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BP's 'Ass Kicking' by Obama Angers Brits, Sparks Pension Concerns

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On the eve of one of the most highly anticipated matches in the World Cup, the tension between the United States and the United Kingdom isn't just over soccer. The gulf oil crisis -- and BP's role in it -- has thrown up a new source of conflict between the two countries.

In his newfound role as "ass kicker in chief," President Barack Obama has set his sights on the multinational oil giant, BP. Earlier this week, the president suggested that BP's chief executive, Tony Hayward, deserved to be fired for his management of the spill that began on April 20 and has continued to spew oil at levels twice as great as initially imagined. On Thursday, Obama summoned the company's board chairman, Carl-Henric Svanberg, to a White House meeting next week to discuss both cleanup and compensation claims.

The U.S government has demanded that BP, in addition to paying all cleanup costs, pay the wages of thousands of American workers laid off since the Deepwater Horizon rig exploded. U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder has refused to rule out seeking an injunction to stop BP from giving shareholders a £10billion dividend (roughly $14.7 billion) next month. BP is also threatened with prosecution if a government investigation determines possible wrongdoing in BP's management of the well.

None of this is going down very well on the other side of the Atlantic, where investors, politicians and the general public are outraged by the growing public animosity towards the oil company and -- by extension -- Britain. Some of the concern is purely economic. The U.K. is saddled with a crippling public debt on the order of £156 billion annually (roughly $229 billion). At a time when Britain is desperate to reduce its deficit, BP is a huge contributor to revenues, paying nearly $1.4 billion in taxes on its profits last year.

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With growing concerns over whether or not the company would be able to pay its dividend, investors are nervous about BP's future. Shares in BP plunged to a 13-year low on Thursday and the cost of insuring its debt rose to a record high. Share prices bounced back up on Friday, but BP has now lost more than 40 percent of its stock market value since April 20. There are now palpable fears in financial markets the company might not survive the Gulf of Mexico crisis intact and could be forced to file for bankruptcy.

Of particular concern are the pension funds of millions of Britons, where BP's position at the top of the London Stock Exchange has made it a bedrock investment for almost every pension fund in the country. The firm's dividend payments, which amount to more than £7 billion ($10.2 billion) a year, account for £1 in every £6 paid out in dividends to British pension plans. Were BP to go belly up, this would directly impact the lives of millions of British workers.

But the real ire toward the United States over BP is political. Part of it is generated by President Obama's seemingly calculated insistence on referring to BP as "British Petroleum" (a moniker the company dropped years ago in favor of the initials BP). John Napier, the chairman of the British insurer RSA, accused the Obama of being anti-British and "prejudicial and personal" in his dealings with BP. The mayor of London, Boris Johnson, went a step further, decrying the "beating up" of a "great British company on the airwaves" as a "matter of national concern." As one columnist in the Daily Telegraph summed up the sentiment over here: "Much of the rhetoric from other American politicians is plainly jingoistic claptrap with a beady eye on their own chances in the U.S. midterm elections."

But the Brit's aren't just angry with the Yanks for beating up on BP and its mother country. They are also angry with their own prime minister -- David Cameron -- for not sufficiently defending the United Kingdom from attacks by its former colony. Cameron's statement that he "completely understood the U.S. government's frustration" with the fallout from the oil spill was widely perceived as "dithering," if not out and out deferential toward the United States. (The two men are scheduled to speak by phone on Sunday.)

The subtext underlying all of this, of course, is just how much the United Kingdom will continue to be America's "poodle" in the future, a reference to Tony Blair's perceived submissive relationship with George W. Bush during Blair's tenure as prime minister. With a relatively new president in America and a brand-new prime minister in the United Kingdom, the two countries are entering into a new phase in their relationship. And one of the big questions on the table is just how much Cameron will be willing to distance himself from Washington.

How the British leader responds to this current crisis may tell us a lot about where Anglo-American relations are headed. At a minimum, the prime minister needs to convey that the Brits object to all this "ass kicking" by President Obama.

And, by the way, that's "arse" to you, sir.

