BP is lying. The federal government is lying
Kenneth Feinberg is … well, let’s call it flip-flopping
Out-of-work fishers and others from the Gulf Coast are enraged about the double dealing of BP and the Feinberg-led escrow fund. They have just learned that if they earned any income or wages from BP as part of the clean-up effort, the money would be subtracted from any claim they make against the so-called $20 billion escrow fund. That is a direct contradiction from what they had been told earlier.
But the latest lie turns out be the tip of the iceberg.
The Obama administration has done an about face on the function of the BP/Obama escrow account plan.
When Obama announced the escrow account in order to vent the rising tide of political anger that was increasingly directed at his disengaged response to the suffering in the Gulf, he promised and assured the people of the Gulf that “Dissatisfied claimants maintain all current rights under law …” (See White House Fact Sheet: Claims and Escrow, June 16, Office of the Press Secretary)
Now, Feinberg, the Obama/BP escrow administrator, has announced that in order to receive lump sum payments, claimants will have to execute a waiver of their rights to sue for full or additional relief in the courts. (New York Times, July 16)
The choice is: Take what is offered, even if it is a portion of what you are entitled to, or else risk ending up like the victims of the Exxon Valdez disaster, fighting it out in court for decades to receive a pittance.
And now… the rest of the story. …..
Harold
