BP has filed suit against the federal government over the EPA’s decision to suspend it from new federal contracts, after the company pleaded guilty to manslaughter and obstruction of justice (h/t Jennifer). The company now alleges that the EPA’s continued ban is “an abuse of discretion.”

The Deepwater Horizon incident was a clusterfuck of historic proportions, but those guilty pleas only resulted in a fine, plus probation and something called “independent monitoring.” Of course, the fine was for $4 billion, which seems like a large chunk of change to me and (I assume) you, but what is that to BP? As a result of the fallout from Deepwater Horizon, BP’s 2012 profits were “halved,” according to the Telegraph, to $12 billion.

In other words, the criminal penalty paid by BP for the deaths of eleven people, an 87-day ocean-floor oil gusher, and who-knows-how-much resulting damage, was one-third of their profit from 2012. Not their revenue, their profit. And if the Telegraph is right, it is only one-sixth of the profit they were expecting. If an individual pleaded guilty to killing eleven people and poisoning a large portion of ocean, that person would likely be spending some time in a very small room. That person certainly would not get any traction with a lawsuit against the government for refusing to hire them. Since corporations are supposed to be people, what gives?

I have an idea for a settlement that the EPA might propose, one that is undoubtedly fair based on BP’s own assurances: The EPA will lift the ban on BP contracts if all BP senior executives and directors personally perform community service by assisting with cleanup along the Gulf coast, specifically including time spent in the water with the “cleanup” chemicals the company used, that it assured everyone was safe. BP said that Corexit was no more dangerous than dish soap, so it shouldn’t be a big deal for the BP higher-ups to get at least elbow-deep in the stuff, right?

Of course, I know the EPA would never make that sort of offer, and I definitely know BP would never go for it. I’d just love to hear how BP tried to weasel out of it.

Photo credit: By NASA [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.