Spill, Baby, Kill

The first heartbreaking images of oil-soaked, dying wildlife are now reaching the media, a reminder of the Exxon Alaska disaster. When will we ever learn that technology is not a failsafe solution and we have no business drilling in 5,000 feet of water without ironclad contingency plans? And, now, this is in our own backyard. Indeed, we might as well have set off a nuclear bomb in the Gulf of Mexico, as the long-term effects will be similar. Barring a quick capping of the “spill” a wasteland waits, destroying the delicate ecosystem along our very borders, and inevitably to the promised economic recovery as well.

New supercomputer studies suggest it is "very likely" ocean currents will carry oil from the Deepwater Horizon spill in the Gulf of Mexico around the tip of Florida and thousands of miles up the U.S. East Coast this summer. Perhaps Washington will finally get the message when the Gulf Stream delivers some of this oil to the Potomac River.