Let’s see: How about a spotty safety record, insistence on voluntary ‘trust me’ self-regulation, a drilling plan that ignored key risks, and failure to use best shut-off technology to save a few bucks?

Limit government, we’re told.  Big companies will police themselves because the potential loss in revenue and reputation is motivation enough, we’re told.  The predictable result is Goldman Sachs, Massey Energy, and BP.

If you Google ‘British Petroleum cited violations‘ you get 192,000 hits.  One of the most revealing is “MMS Records Show BP Has Previous Deepwater Violations” (excerpted below).

CBS and the AP report “BP Didn’t Plan for Major Oil Spill:  Company Suggests in Documents that Likelihood of Accident Happening was Virtually Impossible.”

Planning drives response, and no doubt BP’s delusional worst-case scenario drove them to keep assuring the government and the nation they could handle this.

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There are, and will continue to be, heroic efforts by a wide variety of individuals, including members of the Coast Guard, NOAA, and state, local, and volunteer organizations.  I wish them the best of luck, and wish I could be back in uniform helping out.  But with a spill of this magnitude and complexity, there is no such thing as an effective response.  The Obama administration has clearly mobilized all of the Federal government’s capabilities.  But time and time again, we have learned that our efforts will not measure up to the task at hand.

Today’s guest blogger is Dr. Robert J. Brulle of Drexel University.  I’ve interviewed him many times, and so Climate Progress readers mainly know him as Professor of Sociology & Environmental Science and Affiliate Professor of Public Health, Drexel University.

But before that second career, he was a Commissioned Officer in the Coast Guard for two decades.  Indeed, he has a Bachelor of Science degree from the U.S. Coast Guard Academy in Marine Engineering.

So when he talks about the BP-Halliburton oil disaster, people should listen.  Here’s his entire post:

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The devastating consequences of Exxon Valdez and BP gulf

The BP Gulf Coast rig explosion is a horrible human, economic, and environmental disaster. The death of 11 employees is tragic. The spill could devastate the Gulf Coast commercial and sport fishing industries for years to come. Louisiana’s seafood industry alone is worth $2 billion annually.

This is the biggest U.S. economic and environmental disaster since the Exxon Valdez oil spill in Alaska’s Prince William Sound on March 24, 1989. The key lesson from the Exxon Valdez is that the oil spill continues to have an impact today””more than two decades after the event.

The length and breadth of BP’s gulf oil spill are still unknown, but reviewing the harm and costs from the Exxon Valdez spill can give us a sense of the likely scale of the disaster. Whether the gulf spill surpasses this devastation will depend on whether and when BP can stop the flow of oil from deep on the ocean floor.

CAP’s Daniel Weiss and Susan Lyon compare the stats of the BP gulf spill with the Exxon Valdez spill in 1989 in this repost.  I’ll start with an informative video from ABC news:

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Mayday on May Day:

The Sunday morning shows are dedicated primarily to the unfolding oil apocalypse:

– Charlie “Drill three miles off my coast” Melancon (D-LA), Sen. Mary “Drilling is safe” Landrieu (D-LA), Sen. Bill “Drilling is DOA” Nelson (D-FL) are on CBS’s Face the Nation

– Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano, Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar, Coast Guard Commander Admiral Thad Allen, Gov. Charlie “Now I Remember” Crist (R-FL) on NBC’s Meet the Press

– Napolitano, Salazar, and Rep. Marco “Drill Here, Drill Now” Rubio (R-FL) on Fox News Sunday

– Napolitano, Salazar, and BP America President Lamar McKay on ABC’s This Week

This visualization of the oil spill extent was created by the Times-Picayune from official data.