Our current energy policies have put us on the fast track of killing our planet

Reposted from the Dyslectic Atheist:

After weeks of listening to the officials at B.P. lying, while trying to downplay the severity of this ecological disaster, which was caused directly because of their own negligence and greed – and then hearing all those ignorant right-wind pundits, claiming that the severity of this accident was being overplayed by the environmentalist, solely for their own political gains (I thought how can someone overplay the deaths of 11 oil workers?) And then came the radio talk show hosts like Limbaugh, who were claiming that the oil was actually good for the ocean - and just when I believed that I had heard all of the lunacy, that these ignorant morons had to offer; then I heard this preacher on the radio, blaming this disaster on the godless scientists and the EPA, for over-regulating the industry, which in turn was forcing the oil companies away from drilling their wells in safer places. He was claiming that all of this was happing, because the godless scientists, don’t believe that god has given us these resources to use, and he said that god had placed enough oil in the earth, and everything else on the earth, that will ever need, and it all will last until the rapture comes – and all of this after hearing an ignorant Christian caller, on a different radio talk show, saying how much she missed her dead husband, and that the rapture, couldn’t come quick enough for her – the only thing that I could do at that point, was just scream!

What all these willfully ignorant people, don’t seem to understand is, and that indifferent to what they may believe based on their deluded old book of fairy-tales, is the fact that all life here on earth, started in the oceans over a billion years ago. And if we kill the oceans; all the rest of the life here on the earth, will soon follow – and there will be no rapture, and no imaginary Jesus, to save them.


I find it hard in placing all of the blame for these people’s stupidity and ignorance, solely on their religious beliefs, for them not understanding, just how finite the difference is between the earth being a living planet, and it just being another dead rock floating in space. Our ecosystem is extremely complex, and every and all facets of this system; are totally interdependent on each other - from the smallest life-forms in the oceans, to all of the land animals, including people, everything is depended on each other for survival. Tiny little plankton is the base of the marine food chain. Little fish eat the plankton that then feed the bigger fish, who then intern feed even bigger fish, and at the top of the food chain, is us. The most important of these tiny life-forms, is the phytoplankton; they resided just under the surface of the water, and they provide about 50% of the earth’s oxygen – and together with all the other marine plant-life, they are the only source of oxygen for the fish to breathe. Phytoplanktons are extremely sensitive to toxins – and totally incapable of living in oil. And if there is a mass dying off of the Phytoplankton and other marine-plants, the consequences’ of this, will be extremely severe. As the oxygen levels in the ocean begin to fall, there will be an explosion in the numbers of harmful Bacteria – and the poor fish that haven’t already suffocated to death, will simply become sick and die – many of these bacteria; are also very harmful and toxic to humans as well.


Another of the many problems that we’ll soon be facing; will be an increase in the levels of toxins and carcinogens in the food-chain. Back when the mining industry, began using mercury in the process of extracting gold from ore; no one knew back then, that this extremely toxic substance, would be coming back to haunt us in our food-chain – today, there’s not one single living creature on the planet, that hasn’t been poisoned to some degree or another, by this substance. And soon the extremely toxic chemicals that B.P. and others have been using in a futile attempt to dissolve the oil, will evaporate into the clouds, and return to earth in the form of precipitation (they’re simply breaking down this mass of poison into even more toxic chemicals). And yes, the food crops, the live-stock animals, and humans, will soon, all be enjoying this poison, in the form of rain (at least two of these toxins in this compound, cause changes in the DNA structure of all living creatures – and causes mutations and birth-defects in their offspring).


There are rivers of oil, floating at different depths under the surface of the water – 80 percent of the spilled oil is still under water, and most of it, will eventually reach the coast-lines and pollute the beaches. But not before these toxic clouds create marine dead-zones; and any fish, or any other type of marine animals entering these zones, will simply die. The ones who do survive, will be so poisoned by this toxic mess, that they will have a very difficult time reproducing, furthering the decline of the marine life, in the soon to be wasteland of deadly toxins.


I find this whole situation appalling on so many levels; and not the least of which that it could have been prevented in at least two ways. First of all, it’s too dangerous and irresponsible for our leaders to allow this kind of oil drilling, in such an important and sensitive area of our coast. Secondly, this massive blowout of oil and gas could have been easily prevented, with a device that costs only a small fraction of what the bill for the incompetents of the Bush administration, will be in the end.


Then B.P’s response to this disaster; has just been simply mindboggling to me. Even before the bodies of the 11 dead workers had gotten cold; they were only concerned with recovering as much of the oil as they could – simply so they could keep producing oil from the well; and indifferent to the environmental costs. They started lying about the severity of this event from day one; and now their simply trying to hide it from us. And every one of the actions that they have taken to date; have only be to recover the oil production from this well – these fucking people have been acting like crack-addict’s, who are trying to find they’re lost cocaine-rock; so that they can continue smoking! Now today they’re putting even more people’s lives at risk, in an attempt to try and show that this mess that they have created, is not as toxic and poisonous as it really is – they are creating photo-ops, in which cleanup workers are running around cleaning up oil on the beaches, and without them even wearing the proper safety gear – and at the well site, the boom workers have been exposed to toxic levels of methane gas. They have no concern for the safety of the cleanup workers; they’re only concern is maintaining their own image. When in fact, dealing with this toxic mess, is the equivalent of one sticking their heads into an oven, and then turning the gas on.


