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What Not to Say When Your Company Is Ruining the World

BP CEO Tony Hayward has made gaffe after gaffe defending his company's response to the gulf oil spill. Here are some of his many unfortunate remarks.

 

Joe Raedle / Getty Images

On May 28, Hayward points to the site of the gulf oil spill.

There is a long and awkward history of corporate leaders saying the wrong thing when their companies are facing criticism. Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein responded to his company's role in contributing to the recent financial crisis by suggesting he was doing "God's work." But BP CEO Tony Hayward, whose company just hired a former spokeswoman for Vice President Dick Cheney to help handle the media, has outdone even Blankfein in his unfortunate comments since the company's Deepwater Horizon oil rig blew up on April 20. The blast killed 11 people and sent thick, rust-colored oil billowing into the Gulf of Mexico, destroying natural habitats and devastating the coastal economy.

BP initially estimated that between 1,000 and 5,000 barrels of oil were gushing into the gulf each day. The current consensus pegs the figure at between 12,000 and 19,000 barrels. At 44 days in, it is already the biggest spill in U.S. history, and with no signs of a quick solution to halt the flow of crude, it's dwarfing the 1989 Exxon Valdez disaster in Alaska.

Among Hayward's bizarre statements since the accident:

On April 29, The New York Times reported that Hayward, apparently exasperated, turned to fellow executives in his London office and asked, “What the hell did we do to deserve this?" (A possible answer might be the company's 760 safety violations over the last three years. ExxonMobil, in contrast, has had just one.)

On May 14, Hayward attempted to persuade The Guardian that "the Gulf of Mexico is a very big ocean. The amount of volume of oil and dispersant we are putting into it is tiny in relation to the total water volume."

Only a few days later, he told Sky News that "the environmental impact of this disaster is likely to be very, very modest." That might surprise the many scientists who see the spill as a true environmental calamity, the full extent of which remains unclear.

On May 30, Hayward was less bullish and decided to play the sympathy card. He told the Today show that "there’s no one who wants this over more than I do. I would like my life back." (He has since apologized for those remarks.)

On May 31, he told the world that ecosystem-threatening underwater oil plumes—consisting of droplets of partially dissolved oil suspended in water that many scientists have observed—do not exist. He said simply, "There aren't any plumes."

On June 1, Hayward responded to claims that cleanup workers were being sickened by the fumes from the oil they were exposed to by suggesting another possible, non-oil-spill cause. When nine workers fell ill, according to Yahoo News, he told CNN that "food poisoning is clearly a big issue."

But Hayward is not alone in his manful struggle to spin the news in the face of daunting factual evidence. His colleague Bob Dudley, managing director of BP, told NBC's Meet the Press on May 30 that "I think Tony's doing a fantastic job." To paraphrase President George W. Bush during another poorly managed Gulf Coast disaster: heckuva job, Tony.

