The stock price of Murphy Oil Corporation is down 74 cents per share today on news that the company has been caught engaging in multiple acts of pollution over an extended period of time. At just one of the company’s refineries in Louisiana, Murphy Oil violated pollution standards 21 times over the last 5 years.
The refinery released huge amounts of toxic material into the air, violating the Clean Air Act as it processed crude oil brought in from offshore oil rigs in the Gulf of Mexico. Consider the amount of methane released around the Murphy plant in Louisiana, as reported by a concerned citizens group, as just one example of the harm caused by the Murphy Oil Corporation to its neighbors.
The Murphy Oil Corporation doesn’t limit its pollution to America’s air and waters, however. It pollutes its our nation’s political system as well, with money that’s every bit as dirty as the crude oil it pumps out of the ocean floor.
The chart you see here shows the amounts of political campaign contributions made so far by employees of the Murphy Oil Corporation for the 2010 congressional campaign cycle. You’ll notice that there are only three recipients of these donations: Blue Dog Democrat Mike Ross, right wing Democratic senator Blanche Lincoln, and 2nd district Republican congressional candidate Tim Griffin.
The interesting thing is that these three candidates have received campaign donations from the Murphy Oil Corporation Political Action Committee (MURPAC). In fact, of all the campaign donations made by employees of the Murphy Oil Corporation, not one donation has been made to a candidate who has not received the financial endorsement of MURPAC.
That’s an interesting coincidence, isn’t it? It’s also an interesting coincidence that Murphy Oil CEO David Wood, Vice President of Manufacturing Ernest Cagle, corporate attorney Walter Compton, executive Steve Cosse, and Senior Vice President Billy Stobaugh all just happened to make their campaign donations to Blanche Lincoln on the same day, March 11, 2009. Another coincidence: Steve Cosse, Murphy Oil Senior Vice President Kevin Fitzgerald, and Executive Kelli Hammock all happened to make their donations to Mike Ross on August 19, 2009. Consider that there are 365 days in the year, and a small group of 13 employees from the Murphy Oil Corporation that made direct donations to congressional candidates’ campaigns this year, and the idea that these coincidences are the result of mere random happenstance seems absurd.
It would be a crime, a grave instance of political corruption, if the Murphy Oil Corporation coordinated the individual political donations of its employees. Murphy Oil has already been caught violating laws against pollution. Is it violating campaign finance law as well? I don’t know for sure that such criminal coordination took place, but clues suggesting such coordination are strong.
By the way, Murphy Oil’s money meddling in Arkansas politics is not restricted to congressional candidates. Bill Halter, the Lieutenant Governor of Arkansas, has taken $4,000 from the Murphy Oil Corporation Political Action Committee.
i don’t understand – did you somehow forget that it’s the god-given right of every corporation to pollute their ever-loving shit all over the planet? This is BIDNESS as USUAL, bWAH! Like, get with the program dude.
This country and the entire world – is so FUCKED!
it’s worse than that