What I'm trying to say that none of these candidates would have made good presidents.
I do not think BP has any idea what to do about this disaster. I hope there isn't unlimited amounts of oil down there.
The collusion amongst the regulators (Cheney) and the oil companies is sickening.
i hate to sound ignorant as well, but now i'm hearing others use this phrase "nuke it", what do you mean by nuke it?
boom!
Yeah I get that, but it's a ridiculous solution...
CNN Headline News was showing BP's disaster preparedness plan (pre-Deepwater Horizon) this morning and how it was all but identical to the other major oil companies (Chevron, Exxon, etc.).
CNN said that their disaster operations plan was 9 pages long, and the media-relations disaster plan was 40 pages long.
Yeah I get that, but it's a ridiculous solution...
How come? I really don't know why its ridiculous. I find two months of gushing oil ridiculous. Are we just going with the "it's primitive" argument?
Perhaps, collapsing the well by explosives will create fissures in the oil cavern ceiling....well, then yes, the risk is ridiculous. But I really don't know why they don't go this route. I know it has been considered...but why turned down?
Great Post
Since I live here I think that what makes me so angry. I look at it as a way of life that will be indefinitely altered, I mean for decades this will have effects in the Gulf, it's very sad. You bring up the young people, as you grow older and understand that the policies and actions that we as a generation take will have impacts on future generations. We have a responsibility to leave the world a better place than when we were kids. If you read my earlier posts you can definitely see where I've had a lot of problems with Bush and his Administration's failures but I want to hold Obama's to the same scrutiny and from where I am sitting he has failed on this issue. Maybe BVS is right, maybe living so close to this catastrophe eschews my vision of this and I'm not looking at it from a total objective view and I admit that.[/B]
Also I want to set something else straight I might have come off as some right wing loon in the past which I was never was. I was always middle road maybe leaning toward the right in many views and with that said I could honestly say how bad Bush was. I have many business contacts who are dyed in the wool Republicans/Conservatives who can't/won't admit how terrible the last Administration was. I would like the same scrutiny put to Obama. Going back to the beginning of my posts on this thread and Obama's Thread and even Bush's Thread the biggest point I've been trying to make and prolly ALL of you won't agree with this is that as a country in my view we got the last three Presidential Elections wrong. I never ever liked Bush, I saw him as someone who was in way over his head. I don't think he had what it takes to be a leader, he didn't surround himself with the best people and that is of the upmost importance. As for Obama he didn't have the experiance of leadership that needs to come with the Office. In my view he prolly would be a great president but it happened to fast. Going forward, it scares the crap out of me that there's a real possibility that Sarah Palin will have a chance to become President and here lies in the whole ball of wax. we are not putting the best suited individuals for this job and PLEASE don't think I believed McCain/Palin would have been the way to go, they both we're not suited for it either, as usual the election was who were the better of two evils.
O'Reiley is the only one that seems to understand...
I hate when I agree with him.
.So, are you with BinLaden and against Jesus?
Controled explosions are HUGELY risky underwater, it could possibly cause a much much worse opening.
Plus if you're suggesting atomic, like one poster said the Russians did then you are contaminating life and economies for decades.
and you may end up shearing rock enough to pinch the pipe shut.
The only thing stopping anyone is probably the list of unknowns.
Like I said very risky.
I think they mean the right size explosion to collapse the drilled well opening and close it.
Elaborate, because you haven't presented any reasons why it is so risky.
Exactly. It is interesting the people you find yourself in agreement with sometimes in a crisis-I agreed with Bill, too. He was even shaking his head a bit at Sarah, there was a debate going on. Kinda nice to see that.
Something else to consider, too, I guess BP operates under a foreign flag. So even if Obama did try and put some control on them, technically he really can't do much if anything there because they aren't under U.S. control, they're under Marshall Islands control. It's another clever way for an oil company to sneak past that pesky regulation stuff.
Thank you, and I fully understand that mindset. I absolutely do. I too want future generations to be able to enjoy the very same things we've been lucky enough to enjoy in this world-clean beaches, clear air, lush forests, all sorts of fantastic and curious wildlife, all that good stuff. And I have absolutely no problem with the idea of holding the Obama adminstration responsible for whatever decisions they make about anything. They shouldn't get a free pass, either, no question there. Every government is subject to criticism and scrutiny, and I do appreciate you and other people calling them out on things that I agree are valid arguments, like the vacations and leisure activities and such. I have no disagreement with you on any of this, and I can definitely understand it from a personal standpoint. It's a lot easier to say what you say if you're not so intimately involved in the matter, after all.
And since you live in that area I enjoy hearing your specific opinion, as you know better than I do the way that part of the country operates and can see firsthand the effects of this tragedy. I think it's safe to say I speak for everybody here when I say that I am incredibly sorry for what your area is going through. You guys have been through way too much shit in recent years, and you definitely deserve better . I will be more than happy to help in any way I can think of, donating money when I have it to aid the cleanup efforts, animal rescue people, I can share links I find to spread the word so others can help, etc. I hope they do find a solution, and you all have your way of life back as soon as possible.