'Painting' the Stain

'Painting' the Stain They're back. We are again being "entertained" by TV commercials attacking candidate Barack Obama and his 'liberal friends' - Chuck Schumer, Chris Dodd, Joe Biden et al. As usual these commercials never tell us what's wrong with being 'liberal', they just use the phrase in the sneering way they've been using it for 30 years - as an indictment, a slur, a poisonous label signifying anything anyone wants to think of as bad, evil - and worse- UNAMERICAN!!! The slurring began when conservatives started talking about "bleeding heart liberals" who throw money at programs to keep everybody happy…and then progressed to "pinko, Commie liberals". The words of Ronald Reagan, doing the best imitation of a President in modern times and using his "B" movie abilities as an actor to 'communicate' with the right reading of a word or sentence to make sure we get his meaning, simply said that liberals would enslave us in Socialism making government our masters and the masters of our children and our children's children. - and he was talking about Medicare at the time. The combination of these ingredients and the strange silence of the liberal community, not just the politicians but the entire community, have so hardened the slurs and made them so acceptable, that for the past generation none of the obviously liberal politicians will even acknowledge that ideology, pretending to prefer the term 'progressive' - as Hillary does so often. (What's a little bit amusing in an otherwise sad state of affairs, is that way back in the mid-2oth Century, 'progressives' had a far more liberal connotation than liberal. But in our 'highly educated' America, who would even know that today?) Democrats in general, (who remembers the handful of liberal Republicans anymore?) have run so far from the idea of liberal that they've adopted the ideology of triangulation perhaps (sadly) the real legacy of the Clintons - and so it's difficult to know what they really believe in anymore. And that fact is as true here in New York as it is across the nation. That failure to identify a belief system has kept Republicans in power for more than a decade and threatens to do so again , at least in the White House. In other sections on this website, we have defined the meaning of liberal as those who believe in the strength and value of freedom and justice for all and the existence of a level playing field of opportunity for all. And we have described those programs launched before and after the Second World War, that made America the greatest power in world history. All of them came from a liberal philosophy. Liberals brought America civil rights and women's rights (No liberals, no Barack, no Hillary - and even, no Sarah), ending legalized racial segregation and gender discrimination. Liberals brought us Social Security and unemployment insurance. Liberal brought us the GI education bill and the importance of raising teacher salaries. Liberals brought us Medicare and Medicaid. Liberals gave us Head Start and free legal services for the poor. And a national food stamp program. Liberals have fought for cleaner air and water, and for recognition of the dangers of global warming. Our food is safer, our workplaces are safer, our academics are freer to teach and most everybody can get into a college. All of this - and more - coming from a liberal philosophy and always pitted against the power of conservatives who wanted little to do with any of this and worked hard to defeat all of it. If liberals - once so proud to be recognized as such - have so enhanced the quality of our lives and the greatness of the American society, why have we allowed the ridicule and the scorn to continue to stain the meaning of liberalism and its cause? New York Times columnist, Bob Herbert, likens the strange silence to a form of self-hatred and links it to the feelings and views of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas and being Afro-American. It's an interesting link though not explained in any way. Why should liberals feel a self-hatred? Do minorities get to feel this self-hatred because they've refused to fight back at the right time and in the right way and are then torn apart and seem to have no comeback? There are those who liken the strange and seemingly quiet acceptance of those millions of Holocaust victims to this idea of self-hatred. This is especially true when one considers the fight-back ferocity of Polish Jews in the Warsaw Ghetto. They fought back against their fate with every one of their lives. Why didn't the millions of Jews being sent by train to their deaths rise up against their oppressors in the same way? It is a question that's never been successfully answered but there are those who think that this seeming passivity was due to an inherent belief in the human condition: Human beings unable to accept the existence of evil that lives within all of us and so unable to imagine that a group of politicians could genuinely plan the extinction of an entire population. In our time, genocidal efforts continue in Africa and it is still difficult to believe the number of deaths and maimings. Yet they continue and the World offers lip-service and little more. Maybe liberals could not and cannot believe the essential hate that exists in so many Americans for the very programs that have helped and still help so many of us - including those who hate them. Maybe liberals cannot believe that Americans today actually vote against their best interests because they've bought a series of lies - like the existence of WMD's or Saddam being responsible for 9/11 - and can't bring themselves to reject them as lies even when they are exposed as lies. (Can the