ExxonMobile Gets Another Break on Valdez Spill Penalty

How much do you want to bet that the employees won't be getting any of this savings in their Christmas stockings this year?

A federal judge has given petroleum giant ExxonMobil a break on its pay out for the Valdez spill, according to a breaking report from the Associated Press.

The news agency is currently reporting that a federal appeals court halved the $5 billion awarded by a jury to Alaskans and other parties to deal with the consequences of the spill. The spill dumped tens of millions of gallons of oil in the Prince William Sound, which spread all over Alaska's coastline.

In the third quarter of 2006, ExxonMobil reported earning about $10.5 billion in net income, and in the first nine months of 2006, it earned just under $30 billion.

Cited story.

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Sorry you've been having a rough time, but I have to disagree about science's times. All in all, science seems to be on the ascendant. Specific issues dealt blows to certain fields' credibility, but the big picture is positive on, IMHO.

1. The fallout from the late-2005 Dover intelligent-design decision has been largely positive. Awareness of the vacuous claims of the ID crowd, at least, has spread.

2. 2006 was the breakout year for climate change. Gregg Easterbrook, Michael Shermer and other skeptics fell in line, "An Inconvenient Truth" was a huge success, and the public finally recognizing that it's serious.

3. Anti-science legislators were booted out of Congress across the country, Chris Mooney's book, "The Republican War" on science was a big seller, and both Dennett's and Dawkin's pro-rationalism takes on theism are selling briskly, too.

4. Battlestar Galactica. Need I say more?

There is more about ExxonMobil than pollution issues, financing of climate change denial, etc. There is also their financing of extreme Right racist separatists in Belgium. See here.

That story is disgusting, especially considering how long it has taken ExxonMobil to pay it. I bet it will still go unpaid.