Drill Baby, Drill

There are plenty of things that have come out of Sarah Palin's mouth that I find objectionable, but perhaps none were so instantly annoying than her chant at 2008's Republican Convention. The lady from Alaska was more than happy to surrender her state's wildlife refuges to get to that black gold. Texas Tea. Then, on April Fool's Day of this year, President Obama announced that he would open the door to drilling off Virginia's coast, in other parts of the mid- and south Atlantic, in the eastern Gulf of Mexico, and in waters off Alaska.
If the words "Gulf of Mexico" set off little bells of alarm in your head, then you've probably been watching the news lately. The overhead shots of brown goo seeping into the waters off the coast of Louisiana. Just this past weekend, our president dropped by those same threatened shores to assure us that "everything humanly possible" was going to be done to stop that leak and clean up the mess that was made. Citizens up and down the Gulf Coast rolled their eyes in what could best be described as mock appreciation.
They've heard it before. We've all heard it before. Two hundred and ten thousand gallons of crude oil a day is pouring out into fertile fishing grounds and creeping toward already damaged wetlands. "We are responsible not for the accident but we are responsible for the oil and for dealing with it and cleaning the situation up," said Tony Hayward, BP's chief executive in charge of hand-wringing and excuses. He added that his company would pay all "legitimate claims" from the spill. Lines of oil-soaked birds and sea creatures may have some trouble holding on to a pencil, let alone comprehending the paperwork required for such claims.
Tony might be wondering if this could affect his six-million dollar a year compensation package, a figure he was elevated to just last month. It might serve him well to start pointing the finger at the deep-sea robots who are the ones truly responsible for stopping the leak. And somewhere, Joseph Hazelwood is doing the happy dance.