I definitely never thought of you as some "right-wing loon", and apologize if any of what I said ever insinuated that, you do seem very middle-of-the-road to me, which is good. We could use more of that. I think you are spot on with all your observations. I don't think we got the results of the 2008 election wrong, but I think you're right in that everything did happen a bit fast for Obama. I think he was slightly naive and thought that Americans would actually maybe start coming together and that the Republican Party wouldn't play such lowball tactics and that some of the racist tangents of the extreme right wouldn't be nearly as strong and that he had more support from more politicians than he thought or something. He has a lot of fantastic ideas, there's a reason he won in 2008 and that was it, and if he can manage to get all those ideas to be law then hey, we're on the happy train to good times. But, and I can relate to this, as this is a problem I have sometimes, too, he comes up with all these big picture plans and sometimes tends to forget about the boring, tiring, small-detail elements of getting those plans to be a reality.
Surrounding yourself with good people is absolutely important. Like I said, we desperately need campaign finance reform, because it's hard to tell anymore who are the genuinely good political officials and who are just in it for the money and the power and the prestige. Obama could try and seek out the purest people possible to surround hiimself with, and he would be lucky to get maybe five people at best that could fit that criteria. Fixing our political system would do wonders for future governments. I've made my feelings about a Palin presidency quite known here, so you and I are completely in sync there . Again, I do understand your viewpoint, and you make a lot of excellent arguments, and I apologize again if things got a bit heated here and there . It's a stressful topic, I don't blame people for getting angry one bit.
Angela
Your post was full of so many "mays", "unknown"s, and "probably"s that I'm suprised you're not seeing the risk.
When using an explosion as a means to solve a problem, "mays", "unknown"s, and "probably"s are not words that need to be in the equation. If there isn't a scientific model that can be rendered then it's not worth the risk. What if one of the unknowns was to cause a larger leak? No engineer worth their salt would take that job with so many unknowns in play.
Well, yes, there is the risk of making the situation worse. I speak with uncertainty because I am not an expert. But the tactic has been used with success before. But still, no one has offered any reason WHY this idea isn't considered more and more when no other quick solution exists, except of the easy "It can make things worse" argument without offering any evidence on why. I asked why we haven't collapsed the well with explosives, and that's all I have heard. "It can make things worse." HOW? "It just can. We don't know anything about it."
Well, why don't you looked into the issue a little more? Why do you think I asked?
There's plenty of American companies involved which the US government could directly target. BP basically owned the majority rights to the well, but leased out the actual production to Transocean (a swiss-american company who actually owned and operated the rig) and Halliburton who produced and installed the casing which failed. BP have a lot of failing in the whole mess, but there's been a bit of US xenophobia about the whole thing. BP may have owned and drove the car when the brakes failed but there were two other mechanics playing about them before they set off.[/B]
The main problem here is that the whole shebang was regulated so lightly. The market heads towards a cost floor so cannot regulate itself, safety gets less and less important against the need for profit. This would never have happened in the North Sea, where remote shutoffs for blowout preventers are legally required.[/B]
I actually think if the casing is found to be substandard Halliburton will end up paying for most of this anyway.
The main problem here is that the whole shebang was regulated so lightly. The market heads towards a cost floor so cannot regulate itself, safety gets less and less important against the need for profit. This would never have happened in the North Sea, where remote shutoffs for blowout preventers are legally required.
"he's more machine now, than man. twisted, and evil."
The main problem here is that the whole shebang was regulated so lightly. The market heads towards a cost floor so cannot regulate itself, safety gets less and less important against the need for profit. This would never have happened in the North Sea, where remote shutoffs for blowout preventers are legally required.
Your line of logic is perplexing. You say I'm not offering any evidence of why, but you're only offering that it might work.
If you don't know all the variables then here are two biggest concerns: the collapse doesn't result in closing the opening but instead opens it up even further. You have to understand everything underneath that surface to know for sure it will close up the opening. And two, like Deep mentioned the pressure has to go somewhere. The well is tapped now it has to go somewhere, you can't exactly reverse the flow.
Another thing to consider is that if the explosion doesn't seal off the opening now you have the main part of the leak under rubble and you've made it harder to access.
Knowledgeable sources think that it's very possible there are cracks and fractures in the seabed of the Deepwater Horizon well explosion. In this immediate region, there is a layer of about 1,200 feet of compressed mud from a million years of outflow of the Mississippi River, lying on the bottom. The drilling may have hit a methane hydrate formation in this well, which caused an overpressure of 20,000 psi or so. The Blowout Protector (BOP) is built to handle 15,000. So it just blew everything. It could easily have fractured casing on the well, and worked through fractures in the rocks. This must be evaluated. Also, there is more confirmation of undersea plumes, and it is possible that they are coming from more than one location.
Exactly, why can it make things worse?
You have to understand everything underneath that surface to know for sure it will close up the opening.