Is Hatred Towards the British Justified for the Gulf Oil Spill?

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In summary, there has been a lot of news coverage about the perception in Britain that Americans are blaming the British for the oil spill. However, this is not the general attitude of the American public, as most see BP as the responsible party. The media has also been sensationalizing the issue and trying to make it a "British vs. American" problem. Some individuals have expressed animosity towards the British, but this is not a widespread sentiment. The British media has also been criticized for defending BP and bashing Obama's criticism, while some Americans believe Obama has been too soft on BP. However, it is important to note that BP is a global company and provides fuel to the US. Overall, while there may be some tensions between the
  • #36
I mentioned this in the Gulf spill thread a few days ago, I was getting concerned that it seemed that the US media seemed to be emphasizing the 'British' aspect of BP even though it's pretty much 50% American run. I initially edited it out as I though it would cause flames.

I do believe that there is the right way to apply pressure and the wrong way. With economies being as sensitive as they are right now, publicly bashing a company that is such a large part of the economy to the extent the Obama had had not helped matters. I can understand why he did, as politically he needs to appear tough on the situation. So it's not really a case from the UK of siding with BP, it's a case of the words that are coming out of the Presidents mouth are now starting to affect our economy more than it otherwise would do.

I just think it's not been handled tactfully by either sides. It was a HUGE mistake on BP's part sending Hayward to deal with this, it just emphasised the 'foreigness'.
 
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  • #37
Ivan Seeking said:
Haha, okay, I didn't even know that the name was completely dropped. Given that it was known as British Petroleum for over forty years - most of our lives - I hardly see any malice
It works both ways, "BAe Systems" becomes British Aerospace whenever it is lobbying for UK government special treatment even though it is majority US owned and 60% of it's workers are in the US
 
  • #38
To my knowledge, the only issue that came up was Tony Hayward ordering the press around. He may not know it, but he has no power to do that on public beaches. It was not only insulting to Americans that a CEO of any company would try to order the press around, but for someone who isn't a US citizen to do it was even worse. But this wasn't about BP being British, this was about Tony Hayward not knowing his place. That was a real no-no. It was a fundamental insult to our notion of a free press.

Journalists are still complaining that BP is blocking their access to information that is supposed to be public, but that would likely be true in any case. There is nothing uniquely British about that problem. It just sounds worse when the company isn't generally considered to be US owned. And some journalist may try to hype this in order to put as much pressure on BP as they can. It would be unfortunate if this tactic was exploited to any significant degree.
 
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  • #39
Imo, BP made a pr mistake by putting Hayward in front of the cameras. They should have put an American face on this, right from the start - presumably the top BP person in the US. That would have helped to prevent cultural and political faux pas that the press likes to spotlight. I think Hayward has done a terrible job of message control. And he keeps insulting people.
 
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  • #40
It is obivious that British government does not want BP to fail and go bankcrupt. I believe They are supporting BP financially in cleaning this mess.

"The government must put down a marker with the US administration that the survival and long-term prosperity of BP is a vital British interest," the former British ambassador to the US, Sir Christopher Meyer, has told the BBC.
..

BP paid £930m in UK tax on its profits in 2009, which was well down on the £1.7bn it had paid in each of the previous three years.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/10282777.stm


http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/10282448.stm
 
  • #41
chemisttree said:
It's headquartered in Switzerland for tax purposes but it is based out of Houston, TX.

Do you have a source?

All I found was this.

"Transocean employs over 25,000 people worldwide, and has a fleet of 139 offshore drilling units and three ultra-deepwater units under construction as of April 2010. The company is based in Vernier, Switzerland, near Geneva, and it has offices in 20 countries, including major offices in Switzerland, United States, Norway, Scotland, Brazil, Indonesia and Malaysia."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transocean
 
  • #43
Evo said:
My best friend lives in England and he's not aware of any "high level of Anti-Americanism among the British people".

I live in England and I'm perfectly aware of it. It's not that we hate individual Americans, of course, it's just that we don't like your capitalist running-dog ways.

Of course, saying things like this about us doesn't help matters much either:

[PLAIN]http://img99.imageshack.us/img99/922/drudgem.png

Finally, an English spill that America appreciates.
 
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  • #44
At least when we have a 'world' championship in a sport we allow other countries to play.:-p
 
  • #45
^^heh, that's funny. especially considering that 99% of americans could care less about soccer.
 
