocarbons in the soil and vegetation.”

 

According to the US Environmental Protection Agency, PAHs “are a group of semi-volatile organic compounds that are present in crude oil that has spent time in the ocean and eventually reaches shore, and can be formed when oil is burned”.

 

“The fish are being exposed to PAHs, and I was able to find several references that list the same symptoms in fish after the Exxon Valdez spill, as well as other lab experiments,” explained Cowan. “There was also a paper published by some LSU scientists that PAH exposure has effects on the genome.”

 

The University of South Florida released the results of a survey whose findings corresponded with Cowan’s: a two to five per cent infection rate in the same oil impact areas, and not just with red snapper, but with more than 20 species of fish with lesions. In many locations, 20 per cent of the fish had lesions, and later sampling expeditions found areas where, alarmingly, 50 per cent of the fish had them.

 

“I asked a NOAA [National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration] sampler what percentage of fish they find with sores prior to 2010, and it’s one tenth of one percent,” Cowan said. “Which is what we found prior to 2010 as well. But nothing like we’ve seen with these secondary infections and at this high of rate since the spill.”

 

“What we think is that it’s attributable to chronic exposure to PAHs released in the process of weathering of oil on the seafloor,” Cowan said. “There’s no other thing we can use to explain this phenomenon. We’ve never seen anything like this before.”

 

***

 

Crustacean biologist Darryl Felder, in the Department of Biology with the University of Louisiana at Lafayette is in a unique position.

 

Felder has been monitoring the vicinity of BP’s blowout Macondo well both before and after the oil disaster began, because, as he told Al Jazeera, “the National Science Foundation was interested in these areas that are vulnerable due to all the drilling”.

 

“So we have before and after samples to compare to,” he added. “We have found seafood with lesions, missing appendages, and other abnormalities.”

 

Felder also has samples of inshore crabs with lesions. “Right here in Grand Isle we see lesions that are eroding down through their shell. We just got these samples last Thursday and are studying them now, because we have no idea what else to link this to as far as a natural event.”

 

According to Felder, there is an even higher incidence of shell disease with crabs in deeper waters.

 

“My fear is that these prior incidents of lesions might be traceable to microbes, and my questions are, did we alter microbial populations in the vicinity of the well by introducing this massive amount of petroleum and in so doing cause microbes to attack things other than oil?”

 

One hypothesis he has is that the waxy coatings around crab shells are being impaired by anthropogenic chemicals or microbes resulting from such chemicals.

 

“You create a site where a lesion can occur, and microbes attack. We see them with big black lesions, around where their appendages fall off, and all that is left is a big black ring.”

 

Felder added that his team is continuing to document the incidents: “And from what we can tell, there is a far higher incidence we’re finding after the spill.”

 

“We are also seeing much lower diversity of crustaceans,” he said. “We don’t have the same number of species as we did before [the spill].”

 

***

 

Felder is also finding “odd staining” of animals that burrow into the mud that cause stain rings, and said: “It is consistently mineral deposits, possibly from microbial populations in [overly] high concentrations.”

 

***

 

Dr Andrew Whitehead, an associate professor of biology at Louisiana State University, co-authored the report Genomic and physiological footprint of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill on resident marsh fishes that was published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences in October 2011.

 

Whitehead’s work is of critical importance, as it shows a direct link between BP’s oil and the negative impacts on the Gulf’s food web evidenced by studies on killifish before, during and after the oil disaster.

 

“What we found is a very clear, genome-wide signal, a very clear signal of exposure to the toxic components of oil that coincided with the timing and the locations of the oil,” Whitehead told Al Jazeera during an interview in his lab.

 

According to Whitehead, the killifish is an important indicator species because they are the most abundant fish in the marshes, and are known to be the most important forage animal in their communities.

 

“That means that most of the large fish that we like to eat and that these are important fisheries for, actually feed on the killifish,” he explained. “So if there were to be a big impact on those animals, then there would probably be a cascading effect throughout the food web. I can’t think of a worse animal to knock out of the food chain than the killifish.”

 

But we may well be witnessing the beginnings of this worst-case scenario.

