One of the problems with the gulf oil disaster is it isn’t a 30 second and we’re done sort
of a story. Nor is it a simple story–the amount of leaking oil, the extent of the damage, who is to blame, the path it will follow and how well the ‘cleanup’ will work are all aspects of the story that will be unknown for quite some time.
It’s a hard story for the media to cover and a hard one for the public to fully grasp. In an effort to try to understand what we know at this point, I started making a list of links to information about various parts of this story. And because I’m a really nice person who likes to share, here is what I found:
- AP questions how many times and how thoroughly MMS inspected Deep Horizon. Hell, even BP questions the safety of its rigs.
- Alaska Senator Lisa Murkowski still thinks offshore drilling is a good idea, which is understandable since she raked in $400,000 in contributions from the oil and gas industry during an 8 year period.
- Think this kind of eco-catastrophe like this can’t happen in your area because there isn’t off-shore drilling? Think again. And lets be mindful that we aren’t the only country experiencing problems.
Meanwhile, dead turtles like this are starting to wash up on our shores:
- Unquestionably, the damage to the gulf eco-system will be horrific and there is substantive worry about the dispersant agents that are being used. There is also the horrific possibility that cleanup efforts could be thwarted and the damage spread during hurricane season.
And how did it happen–this excellent graphic from NOAA explains:
- So just how much oil is gushing? Good question–probably more than we’ve been told.
- And as if that weren’t all depressing and infuriating enough, the story that should be screaming at the top of page one but is almost completely awol in the media is this:
Peak oil is coming to an end
- Finally, here is a series of videos running around the web this morning showing just how easy it is to boycott BP–you drive away and go to another gas station to tank up. While boycotting BP is a worthy idea, doing it in your car might possibly be missing the point. Here is another idea that makes the point in a slightly more principled way. Call some friends, get some drums to bang on and make some signs and go stand in front of a well-traveled gas station and make some noise. Count me in.
———-
