"It was twenty years ago today Sgt. Pepper taught the band to play" ...It was also about twenty years ago that the Exxon Valdez spilled oil which covered a large area of Alaska.
The oil, in substantial portion, is still there polluting the environment.
The justices on the U.S. Supreme Court let ExxonMobil off the hook by substantially lowering the damages that had been awarded by an Alaska court.
Now we have another major disaster off the coast near New Orleans (where about 90% of the close-to-shore rigs were wiped out or shut down by hurricane Katrina and Rita, and many other rigs not close to shore were disrupted or destroyed by Katrina and Rita).
In the disaster this week, one of the Cadillacs of oil drilling rigs built in 2001, the Deepwater Horizon, exploded and sank (after about 20 years of what Obama called significant technological improvements to drilling rigs).
Those who are ignorant of the dangers facing humanity like to say drill baby drill, but the real story is Spill Baby Spill.
The search for missing crewmen and the containment of a major oil spill are still under way.
UPDATE: The U.S. Coast Guard has now verified that this is a major spill:
For days, the Coast Guard has said no oil appeared to be escaping from the well head on the ocean floor. Rear Adm. Mary Landry said the leak was a new discovery but could have begun when the rig sank on Thursday, two days after the initial explosion.(Huffington Post). Oilah Akbar! Oilah Akbar! is the religion of the oil barons who preach one thing but deliver the death of civilization.
"We thought what we were dealing with as of yesterday was a surface residual (oil) from the mobile offshore drilling unit," Landry said. "In addition to that is oil emanating from the well. It is a big change from yesterday ... This is a very serious spill, absolutely."
Before this spill we talked about the inane decision to allow drilling offshore, which President Obama alluded to as "tired arguments of long ago".
Start up the word grinders Press Secretary Fibbs (successor to Snotty and Snow Job) and see if you can out do the neoCons with propaganda.
The next post in this series is here, the previous post in this series is here.
I remember the moment of the Exxon Valdez oil spill.
ReplyDeleteI lived in Alaska at the time the news came across, within an hour of the Coast Guard report that it had run aground near Valdez.
I was drinking my morning coffee.
It was an overdose (O.D.) which the powers that be ignored, moving on closer to our demise.
There needs to be a more visceral way to convey the impact of an oil spill to the sheeple. Of course that will never happen absent significant $PR support. I guess that was mainly a rhetorical statement, as we all know big business - and there IS NO BIGGER BUSINESS than big oil - will simply swamp all messages contrary to their party line. Welcome to America. Land of the free, and the home of the (very, very) rich.
ReplyDeleteGood video is probably the better way to get the point across.
ReplyDeleteThe well head has now been discovered to be leaking copiously. Yee haw!
ReplyDeleteThere seems to be a reluctance to spill the beans after spilling the oil.
ReplyDeleteOne report has it:
"The well could be spilling up to 336,000 gallons (1,271,860 liters) of crude oil a day, Coast Guard Petty Officer Katherine McNamara said. She said she didn’t know whether the crude oil was spilling into the gulf." (WRAL TV, emphasis added)
I do not think anyone in the Oilah Akbar! religion wants these sins known at this time.
At least not until they start their offshore temple mosque church to do the snake oil drilling off Virginia Beach.
Post updated. Hat tip to disaffected who was out in front on the news about the well head leak.
ReplyDeleteThis is now a tragedy they could not cover up.
How are they going to get down there to cap the well head if it has been twisted out of shape?
Any oil field workers out there?