Whitehead is predicting that there could be reproductive impacts on the fish, and since the killifish is a “keystone” species in the food web of the marsh, “Impacts on those species are more than likely going to propagate out and effect other species. What this shows is a very direct link from exposure to DWH oil and a clear biological effect. And a clear biological effect that could translate to population level long-term consequences.”

 

***

 

Ed Cake, a biological oceanographer, as well as a marine and oyster biologist, has “great concern” about the hundreds of dolphin deaths he has seen in the region since BP’s disaster began, which he feels are likely directly related to the BP oil disaster.

 

“Adult dolphins’ systems are picking up whatever is in the system out there, and we know the oil is out there and working its way up the food chain through the food web – and dolphins are at the top of that food chain.”

 

Cake explained: “The chemicals then move into their lipids, fat, and then when they are pregnant, their young rely on this fat, and so it’s no wonder dolphins are having developmental issues and still births.”

 

Cake, who lives in Mississippi, added: “It has been more than 33 years since the 1979 Ixtoc-1 oil disaster in Mexico’s Bay of Campeche, and the oysters, clams, and mangrove forests have still not recovered in their oiled habitats in seaside estuaries of the Yucatan Peninsula. It has been 23 years since the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil disaster in Alaska, and the herring fishery that failed in the wake of that disaster has still not returned.”

 

Cake believes we are still in the short-term impact stage of BP’s oil disaster.

 

“I will not be alive to see the Gulf of Mexico recover,” said Cake, who is 72 years old. “Without funding and serious commitment, these things will not come back to pre-April 2010 levels for decades.”

 

***

 

“We’re continuing to pull up oil in our nets,” Rooks said. “Think about losing everything that makes you happy, because that is exactly what happens when someone spills oil and sprays dispersants on it. People who live here know better than to swim in or eat what comes out of our waters.”

 

Khuns and her husband told Al Jazeera that fishermen continue to regularly find tar balls in their crab traps, and hundreds of pounds of tar balls continue to be found on beaches across the region on a daily basis.

 

Meanwhile Cowan continues his work, and remains concerned about what he is finding.

 

“We’ve also seen a decrease in biodiversity in fisheries in certain areas. We believe we are now seeing another outbreak of incidence increasing, and this makes sense, since waters are starting to warm again, so bacterial infections are really starting to take off again. We think this is a problem that will persist for as long as the oil is stored on the seafloor.”

Did the BP Spill Ever Really Stop?

We’ve repeatedly documented that BP’s gulf Mocando well is still leaking.

Stuart Smith – a successful trial lawyer who won a billion dollar verdict against Exxon Mobil – noted recently:

New sampling data from the nonprofit Louisiana Environmental Action Network (LEAN) provide confirmation that not only is BP’s oil still very much present in the water in Bayou La Batre, but that it still exists in a highly toxic state nearly two years after the spill.

 

Here are photos of brown oily foam washing ashore in Bayou La Batre (just west of Mobile Bay) on February 27, 2012:

 

BLB2 28 12C 300x225 2 Years After the BP Oil Spill, Is the Gulf Ecosystem Collapsing?BLB2 28 12A 300x168 2 Years After the BP Oil Spill, Is the Gulf Ecosystem Collapsing?BLB2 27 12F 300x225 2 Years After the BP Oil Spill, Is the Gulf Ecosystem Collapsing?BLB2 27 12D 300x225 2 Years After the BP Oil Spill, Is the Gulf Ecosystem Collapsing?
Photo credit to the Louisiana Environmental Action Network (LEAN)

 

Water samples were taken by Dennis and Lori Bosarge, LEAN members from Coden, Alabama. The lab-certified test results are in (see full lab report at bottom), and they are startling in that they suggest that oil is still leaking from the Macondo reservoir – most likely from cracks and fissures in the seafloor around the plugged wellhead. Scientists believe the cracks were caused by BP’s heavy-handed “kill” efforts.

 

***

 

Despite numerous opportunities to do so, the U.S. Coast Guard has never publicly denied that the Macondo field is still leaking. And these latest sampling results out of Bayou La Batre provide damning new evidence that the BP oil spill never really ended.

Government Sits On Its Hands …

The New York Times notes today:

Congress’s response to the spill has been truly pathetic. It has not passed a single bill to prevent another catastrophe, according to a report issued Tuesday by former members of a presidential commission that investigated the spill. Congress has failed even to codify the Interior Department’s sound regulatory reforms, which could be undone by a future administration.

