BP 'small people' comment causes anger along Gulf

VENICE, La. – The "small people" of the Gulf Coast have a humongous message for oil giant BP: They're tired of the company's big-time executives making insensitive comments.

On Wednesday, BP Chairman Carl-Henric Svanberg told reporters in Washington: "I hear comments sometimes that large oil companies are greedy companies or don't care, but that is not the case with BP. We care about the small people."

Justin Taffinder of New Orleans was not amused.

"We're not small people. We're human beings. They're no greater than us. We don't bow down to them. We don't pray to them," Taffinder said.

Svanberg is Swedish, and his comments may have been an unintentional slight. He uttered the remark to reporters following a joint press conference with President Barack Obama — who had spoke of the small business owners, the fishermen and the shrimpers affected by the spill.

But coastal residents already were angry over the oil spill disaster and at BP CEO Tony Hayward's earlier comments that he "wants his life back."

Asked about the chairman's remark, BP spokesman Toby Odone told The Associated Press in an e-mail that "it is clear that what he means is that he cares about local businesses and local people. This was a slip in translation."

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the only thing that's 'clear' is that a lot of people aren't feeling very forgiving about much of anything and are ready to find fault with pretty much everything.