Quote:

---

As oil drifted onto beaches as far east as the Florida Panhandle, a BP official said Saturday the company was pleased with its operation to funnel crude up from the ruptured undersea well to a drilling ship a mile above on the Gulf of Mexico.

BP Senior Vice President Bob Fryar said the company funneled about 250,000 gallons of oil in the first 24 hours from a containment cap installed on the well to a drilling ship on the ocean surface. "That operation has gone extremely well," Fryar said at an Alabama news conference. "We are very pleased."

That's about 31 percent of the 798,000 gallons of crude federal authorities estimate is gushing into the sea every day.

---

Quote:

---

The chief executive of BP has told Sky News he believes the massive Gulf of Mexico oil spill will end up having only a "very, very modest" environmental impact.

Dr Tony Hayward said: "I think the environmental impact of this disaster is likely to have been very, very modest.

"It is impossible to say and we will mount, as part of the aftermath, a very detailed environmental assessment but everything we can see at the moment suggests that the overall environmental impact will be very, very modest."

He appeared upbeat as he met teams at BP's vast crisis control centre in Houston.

The centre has been working around the clock for more than three weeks trying to identify solutions to the crisis.

The company believes the next stage of its response effort could see the leak sealed completely within seven to 10 days if all goes to plan.

---

Quote:

---

With a tank full of BP unleaded I left my hotel in Hammond, Louisiana, and drove about 20 minutes up the road to the Unified Area Command in Robert, La. It's the same trip taken each day by workers from BP , contracting firms, Transocean, the Coast Guard, MMS and all the other agencies and companies trying to control the massive oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.

The command center sits off a sleepy road where the treeline opens to gates bearing large Shell Oil logos. I turned at the seashell gates and pulled up to a guard post. A pleasant man asked to see my ID. I flashed the ABC News badge hanging around my neck. With a smile he waved me past.

A second guard waved me into a parking lot. It's a campus of buildings for Shell training classes. (Shell made the campus available to cleanup workers and officials at the request of the U.S. Coast Guard, according to the company, which had no involvement in the spill itself).

I walked into the main building, past signs ordering everyone to check in, past the women sitting next to folding tables stacked with papers and checklists, and wandered around. But there's not much to see. A door opened to the "Joint Information Center" room and I could see, for a flash, a hive of activity. But someone had taped pieces of copier paper over every inch of the room's glass walls.

When I ventured closer to where the unified commanding was being done, where response teams were responding and watching live video from the robot subs a mile beneath the surface of the Gulf of Mexico, I ran into another woman at a card table and a security guard.

"Hi. I've just driven from Mobile to Robert and I'm here to get the lay of the land. I'm with ABC News," I said.

She looked mystified.

"You're joking," she laughed.

Nope."

"Let me see your badge," she said.

I showed her my ABC ID.

"Oh dear. You drove all the way from Mobile? You're not supposed to be here."

Then the very friendly security guard explained that media are not allowed in this building. "They've set up a place for you across the street."

"Great. Can you show me where it is?"

He led me out of the building and directed me to a building across the street. "It's the one with the big Shell logo."

wandered in and out of offices, including a classroom with "Drilling/Completion 101" worksheets neatly laid out at each seat, until I finally found what looked like a briefing room, with risers and camera tripods lined up on a podium. But it was being used for a Shell class and was full of students talking.

Finally, while watching Shell students play ping-pong, I called the press center, reached an amiable media liaison and asked him to come out and talk to me.

"Where are you," he asked.

"Right outside your building."

"They let you in? You're not supposed to be here."

He came right out and we talked for a few moments on the condition that this was not a formal interview. We had a pleasant conversation but he made clear that, when we need questions answered, we should call -- not visit. They have briefings once a day but otherwise, this campus is restricted to response workers and students. Everyone, he said, is focused 100 percent on response.

---

Quote:

---

The boss of BP has said the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico is relatively tiny compared with the size of the ocean - but conceded it could cost him his job.

In an interview with The Guardian newspaper he said: "The Gulf of Mexico is a very big ocean. "The amount of volume of oil and dispersant we are putting into it is tiny in relation to the total water volume." But speaking to The Times newspaper he said: "I think I will be judged by the response. I don't feel my job is on the line but of course that might change."

---

Quote:

---

A spokesman for BP PLC says the company needs more proof to support claims by scientists that huge plumes of oil are suspended underwater from the Gulf of Mexico spill.

CEO Tony Hayward said Sunday there was "no evidence" of the plumes and that all the oil from the spill was floating to the surface. Spokesman Graham MacEwen said Tuesday that BP is awaiting analysis of water samples taken in the Gulf before making a final determination. Rep. Edward Markey, a Democrat from Massachusetts, has asked BP to back up Hayward's claim that they do not exist

---

Quote:

---

Scientists with the University of South Florida say laboratory tests have confirmed that oil from a spewing Gulf of Mexico well has accumulated in at least two extensive plumes deep underwater.

