Saving Sea Turtles; Hurricane Alex in the Gulf; Oyster Areas Re-Opened
ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR: We're "Keeping Them Honest" tonight. Are efforts to skim the oil being snarled by government red tape, or is BP trying to slow the skimming and disperse the oil instead to limit its liability? Allegations tonight of both. We are here at the Audubon Aquatic Center Sea Turtle Rehabilitation Program. They've got a dolphin here, and they have got sea turtles, more than 100 sea turtles. We'll show you how those sea turtles are being treated and how their lives are being saved and the oil cleaned off, and what's going to happen to them once this disaster is finally over. We'll have that later in the program. This is day 71, the oil still gushing into the Gulf, still flooding ashore. Tropical storm Alex churning the waters, making them too rough to skim for oil. The Coast Guard today ordering those skimmers, those boats specially designed to collect oil off the surface, skimming it off the surface, ordering those boats back into port until the sea calms down. The fact is you don't need a tropical storm to stymie the skimming. Long before the wind picked up here, it was already tangled in red tape. We are "Keeping Them Honest". People down here demanding to know where is the sense of urgency? I mean, we saw the exact same thing during Katrina, emergency work hampered by people operating from the non-emergency rule books, rules that maybe made sense or might make sense or could have made sense in normal times that seem to make no sense now. Take these skimmers, for instance. There are 433 of them according to "The Times Picayune", the local paper in New Orleans. According to the paper, there are more than 1,600 skimmers available elsewhere in the continental United States. They need every skimmer they can get down here, so why not use some of those? Well, it turns out the 1990 Oil Pollution Act requires many of them to be standing by in case of other spills elsewhere. But you would probably say, well, look, the nation's worst environmental disaster is unfolding right here right now. And what does the federal government say to that? Well, not much. Admiral Thad Allen, last week, more than two months into the disaster, saying that working around the 1990 law is -- and I quote -- "a work in progress". Is that what you would say if this country is being attacked? Meantime, new waves of oil hitting the shore in Mississippi and Florida, new beach closings in both states, and officials closing the inlet into Pensacola Bay as a six-square-mile sheet of thick reddish oil patches getting closer. So, what about foreign countries offering up their skimming vessels? Well, it turns out there's a law against that, too, the Jones Act of 1920, intended to prevent foreign ships from taking part in American domestic trade, taking cargo from one American port to the other; the law being interpreted to mean that foreign skimmers cannot pick up oil within three miles of shore, because that's considered a port and dump it -- a port onshore. As of last week, six vessels have applied for waivers to the Jones Act. None has been granted. Other foreign skimmers are working outside the three-mile limit, kept out by red tape. But are they also being stopped by BP to hide the true size of the spill? Tomorrow, a Dallas investment banker is scheduled to testify before a Senate committee. His name is Fred McCallister. And he's from a company called Allegiance Capital. He says he's been trying to broker a deal with BP to bring 12 large skimmers from Greece. He made the offer two weeks ago, at first believed BP didn't respond because of the Jones Act. Now he is questioning BP's motive, and he's expected to tell the Senate committee tomorrow that BP is trying to disperse and sink the oil, instead of skimming, to serve -- his words -- its own financial interests. Fred McCallister joins us now. Fred, why do you think that BP would prefer to use dispersants over skimmers?</s>FRED MCCALLISTER, VICE PRESIDENT, ALLEGIANCE CAPITAL CORPORATION: Anderson, thank you for having me on tonight. The issue that BP is facing right now is whether to use what's practices that are -- that are normal around the world, which is to try to cause the oil to come to the surface, and then deploy the right amount of equipment and the right type of equipment to gather that oil up and get it out of the Gulf. Using the dispersants allows the oil to stay under the surface and this accomplishes several purposes. It allows the -- it makes it a lot more difficult to quantify the amount of oil that's coming out, which has a direct impact on damages and royalties that have to be paid. It keeps it out of sight and out of mind. And it allows BP to amortize the cost of the cleanup over several years, 10 to 15 years, because some of this oil is going to biodegrade, but a lot of that oil is going to roll up on the beaches for 10 or 15 years. And if they can amortize that over 10 or 15 years, as opposed to dealing with that over the next 15 months, that's a much better financial position for BP to be in.