Posted on 01/05/2008 10:02:51 PM PST by bruinbirdman
Ping
As a resident of Alaska, what is your take on this?
BP talks big about how safety conscious and environmentally friendly they are. And that’s about all it is - big talk. All they care about is their bottom line. The rest is window dressing. Basically, BP execs are highly polished liars and thieves.
Their deal in Alaska is one of the sweetest they have in the whole world. When I worked for them their operations in Columbia cost them an extra $2.50/barrel just for security from the FARC. Last time I checked no one had blown up any of their Alaska pipelines (although they do a pretty good job of allowing them to leak crude all over the place).
The state of Alaska has every right to get a reasonable tax rate out of the oil companies because once the oil is gone the oil companies will be gone too. In spite of all of their big promises they will leave a mess in their wake.
I didn’t say that BP was a saint. Does anyone think that a Chinese state-owned company will be any better than BP?
I have an uncle who worked for Amoco and they had some engineers kinapped by FARC.
kinapped = kidnapped.
The article has it points, mostly off base. Oil *is* the lifeblood of Alaska. Taxes are *sorta* low - but the total of all taxes paid by the oil patch (State, local, FedGov) adds up to a tad over 71% - Hugo nationalized the oil in his little slice of Socialist heaven before he got to 71%.
Govt at all levels makes more money off of oil than the oil companies.
Are oil producing regions getting ‘greedy’ - I guess that is on how you define greedy. Jobs have been lost locally. Partly due to oil co cutbacks and to some extent due to lawsuits filed by Greenies against ALL resource extraction activity. Both parties are unpopular right now.
Sara, the Governor-ette - is no hard core Pubbie.
She has-
Raised taxes
Grown Govt
Made special deals/giveaways to her friends
Increased social / welfare giveaways and generally acted like a classic Dem.
As far s environmentally friendly - I have been to Russia to work oil spills. Massive, seen from space, oil spills. Alaska has a very good record in this and will likely to continue to enjoy the clean record. Check your local newspaper, spill of petro products are almost a daily even in the L48.
The huge fine levied by the courts for the Exxon Valdez was run thru the courts several times, as you would expect - any business would do that.
A point not made was at the time of the spill, the Alaska economy was a basket case, the billions poured into the State for the clean up effort may have saved what was left. I know many folks who think just that.
Bottom line - just as Las Vegas has the gaming industry, AZ has mining, Alaska has a bit of commercial fishing, the oil patch and maybe we will be allowed to expand mining activity.
As for the political corruption, ya - we got that in spades. Just like some other States - its just that our pols sell out for so much less.
Do you call 25% taxes reasonable? If you ask me it is highway robbery and this is in addition to all the other taxes the companies pay, which by the way is the highest taxed industry in the country.
If I was BP I would severely cut back on production and employees. If it was not for the oil companies Alaska would still be living in igloos and riding horses to work.
As to the Chicoms getting the deal, I would hope Washington would nix that deal for national security reasons.
Why can’t we just drill, dammit? Since when is Congress required to drill for oil?
You sound like me, talking about BP. My husband was the environmental advisor for ARCO Marine, in the eighties. He tried to convince BP and EXXON that they needed to be better prepared for a human caused spill because statistics proved that they were way over due. The BP exec (BP runs everything in Alaska) told him that they were not going to spend one more penney until the gov’t forced them to because they had already spent too much in the North Sea. Then the man put a newspaper in front of his face while my husband finished speakiing.
My husband ran a spill drill to prove his point, using a scenario that almost exactly simulated the actual Valdez spill, and still got no response from BP or EXXON.
After the spill, BP threatened to destroy my husband’s professional reputation and make sure that he never worked in the industry again if he testified against Alyeska.
It’s a scare tactic. There is no way, no way, us Alaskans would ever allow commies to have any access to our oil like that. It still sucks that a Canadien company recieved the approval. Where is a decent American company?
Ya
Folks like to rant about oil prices, but overlook the cost of the FedGov and local vigorish.....everyone is hooked on the ‘vig’.
The oil compaines could do a better job, and the big, gay (and now former) head of BP realling screwed the puppy...
Must be an old article. Sinopec's bid has already been rejected by the Palin administration.
The article at the source is dated 6 January 2008.
Your tagline caused me to look at your profile page. Thank you for your service. Can you decribe your visit to Iwo Jima?
This past week Sarah Palin announced that the contract had been awarded to a Canadian pipeline company.
Most Alaskans have had enough of BP.
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