June 13, 2010 - Pensito

I jumped awake in the early morning darkness this morning from a nightmare. In the dream, I was standing on the seawall watching a pod of dolphins surface for air, hearing them expel, then suck in new oxygen through the blowholes near the tops of their heads. Except suddenly the dolphins weren’t here on the east coast of Florida in my warm blue water, they were in the Gulf of Mexico. And when they surfaced to breathe, they were coated in thick brown oil, which they sucked deep into their lungs. Then they began to spasm and die…

One can only guess that the reason BP doesn’t want people to know the extent of the disaster is because they hope to be allowed to continue drilling for oil in the Gulf of Mexico

The oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico already showed that BP has a basic disconnect between words and actions. The whole “Beyond Petroleum” campaign was just that: a media campaign, a tagline, an empty slogan. BP and the other oil companies have done almost nothing to move beyond petroleum, nor has there been any real pressure — by consumers, shareholders, or legislators — for them to do so.

But the company’s crisis communications is shaping into an even bigger sham. BP has done all the right things, according to the new media ethic. They have profiles on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and Flickr. The message is the same at each of these sites: “BP cares, and no one is working harder than BP to make this thing right. Check out for yourself how hard we’re working.”

[…]

Day: June 13, 2010

Spinning the Spill: BP Just Can’t Tell the Truth

Poetic Justice

Verbatim

“One woman at a rally in New Jersey told me last week that she was ‘nauseously optimistic.’ That may capture a lot of people’s last-minute jitters.”

— Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-MD), quoted by Axios, on what Democrats feel ahead of the midterm elections.

“I think Congress made a mistake not protesting turning the Rose Garden into what looks like the entrance to Liberace’s bathroom.”

— Former President Bill Clinton, quoted by The Wrap.

“Boy, they are scraping the bottom of the barrel. It feels like a real desperation play to me, because it has got zero basis in the law.”

— Republican election law expert Ben Ginsberg, quoted by Politico, on the Trump administration’s effort to invalidate Alaska’s election results.

Numerati

3,824

$1.4 billion

-35 points

31%

63% to 38%

KFF Poll: “With the 2026 midterm campaigns in full swing and early voting about to begin, there is a wide enthusiasm gap between partisan voters, with Democratic voters 25 percentage points more likely than Republican voters to say they are ‘more motivated’ than usual to vote (63% vs. 38%).”