BP and Tony Hayward

BP SAYS GOODBYE TO TONY HAYWARD

Tony Hayward most likely worked his way to the top of the giant company BP the usual way: hard work and lots of good decisions all of which made the company more profitable.

Of all the companies drilling for oil off the coast of the United States, unfortunately for Tony, one of BP’s wells sprang a leak.

We all know the rest.

Gazillions of gallons of oil spewing into the Gulf ruining state economies, endangering wildlife, ruining summer vacation plans, and creating a new guy for people to hate. He became the poster boy for clueless executives.

Dubbed the "most hated - and clueless - man in America," Hayward is to be walking away with a golden parachute worth $18 million, The Times of London reported.

So we won’t have to take up any collection for Tony. If he makes 5% interest on his $18 million he will probably have to live on about $900,000 a year. And of course a man of Tony’s success and stature will also be getting pension monies and a return on all his investments.

He went yachting during the crisis so we can assume he will ride out the days remaining in his life yachting, traveling and generally living la dolce vita.

Corporations have a way of realizing that these things are rarely the fault of one man or one decision. In this instance, the leak probably could have happened to any one of the many drilling organizations. This time it just happened to BP. So recognizing that someone has to take the corporate fall, they will make it a soft landing for Tony.

It is in their interest to keep us mad at Tony. They don’t want us mad at BP.
They also don’t want Tony destitute and writing a “tell all” book about the company.

At the end of the day, we Americans have to take a look at ourselves as our thinking is expressed through our government. We need to ask some questions.

Where were the regulations on drilling?

Where were the inspectors?

Did we lose sight of safety in the pursuit of oil?

How many of the other oil-rigs out there are deficient in some way?

How long will it be before another oil-rig springs a leak?

Will we have learned anything from this disaster?

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Update: in a previous column I wrote about the horrendous mistakes that were made at Arlington Cemetery. Recent information is that there may have been a much greater misidentification of graves than originally thought. Original reports put the problem at hundreds of graves. More recently they have mentioned that there maybe 6600 graves misidentified.