demographic of "older white women" who supported Hillary Clinton in the primaries actually support Sarah Palin knowing of the differences between them? Or was that Democratic primary support always about something else "...even Hillary is better than a black man as President?" Maybe the essential ignorance (or stupidity) of the majority of Americans who voted to reelect a George W. Bush is even greater today. Does the Orwellian idea of the big lie - black is white, up is down, etc . or the Rovian idea that just repeating lies and distortions and the American people will buy them because they are not smart enough to know they are lies - or the Schultzian (Peanuts) idea that "We have met the enemy and he is us" - all work today better than they ever have? Certainly Americans must realize that we no longer have a Fourth Estate working to present us with facts and truth. No matter what media we visit today, that's a role long ago abandoned when the weight of a poor education finally reached managing editor-levels, never mind TV reporters with communications degrees or the paid-pundits who represent a specific view on every issue. Few of them understand the issues well enough to know how to find the truth. Maybe it's time for liberals to wake up and see that because everything eventually comes around again, Republicans and Big Business driven by the freedom of their power and the voraciousness of their greed, playing with our financial stability and security, today represent only a different form of robber baron than they represented when the founders of the Liberal Party established it in the mid-1940's. Maybe we need to understand the kind of country we're really living in today - and get to work to save it before it really is too late. And we'd better start with Education because those old cliches that public education helps to make a more informed citizenry and that those who don't know history are doomed to repeat it, are truer now than they've ever been. Martin Hassner, Executive Director Web Site Editor
Warren Buffett: Barack Obama Will Help the Economy, But Don't Expect Short-Term Miracles Posted By: Alex Crippen Topics:Barack Obama | Recession | Economy (U.S.) | Warren Buffett Companies:Berkshire Hathaway Inc. Warren Buffett and Capitol Dome Warren Buffett says "you couldn't have anybody better in charge" for the economy than Barack Obama, but warns "it's going to take time" before things get better. In an interview with Tom Brokaw for Dateline NBC, Buffett says there's a lot of fear everywhere as the country faces "an economic Pearl Harbor .. something it hasn't faced since World War II." WARREN BUFFETT'S DATELINE INTERVIEW WITH NBC'S TOM BROKAW: THE COMPLETE TRANSCRIPT Buffett predicts that Obama's plan for a massive stimulus program will help, but not right away. "We're gonna have a medicine coming in a dosage we've never seen before ... but it won't have immediate impact ... It takes time for it to hit the economy in real force. So people should not expect miracles in February or March or April. That isn't gonna happen." Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy Buffett thinks Obama will make sure the American people know that there will be some pain and sacrifices to be made. "That's exactly what he's gonna say, 'cause it's the truth. And he's smart enough to know it's the truth ... and he's the kind of person who's going to tell you the truth. So, I think he's the ideal president for it. But that's not because I think he can wave a magic wand." While Buffett doesn't rule out the possibility that unemployment will rise to double digits before the end of the year, he doesn't expect the current economic downturn to be as severe as the Great Depression of the 1930s. And he remains very optimistic about the country's ability to come through troubled times. "The truth is we've done it before and we'll do it again ... But it's not always a smooth ride." "In the end," Buffett says, "since 1776 it's never paid to bet against America." Current Berkshire stock prices: Class A: [US;BRK.A 88350.0 2100.00 (+2.43%) ] Class B: [US;BRK.B 2939.0 56.00 (+1.94%) ] Questions? Comments? Email me at buffettwatch@cnbc.com BTW Buffett is the richest man in the world on any given day
Obama freezes salaries of some White House aides By JENNIFER LOVEN, AP White House Correspondent Jennifer Loven, Ap White House Correspondent – Wed Jan 21, 2:14 pm ET Featured Topics: * Barack Obama * Presidential Transition Obama freezing some aides' salaries Play Video AP – Obama freezing some aides' salaries * President Barack Obama Slideshow: President Barack Obama * Geithner urges action Play Video Video: Geithner urges action Reuters * The Bottom Line: Day One Play Video Video: The Bottom Line: Day One ABC News President Barack Obama, accompanied by Vice President Joe Biden, speaks in the AP – President Barack Obama, accompanied by Vice President Joe Biden, speaks in the Eisenhower Executive Office … WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama's first public act in office Wednesday was to institute new limits on lobbyists in his White House and to freeze the salaries of high-paid aides, in a nod to the country's economic turmoil. Announcing the moves while attending a ceremony in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building to swear in his staff, Obama said the steps "represent a clean break from business as usual." The pay freeze, first reported by The Associated Press, would hold salaries at their current levels for the roughly 100 White House employees who make over $100,000 a year. "Families are tightening their belts, and so should Washington," said the new president, taking office amid startlingly bad economic times