BP latest Lake Michigan Oil Spill more than twice as large as first reported, Republicans love Pollution

BP's oil spill from their Whiting, Indiana processing plant into Lake Michigan doubled in size. BP raised the "estimated" amount of oil spilled up from 600 gallons to well over 1600 gallons. But, in reality, this latest estimate is just a guess by BP, as well, and the final total and damage is sure to increase.

Lake Michigan, as one of the Great Lakes the repository of 21% of the World's Fresh Water, is the primary source for drinking water used by 7-12 million people.

Initially, BP claimed the cold conditions and ice on the water allowed them to collect the waxy oil spilled, which was characterized as small. However, Illinois Senators Mark Kirk and Dick Durbin made several public declarations and vowed to investigate the spills causes and effects.

Mark Kirk's refusal to slander Dick Durbin and his non-deference to BP has greatly angered the Illinois Republican Party and Conservatives, in general. Over at the fetid Hotair, Ed Morissey declares Kirk is a coward who won't go Nuclear on Durbin while commenters declare Kirk is a "crap weasel" with "no testicles". Meanwhile, the Illinois Republican Party is looking to implant Jim Oberweis another Corporate scumbag who will vote to eliminate regulations and unchain Corporations.

Just last week, US House Republicans voted to allow Coal Mining Companies to dump Coal Ash into lakes, rivers and streams. In 2011, US House Republicans passed H.R. 2018 to eliminate the Clean Water Act of 1972 and allow Polluting Corporations to do so with total impunity and immunity.

The vote last week by the Republicans was in response to President Obama's decision to empower the EPA and Army Corps of Engineers to protect and defend 20 million acres of wetlands and river sheds from the Pollution Industry. So, the Republicans decided to look out for their constituents.

The Pollution Industry is a big money maker so, of course, Republicans will look out for the Corporations Interest and harm Americans because their job is to defend and empower Corporations at the expense of America.

US House Republicans love Pollution, vote to make dumping Coal Ash and mining waste into streams "Legal"

Faced with the massive toxic coal ash spills into waterways, US House Republicans decided to make the dumping of toxins into rivers, lake, streams legal. After all they won't be drinking, bathing or fishing in the toxic water. John Boehner called it a "pro-jobs growth bill". Because Fuck the EPA and all Regulations!

Congressional Republicans are evil. While an argument could be made the Republican Party contains some good people, any Republican you may have the misfortune to run into in Washington DC, is a villain worse than a mustache twirling caricature of evil. 

Throughout the Misadministration of George W(orst President Ever) Bush, Federal agencies ignorned the criminal polluting by Coal Mining Companies and in the December of 2008, Bush snuck through regulations giving them freedom to dump coal ash and other toxic waste products into nearby rivers, lakes and streams. Because Regulations are job-killers and the word Jobs is magic.

This last year has seen a number of Massive Toxic Coal Sludge Spills into Rivers rendering them not only undrinkable but untouchable.

Duke Energy followed dumping of 82,000 tons of coal ash and 27 Million gallons of contaminated water into the Dan River with another spill because Fuck the EPA and all Regulations! Duke Energy dumped 61 million gallons of coal ash wastewater into the Cape Fear River Basin from its coal plant in nearby Moncure, in Chatham County North Carolina. The vote by House Republicans would simply legalize these spills because Republicans are evil.

This vote is nothing more than a campaign promise Eric Cantor and Congressional Republicans has made to Corporations, 

"Whether it’s the EPA, the FDA, the FCC, the SEC, the CFTC, you name it, there is an acronym for a federal agency causing harm right now. We’re trying to pull that in." - Eric Cantor.

Republicans run this Nation for their Corporate Overlords. They don't care what happens to the Country so do you think they're going to care if your home's drinking water is contaminated? No, Republicans and their Moneyed Masters aren't going to be affected and they know their conservative base can be easily prodded into ignoring Republican Evil by yelling about President Obama's mom jeans or Benghazi!!1!11! who can be reliably counted upon to attack Liberals because condemning Pollution and the criminal negligence of Coal Companies is evil liberals/democrats punishing success.

