Oil Spill Website To Be Controlled By U.S., Not BP

HOUSTON — The US government is expected to take over control of the central information website on the Gulf oil spill response that has been run jointly by various agencies and BP for the 2 1/2 months since the rig explosion.

The Department of Homeland Security wants a one-stop shop for information that is completely overseen by the government as it settles into the long-haul of dealing with the response to the disaster. The U.S. Coast Guard falls under Homeland Security's authority.

BP and the federal government are part of a unified command that is working together to try to contain the oil gusher, but the government has been directing BP at every turn.

A DHS spokesman told The Associated Press on Sunday that the joint relationship won't change when the website is given a dot-gov address instead of a dot-com address.

But who can post information to the site would change. Details are still being worked out.

The spokesman, Sean Smith, said the government wants to be as transparent as possible and increase Americans' access to information.

BP is helping pay for the current website. The government could still bill BP when it takes over the site.

The deepwaterhorizonresponse.com site may still be maintained during the changeover, but ultimately it will be taken down altogether when the government moves the response information to its own website.

A BP spokesman did not immediately respond to several requests for comment on the move, which could occur within days.

A frequent critic of the administration's response to the oil spill, Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., was skeptical the change would amount to much.

"Given that the government taking over the cleanup hasn't exactly fixed things, it's hard to imagine the government taking over a website making things much better either," Issa, a member of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, said in a statement e-mailed to the AP.

"In recent weeks, we've heard directly from local officials pleading for less bureaucracy, more resources and expressing an overall frustration with this administration's apparent pre-occupation with the public relations surrounding this catastrophe," he said.

___

Online:

Deepwater Horizon Response: http://www.deepwaterhorizonresponse.com/

Comments

[my2pesos]

03:08 AM on 07/07/2010

Well at least the government has control of something...

[rbenjamin]

10:14 AM on 07/06/2010

There was a noticeable spike of emergency room traffic as Teabaggers suffered heart attacks and strokes upon hearing the news.

[jeffie44]

09:43 AM on 07/06/2010

"Tar balls hit Texas." Man, GOPers and their followers must be soooo happy right now. Just imagine the political gain of this!!! Why would they care about the rest, they never have....it's just about the political gain.

For them and their followers, this is truly Christmas in July.

[kgb999]

02:43 AM on 07/06/2010

I would be far more excited by this were I not convinced that the Government is pretty much taking orders from BP anyhow.

Is this an improvement, or is it just using our government to whitewash BP's misinformation campaign? It certainly does seem to some extent the political interests of the administration and the corporate interests of BP have been aligned in such a way that this could just add government gravitas to BP's information control strategy.

I'm hopeful, it's a positive. But I'm cynical enough to not be surprised if this turns out to not be the case.

[Aerows]

12:00 AM on 07/07/2010

I'm convinced that the government is taking orders from BP considering that the Coast Guard is threatening to fine journalists who get to close to the clean up. BP has put out nothing but misinformation and NO ONE in our government has called them on it. No one has discussed how this might affect the population living near these areas.

This has been a cover up from day one. I blame BP, but I also blame our government for letting them get away with it.

[Longtimeliberal]

05:55 PM on 07/05/2010

Issa was part of the cabal that helped Cheney;s deregulation.

[fourtruth]

04:55 PM on 07/05/2010

Another breaking story about BP and DOI corruption. BP is not only destryong the ocean, but also our public lands.

Be sure and watch Part 1 also. Another place to find links to similar investigative reports about DOI and BLM start with The Cloud Foundation, then on to the links they provide.

http://www.abovetopsecret.com/forum/thread590146/pg1

We are talking about over 550 million dollars a year in direct and indirect "theft" of taxpayer dollars with Salazar himself in the revolving door between the cattle industry and government. Research CATO 1997 Policy Analysis - Welfare Ranching, USDA beef exports, and BLM direct costs for wild horse roundups and holding.

[KenNY]

03:51 PM on 07/05/2010

As a Republican, I don't blame Obama for causing the oil spill. Maybe he has been less than effective in dealing with BP, however I suspect that BP, like its leaking well, may be uncontrollable. BP's employees and management have demonstrated incompetence in 1) drilling deep water oil wells, 2) following safety procedures, 3) cleaning up oil spills, and 4) telling the truth to the public.