that many fear will grow worse. Those affected by the freeze include the high-profile jobs of White House chief of staff, national security adviser and press secretary. Other aides who work in relative anonymity also would fit into that cap if Obama follows a structure similar to the one George W. Bush set up. Obama's new lobbying rules will not only ban aides from trying to influence the administration when they leave his staff. Those already hired will be banned from working on matters they have previously lobbied on, or to approach agencies that they once targeted. The rules also ban lobbyists from giving gifts of any size to any member of his administration. It wasn't immediately clear whether the ban would include the traditional "previous relationships" clause, allowing gifts from friends or associates with which an employee comes in with strong ties. The new rules also require that anyone who leaves his administration is not allowed to try to influence former friends and colleagues for at least two years. Obama is requiring all staff to attend to an ethics briefing like one he said he attended last week. Obama called the rules tighter "than under any other administration in history." They followed pledges during his campaign to be strict about the influence of lobbyist in his White House. "The new rules on lobbying alone, no matter how tough, are not enough to fix a broken system in Washington," he said. "That's why I'm also setting rules that govern not just lobbyists but all those who have been selected to serve in my administration." In an attempt to deliver on pledges of a transparent government, Obama said he would change the way the federal government interprets the Freedom of Information Act. He said he was directing agencies that vet requests for information to err on the side of making information public — not to look for reasons to legally withhold it — an alteration to the traditional standard of evaluation. Just because a government agency has the legal power to keep information private does not mean that it should, Obama said. Reporters and public-interest groups often make use of the law to explore how and why government decisions were made; they are often stymied as agencies claim legal exemptions to the law. "For a long time now, there's been too much secrecy in this city," Obama said. He said the orders he was issuing Wednesday will not "make government as honest and transparent as it needs to be" nor go as far as he would like. "But these historic measures do mark the beginning of a new era of openness in our country," Obama said. "And I will, I hope, do something to make government trustworthy in the eyes of the American people, in the days and weeks, months and years to come."
533K Jobs Lost in November: Biggest Drop Since 1974 Posted Dec 05, 2008 09:20am EST by Joe Weisenthal in Recession Related: ^dji, ^gspc, spy, dia, QQQQ, TLT, PST From Clusterstock, Dec. 5, 2008 The "whispers" were for a bad number of 450k to 500k job losses, but it was even worse: 533k lost jobs in november. Meanwhile the unemployment rate jumped to 6.7%. It appears this news was worse than the market had expected, as futures instantly sold off. And by the way, remember back in Octoboer, there was a little talk about how the 240,000 jobs lost was acqually a sequential improvement from the 300,000 jobs lost in December? Well, so much for that idea. October was revised to a loss of 320,000 jobs. Here's the official announcement: "Nonfarm payroll employment fell sharply (-533,000) in November, and the unemployment rate rose from 6.5 to 6.7 percent, the Bureau of Labor Statistics of the U.S. Department of Labor reported today. November's drop in payroll employment followed declines of 403,000 in September and 320,000 in October, as revised. Job losses were large and widespread across the major industry sectors in November."
AP IMPACT: US diluted loan rules before crash By MATT APUZZO – 1 day ago WASHINGTON (AP) — The Bush administration backed off proposed crackdowns on no-money-down, interest-only mortgages years before the economy collapsed, buckling to pressure from some of the same banks that have now failed. It ignored remarkably prescient warnings that foretold the financial meltdown, according to an Associated Press review of regulatory documents. "Expect fallout, expect foreclosures, expect horror stories," California mortgage lender Paris Welch wrote to U.S. regulators in January 2006, about one year before the housing implosion cost her a job. Bowing to aggressive lobbying — along with assurances from banks that the troubled mortgages were OK — regulators delayed action for nearly one year. By the time new rules were released late in 2006, the toughest of the proposed provisions were gone and the meltdown was under way. "These mortgages have been considered more safe and sound for portfolio lenders than many fixed rate mortgages," David Schneider, home loan president of Washington Mutual, told federal regulators in early 2006. Two years later, WaMu became the largest bank failure in U.S. history. The administration's blind eye to the impending crisis is emblematic of its governing philosophy, which trusted market forces and discounted the value of government intervention in the economy. Its belief ironically has ushered in the most massive government intervention since the 1930s. Many of the banks that fought to undermine the proposals by some regulators are now either out of business or accepting billions in federal aid to recover from a mortgage crisis they insisted would never come. Many executives remain in high-paying jobs, even after their assurances were proved false. In 2005, faced with ominous signs the housing market was