you obviously don't know shit about what an architect does

Dream up cartoonish, impossible things and let someone else figure out how to translate them into reality?

well, maybe you do

I'm not a BP supporter by any means, but I think I can cut Prescott a little slack on this one. From the comments:

The Editor says:
June 3, 2010 at 4:18 pm

Dear Readers,

Based on some of the comments here, as well as phone calls we’ve gotten on this, I’d like to explain a few things about the quote from BP representative Randy Prescott.

First, The Lens stands by the accuracy of the quote. Even Prescott does not dispute that he said this, saying elsewhere that he chose his words poorly and regrets the remark.

Second, we stand by the context of the quote, but we appreciate how Prescott could have interpreted it differently. This was a meeting put on by the Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, and, among others, it drew many owners of mom-and-pop eateries, taquerias and taco trucks. A woman in the crowd asked whether the seafood is safe to eat. Given the other questions preceding her, we interpreted it as a business owner asking whether she should pay higher prices for a product that may or may not be safe to serve.

Prescott interpreted it as a consumer asking whether she could eat seafood at Gulf Coast restaurants. Given the suburban New Orleans setting of the meeting, and the local composition of the audience explained above, it’s a stretch to believe that Prescott was offering advice about restaurants across the Gulf Coast. Still, speaking off-the-cuff to a crowd is not easy, and we recognize he may well have heard the question this way.

Readers of our story and of his later explanation should consider whether The Lens or Prescott had a reason to present the quote in a particular context.

Third, the comment was offered as Prescott answered questions from the crowd, not – as has been implied on The Hayride – in a one-on-one conversation with our reporter. Some commenters have asked why this wasn’t reported elsewhere. We can’t explain why other news media didn’t cover this event or why those there chose not to use this quote, which was one of many. But for context, this was an evening meeting on May 20, a day full of other news developments. Part of the mission of The Lens is to provide coverage that the mainstream media does not.

Fourth, if we were “out to get” Prescott, the quote wouldn’t be buried at the end of the story. Clearly, this has taken on a life of its own, through the actions of those who read the story, took it upon themselves to look up Prescott’s work number and e-mail, and posted them on our site, as well as Facebook and other social media outlets. It’s not our policy to censor comments, except in extreme circumstances. The posting of an easily obtained phone number doesn’t meet that standard.

For those who dropped in just to read this quote and think we’re sensationalists, I invite you to read other news stories on this site and determine for yourself what kind of news organization we are.

And as always, we appreciate and welcome your comments.

—Steve Beatty
Managing editor of The Lens
sbeatty@TheLensNola.org

I NEED MY GODDAMN SHRIMP

Cut him slack if you want, but the summation of this Editorial-Speak statement in my interpretation is, "The cocksucker said it, we reported it, and now he's crab-walking away from it like the lowlife scum-sucking motherfucker he is. Fuck him."

That's how I interpret it too. And I'm not sure BP has exactly earned any benefits of the doubt these days.

When I skim read the quotation without looking at its context it sounded like he was saying don't worry about the oil spill, we can still buy shrimp from other areas. Who cares about the spill? Whether you use the editor's interpretation or his, it doesn't seem like that now.

I'm not sure what he could have said that would have been much better or much worse. I mean, I hope that the restaurants would be serving shrimp from other regions. What am I missing? I know one thing -- I wouldn't want Prescott's job.

I think it shows a lack of sensitivity to the plight of the people's lives BP just destroyed. Like, "oops we just eliminated your job with our negligence but it doesn't really matter because we can get shrimp from Alaska now."

He could have said something to the effect of, "Not all of the shrimp has been jeopardized by the oil spill in the gulf coast even in Louisiana (which is true), and BP is doing it's best to ensure the future of the gulf coast seafood industry, which we understand as vital to the United States food supply."

this solution seems pretty awesome
first i've heard of it though

i wish that narrator was billy mays

i was hoping the solution was going to be to set it on fire.

fuckin' MICROBES dude.

Oh i get that but this was Q&A session to get facts and information out to the community. I'm assuming that there were a helluva lot of questions he had to get through so I don't really expect every answer to be prefaced with we fuhed up and we're really sorry and we feel your pain. After awhile that pr bullshit sounds meaningless anyway if not backed up by actions.

It seems like the editor is acknowledging that the question was about whether locally sourced shrimp was safe. Whether the question was posed from someone wondering whether it was ok to serve it or to eat it doesn't seem nearly as important to me as it does to the editor. I was interpreting his response as reputable restaurants are going to be buying their shrimp from non-LA sources so as a consumer you should be ok eating shrimp. I guess its fair to intrepret that as a suggestion to a restaurant owner that they should probably buy non-local shrimp but that seems like pretty sound advice to me in the short term so I don't really have a problem with what he said.

The fishermen have been destroyed by this no question. If you want to disagree with me and say he should have been smart enough to acknowledge that, fair enough. But the question wasn't about the impact on the economy and the fisherman, it was about food safety. His political tone deafness might be dumb and regrettable but I'm not going to jump to the conclusion that he doesn't care. A well-executed canned response not backed by action would tell me that more than a poorly thought out, direct off the cuff response.

Any attempt to isolate the response specifically to "food safety" without examination by continuing to ask "Why?" seems to me at best, naive, and at worst disingenuous. Why is anyone concerned if seafood from the Gulf is unsafe? Why are restaurant owners, accustomed to fresh off the boat seafood, having to source seafood from outside one of the most productive (at least, formerly) fisheries anywhere? Why are the local fisherman going out of business? No matter how many "why's" are asked, they all point back to the same answer.

And further to that interpretation, I'll be goddamned if I believe that ANYONE directly affected right now would look to a BP official for advice on food safety, or alternate sources of seafood for their Mike Anderson's Seafood Restaurant.

Hegel said earlier in this thread that he didn't think the Red Menace 2.0 crowd had much criticism about the government/Obama on the spill, but that's not right. Their answer is summed up nicely in a tweet from SarahPalinUSA herself:

The hypocrisy of implying that Republicans wanted to drill in ANWR to protect the environment is obvious to reasonable people, and completely overlooked by Palinites.

But all told, I think most of our outrage is our collective feeling of helplessness channeled into familiar political battles. The uncomfortable truth for the left is that Obama's administration really deserves a lot of blame. It approved the drilling after an inappropriately lax review. The uncomfortable and willfully overlooked truth for the right is that conservative environmental policies are a significant contributor to our dependence on oil and void of regulation. The uncomfortable truth for all of us is that we all directly or indirectly demand gallons of petroleum every day, we have no idea how to make a small dent in even our own consumption, and that consumption propelled the development of the technologies of consumption more quickly than the technologies of conservation and remediation. It's terrifying.

Agreed.

I'd also add that Louisiana is caught in horrid catch-22. We need drilling (at least in the immediate short-term) because our economy is so dependent on it. We have so little industry as it is, we're really not in a position to quit drilling. Yet, it just fucked us hard. Real hard. People need to both eat, enjoy wildlife, and make money here. It's terrifying.

I wonder if Carl Oppenheimer (microbe "inventor") is related to J. Robert?

How to Fix the BP Oil Leak in 3 Easy Steps: http://bobhasablog.com/2010/06/05/bpfix/

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lol

Jeez