I'm a hard determinist. It's quite true that BP could do nothing else. But it's also true that responsibility must be assigned and punishment applied to establish an algorithm for future behavior. That's how the computers on our shoulders work. Otherwise all oil companies would adapt the behavior of no consequences. I do know that none of us are truly responsible for our actions but I also know that societies must work.

Please, DB, do some editing of this article ... two instances of repeated sentences out of the gate, and incorrect naming of Obama's CoS, Rahm Emanuel.

Valid points, of course, but the glaring problems pull attention away from the message.

Leopold and Lobe, eh? One rarely hears this today. "Frankie and Jhonny were lovers..." I've become my father. I'm sitting around in my UNDERWEAR!!! typing this and they're BOXER SHORTS!!...Ahhh, where are my speedos/

@ DB

Fast work.

Yes. My sense is that is the wizard of BP... whereas Hayward is simply the bag-holder. Just as Rubin was the wizard behind Citi and Pandit is the bag-holder.. Hank Greenberg was the wizard of AIG and whoever followed, the bag-holder..

That is the M.O., and I see DB (smiles) is fully aware of it..

@ Pisano.
You're right. I should have made it clear that I wasn't referring to Dr. Machan....I thought I referred to "some libertarians" not to him in my post, no?
Apologies to him, if not.

I was referring to other articles I've seen and probably should have specified which, except I admire the authors on other issues and wouldn't like to do so.

And I've no quarrel with the notion that people are overreacting to BP, either.

I'm fairly certain there's more here than meets the eye.
Peter Sutherland (the tie in to Goldman Sachs) is only one of the pieces of the puzzle....
BP's previous CEO is another.

Reply from The Daily Bell

John Browne, Baron Browne of Madingley
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Lord Browne of Madingley
Born 20 February 1948

Hamburg, Germany

Occupation Managing Director and Managing Partner (Europe) of Riverstone Holdings LLC, President of the Royal Academy of Engineering, Chair of the Tate

Edmund John Philip Browne, Baron Browne of Madingley, FRS FREng (born 20 February 1948) is President of the Royal Academy of Engineering and was group Chief Executive of BP until his resignation on 1 May 2007. Since 2001, he has been a crossbench member of the House of Lords.

Browne was born in Hamburg, Germany, to a British Army officer father and a Hungarian Auschwitz survivor mother. His father also worked in civilian life for Anglo-Persian Oil, which later became British Petroleum. He was educated at the King's School, Ely and St John's College, Cambridge, where he earned a First Class Bachelor's degree in Physics.

He holds a degree in Physics from Cambridge University and an MS in Business from Stanford University, California. He has also been awarded Honorary Doctorates from Heriot Watt University (D.Eng) and Robert Gordon University (D.Tech), Dundee University (LLD), Warwick University (D.Sc), Hull University (D.Sc), Cranfield University (D.Sc), Sheffield Hallam University (Hon. D Univ), University of Buckingham (D.Sc), University of Belfast (Hon DSc 0 Eng) and the University of Surrey (Hon D. Univ), Imperial College, London (Hon D.Sc), (Leuven University, Belgium (D.Sc), Thunderbird (LLD), University of Notre Dame (LLD), Colorado School of Mines (D.Eng), D Mendeleyev University of Chemical Technology of Russia, Arizona State University (DHLitt). He is an Honorary Fellow of St John's College, Cambridge and a Senior Member of St Antony's College, Oxford.

He is a Fellow and President of The Royal Academy of Engineering, a Fellow of the Royal Society, a Fellow of the Institute of Materials, Minerals and Mining, a Fellow of the Institute of Physics, a Fellow of the Institute of Petroleum, a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts & Sciences, a Companion of the Institute of Management, an Honorary Fellow of the Institution of Chemical Engineers, an Honorary Fellow of the Geological Society, an Honorary Fellow of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers and an Honorary Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry.

At the suggestion of his father, Browne joined BP as an apprentice in 1966 while still at university and remained with the corporation throughout his career.
Between 1969 and 1983, he held a variety of exploration and production posts in Anchorage, Alaska [1] , New York, San Francisco, London and Canada.

In 1984 he became Group Treasurer and Chief Executive of BP Finance International.

In April 1986, he took up the position of Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer of The Standard Oil Company in Cleveland, Ohio. In 1987, following the BP/Standard merger, in addition to his position as Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer of BP America, he was appointed Chief Executive Officer of Standard Oil Production Company.
In 1989, he became Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer of BP Exploration based in London. In September 1991, he joined the Board of The British Petroleum Company plc. as a Managing Director. He was appointed Group Chief Executive on 10 June 1995. Following the merger of BP and Amoco, he became Group Chief Executive of the combined group on 31 December 1998 until 1 May 2007.

He was one of the most highly paid executives in the UK with a remuneration package of approximately £5.7 million in 2004.
[edit]Green issues promoted by Browne

From 1997, Browne sought to recreate BP as a "green" energy company. The company linked itself in its corporate communications with green issues by the overt link of its BP initials with the phrase "Beyond Petroleum". Browne stated that the right to self determination is crucial for people everywhere, and that he sees his company's mission as to find ways to meet current needs without excessive harm to the environment, while developing future, more sustainable sources of energy. He promised that BP would cut its production of CO2 by 10% by 2010, although it is as yet unclear whether BP will meet this in the wake of his departure.

Resignation

It was announced on 25 July 2006 that Browne would stand down as chief executive of BP in December 2008, 10 months after his 60th birthday. There had been press speculation that he had wished to continue beyond this date, but he made it clear that he did not wish to do so.