 

***

 

The administration has developed new standards for each stage of the drilling process — from rig design to spill response — insisting that operators fully prepare for worst-case scenarios. But the commissioners’ report notes that the new equipment systems have not yet been tested in deep-water conditions.

Indeed, Mother Jones points out that the White House pressured scientists to underestimate BP spill size. And see this Forbes write up, and our previous reporting on the topic.

This is exactly like Fukushima and the financial mess, because   government's approach to crises is consistent, no matter what area we are talking about: let the giant companies which fund political campaigns do whatever they want ... and then help them cover up the extent of the crisis once it inevitably hits.

 

 

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Wed, 04/18/2012 - 20:16 | 2356665 lakecity55
lakecity55's picture

Dude, we're stuck between gulf oil and fuk-o-shima particles.

Where is the 60-meter ass-teroid?

It needs to land on DC and clean the place out, hahahaha.

And, speaking of conspiracy, is it too incredible Soros ordered Barry to blow the rig? Drilling was shut down, and all those oil rigs went to Brazil, in which Soros had just invested a pile in Brazilian oil, helped by millions$ additionally given by Barry to Brazil to 'help' them get "their" oil to market.....

I'd go with "sabotage by Soros" for 50$, ALex.

Wed, 04/18/2012 - 21:17 | 2356888 nmewn
nmewn's picture

;-)

"And, speaking of conspiracy, is it too incredible Soros ordered Barry to blow the rig? Drilling was shut down, and all those oil rigs went to Brazil, in which Soros had just invested a pile in Brazilian oil, helped by millions$ additionally given by Barry to Brazil to 'help' them get "their" oil to market."

Well, in one of his more bizzare statements, one his first actions was to send down SWAT Teams...TO AN OIL SPILL...for some reason...maybe equipped with sponges and Dawn detergent instead of rifles & flash grenades, I dunno, who knows with this guy...lol.

"Mr. Obama said SWAT teams were being dispatched to the Gulf to investigate oil rigs and said his administration is now working to determine the cause of the disaster."

http://www.cbsnews.com/2100-201_162-6444311.html

Wed, 04/18/2012 - 22:52 | 2357075 Freddie
Freddie's picture

How many wells were drilled in the Gulf of Mexico during Reagan, Bush, Clinton and Bush without any problems? Thousands? Tens of thousands of wells?

Thu, 04/19/2012 - 06:47 | 2357595 TheFourthStooge-ing
TheFourthStooge-ing's picture

Freddie said:

How many wells were drilled in the Gulf of Mexico during Reagan, Bush, Clinton and Bush without any problems? Thousands? Tens of thousands of wells?

There's a big difference between drilling in 200 feet of water and 2 miles of water.

The difference is technical, not political.

 

Thu, 04/19/2012 - 06:29 | 2357574 nmewn
nmewn's picture

lol...Millions!!!

This one straight to the center of the earth exposing us to liquid hot maaagmahh which was going to shoot up and hit the cooler GOM water splitting the planet in two!!!

So again...it was all Bush's fault ;-)

Wed, 04/18/2012 - 19:53 | 2356664 El Gordo
El Gordo's picture

Please do not eat seafood from the Gulf.  I've got a lot of hungry mouths to feed around my place and they love it, so leave it for me please.

Thu, 04/19/2012 - 05:18 | 2357523 vxpatel
vxpatel's picture

i am happy to hear white trash is enjoying fine sea food from the gulf...please eat it all.

Wed, 04/18/2012 - 22:25 | 2357017 smb12321
smb12321's picture

Just returned from a Gulf trip.   Fishing was good and I saw zero evidence of seafood with extra fins, no eyes, etc.   If folks recall, when this happened all the earnest nuts promised that the oil would stay on the surface for years (some said decades) and that life would never return.   But of course, nature is resilient.

Poor George is great at expounding on things without offering solutions.  OK, we don't drill.  So what do we do, buy the oil from Iran or Brazil?