</s>COOPER: Well, let's be clear, though. The EPA has sanctioned the use of dispersants on the spill. I mean, dispersants are generally less harmful, they say, and toxic than the oil itself. But you say it's really about BP's financial interests?</s>MCCALLISTER: Well, it's about -- well, in terms of environmental impact, it's about getting the oil to the surface and getting it out of the water. That's the best solution, bar none. And I understand that the EPA has sanctioned the use of these dispersants, but I also believe that BP is in control of this situation. And they're doing what's in the best interest of BP and their shareholders. No one wants BP to fail, trust me. I don't want BP to fail. It's in the best interests of the country and everybody in the Gulf region. I happen to be from that region. I have family there. I have property there. I want BP to succeed.</s>COOPER: But do you have any direct evidence, though, that what you're saying, what you believe is true is actually true? I mean, do you have any evidence that BP is basically using these dispersants to keep the oil from not coming into the surface for financial motives, and not using these skimmers?</s>MCCALLISTER: I -- I have been working on this project of trying to get these skimmers into the Gulf for over a month now. Everybody in Europe, where standard practice is to raise the oil and to collect it, is scratching their heads and, quite honestly, laughing at what's happening in the Gulf. This is -- and I have educated myself over the last month, as I have gone through this process of trying to get these skimmers here, because it seems self- evident that these skimmers were needed. People like Billy Nungesser down there are using makeshift equipment. And so I began to educate myself. And what I have learned is that everybody is looking at us and wondering why we're allowing this to happen. And as a businessman, the only answer I could come up with is what are the motivations for not dealing with this issue head-on, raising the oil, and collecting it with the skimmers? And the only answer is the financial interest of BP. I don't -- I don't see any other reason that it should be handled the way that it's handled.</s>COOPER: I mean, the other alternative could be, A, that they believe in the dispersants or don't believe in the skimmers, or B, that they're simply incompetent or just not doing a very good job.</s>MCCALLISTER: Well, Anderson, it's a grand experiment on an unprecedented scale. And, unfortunately, I don't know that we're going -- you and I are going to know the results of this experiment until we get 20 years down the road. I think we know what the result would be if we put an armada of vehicles -- of vessels out there and gathered the oil off the surface and took it out of the Gulf. We know what would result from that. We don't know what's going to result from emulsifying this oil into the Gulf, what's happening under the surface to the marine life, and what the long-term effects are going to be.</s>COOPER: Yes. Well, I should point out, as we always do, we invited BP to be on the program tonight to defend themselves, basically, and show their side of the story. They declined that. In particular, in response to this, they said they wouldn't have any response to your allegations. Mr. McCallister, I appreciate you being on with us tonight. Our invitation of course stands, as always, to BP to come on.</s>MCCALLISTER: Thank you.</s>COOPER: More now on the skimmer shortage and the red tape angle. I talked about it just a short while ago with political contributor James Carville and the president of Plaquemines Parish, Billy Nungesser.</s>COOPER: Billy, does this make any sense to you? Seventy-one days into this thing and they're still in need of skimmers to -- to -- to pick this oil up?</s>BILLY NUNGESSER, PRESIDENT, PLAQUEMINES PARISH, LOUISIANA: You know, it's -- how do you say we're at war, and we're still piece- mealing this thing one skimmer at a time, two skimmers at a time? Maybe we'll set aside the Jones Act. Maybe it doesn't have to be set aside. It seems, by now, we should have a clear picture of where all the equipment is and have it all deployed. The oil still has not stopped. What do we not get here? I mean, the men and women on the ground in Plaquemines are working hard. Coast Guard, BP, we're making progress. We're not there yet, but we're making progress. But the support from above is not there. This equipment is still being piece-mealed. We still having trouble getting equipment approved through the process.