"NEW ORLEANS -- With the fourth anniversary of the busted well's final sealing coming up in a couple weeks, BP has been pushing back aggressively against the company's critics. On Wednesday night—just hours before the court's ruling—Geoff Morrell, the company's vice president of US communications, spoke in New Orleans at the Society of Environmental Journalists conference, and blamed the media and activists for BP's rough ride.

The company's efforts to clean up the spill have been obscured, he said, by the ill-intentioned efforts of 'opportunistic' environmentalists, shoddy science, and the sloppy work of environmental journalists (much to the chagrin of his audience, hundreds of environmental journalists).

'It's clear that the apocalypse forecast did not come to pass,' he said. 'The environmental impacts of the spill were not as far-reaching or long-lasting as many predicted.'"

Tim McDonnell reports for Mother Jones September 4, 2014. [2]