Thu, 04/19/2012 - 03:16 | 2357433 AnAnonymous
AnAnonymous's picture

Poor George is great at expounding on things without offering solutions. OK, we don't drill. So what do we do, buy the oil from Iran or Brazil?
__________________________________________

That is the key. There is no other solution to US citizenism than US citizenism itself.

US citizenism determines the future quasi certainly.

Thu, 04/19/2012 - 15:43 | 2359279 akak
akak's picture

.

There is no other solution to US citizenism than US citizenism itself.

//////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

Ah, more mobius-strip thought processes and hypocritical algebraic coconut denialism from my favorite Chinese US citizenism citizen --- make me laugh!

When public spitting, nose-picking, roadside shitting and Tibetan blobbing-up is finally extinguished, only then will we have the solution to the plague of rabbit-breeding, running dog imperialist, puppy-munching Chinese citizenism.

Wed, 04/18/2012 - 21:18 | 2356891 vxpatel
vxpatel's picture

i am happy to hear white trash is enjoying fine sea food from the gulf...please eat it all.

Wed, 04/18/2012 - 19:35 | 2356614 knightowl77
knightowl77's picture

....."Congress’s response to the spill has been truly pathetic. It has not passed a single bill to prevent another catastrophe, according to a report issued Tuesday by former members of a presidential commission that investigated the spill"

 

Really another law will make us all safer????? Like BP wanted to spill and blow all that money ......They're already liable for all the damage.....I am sure that there more than a couple hundred different regulations that they violated as well.....

Like more regulations and new laws will help.....Seriously doubt it

Wed, 04/18/2012 - 20:06 | 2356711 Jumbotron
Jumbotron's picture

Really another law will make us all safer????? Like BP wanted to spill and blow all that money ......They're already liable for all the damage.....I am sure that there more than a couple hundred different regulations that they violated as well.....

Like more regulations and new laws will help.....Seriously doubt it

 

While I agree with you in a cynical sort of way....do you think that LESS regulation will make us safer or decrease the cost of extraction to the point where we have $2.00/gal gasoline?

We have laws because....contrary to most people's naive, sentimental belief....people are basically evil.  And in a capitalist system where profit is the only motive (not being judgemental...just stating the cold hard Darwinian fact) and you have freedom to be an asshole....then you will have in due time EVEN more shit like Deepwater Horizon not less if you deregulate further OR IN THIS CASE DO NOT PROSECUTE AND THROW INTO JAIL THE CEO OF BP, HALLIBURTON AND THE OTHER COMPANIES RESPONSIBLE FOR THIS.

What this also proves is that all Presidents...either Right or Left, Democrat or Republican, Liberal or Conservative will not do a damn thing when the next Deep Water Horizon happens because of the only substance that has signigficantly changed the human condition since....well....the very beginning of the human condition....that being the magical black elixir known as oil.

And in the age of Peak Cheap Energy, just watch what will happen to the environment and the land and the water when it becomes open knowledge we are about to turn back the clock on exponential human growth.  The bankers will demand more cheap energy extraction to help the debt system not only survive but thrive, the President and Congress will demand it to try to cling to the American Dream and to sustain the Pentagon and Empire....the people will demand it to fuel their car centered, A/C cooled dreams of suburbia and big screen TV's filled with American Idol and porn.

We all are about to become rapists.

Wed, 04/18/2012 - 22:41 | 2357054 snblitz
snblitz's picture

And in a capitalist system where profit is the only motive

The motive in free markets is that I value what you have more than what I have and you value what I have more than what you have.  So we trade and are both weathlier.  If this was not the case the trade would not happen.

Now as it happens in some cases, especially with the introduction of money, it is possible for a person to collect up an excess of value or wealth.   This becomes capital.  We then get back to step one and the excess wealth simply becomes another tradable item. 

When the government steps in and interferes with the free market, the market is no longer free and no longer a capitalist system.

Less regulation will  deliver to us the freedom to have what we want.

There are some who would trade some risk to their lives to drive cars for example.  40,000 or so people per year (in the US) give up their lives in order to enjoy the freedom of driving a car.

Thu, 04/19/2012 - 03:55 | 2357459 Colonial Intent
Colonial Intent's picture

Sounds great, when don't we try a free market system instead of this rigged one?

