Despite eyewitness accounts and photographs, and the complaining of local officials, BP decided to spend a full week in blatant denial that thousands of gallons of oil were washing up on the beach in Pensacola, FL.

This quote from The Upshot says it best:

“Remember how the “vast majority” of the oil in the Gulf is supposed to be gone, according to the White House and BP? Sure, you say — but what about those recent independent scientific reports that showed the opposite to be true? Heck, the government’s own chief scientist admitted that 75 percent of the oil remains in the Gulf just a few days ago. Oh, don’t worry about that, because, as White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs gleefully announced this week, oil-gobbling microbes have eaten up almost all of the undersea oil plumes. Confused yet? Yeah, so are we.” Read more here