What if any good can come out of this mess?


I can only hope that the Obama administration will investigate B.P. and charge those responsible for these acts of willful safety violations – and then have the balls to prosecute them.

Our continued use of fossil fuels is only going to lead to more of these types of events. Before a good friend of mine who made millions of dollars back in the 1950``s and 60s as contractor in the Middle East, building their oil industry, had passed away in the 80s – we had many good conversions. He said that in many of the Muslim Nations where he had worked; that when the oil and military contractions who came before him had seen just how, the people living there, were so brainwashed and kept so ignorant by their beliefs in their silly deluded religion, and that they were easily controlled, and kept so stupid by their king’s and leaders, and how their leaders were keeping them busy, by feeding them irrelevant religious bullshit, while they were making all the money – that they decided to use this as a model for America. In god we trust was added to our money; and then all of that other fucking god-loving bullshit, came into being.


What our government needs to do today, to begin solving this problem in the Gulf Coast; is first take control of the situations, and stop letting B.P. dictate the course of our actions – didn’t we resolve this matter with the American Revolution, and the war? B.P. has caused so much harm to our nation that our government should seizes all of their assets, and then take control of the corporation. And then invest massive amounts of money into developing renewable clean energy technology. We need a Manhattan type project, with the goal of eliminating our need for fossil fuels, by the end of the next decade.

The Deepwater Horizon Oil Disaster; It could have been prevented:

Before they start screaming that no one could have foreseen an environmental disaster of this magnitude, which now threatens turning the entire gulf coast into an oily polluted wasteland and a marine dead-zone; let me first say, many of us did. Any type of oil exploration and drilling contains inherent risks and dangers. Most of the risks can be reasonably managed, when drilling on the earth’s surface; but these risks are greatly increase in offshore drilling – and can only be managed with any degree safety, when rules and regulations are first put in place, which put the interests of the commons above those of the oil companies and their profits – and this is why we must elect competent  leaders.

The events that caused this latest of environmental disasters; didn’t start with the April 20 explosion and sinking of the Deepwater Horizon rig - it started when Gorge W. Bush was appointed as President in 2000. In the mid to late 90s, officials in the Clinton administration had drafted new regulations and laws, governing offshore oil exploration and drilling, both before and after Clinton had extended the moratorium on offshore oil drilling. The regulations in this draft were modeled on the same laws and safeguards that are enforced by every other nation on this planet, which is engaged in offshore oil drilling. However, G. W. Bush, and his newly appointed cabinet of brain-dead and incompetent, Christian university graduates, and deluded ignorant Christian idiots and morons; believed the laws just amounted to more government regulation and the interference in the private matter of business. And that the regulations and laws would just discourage private investment.


Then in 2003, under the pressure of the oil companies, the Bush administration further weakened the regulations and laws concerning the construction and operations of these offshore oil drilling rigs. The oil companies and their contractors complained that many of the required safety devices, would not increase safety, but would only complicate the construction, and increase the cost of building the oil-rigs. Bush agreed saying “it’s best to leave those decisions up to the experts, like myself, the ‘oil men’ who know how best to drill an oil well” (well he said something just as stupid, even if those weren’t his exact words).

One of those required safety devices, was a remote controlled blowout preventer, that with the other required safety equipment, would have automatically shut off the oil within minutes after the explosion had occurred – and if this device had been installed during the construction of this oil-rig; we would only be dealing with a few thousand gallons of oil, and not the millions of gallons of oil we’re now faced with today. Their main objection to this device and its supporting equipment, was that it would have added about 700,000 dollars to the cost of the construction, of each new oil-rig (a small price to pay for preventing an environmental disaster of this magnitude, you just might think?)


I was deeply sadden when this ignorant Christian moron, G. W. Bush, decided to expand offshore drilling for oil, this despite all the warnings of the dangers presented by scientists, that by him doing so, he would only be creating a disaster waiting to happen.


The biggest concerns I had back then was without direct government oversight, laws and regulations, and a real invested plan to quickly deal with these types of disasters; we would be betting the future of life as we know it here on our only planet, on those deluded Christians who are only concerned with Jesus, the rapture, and a deluded vision of an afterlife.


I was very disappointed when Obama caved into these ignorant mindless Christian morons in the GOP, who are led like ignorant-sheep, by the interests of corporate America, I hope that now he will grow some fucking balls, and enact a permanent ban on this madness, or at least reinstate the moratorium on new drilling, at least until all of the current safety issues have been properly addressed.


I can now only hope that the damage being caused by this disaster, will open the eyes of those ignorant Christians voters in the south, who’s only criterion in choosing their leadership, is that they be just as anti-science, deluded and ignorant as them, and only concerned about the here and now just like they are. But I believe it will only be a matter of time, before they start blaming Obama for this too; and then they’ll again support that ignorant Christian bitch, and the “drill baby drill” mentality.