in jeopardy, bank regulators proposed new guidelines for banks writing risky loans. Today, in the midst of the worst housing recession in a generation, the proposal reads like a list of what-ifs: _Regulators told bankers exotic mortgages were often inappropriate for buyers with bad credit. _Banks would have been required to increase efforts to verify that buyers actually had jobs and could afford houses. _Regulators proposed a cap on risky mortgages so a string of defaults wouldn't be crippling. _Banks that bundled and sold mortgages were told to be sure investors knew exactly what they were buying. _Regulators urged banks to help buyers make responsible decisions and clearly advise them that interest rates might skyrocket and huge payments might be due sooner than expected. Those proposals all were stripped from the final rules. None required congressional approval or the president's signature. "In hindsight, it was spot on," said Jeffrey Brown, a former top official at the Office of Comptroller of the Currency, one of the first agencies to raise concerns about risky lending. Federal regulators were especially concerned about mortgages known as "option ARMs," which allow borrowers to make payments so low that mortgage debt actually increases every month. But banking executives accused the government of overreacting. Bankers said such loans might be risky when approved with no money down or without ensuring buyers have jobs but such risk could be managed without government intervention. "An open market will mean that different institutions will develop different methodologies for achieving this goal," Joseph Polizzotto, counsel to now-bankrupt Lehman Brothers, told U.S. regulators in a March 2006. Countrywide Financial Corp., at the time the nation's largest mortgage lender, agreed. The proposal "appears excessive and will inhibit future innovation in the marketplace," said Mary Jane Seebach, managing director of public affairs. One of the most contested rules said that before banks purchase mortgages from brokers, they should verify the process to ensure buyers could afford their homes. Some bankers now blame much of the housing crisis on brokers who wrote fraudulent, predatory loans. But in 2006, banks said they shouldn't have to double-check the brokers. "It is not our role to be the regulator for the third-party lenders," wrote Ruthann Melbourne, chief risk officer of IndyMac Bank. California-based IndyMac also criticized regulators for not recognizing the track record of interest-only loans and option ARMs, which accounted for 70 percent of IndyMac's 2005 mortgage portfolio. This summer, the government seized IndyMac and will pay an estimated $9 billion to ensure customers don't lose their deposits. Last week, Downey Savings joined the growing list of failed banks. The problem: About 52 percent of its mortgage portfolio was tied up in risky option ARMs, which in 2006 Downey insisted were safe — maybe even safer than traditional 30-year mortgages. "To conclude that 'nontraditional' equates to higher risk does not appropriately balance risk and compensating factors of these products," said Lillian Gavin, the bank's chief credit officer. At least some regulators didn't buy it. The comptroller of the currency, John C. Dugan, was among the first to sound the alarm in mid-2005. Speaking to a consumer advocacy group, Dugan painted a troublesome picture of option-ARM lending. Many buyers, particularly those with bad credit, would soon be unable to afford their payments, he said. And if housing prices declined, homeowners wouldn't even be able to sell their way out of the mess. It sounded simple, but "people kind of looked at us regulators as old-fashioned," said Brown, the agency's former deputy comptroller. Diane Casey-Landry, of the American Bankers Association, said the industry feared a two-tiered system in which banks had to follow rules that mortgage brokers did not. She said opposition was based on the banks' best information. "You're looking at a decline in real estate values that was never contemplated," she said. Some saw problems coming. Community groups and even some in the mortgage business, like Welch, warned regulators not to ease their rules. "We expect to see a huge increase in defaults, delinquencies and foreclosures as a result of the over selling of these products," Kevin Stein, associate director of the California Reinvestment Coalition, wrote to regulators in 2006. The group advocates on housing and banking issues for low-income and minority residents. The government's banking agencies spent nearly a year debating the rules, which required unanimous agreement among the OCC, Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., Federal Reserve, and the Office of Thrift Supervision — agencies that sometimes don't agree. The Fed, for instance, was reluctant under Alan Greenspan to heavily regulate lending. Similarly, the Office of Thrift Supervision, an arm of the Treasury Department that regulated many in the subprime mortgage market, worried that restricting certain mortgages would hurt banks and consumers. Grovetta Gardineer, OTS managing director for corporate and international activities, said the 2005 proposal "attempted to send an alarm bell that these products are bad." After hearing from banks, she said, regulators were persuaded that the loans themselves were not problematic as long as banks managed the risk. She disputes the notion that the rules were weakened. In the past year, with Congress scrambling to stanch the bleeding in the financial industry, regulators have tightened rules on risky mortgages. Congress is considering further tightening, including some of the same proposals abandoned years ago.

