Credit: Image Captured From BBC Video

BBC:

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  • Image Captured From BBC Video

A Deepwater Horizon rig worker has told the BBC that he identified a leak in the oil rig’s safety equipment weeks before the explosion.

Tyrone Benton said the leak was not fixed at the time, but that instead the faulty device was shut down and a second one relied on.

Speaking of brothers and the worst environmental catastrophe in this country’s history, Obama might not only politically survive this mess but benefit from it. The spill has put the GOP in a state of confusion—apologizing (Barton), praying (Palin), keeping silent (Cheney). What it is that’s made so clear by the catastrophe is the important role of the government in American life. It is this fact that Palin is trying to obscure by redirecting all hope for a solution to a God in the clouds. But on the ground, in reality, the scale of the disaster can only be matched by a state that’s large enough to mobilize a national effort. And anyone who is not thinking about this mess on a national (if not international) scale is essentially dreaming. $20 billion is nowhere near the amount that’s actually needed to address the environmental and economic destruction caused by this seemingly endless spilling.

Charles Mudede—who writes about film, books, music, and his life in Rhodesia, Zimbabwe, the USA, and the UK for The Stranger—was born near a steel plant in Kwe Kwe, Zimbabwe. He has no memory...

12 replies on “Blacks and BP”

  1. If I recall, Charles, a few weeks ago you were claiming that the spill was Obama’s key failure as a president, and that it signaled the end of his political influence. Have you since changed your mind?

  6. WTF does the color of anyone’s skin have to do with this oil spill?… WTF?!!! Do you think that a “brother” will matter to the inestimable sea life destroyed by this disaster, or the irreparable damage to coastal eco-systems? WTF Charles?!!!… In your deranged negro-centric race-baiting & negro-centric promotional propaganda you have now created a crawl space underneath your all time low…

  7. Good Afternoon Charles,
    Interesting observation. However, I am going to disagree. Pres. Obama could benefit from the oil spill but I doubt it. Besides the Republicans aren’t the only ones seemingly divided:

    http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/…

    I believe the unemployment rate currently at a stubborn 9.7% is going to cause a greater problem for Obama and the midterm elections. That, plus the oil spill I think augers a long, hot and unhappy summer for much of the country which begins today BTW. Happy Summer Solstice.

  8. Last I checked Obama was on the BP payroll, republicans are not the only corporate whores. In fact Obama has given more taxpayer money to corporations than anyone else in history.

    But keep dick riding for change.

  10. This story:
    Obama biggest recipient of BP cash
    Reuters Wed May 5, 2010 5:15pm
    http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE64…

    “During his time in the Senate and while running for president, Obama received a total of $77,051 from the oil giant and is the top recipient of BP PAC and individual money over the past 20 years, according to financial disclosure records.”

  11. This isn’t a spill. So it’s not a “seemingly endless spill”, as though the tanker it was spilling from contained much more than we thought it did. It’s a GUSHING WELL that is bored into a miles-deep underground oil deposit. No one knows how much is in there, except that BP itself said last week that if it isn’t stopped, it could gush for 10 years.

    If anyone’s worried about Obama getting $77K from BP, how do they explain him insisting that BP fund $20 billion in reparation? Did that $77K shut Obama’s mouth? And also explain why Obama’s future is the important factor here; I thought the people without jobs or working on cleanup and getting sick from it in the Gulf and the animals who are and will be dead in the Gulf are a bit more important.

  12. Wow $20 billion for a cleanup that is currently estimated at $62.9 billion. http://www.foxbusiness.com/story/markets…

    Thats not counting lost jobs, and the economic fallout from a destroyed fishery. Dear leader is reallly socking it to BP, and hey didn’t Obama open the coastlines for more drilling about a month before the spill.Yea the oil companys don’t influence the government, and Obamas not just another big oil/big banking/big corporation shrill.

    You just keep those blinders on

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