In terms of what this oil spill means for the gulf coast and its long term effects it will be tragic for years to come and it's my hope that BP does step up to the plate and helps mitigate some the damage caused by this well. However, speculating on how engineers can seal off the flow of oil from this well is just that speculation, and I have every confidence that a solution will be found and the challenge will be met and the well sealed off. The after-effects of this spill will need to be addressed by cool heads and not by reactionary voices using this as a hammer or as a gotcha to further some agenda when the real tragic results of this spill will be the people living it. I frankly find it somewhat amusing everytime I hear from the extreme anti-petro side of this argurment they are doing so on a petro based product and no doubt at some tie duing the week consuming any number of products produced by that same industry all the while condemning its use for others except for themselves. It's prudent for our nation to move forward in a DIVERSE energy solution for the future and one that includes fossil fuels for the near term and using this tragic spill to promote favored solitions does not help in that promotion.
we are in agreement through most of your comments. i think though, what you call 'extreme anti-petro' are not so much anti-petro as they are pro-alternative energy because it is not worth a tragedy like this to enrich multi-national oil companies. and we need to wean ourselves off of oil because every dollar we spend on oil enriches some country that gives money to people who want to bomb us into the next century.
and therein lies the rub... it's not even our oil... it's BP's. and why it is our responsibility to clean up their mess is beyond me. we have to do it because it's the right thing to do, but they should cover all costs...and not just clean up costs.
the thing that's really heartbreaking is how does a father teach his son how to shrimp when the shrimp are going to be contaminated for a generation? how do you give people back their lives?
for a multinational oil company?