Convenient Disasters

By Alan Caruba —— Bio and Archives May 1, 2010

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I am the last person to subscribe to conspiracy theories, but I do find it incredibly convenient for the opponents of offshore (and domestic) drilling for oil that the BP oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico had an explosion and the subsequent leak.

Opponents of coal mining also received a gift in the form of the Massey coal mine explosion in West Virginia that killed a number of miners. All-in-all, a bad few weeks for what the Greens call “dirty” fuels. The decades-long ban on off-shore drilling along the 85% of the U.S. continental shelf was declared rescinded at the end of the second term of George W. Bush (why did he wait nearly eight years?). Even President Obama made some comments regarding it about a month ago, but I thought then and think now that it was a subterfuge to make the announcement of the approval for a giant wind turbine field off of Hyannisport, Massachusetts more palatable to the public. Now the President, who has never had a good word for coal or oil, gets to fly over the giant oil slick on Sunday and return to the White House to further damage any prospect of Americans have access to their own oil. Frankly, I do not ever recall an account of an oil rig “exploding.” These giant rigs are technological wonders, filled with all manner of safety devices. Coal mines, on the other hand, have a long history of such events. The irony is that BP (British Petroleum) Oil has for years trumpeted how environmentally concerned it was. BP would have had us believe that they were about more than just oil and a good corporate citizen championing environmentalism. They are about to learn whether their Green friends come to their defense. It’s doubtful. The real losers in this disaster are Americans who will eventually see the price of a gallon of gasoline rise along with the cost of all other oil-related products. It’s not like any common sense will be applied wherein someone in government says it’s time to drill in a tiny area of Alaska’s desolate ANWR to make up for the supply loss from the BP rig. If anything, the BP disaster will be used as “further proof” that all offshore drilling should be stopped. Tell that to Mother Earth. Oil from beneath the oceans and seas escapes all the time. The difference is that it cannot be captured, refined, and used for our benefit. © Alan Caruba, 2010