The researchers said in Baton Rouge on Friday that tests confirmed their initial findings that were based on field instruments. BP PLC CEO Tony Hayward has said there was no evidence of large underwater plumes. The researchers say the extensive layers of oil are sitting far beneath the surface miles from the site of the Deepwater Horizon explosion. The university is collecting data for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

The lab tests are the most conclusive evidence yet in a vigorous scientific debate about where much of the oil is ending up.

USF and NOAA planned to issue a more full report on their findings about the oil plumes Monday.

"We're certain it's oil," said Ernst B. Peebles, a USF biological oceanographer and chief scientist aboard the college's Weatherbird II research vessel, the ship that did the sampling. "We've done the analysis." Peebles said laboratory tests were performed on water drawn from two layers of oil, a 98-foot thick layer found about 1,300 feet down and a second, even thicker layer found at a depth of about 3,200 feet.

---

Quote:

---

BP spokesman Mark Proelger said the company was awaiting further analysis of what is in the plumes from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

"It's too early to say whether any data indicates the plumes contain oil or not," Proelger said.

During its own testing of waters around the spill site between May 7 and May 26, BP found evidence of oil in samples taken from more than two dozen locations. However, none of the sites revealed oil concentrations greater than 75 parts per billion. "These very low concentrations do not have a significant effect on marine life," the company said in a May 30 report to the federal government.

---

Quote:

---

BP CEO Tony Hayward has been caught saying 'I want my life back' in a TV interview as shares in his company collapsed amid another failed attempt to stop oil leaking into the Gulf of Mexico.

Mr Hayward made the comment in an interview with US network FOX News earlier this week and has provoked an angry reaction from US commentators.

---

Quote:

---

In a gloomy assessment, Dougie Youngson, oil analyst at Arbuthnot, added that the crisis had the potential to "break" the company.

"This situation has now gone far beyond concerns of BP's chief executive Tony Hayward being fired, or shareholder dividend payouts being cut - it's got the real smell of death. This could break BP," said Youngson.

"Given the collapse in the share price and the potential for it to fall further, we expect that it could become a takeover target - particularly if its operating position in the US becomes untenable."

---

Quote:

---

Energy giant BP has hired a Washington-based, bipartisan political consulting firm to produce its new aggressive national advertising push, including a national TV spot released Thursday, CNN has learned.

Sources familiar with the arrangement say that Purple Strategies, headed up by veteran political consultants Steve McMahon, a Democrat, and Alex Castellanos, a Republican, produced new advertisements now running on both television and in newspapers.

The sources say that BP hired Purple Strategies to produce what will likely be a series of advertisements as part of BP's attempt to rehabilitate its battered image.

---

Quote:

---

In New Orleans Friday, President Obama lashed out at BP over reports that it plans to spend $50 million on an ad campaign to improve its image and $10 million on dividends for shareholders.

"What I don't wanna hear is when they're spending that kind of money on their shareholders and spending that kind of money on TV advertising that they're nickel and diming fisherman," Mr. Obama said.

---

Quote:

---

The company is also running print ads in newspapers including The New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, USA Today and The Washington Post. The price tag for this PR gambit: About $50 million, according to an estimate from Jon Bond, co-founder of the Kirshenbaum Bond Senecal agency, which has counted brands such as Snapple and Capital One as clients. BP declined to comment on the cost.

"What they're doing is Tylenol 1982, but it's not 1982," said Jon Bond, referring to Tylenol cyanide incident, which prompted the CEO of Johnson & Johnson (JNJ, Fortune 500) to appear in a televised ad campaign in an attempt to reassure customers.

One big difference between now and then is the fact that BP's airtime has a formidable competitor: A live video feed of the underwater leak that's all over television and the Internet.

Rather than put its CEO on TV, Bond said it would be more effective for BP to set up a live 24-hour channel showing the work its employees are doing to try and contain the spill. "I don't know if now's the time to be spending the money on advertising-marketing," said Spyro Kourtis, president of the ad agency Hacker Group. "I don't think they have control of the situation. That's the problem."

Of course, BP disagrees. "Tony Hayward believes he has an obligation, a responsibility, not only to stop this leak and clean up this spill, but to keep people informed about the effort," said spokesman Mark Salt.

---

Hippie Operative Nikita Nicovna Talibani,
signing off


To our President: “Mr. President, you're a god damn, mother fucking liar. Fuck you, you cock sucking community activist piece of shit.... oh, go fuck yourself, Mr. President” ...Raptor

To Anthony, unquestionably the most civil person on this forum: “Go fuck yourself. On this matter, make no mistake. I want you to go fuck yourself long and hard, as well as anyone who agrees with you. I got no use for you. ...Raptor

To Frem: “You miserable piece of shit.” ...Raptor

To Niki: “My guess is it won't just be your ugly face you dislike.....Well, it's true......if you had a soul.” ...Raptor

...Remember, remember, the ugliest member...