  • #46
I think we should reinstate "Britisher" as the noun for British people. Much better than Briton (and no one can remember Briton anyway seeing as people always write "Brit" or find a way around it).
 
  • #47
Ivan Seeking said:
When the Brits figure out that Hoover isn't the only company that makes vacuum cleaners, we can talk. :biggrin:

That will be probably abut the time we will (in Poland) finally learn that calling vacuum cleaner elektroluks doesn't make sense, neska (as in nescafe) is not a synonym of a soluble coffee and - the most difficult one - that bicycle is not rower (no v in Polish).
 
  • #48
All this British love is making me weep. I need Kleenix. That would be Kleeniv is Polish and tampon in British, I think.
 
  • #49
Proton Soup said:
^^heh, that's funny. especially considering that 99% of americans could care less about soccer.

It's "couldn't care less", that's what I hate about Americans.
 
  • #50
madness said:
It's "couldn't care less", that's what I hate about Americans.

:smile:...a perfect example of what we love in Brits, ahahahah...
 
  • #51
lisab said:
:smile:...a perfect example of what we love in Brits, ahahahah...

Hey, I really like some Americanisms (like "go figure" or "do the math", especially because I can really wind my brother up by speaking those words in an American accent :smile:) but I've also got to take issue with that expression.

The whole point of language is to convey meaning and "I could care less" epically fails at this!
 
  • #52
Ivan Seeking said:
Nonsense, and nonsense. In fact the latter statement qualifies as crackpottery. Obama has only been in office for 17 months. In the mean time, we had the financial crisis, two wars, and the health care debate.

Consider: http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/17390/111965?RS_show_page=0
 
  • #53
madness said:
It's "couldn't care less", that's what I hate about Americans.

it's a perfectly good idiom, and I've decided to keep it
 
  • #54
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  • #55
LONDON – President Barack Obama reassured Prime Minister David Cameron on Saturday that his frustration over the mammoth oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico is not an attack on Britain as the two leaders tried to soothe trans-Atlantic tensions over the disaster.

Cameron's Downing St. office said the two leaders held a "warm and constructive" telephone conversation for more than 30 minutes...
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100612/ap_on_bi_ge/us_oil_spill_us_britain
 
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  • #56
jreelawg said:
Do you have a source?

All I found was this.

"Transocean employs over 25,000 people worldwide, and has a fleet of 139 offshore drilling units and three ultra-deepwater units under construction as of April 2010. The company is based in Vernier, Switzerland, near Geneva, and it has offices in 20 countries, including major offices in Switzerland, United States, Norway, Scotland, Brazil, Indonesia and Malaysia."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transocean

From the source you provided…

The company started out as Southern Natural Gas Company which acquired DeLong Engineering and formed The Offshore Company from that acquisition. That company became a wholly owned subsidiary of Southern Natural Gas Company and changed its name to Sonat Offshore Drilling. Sonat acquired a Norwegian company named Transocean ASA. The new acquisition was renamed Transocean Offshore. This company later merged with Schlumberger’s Sedco Forex and the new company was named Transocean Sedco Forex. This new company was headquartered in Houston, TX. (circa 2000) During this time frame, the company changed its ‘headquarters’ to the Cayman Islands to avoid taxes. This new company acquired R&B Falcon in 2000 and Deepwater Horizon along with it. In 2003 the name was simplified to Transocean. Merged with GlobalSantaFe Corporation in 2003 (also a Houston-based company). For tax purposes the new company moved its ‘headquarters’ to Switzerland and lowered its tax rate from the mid thirties to the mid teens! 12 people work for the company in Switzerland.

Hardly a REAL headquarters don’t you think?
 
  • #57
Ivan Seeking said:
[...]
The name of the company is British Petroleum.
The company name is BP, period. The company name is not 'British Petroleum', as was referenced earlier in this thread.
 
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  • #58
mheslep said:
The company name is BP, period. The company is name is not 'British Petroleum', as was referenced earlier in this thread.

And I acknowledged this as well. I knew that the name was not generally being used for advertising purposes, so at first I didn't get the point. I thought it was still technically British Petroleum.

Note also that in today's email from Obama, he uses the BP name.

The BP oil spill in the Gulf Coast is the worst environmental disaster of its kind in our nation's history. I am returning to the region today to review our efforts and meet with families and business owners affected by the catastrophe.