</s>COOPER: Shell Oil apparently offered up this huge vessel that they have. And, basically, BP said no thanks, and it's still just been sitting in a dock.</s>NUNGESSER: There's many vessels all over: German, there's Australia, there's Dutch equipment. All these skimmers all over the world, some that can go down and get these -- this oil beneath the surface, and yet none of it has been deployed.</s>JAMES CARVILLE, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: You know, it strikes me that the President said in a speech -- I was glad to see it, because of the language he used -- is that we're being invaded. This is -- but the heck with the oil spill act of 1990. And they're governed by that and they're governed by something else. Go to Congress, get them to change it. They went in 1:30 in the morning for Terri Schiavo, they changed it like that. It's not -- this no one envisioned this. So, if the statutes we have now are inadequate to deal with this, have something amended. And it's not the -- the Coast Guard would tell you, look, we're in compliance with this statute and this person is in compliance with that statute. And I think the President -- I have always thought from the get- go that this is an extraordinary event, a catastrophe of the first magnitude. I still think that we haven't gotten the whole truth as to how bad this is. And I just think that we're operating under a 1990 statute that's not appropriate to the gravity of the situation we're in.</s>COOPER: It does seem that people use that rhetoric of fighting a war, but, I mean, honestly, if a war was fought the way this is being fought, the country would be--</s>NUNGESSER: We would be occupied territory.</s>COOPER: -- completely --</s>CARVILLE: Maybe we are in Afghanistan.</s>NUNGESSER: You know, when you talk about the dispersants, and if we let it come to the top, it would be ugly, if equipment like this, one that is sitting up in -- the largest skimmer in the world --</s>COOPER: Right. There's this huge supertanker now which can apparently suck up -- I mean, they claim can suck up hundreds of thousands of barrels of oil.</s>NUNGESSER: And there's no sense of urgency to get it to work. If we brought all that kind of equipment and put it out there, and this oil is light, and we quit spraying the dispersants, let it come to the surface, and surround it with all these fleets from all over the world, we could be kicking butt, as the President says, out there, before it comes ashore underneath the surface.</s>CARVILLE: Yes.</s>COOPER: You saw Vice President Biden today. How did that go?</s>NUNGESSER: Well, I was disappointed. We waited with the other parish presidents a little over three hours. He walked in, took a picture, and was on his way. I got 30 seconds with him. And I thought we were going to sit down and have a meeting. I brought a book of stuff to discuss.</s>COOPER: You actually brought a book of stuff that you wanted to discuss with the vice president?</s>NUNGESSER: Well, I wanted to show him my five-point plan, why the berms are important, why we have to have a long-term plan. If the oil is going to be out there two to three years, we've got to control our destiny. We've got to clean it up inside and we have to have a long-term plan to keep it out. And we're fighting to get that approved. So, I had that plan to give him. I did give him the book. But I said, listen, tell the President it's not too late. But if we don't make some serious changes and a sense of urgency does not take hold here, we will lose this war, and it will be his fault.</s>COOPER: We've got to take a quick break. We'll have more with you guys in just a minute.</s>COOPER: In the meantime, let us know what you think. You can join the live chat right now at AC360.com. I just want to remind you, we're at the Audubon Aquatic Center Sea Turtle Rehabilitation Program. They're really doing remarkable work here, trying to save the lives of sea turtles. They have more than 100 of them here that they have found covered in oil. Here's one of them. It's actually kind of just resting here. We'll have a lot more about what they're doing to take the oil off these turtles and one day hopefully re-release them into the wild. Also ahead tonight: BP's so-called reporters on their blog. They always seem to find the silver lining in this disaster. They have even been getting some of the people around here to talk and be quoted in their stories. The question we had is are they cherry-picking quotes and taking what people say out of context to make the company look better? We asked one of the folks they spoke to, "Keeping Them Honest". And later: Chad Myers on Tropical Storm Alex, where it's heading, how soon it's likely to become a hurricane, and what impact it's already having here.