Nationalize ALL BP stations, property and refineries until they clean up the mess

[DainBramaged]

enough of this bullshit telling us what to do. Assholes.

[RandomThoughts]

1. How would nationalizing help

If corporations or money systems can set governmental policy?

Why would that make a difference?

I think getting the tentacles out of many areas needs to be done also.

[Tansy_Gold]

2. If you nationalize them, they have no assets and no resources

to do anything with.

If you (we) nationalize the company, its assets become ours and so do its responsibilities.




TG

[DainBramaged]

4. (sigh) ok let them tell us what to do I don't give a shit then.....

:argh:

[aquart]

6. "Its assets become ours." WHAT A GOOD IDEA.

Entertaining how you believe that's a bad thing.

[DainBramaged]

7. I wonder what kind of gas it uses?????

[Tansy_Gold]

10. I didn't say it's a bad thing. I merely stated a fact without expressing

any opinion about it at all.

YOU said it was a good idea. *I* said nothing.



TG

[Catshrink]

3. They're Brits.

[DainBramaged]

5. Do they have property here?

I guess the BP defenders are alive and well on DU.

[Catshrink]

11. No, I don't defend BP

Just wondering if the US could nationalize a foreign corporation.

[kestrel91316]

21. Any assets on US soil or within out coastal waters could be nationalized.

It has happened to US and European national assets in third world countries in the past, right?

[Tansy_Gold]

8. That really doesn't matter, since regimes routinely nationalize companies and

industries that are "owned" by someone else but on their territory.

But it's not just a matter of saying the magic words -- there has to be a political mechanism already in place and prepared to go in and take over. For example, when a bank fails and it's taken over by another bank, the acquiring bank's executives take over.

The US government doesn't have a Department of Oil Company Take-overs (mildly facetious) and the US government doesn't routinely nationalize either companies or industries.

I realize that this is a catastrophe beyond anyone's experience to cope with. This is beyond Exxon Valdez because that at least was a finite amount of crude and contained to a relatively limited geographic area. BP/DH is catastrophic and ongoing, with no end in sight. So people are desperate and afraid and looking for solutions and answers. And while I deplore what appears to be a studied inaction by the Obama administration, I don't believe action for action's sake is the best, ahem, course of action either.

Should BP and its administration be removed from control of the situation? I certainly think so, but I think there also needs to be someone competent who is ready and available to step in and take charge the instant BP is out of the picture. I personally don't know who or what that would be. I also suspect that should the Obama administration currently have or be working on plans to wrest control of the situation from BP, they would have to be assembling those plans without BP being essentially tipped off before the new "operator" is ready to take over, lest BP simply walk away and say, "You want it? It's yours, baby. Hasta la vista."



Tansy Gold

[Cleita]

14. We do have a Department of the Interior and I believe this would

fall under their provenance. They would need to hire the contractors who are best suited to fix this. Then afterwards we can worry about who will actually operate those rigs.

[Tansy_Gold]

17. That's a possibility. Department of Energy too.

Thinking and discussing -- instead of reacting and exploding into hysteria -- has a tendency to find workable solutions and discard non-workable ones. Ne c'est pas?



TG

[Cleita]

A coalition of both departments could be workable. It probably would

be contentious at first, but in the end compromises would be reached and perhaps a workable solution that benefits the majority, not the minority business interests.

[Tansy_Gold]

20. Well, there are always overlapping issues, responsibilities, etc.

Dept of Defense and State Dept, for the obvious examples. Commerce and Labor. Transportation and Energy. And so on. The bureaucracy handled the formation of Dept of Homeland Security, so I'm sure the bureaucracy could handle the fusion of Energy, Interior, Commerce, etc., that would be needed for a hypothetical nationalization of BP and/or the entire oil industry.

TECHNICALLY, it already is sort of nationalized, in that the leases are -- AFAIK -- handled as national (sic) assets, with revenue coming to the Treasury. Operation of the drilling rigs and wells, obviously, is handled by private companies, including "foreign" ones.


TG

[WeDidIt]

9. Absurd notion n/t

[Cleita]

12. I think we should nationalize all the oil.

It's a resource that belongs to the people not private companies and stockholders. We can sell it on the open market and use any profits to pay down our national debt and fund social programs. Even the repressive monarchy of Saudi Arabia does that. They use part of their profits to fund health care and other programs for the people.

[kestrel91316]

22. B.I.N.G.O.........yeah, just call me a commie pinko. The older I get, the lefter I lean.

[jmowreader]

13. Property and refineries maybe, stations no

Almost all gas stations are independent dealers who have contracts to buy only BP fuels for sale. Nationalizing all those guys wouldn't hurt BP in the least.

And the problem with nationalizing BP would be, if we did they'd just say "it's your oil spill now so fuck you."

I WOULD, however, support bringing a floating brig down to the Gulf Coast and imprisoning BP's executives on it until the spill was remediated.

[Cleita]

15. I agree about the stations.

They are at the retail end and should be in private hands. It's the actual extraction of the resource that should be nationalized. Even the refineries could be privately owned, but there would be a stick to hold over them if they don't comply with rules and regulations that they won't get any crude until they do.

[Aviation Pro]

16. We have a Department of Defense....

...and we should declare BP a terrorist organization and unleash hell on them.

[roamer65]

18. Nationalize the whole oil industry permanently.

Other countries have done so and they're just fine.

PEMEX- Mexico
PDVSA - Venezuela
Saudi ARAMCO - Saudi Arabia
Statoil - Norway
PETROBRAS - Brazil

What other national oil companies am I missing? Help me out folks!

[Kingofalldems]

19. K and R for the teabaggers and freepers to see

[proud2BlibKansan]

23. Kick