Meh, you can brush off the de-regulation mantra of the republican party all you like - you want small government, you will see a lot more of this stuff happening.  That's part of the line.  (And Clinton was way too sucked into the de-regulation bullcrap by the then-republican congress).

Who cares if other industry oil people are mad at BP - since when does that mean a hill of beans?  The question is this - do ALL the other oil companies have safety standards that they adhere to and BP was the "lone idiot" ?  Yeah, sure   They grouse, but facts are facts - companies cut corners *whenever* they feel they can.  sure, nobody expected this disaster to happen, and if it didn't, then booya, more profit.

I say Obama gave em a slap, since the republicans basically called it a travesty of the first order - you been paying attention? 

Market value?  pfft, who cares about market value - you seriously think BP will not recover their value in less than 2 years?  Remember, they deal in oil, and we buy oil from TERRORISTS.  So, any company can do pretty much anything and we will eventually bend over again and let em go to town.  the scope of our national security issue on oil is SO vast that the oil companies get a license to kill, pure and simple.

I'd love to see Obama lay down more smack - think Congress will help him make that happen?  Will the American people accept higher gas prices?

I LOVE how 15 months into Obama we want to forget about Bush - I heard about Clinton for ALL EIGHT YEARS of Bush's run.   Heck, I heard that Clinton was responsible for the late 7th year economic crisis that Bush had - and that is why Bush had to start massive bailouts...   So,  I got 6 and a half more years to not nice person about Bush with IMPUNITY. 

And, seriously, Bush and Bush Sn are "oil men" - they went to war for the oil industry.  SERIOUSLY.  The party mantra was "drill baby drill" and we have a drilling crisis and we want to blame Obama... /pfft   You honestly think if McDuffy and Palin were in power, BP would have been regulated?  

Pretty much.  Here's an example of what I am talking about: http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/business/7062695.html  That company that the gov't went "soft" on now runs safely.  Hmm.. You mean they did it WITHOUT big government getting on their case?  Who would have figured that?

 The executives who's fortune is tied up in market value.  The guys who get their big fat bonuses based on market value.  Market value IS the currency of the corporate elite.  You had better believe that those people care a GREAT deal about market value.

Two things.  1. I never blamed Obama.  I blamed the government.  There is a difference - a big one.   2. McDuffy and Palin would not have regulated BP.

YOu seem to think that I am opposed to regulation.  I am not.  A free market is not "free" if it is unregulated.  That is because there is a very clear business advantage to not running your business in a "free" market if you have the power to manipulate the market.  This is why lobbyists make so much cash.  My point is that the US Government is not capable of regulating the market, they are only capable of biasing the market towards corporations with enough money and low morality to buy the government.  Their attempts to regulate are causing more problems than they are solving.   Leave it in the hand of industry players  (trade unions, Industrial Liscensing groups, National Business Associations) and let the government empower and regulate THOSE institutions to do the work that they cannot do themselves.

It appears, I have the answer to my question - $10 billion.  That actually works out fairly well, 50% of the cost gets picked up by BP and 50% by the other contributing party .

Citing steep losses from the Gulf Coast oil spill, BP said Tuesday that it plans to seek a tax credit of up to $10 billion from the U.S. government, or about half the amount it pledged to aid victims of the disaster.

...Under U.S. corporate tax law, companies can take credits on up to 35 percent of their losses. For BP, that means a savings on its tax bill of about $10 billion.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/07/27/AR2010072704437.html?nav=rss_email/components