The Gulf Oil Spill: Thirty-Five Days And Counting

I had planned to get this post up sooner. But I was waiting to see what happened to my old AHS classmate John Tote in his bid for Director of N.C. Mental Health. Meanwhile, the good Dr. Joe Guarino beat me to it. So forgive me if I repeat myself.

If I had not gotten into medical school all those years ago, "Plan B" was to pursue a doctorate (PhD) of some sort in the biological sciences . . .

. . . I'm quite certain it would have had something to do with chasing large sea creatures in deep blue waters. We all have our secret desires and what-if's. My Pops was a train-man at heart. I am a tree-hugging/animal-loving geek.

I might not have gotten "rich" (yeah, right) chasing whales, but I probably would have been much happier/healthier in the long run.

Happy that is, until now. I can barely stomach news reports on the Gulf Oil spill. It's physically painful for me to look at the pictures of dead sea birds and fish . . . or the mucked-up wetlands and shores.

And this live feed from CNN is just nauseating.

As this man-made-disaster-now-in-its-thirty-fifth-day has unfolded . . . and President Obama has coasted over it like a sufer on a big wave . . . it has been incredible to me that everything that happened immediately before and after Hurricane Katrina (an act of God that everyone on the Gulf Coast knew was inevitable . . . yet somehow no one was prepared to deal with) was, according to the deep-blue rabid left (and an MSM infatuated with youth and vigor as opposed to honor and duty), George Bush's fault.

It actually wasn't.

We-The-People-Of-The-United-States can send a man to the moon and shuttles into orbit, but we cannot stop a gusher on the ocean floor? And if we cannot stop a gusher on the ocean floor, what-in-the-HELL were we doing drilling there in the first place?

Where is the damned fleet? Where are the best-minds and brightest ideas?

Yet until recently, there's been barely a whimper about the Obama administration's stunning/appalling lack-luster response to the ecological disaster that is the Gulf Oil spill-that-is-still-spilling.

It's just a small portion of a big ocean. No big deal.

Our President and his minions-hunkered-down-in-the-West-Wing kept reciting the same mantra: Let BP handle it. They are the experts. Yeah right. Just like BP obviously handled everything leading up to the explosion so well. And the government, of course, offered stellar oversight.

Just like the government offers stellar oversight of "non-profit" healthcare and its own programs.

Speaking of mixed messages, before the disaster, Obama wanted to drill immediately off the North Carolina coast. Even deep-blue Bev Purdue was caught off-guard, and was not real enamoured of that "progressive" idea.

Of course, in the end, for Governor Bev, it came down to profit as opposed to principle.

The Democratic party and ideological left has a collective stroke every time someone so much as mentions drilling in Alaska (where containing a wayward/spewing well would be much easier than stopping an open gusher over a mile below the ocean's surface). Yet, we in North Carolina, with fragile barrier islands that literally move with every hurricane are supposed to suck-it-up.

Make no mistake. This mega-disaster WILL affect us sooner or later. Ocean currents have the potential to make our already-fragile North Carolina coastline a wasteland for wildlife.

In fact, an NCSU professor (one of those PhD's) says we already have good reason to be very worried. And that's not even taking into consideration the wild card of hurricane season.

Meanwhile, you cannot tell me that ideology and media bias are not shaping and minimizing the environmental & economic impact of this story . . . to detract attention away from President Obama's sorry/pitiful excuse for leadership in what I fear will ultimately prove to be a global disaster. And/so there IS (dontcha just love that word?) a "disconnect". Dr. Joe Guarino is spot-on . . .

. . . as Joe is spot-on about a great many other things going on in our community. Ugly things. Insidious things. And for that, he has become a target.

I wouldn't, of course, know anything about that.

Not everyone in this blogosphere is "stupid", Mr. Cone. Or "batshit crazy" or a "booger-eating moron" or a "lunatic" or a "racist" or any of the other nasty/vile things you and your high-minded, enlightened friends-oh-so-concerned-with-civility have flung during any-given-day-in-the-blogosphere.

Moreover, those of us who have been on the wrong end of silence FOREVER (and who think that, in this state seeped in corruption, MORE sincere prayer in public venues might actually be a good thing) are not buying what you are selling.

Among other things, Barack Obama was supposed to be "Mr. Environment". Of course, he was supposed to be a lot of things that he is clearly not.

But I guess we can look on the bright side. The toxic effects of the muck between our toes and the tar flavoring our seafood won't be that big of a deal when Obama's new-improved government healthcare reform bill really kicks in.

Yeah right. And if you believe that, I have an oil rig in the Gulf to sell you.

There's only a wee bit of damage.