The Pollution-Industry is making huge profits and Republicans are working to make sure any costs they incur while raping the Nation and Planet will be passed onto the taxpayer and Working Class. Because Republicans job in Government is to ensure Profits and Privatized while Losses are Socialized.

Additionally, 2013 saw the amount of oil spill surpass the last 40 years combined;

Altogether, 800,000 gallons spilled from US railroads in the years from 1975 to 2010. That data, which comes from the Pipeline and Hazardous Material Safety Administration, does not include records of Canadian spills, some of which are thought to surpass one million gallons spilled on their own. 

In part because of major derailments in Alabama and North Dakota, over 1.15 million gallons of crude oil seeped from train cars.

So, it should come as no surprise that BP at Whiting Indiana is back to polluting Lake Michigan again. Because Fuck the EPA and all Regulations. BP confirmed their plant, newly renovated to process Canadian Tar Sands, dumped a huge unknown amount of oil and tar sands sludge into Lake Michigan. Lake Michigan water is the primary source for drinking water for 12 million Americans in Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana and Michigan.

But, while all this is occurring duped and ignorant conservatives across the Nation are busy deriding President Obama for not doing something, something, something about Crimea instead of focusing on the Terrorists, Koch Industries, Duke Energy, BP, Murray Energy and so many others, in our midst. Just as their Republican Handlers and Plutocratic Masters intend.

Petcoke in Chicago

Earlier this year Detroit was smothered in Petroleum Coke (Petcoke), the newest waste product of the filthy Koch Brothers Koch Carbon LLC and other Multi-National Oil Conglomerates, from the refining of Canadian Tar Sands. Giant clouds of toxic black dust and carbon choked poor Detroit residents until Detroit Mayor David Bing ordered Koch Brothers Sovereign Corporation Koch Carbon LLC to remove the petcoke.

Koch Carbon surreptitiously removed the Petcoke, most likely to Ohio, where the High-Sulfur heavily polluting toxic waste was probably burned for electricity.

Well, Our Corporate Lords and Masters are at it again. If you ever wondered what it was like to live in 19th century London with Industrial Factories dumping massive amounts of carbon on your heads come to the Southside of Chicago where massive piles of Petcoke are collecting along the Calumet River.

BP Whiting, which under George W(orst President Ever) dumped thousands of tons of toxic chemicals (including tons of mercury) into Lake Michigan in violation of the Republican neutered EPA regulations, now don't even have to worry about the Rump EPA, as the Right-Wing Government Shutdown has furloughed 99% of the EPA.

I suppose it makes sense. Conservatives have increasingly pushed America back to the 19th century. By, rolling back Voting Rights for minorities, making Birth Control illegal for women, involving the US in various little conflicts, many in the same regions Victoria and her PM's sent troops, and a retarded economic system which rewards the Inheritors of Wealth, Rentiers and Robber Barons.

So, why shouldn't we get to experience the joys of 19th century Industrial expansion as well?

BP Whiting is producing 6000 tons of Petcoke a day.Detroit’s Marathon refinery wasn’t producing petcoke before its expansion, according to the report, but now produces 1,720 tons per day while the Phillips 66 refinery in Wood River, Illinois, is increasing its petcoke output from 1,300 to 5,700 tons per day.

The waste product is laced with sulfur, mercury, nickel, vanadium and selenium and various other toxic residue but why should that matter to the Koch Brothers or BP? It's not in their backyard. They don't have the clouds of choking carbon befouling their lungs. The petcoke isn't sitting next to river they live upon.

Tom Shepard, a neighborhood activist, worries about piles
of petcoke building up along the Calumet River in Chicago.
(Photo by Kari Lydersen / Midwest Energy News)

But, who needs a Government? Who needs an EPA? Who needs Job Killing Regulations?

Hello Joe Barton, John Boehner and other Republicans. BP is awaiting your apology!

