The importance of maintenance

Posted on August 7, 2006 by Gene

Perhaps I am oversimplifying the situation — but since the Bush administration is constantly guilty of the same thing in order to push home their agenda, I’ll go with it.
So. BP is closing down the Prudhoe Bay oil field because their pipeline is so horribly corroded that 16 miles must be replaced. In the meantime, the Federal government has offered to open up the Strategic Oil Reserve to replace the lost production.
Here’s the thing. BP made $7.3 billion in profit last quarter — in other words, after expenses like, say, maintenance. They haven’t been cleaning the pipeline because they didn’t think it was necessary, and only checked it after the feds forced them to after a 270,000 gallon oil spill.
Does greed have no end? $7,300,000,000 in profits last quarter, and they couldn’t be bothered to keep their equipment maintained. And now the government wants to release oil from the reserve, paid for by our taxes, so that BP can sell it back to us at $3.50 per gallon?