Oil Comes Up

Thad Allen admitted the government purposefully transferred toxicity to the water column in his August 9 conference call. McClatchy reported:

Thad Allen: The reason dispersants were used; they were not in a position where we could actually effectuate in situ burning or skimming. And of all the means out there, sometimes use of dispersants was the only means available to us, and dispersants are less toxic than the oil themselves, and EPA, after having completed testing on actually mixing dispersants with the Macondo well crude oil, have no increased levels of toxicity or no areas for concern, so I don't think it's an issue of harm.

It's an issue of what's the most effective way to deal with oil in the water so it doesn't ultimately end up on the beaches or in the marshes.

It is an issue of harm, given oil-dispersant mixture is as toxic as oil itself. Dispersant combines with oil and ends up in the water column. The government decision could explain the secrecy over disposal of dead sea creatures.

In the White House meeting BP successfully argued Obama decided the oil drilling moratorium, thus it wasn't financially responsible for paying unemployed oil workers. Did Obama make the dispersant call, relieving BP of responsibility for an accurate death count? If so, Jamie Gorelick is good, very good.

The owner of Dean Blanchard's Seafood in Grand Isle, Louisiana spoke to James Fox. He said:

Every time we go in the boat, if we hit the bottom with your prop, the oil comes up. If you throw your anchor, when you pick it up, you got oil on the anchor, oil on the chain. We know it's on the bottom.

All of our seafood is a bottom feeder. And the plankton and the nutrients that feed our seafood, the small fish, the shrimp and the crabs, is on the bottom. If they go to eat and there's big clumps of oil on top of the food, I think you gonna have, if the food dies, the plankton and all dies, we don't know what the effects going to be. BP's not cleaning up the oil. Their job is to clean up the oil. It looks like the Coast Guard is helping them by trying to cover it up, too.

They don't want to pick up the oil, because it's more effective to sink it.

We know they're illegally spraying inside the three mile line. They're doing it at night.

Out of sight, out of mind. That goes for animal carcasses, EPA toxicity tests and the oil itself. America gets platitudes, "red tide" red herrings and the message to move on.

Update: Dean Blanchard is quoted in an AFP article as saying:

"It sucks. They're not paying. They're basically doing what an insurance company does, send you the first adjuster who says we should pay you, then they fire that adjuster and hire another one until they find an adjuster who thinks they shouldn't pay you."

"They need to give us two or three shrimp seasons to see whether they all die off," he said. "If that oil sinks to the bottom of the ocean like they're planning, then what are next year's baby shrimp going to eat? They need to give us more time to decide what to do."