We are working to hold BP accountable for the damage to the lands and the livelihoods of the Gulf Coast, and we are taking strong precautions to make certain a spill like this never happens again...
 
  • #59
vertices said:
So "Obama tells Cameron [the UK prime minister] that frustrations with BP have nothing to do with national identity".
[...]
You're the one who allowed BP to lobby your government to recklessly erode safety standards...
There is a fairly good argument to be made for that last statement based on the actions of the US Interior Department (MMS) under Obama:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/05/04/AR2010050404118.html"
WaPo said:
The Interior Department exempted BP's calamitous Gulf of Mexico drilling operation from a detailed environmental impact analysis last year [April 2009], according to government documents, after three reviews of the area concluded that a massive oil spill was unlikely. [...]
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/05/04/AR2010050404118.html
 
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  • #60
Yep, Obama has already admitted that he screwed up. BP claimed to have the means to handle an accident like this, and he didn't demand proof. He didn't believe the environmental impact study was needed.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/28/us/28obama.html

But this doesn't speak to deregulating for issues of safety. Who waived the requirement for the accoustically actuated valve intended to prevent a disaster like this?

And now, those whose entire platform is based on the premise that less government is better, are asking, where's the government?? Why didn't THEY prevent this? Why don't THEY do something? Where is our consoler and chief?

Where are the tea drinkers now?
 
  • #61
In a speech last week on the disaster unfolding in the Gulf, President Obama told the nation that for decades, there existed a “scandalously close relationship between oil companies and the agency that regulates them,” and that he took responsibility for a culture that had “not fully changed” [1] under his administration...

As we’ve noted, the ethical lapses within MMS run the gamut: accepting gifts from “good friends” in the industry [6], applying for industry jobs [7] while at MMS posts, keeping data on offshore drilling away from environmental assessors [8], failing to collect royalties from industry [9], using agency equipment for storing and sharing pornography [6], sleeping with oil and gas representatives [8], and even working while under the influence of illegal drugs [10]...

The Obama administration has also pledged to investigate MMS’ liberal use of so-called categorical exclusions [13] to federal environmental law, a practice that has gone on for decades...
http://www.propublica.org/ion/blog/item/under-cheneys-influence-wyomings-oil-ties-flooded-mms
http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/remarks-president-gulf-oil-spill
 
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  • #62
Having spent a decade or so in the Americana-Militaria industry, brokering, buying and selling weapons, uniform parts, etc related to the French and Indian Wars, and the Revolutionary War, etc, I don't hate the Brits (got some personal heritage through a Hessian officer) but I certainly appreciate the differences in the way that the British and the French treated the colonists and the native Americans.
 
  • #63
Ivan Seeking said:
Why didn't THEY prevent this?
If more of the numerous shallow water oil reserves had been opened as pushed for years ago they might well have.
 
  • #65
  • #66
Phrak said:
How is this wrong? He's a CEO, which means a BS artist. He can't stop oil leaks. It's not one of the required job skills for his occupation of choice.

There isn't anything wrong with taking a day off (as you say he's pretty much useless in stopping this), it is however a PR mistake to do it so publicly.
 
  • #67
xxChrisxx said:
There isn't anything wrong with taking a day off (as you say he's pretty much useless in stopping this), it is however a PR mistake to do it so publicly.

Indeed. It fits, though, with the tone-deaf way BP has handled this disaster.
 
  • #68
  • #69
Byllie said:
I think the Americans are trying to stoke up some brotherly rivalry between the USA and the UK.

Look here for a rather a comical yet horribily innacurate headline that makes reference to the battle for 'bunker hill'

http://www.whoateallthepies.tv/world_cup/31556/new-york-post-hails-usa-1-1-win.html

It's akin to us Brits mentioning D-Day after thrashing the Germans in the round ball game!

To be honest, anything more than an a defeat was a victory for the USA in that game. When you go into a game expecting to come away with 0 points, and you come away with 1 you are a winner. England were expected to utterly thrash the group, it's a shame they are playing like a sunday league team.
 
  • #70
How can you hate a society that has lost a world-spanning empire, and has been reduced to a lapdog for a former colony? I feel pity, in a general sense, but that's a historical notion and not personalized to this generation or any other. The British people, are just people like any other.
 

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