Here’s a letter to the Washington Post:
Deborah Hahn writes: “Until the damaged BP well in the Gulf of Mexico is capped, please publish daily a front-page picture of wildlife covered in oil, in misery, dying, unable to be cleaned” (Letters, June 26). Ms. Hahn believes that “such pictures are needed to educate the public” about the “horrors of what oil accidents do to our fellow creatures.”
Oil accidents are indeed horrible. But they are the very visible downside of a product with an enormous upside – an upside so important and ubiquitous that, ironically, it has become invisible. It is to us as water is to fish.
So an even greater danger now is an economy polluted by a gusher of panic-driven crude legislation. To counter this danger, please also publish daily a picture of oil’s neglected benefits – such as people still alive because of pharmaceuticals and medical devices; men and women healthy because dangerous bacteria were killed by ammonia or kept contained by plastics; children and grandparents smiling because they’re able to visit each other having driven over roads made of asphalt or flown in airplanes powered by aviation fuel; your readers enjoying your paper (printed with ink!) because they wear eye’glasses’ made of plexiglass.
What really needs more media attention are the many marvels that, because they are so common, are taken for granted.
Sincerely,
Donald J. Boudreaux
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Point taken. However, BP had a responsibility to operate in a safe prudent manner – they did not. Bob Brinker said on his radio show that he checked and found that the other big operators in the gulf had around 12-13 safety violations combined – BP, on its own, had hundreds!!! If all precautions were taken and safety and operational standards were rigorously followed, then an accident is an act of God. But thats not what happened.
The distinction between BP and the other operators need to be emphasized, and we shoudl just cut BP out of all of their licenses and permits – let them sail on that!!!
I won't speak for vidyohs. But history has shown that when a large, heavily armed, and extremely powerful government endeavors to maneuver around, rather than follow, the laws, the risk to everyone under its hegemony (and beyond) can be quite grave and lasting. Certainly far greater than any oil spill.
You didn't read my whole statement. I said more than that. And the totality of what I said includes (to anyone with a basic uncontroversial understanding of supply and demand) what you said.
I am presuming, with a high degree of confidence (the kind I would bet a large percentage of my net worth on), that there will ALWAYS be oil sitting in “easy” to get spots–not just for a century.
It is always amusing to hear those folks explain the low price of oil. There is at least one common characteristic among those in the “peak oil” crowd–they are economic illiterates.
Perhaps if people had made a stink about it (so to speak). Instead people complained more about the effect of the loud motors on their passing horses. And speed laws were made because of it.
But in a totally free society, where all property is either privately owned, or unclaimed, the owners of the affected property would have the say. And of course, those owners would almost certainly be influence by their voluntary agreements with their neighbors and others.
In other words, you are describing something that can only be a problem to the extent that there is not a free society.
The PotUS apparently disagrees with you, as he issued a moratorium against ALL Gulf deep water drillers.
“Obvious” does not include anything that requires complex models and large data sets with low signal-to-noise ratios.
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