Wed, 04/18/2012 - 22:31 | 2357027 smb12321
smb12321's picture

What in the world has happened to common sense on this board.   It's like hearing those goofballs who never went to class because they were always protesting against the "system" on daddy's dime.  Since when did A/C, big screens and the American Dream become the enemy.  It is not true that anything associated with American is evil. "The Bankers will demand more cheap energy.."  Jesus Christ.
"

Wed, 04/18/2012 - 20:51 | 2356811 Xkwisetly Paneful
Xkwisetly Paneful's picture

Fuck you , know nothing piece of shit.

Go sodomize yourself in the corner to pacify the self loathing.

Unlike the fish that may actually be genetic at this point.

The human race is thriving. Read that 200times, despite the government and largely thanks to those evil capitalists err rapers in your mentally deluded world.

Government is basically evil.

The only reason they are drilling out there is the beloved government.

Just cannot make up the special kind of stupid that inhabits zerobrains.com.

 

 

Thu, 04/19/2012 - 07:50 | 2357653 Jumbotron
Jumbotron's picture

 

Fuck you , know nothing piece of shit.

Go sodomize yourself in the corner to pacify the self loathing.

Unlike the fish that may actually be genetic at this point.

 

Hey Rush Limbaugh...welcome to ZeroHedge.  There...there...I know....it can be frustrating living with the fact that you blew out your hearing taking drugs and you can't get it up without Viagra and you can't keep a marriage (what is it....4 now and you ran away Daryn Kagen....(probably after she met the person you really love and seeing his life-sized portrait in you house....namely you,  LMAO !)

So I'll try to be easy on you and answer some of the guys' comments above you as well...because I know how hard it must be to scratch your brain with your dick seeing as how your head is so far up your ass and your dick is so short.

Here's the first thing I want you to do.....learn to read.  You're deaf....not blind.  I never said anything about capitalists being evil.  That's like saying guns are evil.  Capitalist is a word to describe a person who holds a certain economic philosophy.  A word that describes somebody can never be good or evil....it is just a word.  Understand?.....good!

Now..that said...the person holding such a belief is evil...just as a person who holds Communists beliefs is evil.  Read my text again....I hold that ALL people are basically evil.  That is to say....that any given moment everyone...no matter if they try to do good 100% of the time will fail and do something evil.....not in a Hitlerian or Snidely Whiplash kind of way....but primarily from inaction or cowardice as much as any kind of overt action.  And self-delusion of your own personal evil is evil in itself for it allows that evil to fester and become the norm.

OF COURSE, government is evil....it's made up of EVIL HUMAN BEINGS....and guess what RUSH...EVERYONE OF US VOTED THEM IN THERE....SO WHO IS TO BLAME?  Look in the mirror my friend...or your life sized portrait.

To the point that government or environmental laws are the ONLY REASONS deep water drilling is being done...here are two thoughts.....

Number 1:  Horsehit.  Deep water in the Gulf is where the last of the major conventional oil plays are left in the CONUS.  And even then, it certainly is not conventional oil as West Texas Crude is insofar as it being light, sweet crude that is easily and cheaply refined into derivatives such as gasoline and plastics.  And with the advent of shale oil and how destructive it is and some of the same chemicals used in the Deep Water disaster to disperse the oil are being used to crack and frack the shale to get the gas and heavy oil out...to say that it is environmental laws and government's fault is silly and childishly naive.  But we all know that money can't cure stupid and ignorant....only make it worse by insulating yourself from the truth.

Number 2:  Look at the other countries in the world DOING THE SAME DAMN THING AS FAR AS SHALE OIL AND DEEPWATER DRILLING THAT HAVE NO...I REPEAT...NO ENVIRONMENTAL LAWS SUCH AS OURS OR FAR LESS ONEROUS.....WHY ARE THEY DOING THE SAME DAMN THING?

You stupid fuck....it's because that's where the oil is now.......deep underground nearer the earth's mantle and cooked to high hell or locked away in shale and not fully formed like the cheap, easy shit as Jed Clampett found by shooting the ground and up came a bubblin' crude.

