Where’s PETA and the Angry Tea Party Crowd on this Gulf Oil Disaster?

Here’s a few things to ponder …

Where’s PETA and the Tea Party?

Where the hell is PETA? Yeah i said it? Lemme repeat that incase I was misunderstood.. Where is PETA? You know them, the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals… Where are those guys around this Gulf Oil Spill Issue?

For many of us this disaster didn’t hit home until we started seeing dead turtles and pelicans immersed in oil come washing up on our shores. I mean we lost 11 people and for the majority of us, it was in one ear and out the other.. People losing jobs?…Again-it was in one ear and out the other. But all those dead animals struck a chord. It was exasperated when we heard idiots like Alaskan Congressman Don Young try to explain this off as if it was natural and the animals killed weren’t no big deal. Sounds to me some serious animal rights violations took place, both by BP and those who support and explain away their actions.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IuozWIsDyyU

When the oil spill started and was said to be headed toward the wild-life packed marsh lands of Louisiana, I half jokingly and half seriously tweeted ‘Where’s PETA?’ I was joking that if folks like a ‘dog killing’ Michael Vick and a fur coat wearing Jennifer Lopez could incur this organization’s wrath, wait till Tony Hayward CEO of BP crossed paths with PETA. I even included PETA  (@Peta) on the tweet and never heard back.

That was a good 50 days ago. Here we are on day 60 and as I perused their website I see there’s still no mention of the Gulf Oil Spill, which I find to be beyond strange. As you can see from the front page of their website which was taken today June 10th, they have updated information including the recent passing of Golden Girl Rue McClanahan. There’s also a recent story of porn star Jenna Jameson and her doing a shocking video about how chickens are treated, but no Gulf Oil Spill…

The website PETA.org has an action center page where people can join campaigns against KFC, Petsmart and others but no BP. I don’t wanna be petty and I realize some of these campaigns are probably worthwhile but to see how vehement PETA was over Michael Vick and the NFL where members could be found picketing outside games and stepping to fans who supported Vick, why so silent on BP and Hayward? Will members show up at his next outing and throw blood on him for all the oil soaked rare Brown Pelicans his company’s negligence harmed and killed? Will they be picketing BP stations the way they did NFL games? Thus far I haven’t seen them at the BP in my area..They were out and about during the NFL games when Vick returned..

Not to be unfair with PETA, I have to also ask this question about the Tea Party crowd? It was just a few months ago we saw a big Tea Party rally in New Orleans where folks skewered Obama for giving away government money. Some went so far as to have Obama’s face made to look like Hitler… Where’s the Tony Hayward posters that vilify him? Where’s the Tea Party  crowd whoo-riding the CEO’s press conference or townhalls like they did during the healthcare debates? Where’s the venom and outrage being directed toward BP executives who seem tell endless lies about the spill to people who live in regions that the Tea Party found major support?

One has to wonder if these organizations are all hype, scared or in the back pockets of a multi-national like BP and their friends. In any case, it was bugging me to see these outspoken groups  absent from the fight while others like the Hip Hop Caucus in Washington DC picketed Hayward’s New York office last week and attempted to secure a citizen’s arrest.  CNN did a story on a young girl who was 10 or 12 years old launching some sort of protest for the destroyed wild life..Rap star Talib Kweli stepped to the plate and dropped a searing song called Ballad of the Black Gold which deals with issues around oil. Everyone’s been stepping up..Just wondering why we haven’t seen and heard more from these two groups that garnered reputations for kicking up dust?

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BP Needs to Write Hefty Checks & President Obama Needs to Give Back BP Campaign Money

Woke this morning to ‘Breaking news‘ that the Gulf Oil Spill has been capped. Call me skeptical but that seemed a bit too good to be true. Now of course a few hours after this initial assertion, everyone is backpedaling and as President Obama is fond of saying, they are ‘re-calibrating’ their remarks. In other words-Here comes the corporate spin. But that’s either here nor there.

What all of us need to be watching for is to how BP which has had its third so-called accident in 5 years will start compensating people and businesses it destroyed. BP needs to be underwriting every single animal rights and rescue organization that are feverishly plucking oil soaked birds and mammals to clean and care for them and keep them out of harms way. We should all be treated to a breaking news story showing BP CEO Tony Hayward cutting lots of hefty checks to those operations.

Next we should all be treated to Hayward cutting large checks to fishermen and all businesses including tourism impacted by his company’s blunder. Someone suggested that we should take this a step further and make sure all Gulf businesses own a part of BP. That just might be the move. We should also see similar checks written by the other companies involved in this disaster including; Haliburton and Transocean Limited.

It would be nice to see the Drill Baby Drill crowd which includes miscreants like; Michael Steele, John McCain, Sarah Palin, Newt Gingrich etc, all apologizing for their gross miscalculations and misplaced advocacy for off shore drilling. Obama was right to put a moratorium in place. It needs to be permanent.

Speaking of which, we also need to see a press conference with President Obama and every other federal and state politician who took campaign money from BP, giving it back. They should publicly return the money let all of us know they are in no-way beholden to the oil giant.  Obama says he didn’t take any money, but here’s what’s being reported:

BP and its employees have given more than $3.5 million to federal candidates over the past 20 years, with the largest chunk of their money going to Obama, according to the Center for Responsive Politics. Donations come from a mix of employees and the company’s political action committees — $2.89 million flowed to campaigns from BP-related PACs and about $638,000 came from individuals.

On top of that, the oil giant has spent millions each year on lobbying — including $15.9 million last year alone — as it has tried to influence energy policy.

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.

Read more: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0510/36783.html#ixzz0p9e1qXmw

BP CEO Tony Hayward needs to hold press conferences with him writing hefty checks for all the people who's lives he ruined

All the key folks involved and rightly so made it a point to be constantly be on TV to give us around the clock information and updates. We should all demand that they continue this process when it comes to recovery and compensation. After all, it’s when the cameras are off and our collective attention is redirected elsewhere that big companies start to toss-up all sorts of red tape and road blocks and pull all types of shenanigans resulting in people not getting their money…

These companies should do the right thing and not hide behind caps limiting what damages can be collected. Their should be no shortchanging the people. We’ve heard way too many Rush Limbaugh type pundits brag about how ‘private’ should be left to their own devices and they will do right by the American people. Well, here’s their chance. BP needs to handsomely compensate everyone. It’s the ethical thing to do..

Failure for these companies to properly compensate people will be an indication that this so called ‘free market, unregulated business environment that conservatives and Tea Party types crow about is a complete failure. We should also keep in mind that almost every single Gulf Coast state Senator is against removing or raising the 75 million dollar liability cap.All those Rush Limbaugh/ Glenn Beck types who claimed the market can take care of itself need to be leading the charge making sure all those private businesses involved are stepping it up BPHaliburton andTransocean Limited and don’t hide behind their political friends.

Something to Ponder.

-Davey D-

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