Why globalism matters – or more to the point, why nationalism is still important.
First, a brief recap of the history of BP. The ancestors of BP begin when oil is discovered in Iran in 1908. British Petroleum was owned by the British government. After WW2, England wanted to force changes to their arrangement with Iran – when the government refused, the CIA assisted in ousting the government and installing the Shah of Iran. Following the Islamic Revolution, BP signed a new contract with the Ayatollah giving BP 90% of the income and Iran 10% (The typical “first offer” from an oil company is to give the landowner 1/7th of the value of the oil produced)
In the 1980s, British Petroleum was sold by the Thatcher government, and they started a series of acquisitions. BP acquired a large portion of Gulf’s refining and distribution following the merger of Socal and Gulf.
During the Clinton Stock Market bubble of the late 1990s, BP swallowed up Amoco and Atlantic Richfield (ARCO). Thus BP was born. BP is also very active partnering with Russian billionaires to develop Russia’s oil and gas resources.
The head of BP (Carl-Henric Svanberg) was until recently the head of the Swedish phone maker Ericsson. He and his wife are academics (his undergrad degree was in physics). He knows nothing about the oil or chemical business. He knows nothing about British or American culture, hence his “small people” remark. He certainly would not be sensitive (and probably not sympathetic with) the Cajun culture of Louisiana, a legacy of the French influence in America in the formative era of the United States. Hence you have BP’s Randy Prescott explaining that there are other places in the world people can buy shrimp. [China comes to mind]. BP has no stake in the United States. We are no different than Nigeria or Bhopal India.
This is quite a problem for globalist Barack Obama. His supporters are not happy with his non-response and focus on after-the-fact lawsuits instead of dealing with mitigating the damages.