[mummblemouth]

05:07 PM on 07/05/2010

And do you, as a Republican, acknowledge the Bush/Cheney deconstruction of the MMS that helped lead to this mess?

[banker67]

03:25 PM on 07/05/2010

Counting down now from day 1.
How many days before every GOP propagandist blames the oil spill on Obama?
And how many days after that before GOP party members parrot that vile lie night and day, night and day, night and day?
As Goebbels once said, more or less, people will believe anything if you repeat it often enough and loud enough. How right he was.

[cambo]

03:08 PM on 07/05/2010

Oh, now it wants control of a website, it`s a pity it didn`t exercise some control in this collosal disaster from day 1.

[LeftLeanWing]

05:14 PM on 07/05/2010

And the result would have been the same.....

[ProCynic]

02:59 PM on 07/05/2010

So, instead of company propaganda, we're going to get government propaganda? How about it gets run by a coalition of NGA, Coast Guard, and the governments of LA, MS, AL, and FL?

[unite4change]

02:32 PM on 07/05/2010

Most people know there is a double standard when reporting on President Obama.

"No, the government didn’t operate or own the rig. And oil giant BP was obviously the responsible party. Yet the press immediately focused in on Obama."

No one, not even the press, held George Herbert Walker Bush responsible for the Exxon Valdez oil spill:

http://mediamatters.org/blog/201006170007

[bilo rile me]

02:32 PM on 07/05/2010

"'Given that the government taking over the cleanup hasn't exactly fixed things, it's hard to imagine the government taking over a website making things much better either,' Issa, a member of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, said in a statement e-mailed to the AP."

When you consider the difficulty BP had focusing on drilling operation within a scope as narrow as an offshore platform, and the resulting catastrophe, a website is only a mammoth distraction, Instead of inventing new ways of telling us 'everything's fine,' Bp needs to spend a lot more energy cleaning up their mess. We'd like our lives back, eleven and counting.

[mortgagechief]

01:52 PM on 07/05/2010

It apparently does not matter: whatever the administration does, the GOP will fault it. If the white house decided today to give every citizen a $1.00, the GOP will oppose it on the grounds that it will increase the deficit. On the other hand, if tax cuts were enacted to the 1% that makes up the GOP's base, then the deficit fears will totally vanish.

[mrJJ]

01:34 PM on 07/05/2010

Oil Spills Raise Arsenic Levels in the Ocean, Says New Research
Source: ScienceDaily

(July 5, 2010) — Oil spills can increase levels of toxic arsenic in the ocean, creating an additional long-term threat to the marine ecosystem, according to research published July 2 in the journal Water Research.

snip

In the study, a team from Imperial College London has discovered that oil spills can partially block the ocean's natural filtration system and prevent this from cleaning arsenic out of the seawater. The researchers say their study sheds light on a new toxic threat from the Gulf of Mexico oil leak.

snip

In the study, the researchers discovered that oil spills and leakages clog up sediments on the ocean floor with oil, which prevents the sediments from bonding with arsenic and burying it safely underground with subsequent layers of sediment. The scientists say this shutdown of the natural filtration system causes arsenic levels in seawater to rise, which means that it can enter the marine ecosystem, where it becomes more concentrated and poisonous the further it moves up the food chain.

more: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/07/100702100144.htm

Corexit Being Sprayed From Coast Guard Planes
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1FxfYqnlQ50

[Kevin Atlanta]

01:02 PM on 07/05/2010

The spinmeisters from BP and the US Corporate Fascist Controlled Government will do anything to maintain their Orwellian positions.
What about the sub-surface plumes that are ticking time bombs of absolute ecological destruction with the UK banned CoreXit and 5 EXXON Valdez size plumes known now?
Where are the tankers pumping up this toxic soup and processing it?
This is more than just the environmental catastrophe in the Gulf as these plumes migrate around Florida delivering death and destruction to the entire East Coast fishing industry but will sterilize the Grand Banks fishing into the Arctic and back down the Western Coast of the UK.
WE can do without the propaganda and demand action.