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I've been contacted by President Obama's transition team for suggestions on energy and the environment. If, these issues are important to you, comment below or, let me forward you a link to fill out http://www.change.gov/page/s/energyenviro Thank you for your comments Chris

UAW leader says blame economy for Detroit 3 woes Saturday November 15, 4:45 pm ET By Mark Williams, AP Business Writer UAW president says economy to blame for automakers problems, not workers COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) -- Even as Detroit's Big Three teeter on collapse, United Auto Workers President Ron Gettelfinger said Saturday that the problem is not the union's contract with the automakers and that getting the automakers back on their feet means figuring out a way to turn around the slumping economy. ADVERTISEMENT "The focus has to be on the economy as a whole as opposed to a UAW contract," Gettelfinger told reporters on a conference call, noting the labor costs now make up 8 percent to 10 percent of the cost of a vehicle. "We have made dramatic, dramatic changes and the UAW was applauded for that," he said. Instead, Gettelfinger blamed the problems the auto industry is suffering from on things beyond its control -- the housing slump, the credit crunch that has made financing a vehicle tough and the 1.2 million jobs that have been lost in the past year. "We're here not because of what the auto industry has done," he said. "We're here because of what has happened to the economy." Gettelfinger also called on Congress to act quickly on a bailout plan for the auto industry, saying action is necessary before President-elect Barack Obama takes office in January. He said if one automaker were to file for bankruptcy, the others may follow. He said the automakers would find it difficult to restructure under bankruptcy laws and instead could end up out of business. "Would you buy a car from a bankrupt automaker?" he asked. The Center for Automotive Research, which receives funding from the auto industry, has warned that the collapse of the Big Three could set off a catastrophic chain reaction in the economy, eliminating up to 3 million jobs and more than $150 billion in tax revenue over the next three years. Gettelfinger called on Congress to act quickly to provide loans to help the automakers until the economy improves and the automakers can move ahead with their plans to become more competitive. "We cannot afford to allow to see this industry collapse. There is a real concern that could happen." General Motors Corp., Ford Motor Co. and Chrysler LLC are seeking $25 billion from the government to get them through the economic crisis and the worst sales slump in more than 25 years. GM appears to be in the worst shape, warning that it can't borrow from normal sources. The nation's largest automaker said it had $16.2 billion in cash at the end of September, raising the possibility that GM will fall below the minimum of $11 billion to $14 billion needed for day-to-day operations by the end of the year. Democrats in the lame-duck Congress are pressing for a bailout of Detroit's Big Three with money from the $700 billion Wall Street rescue package. But President George W. Bush and many Republicans have come out against the idea, arguing that the financial rescue package was not intended for such uses, and that a bailout would reward poor management and lead other industries to demand government handouts. In a statement Saturday, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said the Democratic proposal gives automakers time to develop plans to assure their long-term viability, including meeting new fuel-efficiency standards and developing new technology. "A restructured, competitive American automobile industry will continue to play a crucial role in our national economy and in the global marketplace," she said.

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