Real Tarryl Clark Ads of Genius

Tarryl Clark, the latest person sent up to attack Evil Michele Bachmann, has been running a boatload of anti-Bachmann ads that reference Bachmann's comments concerning BP's role in cleaning up the oil spill.

Among Bachmann's concerns was the establishment of a $20 billion trust fund to pay damage claims. Clark's contention, which is ludicrous, is that Bachmann wants to let BP "off the hook" for damages or something.

Bachmann had a point: even for a huge multinational like BP, $20 billion is a huge chunk of change. It's hard to operate with that sort of gouge taken out of your company. And now we can see one result of the problem: BP is having trouble paying its other bills. Ed Morrissey shares a report from a local television station in the Gulf:

Hundreds of fishermen from Lake Charles to Moss Point, Miss., were supposed to get checks from BP on Wednesday but didn’t. Wednesday night, their lawyer wanted answers. Jeffrey Briet represents more than 500 fishermen, and he said the payment system he set up with BP required his clients to be paid every 30 days.

Now that process has suddenly changed without warning, Briet said.

“Not only did they spring it on us that the process has changed, but the people I’ve been dealing with for six weeks who’ve done a good job said, ‘We don’t know what the process is going to be. We’re not authorized to talk to you about it. Someone from BP will contact you,’” he said.

But Briet said he hasn’t heard from BP or its lawyers. He said the claims people have been given so much conflicting information about the process that they can’t provide answers.

So is BP evil? Well, let Ed explain the problem, which anyone who actually understands the private sector could have explained:

Generally speaking, when a company fails to make payroll or meet its Accounts Payable on time, it’s a sign of potential collapse. Sometimes, it’s just a simple issue of red tape within large corporations. It’s hard to tell which is which, but with BP transferring $20 billion into a trust fund and spending a few billion more on the cleanup, it’s certainly not unreasonable to wonder about its cash flow and stability.

Bachmann understood that, which is why she complained about the Obama administration's heavy-handed approach. The irony is that Clark is trying to say that Bachmann wants to let BP off the hook. If BP ends up collapsing, the $20 billion the Obama administration took out of its hide will be one of the primary reasons. And if BP collapses, guess who will be on the hook?