Paying the Price

Florida Representative Alcee Hastings deserves an ocean of ovations for introducing a bill to block oil companies from being able to write off the costs of cleaning up oil spills. The fact that powerful petroleum profiteers can financially absolve themselves of their sins against the seas is a national disgrace, one that Rep. Hastings' bill would remedy.

Hastings' bill is both fiscally and logically sound. There is no justification for oil companies being able to avoid bearing total responsibility for spills. Hastings notes,

Through clever accounting, a big oil company can actually deduct from its tax liability the money it spends cleaning up after an oil spill as an 'ordinary cost of doing business.'

There's nothing ordinary about outrages such as the 2010 Deepwater Horizon disaster. If Hastings' bill passes, and oil companies are forced to pay in full for the damages caused by spills, perhaps these companies would figure out that pursuing a cleaner path just might be a wiser approach. After all, has there ever been a wind spill in the United States?

Hastings acknowledges that this bill could compel needed changes in American energy policy:

By eliminating a loophole that lets the largest oil and gas companies benefit from their own mistakes, this bill makes the tax code fair again for hardworking Americans and will put our country on track to develop a clean, sustainable, and sensible energy policy.

I believe the tax code should reflect our country's need to end our reliance on fossil fuels by discouraging blowouts and oil spills and providing incentives for responsible and efficient energy use, and sustainable, clean energy sources. We can no longer afford a 20th century energy policy when the rest of the world is well into the 21st century. From the Keystone pipeline debate to subsidies for oil and gas companies, our antiquated energy policy is reflected in our outdated tax code containing many provisions that have long since outgrown their usefulness. My bill will put our country on the right track.

It's difficult to imagine the oil companies (and the "free-market" outfits they sponsor) conjuring up any logical argument against this bill. They certainly can't plead poverty; ExxonMobil, for example, recently announced that it scored a $41 billion profit in 2011.

President Obama should call on Congress to pass this bill, and signal to the American people that he will not hesitate to sign it into law. What would be the political downside? How many Americans are really rooting for the oil companies to avoid financial responsibility for their actions?

There isn't an insult the opponents of this bill can come up with that will damage Obama. They've already exhausted their epithets. Obama merely has to emphasize that he's standing up for the rights of the American taxpayer--and that the opponents of the bill are standing up for the rights of their fossil-fuel financiers--and he wins the moral fight in a first-round knockout.

In his State of the Union Address, Obama vowed that he would not walk away from the promise of clean energy. However, clean energy won't fulfill its promise so long as the producers of dirty energy can get away with their economic and environmental damage. Does Obama want to be remembered as the man who wrote off concerns about the abuses of Big Oil?

Obama made a brave and bold decision when he gave a thumbs-down to the potentially hazardous Keystone XL pipeline. He should give a thumbs-up to Hastings' effort to hold oil companies accountable. By doing so, he will draw a line in the sand--a line between integrity and irrationality, a line between conservation and contamination, a line between morality and malice.