On 6 January 2007, Browne won his first interim injunction against the allegations by his former homosexual lover Ashley Staines being published. He later disclosed being "terrified" that his sexuality would be revealed publicly. A week later it was announced that his retirement date had been brought forward to July 2007 and that he would be succeeded by Tony Hayward. In April 2007, after a court case lasting over four weeks, Browne appealed to the Judicial Committee of the House of Lords, who ruled that he could not prevent Associated Newspapers from printing allegations about his romantic life and alleged misuse of company funds. Lord Browne resigned from BP on 1 May 2007, and resigned as a non-executive director of Goldman Sachs on 10 May 2007.

At the time he faced allegations that he had supported his boyfriend, Canadian Jeff Chevalier, throughout their four-year relationship, and when Chevalier moved back to Toronto at the end of the relationship, that Browne paid for 12 months of a lease on an apartment.

BP chairman, Peter Sutherland, said that a review into allegations that company assets and resources had been abused were "unfounded or insubstantive".

Lord Browne says he felt he was under pressure to resign due to UK newspaper Mail on Sunday revelations about his personal life and relationship with Chevalier. As part of a statement made at the time of his resignation, he commented: "In my 41 years with BP, I have kept my private life separate from my business life. I have always regarded my sexuality as a personal matter, to be kept private. It is a matter of deep disappointment that a newspaper group has now decided that allegations about my personal life should be made public."

Browne faced charges of perjury for lying to the court over how he met Chevalier. Browne in a deposition to the court initially said the pair had met when they were both exercising in Battersea Park. Browne later admitted this was a lie. He acknowledged that he had actually met Chevalier via a commercial gay escort website, Suited and Booted. However, Mr Justice Eady, the presiding judge in the case, said he decided not to refer the matter to the Attorney General with regard to possible perjury charges, as disclosure in the judgement of Lord Browne's behaviour was "probably sufficient punishment".

You are so wrong Dr Machan, You are not a minor public intellectual. . . You are at the very top, in my mind!

Perception is reality. This is the falsehood that prevails in our country and it is on fully display in the Washington hearings. The congressmen are acting like juveniles. The have no interest in pursing truth and want the perception they are creating surrounding the tragedy to replace truth.

They have no expertise on oil technology. They have blocked every attempt for decades to develop an energy policy. They are intent on creating a false perception around oil so they can get cap and trade passed. That's the entire purpose of this political drama.

Obama lost no time displaying his bullying to force BP into submission in order to get as much money as possible for politicians and their favorites. Obama announces a moratorium on drilling and wants BP to pay the expenses of all the other oil companies who now have unemployed workers. Plus the bully display is also to intimidate the other oil companies into supporting his program of cap and trade.

Feinberg will be the payout czar. He carried the title "Office of the Special Master" for TARP. He loved that title and and repeatedly used phrases like "they complied with my program." But Club Fed bankers were exempt. They got their money repaid 100% and were exempt from rules applied to everyone else. Now he's Special Master for the BP payout. We need hearings about that.

Coercing corporations is Obama's preferred technique and in this he displays coercion as the first tool of the false covenant. Where coercion can't be done he will use manipulation which is the second technique of the false covenant. Now we also see Clinton, Buffet and Gates encouraging billionaires to give half their money away. To whom? I have no trouble answering that. You can be sure it won't be to those trying to preserve the bedrock of our constitutional republic. Collectivism marches onward, upward, higher and higher. Excelsior!

Reply from The Daily Bell

We amazed by all the misinformation and see it as a way to provide a "road map for posterity."

The sad truth of what you say is evident in our society today. There may be prosecutions, but no one of import will be prosecuted! only underlings, people who don't have deep pockets, or someone who, for an amount will accept the blame. Then it will be business as usual in big oil. When at a critical point, where you need a shut off valve/better pipe, none is installed, COST! And leadership, it's on vacation/non-existent!

Reply from The Daily Bell

Sadly we believe leadership may be very much in evidence.

@ Lila Rajiva

I like your sharp intellect and critical attitude shown on your blog and in many posts here, but I don't understand why you say "They like to talk about accountability and responsibility in other cases, but have tended to fall back on "accidents happen" in this, overlooking BP's sheer incompetence, as evidenced here, as well as in its unseemly record over the years."

Dr Machan imho just made a neutral observation, in fact saying that big companies are considered guilty until proven otherwise. Accidents happen, indeed, but where does he say that the one that causes the accident shouldn't solve/clean up on its own account?

I think quite a bit is known already. And I really don't see why it's the government's responsibilty. You foul up, you clean up. I think the whole business was a set up of some kind, that might have gotten out of hand.

"libertarians seem to suffer the same blindness."

Not quite, as more untainted non power-elite and objective information becomes available, prejudgement of fault, negligence, or premeditation by either the Leviathan or BP is at this time fruitless and tenuous.

If there is to be condemnation, it is that the spill has not yet been stopped by either agency or anyone else.

Dr. Machan is entirely right on this point. It's perfectly true that the socialists seem blind to the irony of their public postures.

The only problem with his thesis is that libertarians seem to suffer the same blindness.

They like to talk about accountability and responsibility in other cases, but have tended to fall back on "accidents happen" in this, overlooking BP's sheer incompetence, as evidenced here, as well as in its unseemly record over the years.

On the other hand, when the offenders are public school teachers or postal workers (or other minor functionaries of the state), the same libertarians work themselves up into a frenzy about government incompetence.

Both sides are at fault, really.

And the cause on both sides is too much attachment to ones' own ideology and personal investment in it and too little to factual history and objectivity.