And I do not loath myself by saying that we will all welcome the raping of the earth when it comes to extracting the last bits of energy left when we all realize we are about to turn back the hands of time and go back to a less energy intesive world like our grandparents and or course the ramifications of that to our techno-lust fill dreams of cornucopian lifestyles forever and bowls of sweet Skittles shitted out daily for us by magical unicorns.  You will see your dreams of dergulation and laws just being ignored or not enforced as they are now just so we can somehow stave off collapse if for only one reason.....so the Baby Boomers can die off before the shit can hit the fan.  All your libertarian dreams will come true.....and it still will not mean shit when it comes to $30/bl oil and sub $2.00/gal gasoline.....much less your dreams of exponential growth and freedom....whatever that means.

Well....you're still free to be a stark raving, ignorant, cocksucker.....so enjoy it while you can.

ROTFLMFAO !!!!!!

Wed, 04/18/2012 - 20:42 | 2356790 nmewn
nmewn's picture

"...do you think that LESS regulation will make us safer or decrease the cost of extraction to the point where we have $2.00/gal gasoline?"

Personally, I'm all about $2.00 gas.

Regulation didn't cause the spill or prevent it. It was an accident.

However, spreading Corexit all over the place was an exceedingly bad idea. The operation was overseen by the Coast Guard, a government arm...ie taking orders from civilian regulators.

It is my position government did not want scenes of oil covered birds. It was the very people some want to give more power to who sank the oil with chemicals instead of leaving it on the surface to be cleaned up...down to the crustaceans.

No one wanted this to happen...but there is one solid truth in life...regulators & pols can turn a bad situation into a worse situation in no time flat.

Wed, 04/18/2012 - 23:43 | 2357148 DaveyJones
DaveyJones's picture

oil and energy are indeed one of the greatest examples of the government screwing things up, killing more people than necessary, lying out their ass, and making it worse for everyone involved...except the really big corporations - but that's just about true for every industry now in this corrupt shell of a place. It's really a chicken and egg thing - did government make it worse or did the monstorous growth and power of the entity make government worse.    

Thu, 04/19/2012 - 06:25 | 2357567 nmewn
nmewn's picture

Well, you know I'm not an anarchist by now.

Government is something that needs to have just as many shackles on it as any industry. I'm quite sure there are buildings stuffed to the rafters with statist statisticians busily calculating events that never happened to prove their worth to society.

Seems like a hard sell to me, but it is the primary reason for its existance now. To convince a majority of the public we could not survive without more of it.

A very good case (by the anarchists) has been made in many areas (enviromental, societal, economics) that it is a major factor in just about every calamity. It is populated by bad decision making humans afterall.

But I remain in the camp of less is more.

Thu, 04/19/2012 - 06:36 | 2357582 Ghordius
Ghordius's picture

well said, though I'm not sure I understand your point after "...industry" and before "less is more"

political discussions would be so much easier if people would just state their preference of what percentage of GDP governments should be allowed to use, and not more. a nice numeric referendum would be so enlightening...

Thu, 04/19/2012 - 18:56 | 2359777 nmewn
nmewn's picture

"well said, though I'm not sure I understand your point after "...industry" and before "less is more"

lol...well, as much as I hate nuance, sometimes I fall into it too.

"a nice numeric referendum would be so enlightening.."

Not much on flawed GDP (Kuznets was clear about what it was and was not)...but seeing as how its the only metric used today...15% and not a penny more in the way I think about it. But my metric doesn't include transfer payments confiscated from the private sector and then counted again ;-)

Wed, 04/18/2012 - 23:25 | 2357113 LetThemEatRand
LetThemEatRand's picture

A private company spread the Corexit.  The government allowed it.  Between these two parties, who is more culpable?

The lack of regulation allowed BP to drill without equipment that would have prevented the spill, namely an acoustically triggered shut-off valve required by governments in other regions, but not the U.S. government.  More regulation would have prevented the disaster.  Fact versus fiction.  Ideology versus reality.

Thu, 04/19/2012 - 06:06 | 2357550 nmewn
nmewn's picture

"A private company spread the Corexit.  The government allowed it.  Between these two parties, who is more culpable?"

You're kidding right?

The Coast Guard had control of the scene. No one goes out and wanders around in an oil spill without permission. Its a good way to get arrested or shot if you resist, its the one thing governments everywhere are good at. So, Ill turn the question around, if the controlling party pays/allows another party to dump arsenic in the drinking water supply which party is more culpable?