For all the dastardly reporting detailing the disgusting fallout and on-going damage done to the Gulf due to the reckless negligence of BP, Halliburton and Transocean, after the April 20, 2010, explosion aboard the BP-leased Deepwater Horizon spewed 5 million barrels of oil into the Gulf and killed 11 workers.

“The Gulf is returning to normal.” - Ken Feinberg.

The images of eyeless shrimp, lesion covered fish and deformed crabs are commonplace in the Gulf now 2 years after the worst Oil Spill in American History. "Some of the things I've seen over the past year or so I've never seen before," said Will Patterson, a marine biologist at the University of South Alabama and at the Dauphin Island Sea Lab. "Things like fin rot, large open sores on fish, those were some of the more disturbing types of things we saw. Different changes in pigment, red snapper with large black streaks on them."

But, guess what the rapacious Oil Conglomerates don't give a fuck. If they poison the waters, obliterate life and destroy the livelihood of millions of Americans so what? As long as the bottom line is safe.

As long as Republicans, place the blame for their evil onto President Obama, to satisfy the bigotry of their stable of warped conservative drones.

"I think the people responsible in the oil spill--the federal government--should take full responsibility for what's happening there," John Boehner, Speaker of the People's House? Or Propagandist and Lackey for BP?

Republicans and Conservatives hate America so much that they would impeach The American President [Is Obama's BP Shakedown an Impeachable Offense? - American Thinker] for holding a Foreign Company (BP) accountable for their shoddy, slipshod, reckless, money-grubbing negligence in the Gulf of Mexico Oil Spill.

How can "Freedom-loving" Conservatives agree with the US Government giving billions of tax payer dollars to BP, who has used and is using that money to subvert and bribe people overseas? How can they abide a Party which defends a Corporation which damaged the Gulf so severely that it'll take decades to recover.

"I apologize," Republican Joe Barton told Tony Hayward. "I do not want to live in a country where any time a citizen or a corporation does something that is legitimately wrong is subject to some sort of political pressure that is -- again, in my words, amounts to a shakedown. So I apologize."

Corporations are people, my friend! But, personal responsibility ends when Corporate-hood begins...

While the response operation was going on, BP was responsible for cleaning it up, sort of... If you can call throwing millions of pounds of chemical dispersants, burning the oil and setting up rubber buoys a "clean-up" response. Now, if oil is found where it shouldn't be, an investigation will take place, led by the Coast Guard, to find the "responsible party". BP is no longer automatically liable. "What it means is we're going back to the normal way of handling coastline issues," explains BP spokesman Ray Melick. The Normal way being for them to cut all safety features, steal as much oil as possible and leave the clean-up to whatever Nation was stupid enough to invite them in. As Greg Palast wrote, BP Cover-Up "They Knew",

Two years before the Deepwater Horizon blow-out in the Gulf of Mexico, another BP off-shore rig suffered a nearly identical blow-out, but BP concealed the first one from the U.S. regulators and Congress.

“I urge the citizens of Louisiana: Move on already,” Ken Feinberg said. As Melick added about BP, "We're not going anywhere." How true! The damage wrought by BP isn't going anywhere. It'll be here for decades. So just move on America... You and your lives mean little compared to the Corporate Person BP.

Republicans want to Kill Chicagoans via Lead Poisioning

Yes, Republicans entice their conservative drones to shoot Liberals but this is the more prosaic poisoning.

From the Chicago Tribune story,

EPA researchers tested samples from 29 Chicago area homes and at least 1 liter in the first 12 tested in 15 of the 29 homes exceeded 15 parts per billion of lead. The current procedures require only the first liter out of the pipes be tested. The current procedures, obviously give an inaccurate account of the lead levels as the higher levels were registered in the proceeding water.

The EPA says there is no safe level of lead exposure, especially for vulnerable populations including children, pregnant women and infants who drink formula made from tap water. Miguel Del Toral notes that lead is the only substance other than carcinogens for which the EPA exposure goal is zero.

But, Republicans know that by simply eliminating the EPA the Lead levels will effectively drop to zero because no agency will be measuring for them!

