An alarming report on the safety record of the BP Corporation appeared in the July 3 newsletter from ProPublica.org, a nonprofit investigative journalism site. It exposed a history of calculated disregard for human life and well-being on the job.

There couldn’t be a better example of criminal conduct in the name of corporate “cost externalization” and the terrible burdens it places on working citizens. The only reason it’s being tolerated is the seemingly limitless money that flows to lobbying efforts and other forms of corporate infiltration in the legislative and regulatory processes. As a result, America is slipping to Third World status when compared to health and safety statistics among developed nations.

Conduct in industry that causes incidents such as those in the article will only stop when it is criminalized and when infraction fines become so onerous that to ignore sound safety and health practices would be unthinkable.

BP said it themselves when referring to the “cost-benefit analysis” that priced human life. It is sad and awful testimony that even some members of affected communities are so inured to consequent death and disease that they accept it as a part of life.

Criminal conduct by scurrilous corporations and the terrible costs it imposes on American citizens must be attacked through a comprehensive effort at both state and federal levels. Tragically, that is unlikely to happen until corporate money and influence are purged from our democratic processes.

Seabury Lyon, Bethel