photo by BP America (Flickr Creative Commons)
As estimates of the oil spilling from the busted well in the Gulf of Mexico shot up like a post-Perestroika stock market on an almost daily basis, so plummeted the credibility of BP and the US government’s estimates regarding the volume of leaking oil. Accuracy apparently is not their strong suit.
Won’t get fooled again.
Or will we? What choice do we have without our own personal oil spill experts replete with super submarines? Even James Cameron wasn’t allowed to look – and he made Avatar, Aliens and Terminator. Surely that’s gotta open some doors?
None of this means the government or BP is outright lying. I’m sure they have different methods of measuring, which provide information for different estimates. But those estimates have not been very reliable and the latest claims that 75% of the oil has been cleaned up, degraded, dispersed, etc., have been proclaimed as if everything is A-OK now. Naturally, scientists and environmental groups have criticized this glossing over of the facts.
Of course, the details of the real report don’t say that everything is fine or certain, even if Whitehouse sound bites suggest it is.
Check out this segment from the Rachel Maddow Show on the credibility of government info regarding the oil spill and the latest bit of positive spin.
Rachel Maddow: Oil claims strain credulity
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