As I related with my post Peter Roskam called me the other day about the Job-Killing EPA in which I asked Representative Roskam why the Republicans overwhelming support the idea of eliminating the EPA and federal clean water standards HR 2018, A Republican House bill in which 223 of 236 (94.5%) of Republicans voted to eliminate the Clean Water Act of 1972. The answer is always that the EPA harms jobs.

"Whether it’s the EPA, the FDA, the FCC, the SEC, the CFTC, you name it, there is an acronym for a federal agency causing harm right now. We’re trying to pull that in." - Eric Cantor, famous Republicon Hit Man for the Plutocracy who demanded disaster relief for Tornado victims in Joplin, MO only be appropriated from cuts to Medicare.

Oh, but don't worry Corporations have your best interest at heart, they certainly will voluntarily reduce their toxic pollution! It's the Myth of Self-Regulation.

As we have seen with every deregulation and privatization scheme Chicago and Cook County residents would face the prospect of tainted water with little to no remedy to face giant Corporate Criminals who regularly violate EPA and State rules now and would pollute and poison Americans with absolute impunity if the Republicons succeed in their efforts to dismantle the EPA.

BP Commercials and Lawsuits and the Petroleum Pigs

"Are you fuckin' kiddin' me? You don't ever admit the existence of this thing. Ever!" ~ Frank Vincent, The Sopranos

BP wants you to know they destroyed the Gulf for Generations but, it's fine now. I'm actually surprised that BP ran a commercial during the BCS title game. I'm not surprised they choose to peddle their pablum to the mouth-breathers who breathe vicariously through student-athletes. Just that they would reference it at all.

The standard model for the rapacious evil Petroluem Companies has been to blame 'Mother Nature' let a spill fade into memory and then proclaim 'See it's all better now!'

BP's commercials portray a sublime Gulf, with sparkling beaches, reenergized businesses, smiling happy fishermen and pristine waters bursting with seafood. As the propaganda tells Us, 'BP is still here and isn't going anywhere.' So get used to your gulf shrimp and oil cocktail.

These commercials, only 20 months after the biggest criminal Oil disaster (that Americans have seen), should serve as a stark reminder of BP's absolute evil. But, Surprise America! The undying negligent Corporate Monster BP has been screwing the US and the World for decades in the pursuit of Oil profits.

Every now and again, a Petroleum Corporation has to step forward and receive the lash of public criticism, but the key for the Oilmen has always been to keep the game going. And they have honed their skills and refined their modus operandi for a century.

The Petroleum Pigs have some how convinced the American People, Natural Resources which belong to Us as a Nation, are theirs. So, they steal Our Oil and sell it for Their Profits and ensure whatever the damage to the land and people that occurs isn't their problem and they receive taxpayer funding to do it all. Profits Privatized, Losses and Costs Socialized. American Capitalism at it's finest.

Even when the victims of the Oil Monsters victims were nominal Americans, i.e. Native Alaskans and the land and seas destroyed were "U.S." territory, Americans could be relieved to know no lawsuits against Exxon would be heard as a result of the heinous unforgivable Exxon Valdez spill.

Although Alaska Natives may have suffered to a greater degree than members of the general public, "differences in the intensity with which a public harm is felt does not justify a private claim for public nuisance." . . . All Alaskans have the right to lead subsistence lifestyles, not just Alaska Natives.

Judge Russell Holland 03/23/94.

Fortunately, as long as the BP or Chevron or ExxonMobil or Royal Dutch Shell Group were destroying ecosystems and screwing people Overseas no problem! The Free Market knows best. Drill, Baby! Drill! I bet you didn't hear about the massive Oil spills from Royal Dutch Shell Group, the equivalent of an Exxon Valdez every year for 50 years or the fact it will take 30 years for the damage to subside and cost $1 Billion Dollars.

In South America, at least, the people are fighting back. President Rafael Correa, a U.S. and Belgian educated economist declared the debts forced on Ecuador by Vulture Capitalists and Corporate Oil Monsters to be illegitimate and that the oil and gas reserves in the country belong 100% to the People of Ecuador. This greatly angers the Neo-Feudalists and the Petroleum Pigs. Happily, the Ecuadorian Courts have ruled the overwhelming evidence of criminal negligence and evil tactics used by Chevron from 1964-1992 constituted a ruling of $18 Billion Dollars in damages.

