The Big Question: Is probing BP a good move right now?

Dean Baker, co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research, said:
BP obviously did not take appropriate precaution in its drilling. It is quite likely that there was criminal negligence here. President Obama absolutely should be using all the authority of the Justice Department to determine whether there was criminal negligence and to prosecute fully all the BP executives responsible.

BP’s CEO Tony Hayward was quoted as saying: “I want my life back,” meaning that he’s tired of dealing with the spill. There are tens of thousands of people in the Gulf area who are not going to get their life back: the fishermen, people in the tourist industry, and people who have retired to the region to enjoy the coast.

Mr. Hayward is a high-flying CEO with pay packages that run into the millions or tens of millions annually. He is supposed to know what he is doing. He took big risks with other people’s lives and he lost. He should not get his life back.

As the tough on crime crew is fond of saying, “if can’t do the time, don’t do the crime.” We have to make sure that highly paid executives who break the law get the same treatment as teenage drug users. It’s time for a little justice.

Tyson Slocum, director of Public Citizen’s Energy Program, said:

News that the DOJ is launching a criminal investigation into BP’s possible negligence for causing the worst industrial and environmental catastrophe in U.S. history is a welcome development. We must remember that BP has one of the worst track records of any oil company operating in America: The company was already on criminal probation at the time of the accident as a condition of its two guilty pleas to criminal violations of the Clean Air Act and Clean Water Act back in 2007. BP has kept federal criminal investigators busy over the last several years, as federal criminal probes have resulted in BP being forced to pay more than $600 million in penalties and fines to settle allegations that it killed workers, willfully disregarded environmental laws, and engaged in widespread price-gouging of American consumers. Federal investigations reveal BP to be a habitual corporate criminal, with every phase of its American operations – from oil drilling to refining to pipelines to gasoline marketing to commodity trading – having violated multiple US laws.

It has become clear that BP management on the Deepwater Horizon were negligent. We now know that BP knew the blowout preventor was compromised but proceeded ahead because, well, replacing the preventor could have stalled the drilling operation for months, and BP didn’t want to lose money. And this is a tragic yet common theme with BP’s American operations: cut corners, ignore safety warnings and disregard repeated regulatory  reprimands.

Peter Navarro, professor of economics and public policy at U.C. Irvine, said:

It’s a great move.  Let’s start at the top: Criminal negligence at the White House.  To paraphrase an old Greek proverb; Fish are rotting in the Gulf from the head down.

John F. McManus, president of The John Birch Society, said:

If there is any criminal activity on the part of anyone regarding the gulf oil disaster, then they should indeed be prosecuted.  So an “investigation” is certainly called for.  But no one should jump to any conclusions at this point.
 
Many fingers are being pointed at BP and maybe this firm is responsible, even criminally responsible.  If there are others whose deficiencies have contributed to this problem – even governments – let us hope that the investigation will bare out them as well.
 

Justin Raimondo, editorial director of Antiwar.com, said:

Criminal charges are the right move — if the Obama administration is looking to divert attention away from the real scandal, which came about because of the “regulatory capture” of the MMS (the agency that supposedly oversees the drilling activities of BP and others) and the actions by Congress which limited the liability of BP in the first place.

Hal Lewis, professor of Physics at UC Santa Barbara, said:

Whatever the sins of BP (which are indeed plentiful and known) this is just cheap politics. The highest priority is to stop the leak, and THEN place the blame. But the administration sees this as an excuse for ordinary Chicago politics. BP, for better or worse, is the company trying to stop the leak, and nipping at them while they do it is no help. There are no drilling experts in the White House, but there are lots of lawyers—from the top down.