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296 Comments

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ascotcrew

I live in Florida and this mess is headed my way.
Questions that need answers:
1. Don't we have a torpedo or missile that would close this hole is 2 seconds. If
we can blow up half a mountain with a bunker buster, why not an oil pipe.
2. Why weren't tankers ******* up immediately after the explosion. That one is on BP
and Obama for not accepting the Dutch offer immediately.
3. If Obama is summoning BP to give them an Ass Kicking, why doesn't Congress summon
Obama to explain why he has not solved this problem. I believe there is a huge
cover-up that is being buried right now. Maybe a new Conservative Congress will
get some answers starting in November.

June 13 2010 at 11:42 AM Report abuse +3 rate up rate down Reply
Pamela

"According to the Center for Responsive Politics, the President was the largest single recipient of campaign contributions from BP and its employees over the past twenty years."

Obama's in a tough spot and doesn't know how to disentangle himself from it. He can't really bite the hand that feeds him. He has many contributers to pay back besides BP. Money doesn't come without strings attatched. He's just beginning, and he'll use our money to do it.

June 12 2010 at 9:37 PM Report abuse +5 rate up rate down Reply
1 reply to Pamela's comment
dc walker

.why has no one complained when the senate took ten billion and handed it out to other elected senators for votes during the health care debate? America was asleep, is still asleep and turns its back once again when oil companies pay off elected officials. You get the government you vote for.

June 13 2010 at 3:15 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
barney2022

Absolutely no leadership skills whatsoever from this President... I knew we were in trouble when the white police officer and black professor got into a spat and Obama decides to have a beer with both men, what a JOKE!! I cant believe we elected this man into office... Mr. McCain, Im truly sorry that i voted for Obama

June 12 2010 at 8:49 PM Report abuse +4 rate up rate down Reply
eeverettm

Obama just talks tough because that's all he has going for him. A Mouth that doesn't stop.

June 12 2010 at 8:04 PM Report abuse +6 rate up rate down Reply
Tommy O

Does that mean that Obama should step down for poor managment of our country as he puts us further into Debt and Recssion??
Obama should be careful of what his standards are for other People and Nation's
as he will have to live up to them.

June 12 2010 at 4:59 PM Report abuse +8 rate up rate down Reply
bbfriel

The British have a right to be upset about their shares of BP going down the tubes. However, that does not excuse them from expecting the people from four states in the U.S. to stop being so angry. The British lose some of their shares. The U.S. citizens of Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Florida (several million people and almost the size of Europe) have lost not only their jobs and pensions but also all wildlife from those areas will be nearly extinct. There will be no more fish, shrimp,oysters, whales, turtles, no more birds of any kind that feed off the ocean. Let them think this over before they start throwing stones at us.

June 12 2010 at 2:47 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
ernestvalerius

I understand and agree with the British wanting to distance themselves from this Mega-Corporation. The British are genuinely disturbed and concerned about the Gulf, its wildlife, and us. British Petroleum, BP, is an international corporation owned, in no small part, by American investors. There is, however, one thing that bugs me. It's BP's use of "oil spill" to describe this disaster. This is no minor oil spill, or major one for that matter. "Spill" just does not do justice to the magnitude of this catastrophe. "Oil Geyser" is more descriptive but still falls short.

June 12 2010 at 2:30 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Elmore

So the Brits are objecting to BP's ass kicking, or arse kicking. My heart bleeds. BP has a well-deserved reputation as a rogue outfit, taking short cuts, doing things on the cheap, skating by. Add covering up, lying, ducking responsibility to the mix. Well, the extent of the damage caused by the Gulf oil disaster may never be fully known. All I have to see is another pelican smothering in oil to not give a damn what the BP sympathizers think. We have been hurt and if the Brits can't see that, then tough s--t. I hope that the ass kicking has just begun. And while we're at it we need to kick all the asses in our own Federal bureaucracy who enabled BP to wreak this awful, unspeakable havoc.

June 12 2010 at 1:35 PM Report abuse -5 rate up rate down Reply
punnster

Obama's MMS should have been doing monthly drilling oversight inspections. In one year, not one inspection. If Obama's people had done their job, could the spill have been prevented? Or did he not hire people qualified enough to inspect right.

June 12 2010 at 1:29 PM Report abuse +3 rate up rate down Reply
punnster

If Obama keeps attacking BP, BP could go bankrupt and not be able to pay for fixing oil spill.

June 12 2010 at 1:23 PM Report abuse -2 rate up rate down Reply

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