The evidence against Chevron comes not only from plaintiffs, but also from Chevron's own experts and environmental auditors as well as independent third-party sources. The damages included a punitive component designed to punish Chevron for trying to sabotage the trial and threaten judges with jail time if they did not rule in the company's favor.

On Sunday 01/08/12, Hugo Chavez declared, "I will say it once. We will not recognize any decisions of the ICSID. We will not recognize them." Chavez seized back control of Venezuela's resources from the Vultures at ExxonMobil. Exxon called upon the power of the IMF and the World Bank to exert economic pressure on Venezuela regain control. Chavez along with allies Bolivia and Nicaragua, has said in the past that it would withdraw from the convention that created the ICSID, arguing that the international body gives transnational companies a gateway to violate national sovereignty.

So, BP agreed to pay $20 Billion Dollars for damages to the Gulf. This only happened after Republicons nearly shit themselves unconscious apologizing to BP for the hassle. And only after BP agreed to a "fair mediator" Kenneth Feinberg to administer the fund. "I want the lawsuits to stop" Kenneth Feinberg said. Of course, what Ken Feinberg actually wanted was the lawsuits against BP to stop. BP has been free to sue whomever they wanted and they did so in April 2011 when they filed lawsuits against Transocean Ltd., Halliburton Co. and Cameron International, for over $40 Billion Dollars.

See how "fair" that is? BP causes a Disaster and stands to gain $20 Billion Dollars in profit. It's all part of the Game. Oil Companies steal your Oil and sell it back to you. And they get you to finance the con they are pulling, foist the cost of the damages their rape of the land causes, while getting the rubes to clap and cheer wildly "Drill Here Drill Now!"

The Thinner Blue Line

173 officers were killed in line of duty in 2011. It's a sad time for those families of the Officers killed. It's also a sad time for the Image and Reputation for Police Officers and Departments.

The viscous, unconstitutional criminal oppression of OWS and the #Occupy Movement in New York, Oakland, Richmond, Albany, Boston and numerous other cities has once again put police officers into conflict with the 99%. Of course, this is precisely what the 1% want and expect. The 1% have always sought to use Police Departments and Individual Officers to fragment and divide. The Plutocracy also sees the quelling Domestic Dissent as the only legitimate Role of Police Officers.

Police Officers have once again found themselves placed in the role of Oppressor of the Poor in Service of the Rich. The Plutocracy has created an Economic and Political Model out-of-touch and unresponsive to the 99%. The Government is in service (and has been for a long time) to the Very Rich and their Multi-National Corporate Monsters.

Do you think any Police Departments are investigating BP over it's criminal negligence from the Deepwater Horizon Gulf Disaster? Do you think Detectives are investigating BP for the continual dumping of Mercury and various other toxic chemicals into Lake Michigan from their Whiting Indiana Plant? No Police Officers are tasked with keeping poor people in line.

There are other problems with Policing in America, as detailed in the Department of Justice Investigation of the Seattle Police Department, which found

"that SPD engages in a pattern or practice of using unnecessary or excessive force, in violation of the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution and Section 14141.” The DOJ Executive Summary states, "Deficiencies in SPD's training policies and oversight with regard to Use of Force contribute to the constitutional violations."

The DOJ report highlights the "few bad apple" theory,

"In any given year, a minority of Officers account for a disproportionate number of Use of Force incidents."

There are always going to be a percentage of individuals who abuse their authority. But, the System itself is at issue. Police Officers have to decide which side they are on. Is the Officer willing to be a Guardian of the Plutocracy? A truncheon wielding, pepper-spraying Bully for the 1%? Because every Police Officer should realize once the 99% are crushed, once the Middle Class is forever obliterated, once we are reduced to Wage Slaves chained irrevocably to be cogs in the machines of industry and war, Police Officers will be disposable too.

