Stonemirror

As BP's boss Tony Hayward is grilled by US Congressional Comittee the results are all too predictable. You'd think Tony Hayward was a politician, with the skills he;'s shown at evading responsibility and dodging questions. It seems however that the politicians grilling him are understandably a tad annoyed at this behaviour. The problem is this; they (the politicians) spend their ENTIRE POLITICAL CAREERS doing the very same.

Lie, deceive, cheat, dodge, pass the buck are all just tools of the trade for politicians, all for self interest. Tony Hawyard is just doing what they do, and they don't like it. Perhaps someone should update the dictionaries politicians have access to to include the term "hypocrite". If they were even remotely honest, this would be a perfect lesson in how their voters see them, and how the voters get the EXACT same treatment from them as Tony Hayward is giving them.

They know all this of course, politicians are not stupid, they are very smart at manipulating the system and the voters for their own gain. Still, it's hard to be too hard on someone when you do the same thing for a living.

BP should be dragged over the coals for the oil spill. Just as other multi-nationals should be dragged over the coals for similar incidents around the world, which rarely happens. All too often you see a US based multinational destroy local lives and livelihoods in the developing world, and escape justice or restitution by paying off some local officials and insisting that they have broken no local laws, and can't be held to account in the US. Again a dictionary lacking the term "hypocrite" may be at fault.

 I note that to appeal to the US voters, they're not impressed with BP's handling of the spill, how they have seemingly ignored safety advice and favoured profit over quality. They also don't trust BP to handle claims promptly, and want BP to set aside money that a third party handles to ensure claims are paid promptly.

Again the difference is remarkable between what multinationals are forced to do when it's US nationals (voters) livelihoods at stake, and US based multinationals responsible for incidents outside of the US (non-voters). Maybe the handling of BP should become a template for US based multinationals (donators to US politicians election campaigns) who are negligent overseas, enforced by US politicians, on behalf of those (outside the US) most in need.