BP's Hayward: In oil spills, size counts

When it comes to holding opposite ideas at the same moment, Tony Hayward, BP's chief executive, is a master of cognitive dissonance. He can simultaneously think big (as in ocean) but also tiny (as in BP's oil spill), conjuring up both images to slip out of the noose of his company's negligence in the Gulf catastrophe. Here's how he did it in an interview with the Guardian newspaper:

"The Gulf of Mexico is a very big ocean. The amount of oil and dispersant we are putting into it is tiny in relation to the total water volume."

While the experts are still trying to figure out what upward of three million gallons spilling a day will eventually do to devastate that big ocean's ecological system, we'll add our two cents by freely giving Hayward our coveted Grumpy Abe Linguistic Lunacy (GALL) award.