The 1% Hate Uncertainty

“Socialism, communism, whatever you want to call it, is never the answer.“ - Hank Steinbrenner, who received $1,200,000,000 Billion dollars in Taxpayer money to finance his baseball stadium. From which those profits will neatly land in his pocket.

The 1% of this Nation hate uncertain elements. What they would rather have is the certainty of the economic model they are confident in; Neo-Feudalism, in which their profits are privatized and protected by Government and their losses are socialized and paid for by the 99%.

But, there are also elements of modern life, pensions, Medicare, the EPA, freeways and schools which represent huge areas of Uncertainty. Your pension would be better off as a private account inside their Wall Street casinos where they can gamble it away and tell you, 'Oops! The Free Market just swallowed your life savings! Sorry, but that's Freedom.' As Republicon Jeb Henserling told America, "I don’t think we can figure out how to outlaw recessions any more than we can outlaw tornadoes or outlaw hurricanes. Economic growth has never gone in one straight line up. It’s a part of freedom."

Schools represent another area of Uncertainty. Schools and Teachers teach the 99% things the 1% does not want them to learn. Note how often this is the cry of David Horowitz, Michele Bachmann, Faux News listeners. Schools are awful places where children learn to make up their own minds instead of absorbing the Neo-Feudalist vision of America. And now unlike what George Carlin observed, the 1% don't even need Americans to be "just smart enough to run the machines and do the paperwork, and just dumb enough to passably accept all these increasingly shittier jobs", for they can increasingly go anywhere in the world to find their labor pool.

So, if it's revealed 1 in 2 Americans live in "Poverty"? The 1% funds Think Tanks to produce the kind of education they want you to have. Poverty? Harumph! Why that doesn't exist in America! Here is this Study which clearly shows the 99% "have an adequate and reasonably steady supply of food". This comes from the mouths of the puffy faces of those who've never, ever missed a meal.

You see the modern One Percenter has fully absorbed the Ayn Rand Economic Philosophy. They are Great Atlases bestriding this Land, this Nation, this World with their awesome Minds. The 99% are to be feared and controlled because, as in Rand's vision, the Common Man is nothing more than a potential Parasite. And once you've started viewing your fellow man as a "worthless eater" it becomes apparent why increasingly, the 1% is comprised of Sociopaths, people unable to express or recognize human emotion.

Why would a One Percenter want a functioning infrastructure? They no longer need the American worker or American factory. It's often pointed out we aren't a Manufacturing country anymore but a Financial one, and what the Financial Exploiters want is the ability to move "their" capital anywhere in the world at a moment’s notice, to engage in predatory lending, usury and eliminate all banking/financial regulation. The 1% do not see American workers, companies or factories as assets but as giant pools of liquidity waiting languidly, for them to drain and thus quicken themselves with Naked Credit Default Swaps.

Why would the 1% want EPA restrictions? Their water isn't going to be filled with the toxic run-off from fracking. And BP can't be certain a Government inspection of the BP Whiting, Indiana Oil Refinery Plant which routinely dumps a dozen toxic byproducts from oil refining, including benzene, toluene and suspended solids containing mercury, lead, nickel and vanadium, into Lake Michigan will cost them some of their beautiful money. And Massey Energy has to face the uncertainity of how much money the Government will demand they pay for killing their miners by their rampant criminal negligence.

So, much Uncertainty facing the 1%! How does the Melting Pot benefit the psychopathic 1%? They don't need a Nation, they gate off their communities, they hire their own private police services, they have 24 hour Propaganda Networks. If they have bigger problems they band together and instruct their wholly owned Congressmen and Senators to adopt their Views and pursue their issues. The 1% are constantly pushing their Republicon Guards to eliminate Medicare, Medicaid, and steal Social Security. Because those SSA funds represent the last Great Pool of liquidity waiting for them to tap.

The 1% don't need you. But, what they do need every so often is to eliminate Uncertainty. And that is why the filthy 1% who deliberately caused the economic collapse and the housing bubble are now trying to convince enough people that it was caused by social programs for the poor and middle class.