No amount of regulation can overcome faulty equipment or human error. If all that was required was more regulation, there would never be another plane crash, ships running ground, auto accidents, house fires etc. Why, these things are simply not allowed by mandate/regulation...lol...yep, fact vs fiction alright.

By the way, I'm not opposed to your "acoustically triggered shut-off valve" but again we would be left with the same question wouldn't we...did the switch prevent the spill...or the bureaucrat? The well had just had government inspectors on it...the week before if I recall correctly.

According to this article the UK doesn't require them either. So, to me, its a one off tragic event, as I don't remember a major oil spill over there in quite some time.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704423504575212031417936798.html

Wed, 04/18/2012 - 19:32 | 2356602 DarthVaderMentor
DarthVaderMentor's picture

Pink slime is looking better every day.........

Wed, 04/18/2012 - 20:48 | 2356695 nmewn
nmewn's picture

Or we could just go all Indonesian on the deal and eat dogs.

/////////////////////////

Was it something I said? ;-)

http://rightwingnews.com/picture-dumps/my-first-romney-2012-button/

Wed, 04/18/2012 - 19:27 | 2356593 geekgrrl
geekgrrl's picture

Thanks for pulling all this stuff together GW. I came across the Al Jazeera story and was starting to poke around for more stuff, but you already did the homework.

I had a suspicion that there would be all sorts of developmental problems, but even I'm shocked by some of the findings. This report really got my attention: "crabs that are dying from within … they are still alive, but you open them up and they smell like they’ve been dead for a week”."

This is just beyond my comprehension and is so far beyond horrific that I can't find the words to describe how I feel. I am sickened by our species, and our almost complete disregard for life. 

All you fuckers arguing for more drilling and more nuclear, may your internal organs rot like these crabs so that when the coroner cuts you open, the smell of death fills the room.

Thu, 04/19/2012 - 06:03 | 2357546 New World Chaos
New World Chaos's picture

Zombies!

Dead inside, soulless, retarded, instinctively consuming the living, often found in cities, malls, and office buildings, more of them every day. 

My brother always wanted Zombie Apocalypse.  I told him it is already here.  It is what the American Dream has become.

Wed, 04/18/2012 - 19:17 | 2356545 lawton2
lawton2's picture

I have been to that area a few times and it looks like a spill never happened and many people are saying a lot of the locals are fibbing quite a bit to try and get paid and you could always find a few strange fish even before the spill just like you can in non spill areas.

Wed, 04/18/2012 - 21:08 | 2356869 Reese Bobby
Reese Bobby's picture

How dare you speak from common sense experience.  GW and his fans form opinions from the internet.  The ocean is one brutal food chain and every manner of screwy creature is produced.  But trying to explain something as simple as a slip hook to GW and his "sky is falling" pals is one big waste of time.  I was fishing the Gulf a few weeks ago and it is thriving.  GW was on a boat when he was five years old I'm guessing.

 

Remember when science wasn't corrupt?  Or maybe I was just young.

Thu, 04/19/2012 - 03:11 | 2357430 AnAnonymous
AnAnonymous's picture

The ocean is one brutal food chain and every manner of screwy creature is produced.

______________________________________________

Well, the 'brutality' of the food chain ensures that 'screwy' creatures are not that numerous and usually, an increase in the number of 'screwy' creatures shows something has happened to the chain...

Wed, 04/18/2012 - 19:38 | 2356577 George Washington
George Washington's picture

Here's what I think about your propaganda:

http://i.chzbgr.com/completestore/2012/4/9/f4fd0d52-e976-48c0-a972-e8cdde986e82.gif

http://i.imgur.com/sURma.gif

http://i.imgur.com/gf8D2.gif

http://i.imgur.com/YIEao.gif

http://i.imgur.com/zPgOt.gif

http://i.imgur.com/QqdFO.gif

Wed, 04/18/2012 - 23:51 | 2357193 TSA gropee
TSA gropee's picture

GW, that's some damn funny shit. Oh, and +1 and high five on the article.

Retard got lucky and managed to hook 5 fish that aren't showing signs and then considers that an adequate sample. LMAO.

