re: #340 Bagua

The problem being the regulator relies on industry to advise them on best practices and condition of their equipment. The regulator then keeps track, checking off the boxes. Now they are considering doing things like actual testing to certify the BOPs and proving the equipment is fit for purpose. This can’t be done because of the state of things.

So they either agree to upgrade things through stages and hope for the best in the interim, or they shut a good part of it down. How does any President do the right things with those choices?

More to the point, forget any individual occupant of the Executive branch. It comes down to an effective civil service structure, regardless of the party in power, that provides a seamless oversight capacity that does its best to prevent these situations from happening and if they do, ensuring that that the response by the Responsible Party is appropriate and effective to the release.

sadly, that will require a complete overhaul of the MMS and the rules under which it operates. And *that* means that the Legislative Branch will have to pass new Laws under which the MMS will be required to perform regulatory oversight. Which means the Senate and Congress will have to ignore Big Oil’s influence in Washington.

Anybody want to make book on that happening?