Because they need to get their Wholly Bought and Paid for Republicon Party and Pro-Business Democrats elected to eliminate Uncertainty so that they may turn all of America into a Galt's Gulch. But while, they live as Lords, the 99% will live as serfs and wage slaves mining their gold, picking their arugula and quietly dying off when their working years are over.

Because that is Certainty the 1% are Striving towards and Rand's Ultimate Vision for the 99%, for the Common Man, that he toil unobtrusively underneath the feet of the 1% Colossuses and have the courtesy to die quickly and quietly.

Peter Roskam called me the other day about the job-killing EPA

While relaxing at home one evening, my antiquated landline rang. Why whomever could it be calling me on this line? I wondered. It was Republican Illinois House member Peter Roskam conducting a Telephone Town Hall Meeting

Roskam does these phone call "town halls" where the listener can listen to Roskam speak to people or, if they are so inclined, press the pound key to be transferred to a staffer to screen a question for Representative Roskam. I did so and told the nameless staffer I'd like to ask Representative Roskam a question about his yes vote for HR 2018, A Republican House bill in which 223 of 236 (94.5%) of Republicans voted to eliminate the Clean Water Act of 1972.

Representative Roskam took my question. I told him in light of the egregious and on-going dumping problem by the BP plant at Whiting Indiana how did he feel it was a responsible position to vote to eliminate the Federal Government's power to regulate and stop Corporations from polluting and put that power in the hands of the States, when his constituents' drinking water was directly affected by another State Government's decision.

For reference, the Indiana State Government voted to allow BP to ignore the EPA and the Clean Water Act on the amount of Mercury it dumps into Lake Michigan. Mercury is toxic substance to humans that once it enters the human body can not be gotten rid of and leads to heavy metal poisioning*. The reason we Chicagoans can not eat Lake Michigan fish? Too much Mercury. The BP Whiting Indiana plant also dumps a dozen toxic byproducts of oil refining, including benzene, toluene and suspended solids containing mercury, lead, nickel and vanadium

The BP Whiting Indiana plant has a history of flouting EPA regulations and dumping huge amounts of toxic pollutants into our air and drinking water. And while in 2007 the Indiana Government was paid off to state BP would self-regulate and was working within Federal guidelines, the truth is BP was blatantly polluting the Lake.

In 2009, BP acknowledged that for the last six years its Whiting refinery violated federal pollution limits on benzene, a highly toxic chemical linked to leukemia and other health problems.

BP reported that it had processed too much benzene at the refinery's sewage treatment plant, about 15 miles southeast of Chicago.

Last year alone (2008), the company processed more than 95 tons of benzene waste -- about 16 times the amount allowed. BP also violated the 6-ton limit from 2003 to 2007.

Whiting Refinery was cited who violations of U.S. and Indiana EPA regulations in October 2008,

Federal regulators say BP PLC violated the Clean Air Act by beginning to make modifications at its Indiana oil refinery along Lake Michigan to process Canadian crude without the proper permit.

So, faced with the fact that his vote would allow a Corporation based in one state, in this case Indiana, to flout laws and regulations and directly harm the citizens of other states, Illinois, Wisconsin and Michigan all draw water from Lake Michigan, how could he justify it?

Well, here's how all Republicans justify their actions, by anecdotal analogy. Peter Roskam related to me a story about how some nice small business in Oakbrook Terrace, Illinois was hampered in their mechanical engineering designs by the over regulation of the EPA, which demanded they produce an engine type which they could not possibly produce thus causing the small business to fail. If there is one thing the Republicans do well it's stay on message.

The Republicans have been proclaiming the EPA kills jobs, and obviously Roskam's folksy aw shucks small business anecdote was unassailable and proved the Republican message. Plus this being a telephone conference, I was not allowed to ask a follow-up about his vote about the Clean Water bill, but that is to be expected.

Now, Representative Roskam seems like a nice moderate conservative, but it's his type and his willingness to go along with the Michele Bachmann's of the Party and their crazy, fringe, plutocratically controlled views, in this case "The Job-Killing EPA" and vote overwhelmingly for bills which are clearly harming the American people.