Wed, 04/18/2012 - 22:00 | 2356964 jharry
jharry's picture

George, you are a hoot!  I'm having a problem. I can't stop laughing.

Wed, 04/18/2012 - 20:23 | 2356744 geekgrrl
geekgrrl's picture

ROFL!  Fecal Hz? Hmmm... I wonder what the Laplace transform of that is? I'm guessing money.

Wed, 04/18/2012 - 21:25 | 2356913 I Got Worms
I Got Worms's picture

Jesus, that pole vaulter is killing me, can't stop laughing. My wife is looking at me like I'm crazy.

Thu, 04/19/2012 - 00:31 | 2357271 CompassionateFascist
CompassionateFascist's picture

And notice the cut..that was not a real dog which was kicked into the river. Was it?

Wed, 04/18/2012 - 22:15 | 2357003 Decolat
Decolat's picture

Yeah, my wife can't see the genius humor on ZH either.

Wed, 04/18/2012 - 22:06 | 2356987 Farcical Aquati...
Farcical Aquatic Ceremony's picture

Same scene at my house.  Thanks, GW, haven't laughed that hard in a while.

Wed, 04/18/2012 - 20:58 | 2356841 Xkwisetly Paneful
Xkwisetly Paneful's picture

Anyone else from Al Jazeera to quote?

Who knew the inventors of backwardation could appear so progressive,

it is laughable if it wasn't serious.

Their insurance premiums dropped in 2011, do you know why?

Because the losses were far less than the sensationalized bullshit estimated numbers originally made it out to appear.

BTW still waiting for that TMI meltdown to eliminate the east coast.

Thu, 04/19/2012 - 09:32 | 2356505 Normalcy Bias
Normalcy Bias's picture

"People who live here know better than to swim in or eat what comes out of our waters.” - Darla Rooks, a lifelong fisherperson from Port Sulfur, Louisiana

Well, nice lady, thanks for continuing to help put this poison into the food supply!

Wed, 04/18/2012 - 18:49 | 2356443 navy62802
navy62802's picture

The Gulf is definitely fucked. I avoid seafood from there, lest my offspring are born with 2 heads and 3 arms.

Thu, 04/19/2012 - 04:36 | 2357486 e_goldstein
e_goldstein's picture

Maybe poison, may not. Funny thing is, where I live, the oysters have never tasted better.

Wed, 04/18/2012 - 23:43 | 2357163 Stuck on Zero
Stuck on Zero's picture

Ecosystem collapse?  No.  Nature has been releasing giant oilfields to the surface of the gulf for aeons.  Drillers will tell you of going through many thousands of feet of sludge in places to reach a solid bottom.  Most of this is remnant oil, detritus, and clathrates.  In fact the drilling mud fizzes as it comes to the surface as it boils off methane and heavier gasses.  The system will recover but how much more of this stress do we need?  We're going to smoke ourselves to death to drive 12 mpg cars.  We need more work toward achieving 50% efficient solar photovoltaic systems and then we can kiss oil goodbye forever.

Wed, 04/18/2012 - 19:42 | 2356635 Buck Johnson
Buck Johnson's picture

The Gulf is done, it's to contaminated to have good seafood.  We will see in a few years how bad it truly was.

Wed, 04/18/2012 - 21:17 | 2356889 Reese Bobby
Reese Bobby's picture

How close do you live to "the Gulf."  And there is a difference between "to" and "too."  Try "as well" while you learn.

 

Q: How long did GW shut-up after nature consumed the big oil spill in about a week?

A: Not long enough, as expected.

 

Al Gore is a shining light compared to GW.

Thu, 04/19/2012 - 04:59 | 2357505 TheFourthStooge-ing
TheFourthStooge-ing's picture

Reese Bobby said:

How close do you live to "the Gulf."  And there is a difference between "to" and "too."  Try "as well" while you learn.

Rarely do I have the misfortune of encountering such an ostentatious display of pedantry.

 

Wed, 04/18/2012 - 23:24 | 2357115 DaveyJones
DaveyJones's picture

is that what we call the MSM now, "nature?"

Wed, 04/18/2012 - 19:09 | 2356518 Normalcy Bias
Normalcy Bias's picture

...And seafood from the Pacific is now radioactive. No more seafood for me...

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