Get This!

A week before BP's civil trial for the 2010 Gulf oil disaster, a district judge in New Orleans just reduced the company's liability by $3.4 billion. That means BP won't be liable for the full $21 billion in fines for dumping millions of gallons of oil into the Gulf, and now the company faces a maximum liability of $17.6 billion. That's less than the oil giant made in 2012 alone – when they raked in profits of over $25 billion. According to District Judge Carl Barbier, the 800,000 barrels of oil captured at the site of the broken well "never came into contact with any ambient sea water, and was not released into the environment in any way." BP's also fighting the federal government's oil spill estimate, saying the number of barrels released is 20% too high. It's hard to understand how BP will dispute the government's estimate of oil released, given that toxic dispersants were used to dilute oil spewing from the undersea well. The fact is, the dollar amount of BP's fines is irrelevant. No amount of money can cover the monumental damage done to the Gulf. There's no dollar amount that brings back the 11 workers killed on the Deep Water Horizon. We should give BP the corporate death penalty and revoke their right to do business in our nation.