Thanks, Jim, for calling a spade a spade, and painting a realistic picture of BP and Tony Hayward. Gosh let's put a lid on this mishap so Tony can have his life back. He's got a lot going on, and it would be a real shame to slow him down just when he and Ken Salazar are hitting their stride to provide Americans with all the injectable black gold they can handle.

These horrors will stop when the Corp execs get JAIL terms.
There is only one reason for corporate success or corporate failure---management.

And the banksters bailed out by taxpayers walk free, not to mention the torturers and war criminals. How convenient?

What about Goldman Sachs, you dummies! You can't see the wood for the trees!

Imagine the reaction to this catastrophe if it was caused by Goldman Sachs, Halliburton or other US corporate criminals?

I guess nothing and the dummies would enlist to invade Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq and Iran.

'Truthout' is a misnomer. You people that post on here can't handle 'the truth', otherwise you would rise up and do something about it instead of trying to shift the blame onto somebody else that your criminal corporate puppeteers want you to blame.

I feel sad for you all, how easily you have been deceived.

Mike(UK), I think you misjudge us Yanks who frequent the truthout.org news service. Many of us have "risen up to do something" about the incredible pillage and rapine wrought by various corporate "persons" in our midst. Many of us are politically active, go to protest demonstrations (which often are not covered by our corporatist media), are in frequent -- and sometimes more than a little contentious -- contact with Federal and State legislators and members of executive departments, and, to the extent we are able, make financial contributions to political candidates and causes. I'm not clear as to just what it is you think we should be doing, nor am I clear as to just how you perceive any of us are "shifting blame." And yes, many of us are aware of the connections between Wall Street thieves/thugs and the various other corporate Mafiosi in our midst.

But I'd point out that you Brits don't exactly have clean hands, either. Cleaning up the messes left by your Empire's retreat/collapse is among the most difficult and/or nasty tasks left to the rest of the world by your government.

you have heavy industry being run by finance flunkies

put the engineers back in charge

Mr. Hightower's normal humor is not very evident in this piece, I think it is because he and we are all so disgusted by this subject. We are all beyond words, we are all beyond insults to the participating ROUGES of "Drill Baby Drill" people and the Cheneynistas who allowed this to happen.
Mike (UK) is right on many levels, I just want him to know that we are not all deaf, dumb and blind and stupid it is just that we are so tired of fighting the forces of evil for so long, since Nixon at least, that we just seem feable.
Do help us if you can Mike (UK.), start by holding YOUR corporations accountable.

Time to revoke - disincorporate - BP's corporate charter in the United States.

Firstly we can start by not playing the blame shifting game and decide what we the people can do about this mess we all find ourselves in, it is no longer someone else's fault or problem.

My thoughts are that these political and corporate criminals are untouchable (too big to fall) by the people who will ultimately become their serfs and slaves big time, many even regarded as no longer economically viable, like you've never seen before.

So how are we going to prepare for this day that I think will come? Certainly by not blaming each other for the sins of our masters! We the people need to get our act together as a united front both in the US and UK.

I am not advocating terrorism, political action or civil disobedience to authority that WE'VE put in place having been deceived. We are ALL guilty to a greater or lesser degree, for allowing these criminals to act on our behalf. Our insatiable greed for riches and an unsustainable life style for instance.

Now 'the bread and circuses' is over, there is no 'free lunch' and the people will soon wake up to that fact and I despair. 'They have you now' and as civil unrest becomes manifest most people will have no way out but to capitulate or starve.

There is a lot of talk about FEMA camps having been set up for this day, how true this is I do not know, but we the people have to be prepared and ready for that eventuality. I am.

the whole oil industry are corporate criminals, following the Supreme Court ruling that they are individuals,when the people of the southern states will take judicial action against BP to begin with?