* - Sir Isaac Newton most likely suffered from mercury toxicity due to his early alchemical work.

Joe Barton and the Republicans War Cry; 'Death to the America! Power to BP!'

"I think the people responsible in the oil spill--the federal government--should take full responsibility for what's happening there," John Boehner, Republican shields BP. "I apologize"- Republican Joe Barton kowtows to Tony Hayward for interrupting his Boating Enthusiasm.

Republicans can't help but show their utter hatred and desire to murder the poor and protect evil Corporations. Republicans defend and succor BP and Halliburton because those Companies kill poor people and there is nothing more lovely in the eyes of Republicans than a dead poor person.

Joe Barton, Steve King, Joe Wilson, Marsha Blackburn, Michele Bachmann and Sarah Palin, Haley Barbour and the ImPotentate of the Punk Ass Bitch Republican Party R. Limbaugh get excited and aroused by the sight of dead poor people and environmental destruction.

The Republican Party is using BP, Halliburton and others to murder Americans. They can be no other rational reason the Republican Party has allowed BP to violate with gross impunity all US Environmental Laws for years. And especially under the Disastrous Regime of Dick & W.

Dick Cheney is poised to become the 3rd most dangerous cause of death in America. He's killed more Americans than anything but Cancer and Auto Accidents. I'd say employ Dick Cheney in the War on Terror but we all know he'd never move his quivering pasty chicken hawk ponderous bulk anywhere near a War Zone, he's a Republican after all so he's a Cowardly Murderer.

The Latest BP Gross Violations have superseded their previous reckless violations, in which BP murdered their workers by actively undercutting safety and purposefully violating EPA laws and regulations. BP's reckless behavior stems from the free hand and shielding they have received from The Republican Party and the Bush Cheney Regime.

And now Republicans, Joe Barton, Michele Bachmann, Steve King, John Boehner, Newt Gingrich and the rest of the Republican Punk Ass Bitches can't fall over themselves fast enough to defend BP and Murder Americans.

Update June 21:
Republicans and Conservatives hate America so much that they will impeach The American President for holding a Foreign Company (BP) accountable for the reckless Gulf of Mexico Oil Spill. [Is Obama's BP Shakedown an Impeachable Offense? - American Thinker]

The Fascists at Faux News have called the Gulf Oil Spill 'Obama's Iranian Hostage Crisis'. I could go along with that because once again the Republicans are allied and negotiating with a Foreign Power to the detriment of the American people.

Man Made Disasters and Climate Change

The dramatic photos of the Man Made destruction of the Aral Sea and the reckless Corporate Negligence directly causing the never ending oil leak in the Gulf of Mexico should definitively end the debate about Climate Change. I write should knowing that the it won't because the Soulless Republican Party in defense of their Plutocratic Corporate Masters will fight to defend the Rights of BP, Haliburton and TransOcean to make billions even while the Seas die and Battered Republican Voters will accept whatever narrative Dick Armeys' Freedom Works, Fascist Fox News and the Texas School Boards tell them.

BP has a long history of ignoring and out right flaunting of regulations. In the Chicago land Area, BP's Whiting Refinery used the Bush Regime's lack of vigor or outright blind eye to dump massive amounts of benzene, mercury and other toxic and cancer causing chemicals into Lake Michigan.

Now after BP undertook a drilling operation, in which they had no remedies to fight or even prevent an accident if something went wrong, we learn multiple warning signs and problems began to occur a full 24 hours before the deadly explosion and never ending oil leak.

But, Sarah Palin and Sean Hannity have been dutifully repeating Non American Rupert Murdoch's fascist lies that Obama is somehow to blame. But, that's to be expected Hannity and Palin will do anything for money. Of course, Republicans love the Gulf Catastrophe because Republicans love BP and BP loves to kill their workers. Therefore, Republicans love to kill American Workers.

Related:
Disaffected and it Feels So Good: Global Warming is Baloney!