Gulf Coast Oil Spill Reaction: Hold British Petroleum Accountable!

Finger-pointing in the huge Gulf Coast oil spill caused by the explosion on a British Petroleum oil rig has reached a fever pitch with 2012 Presidential candidate and former half-term Governor of Alaska, Sarah "Drill, Baby Drill" Palin pointing her bony finger at the Obama Administration.

Like the old saying, when you point the finger at someone else, you have four pointing back at yourself. Sarah Palin has not formally announced her candidacy for the Presidency for 2012 and has played coy when asked of her intentions.

Forget it. Sarah Palin is running for President regardless of what she says out of her pitbull lipsticked mouth when she's not cashing in on her recent fame by having a pop-up book ghostwritten for her.

Sarah Palin lambasting Barack Obama for the Gulf Coast oil spill, along with most every other malady known to man and some that haven't been discovered yet is clearly a case of the "pot calling the kettle black".

Sarah Palin even had the gall to blast President Barack Obama for his ties to "big business" and "Big Oil." As Senator Joseph McCarthy was famously asked in the Senate hearings in the 1950's "have you no shame?"

Anyone who took the time to do a little research would know that the John McCain campaign in 2008 accepted campaign contributions from Big Oil of $2.4 million dollars to Obama's $900,000. In other words, then candidate Obama was given only a little over a third of the dollars from Big Oil that Palin's running mate McCain received.

While I believe Barack Obama should have reacted sooner to the Gulf Coast oil spill, it took eight days before any cabinet heads were dispatched to Louisiana, the biggest oil spill since the 1989 Exxon Valdez disaster was not Obama's fault.

Criticism of Obama for reacting too slowly to the Gulf Coast oil spill is not totally off the mark. Obama's claims during the 2008 campaign of not accepting any oil money were not on the mark, either.

However, after two years of right-wingers haranguing Barack Obama for being a "socialist", now we're told the man is a tool of "Big Bidness?" It's kind of hard to be guilty of both those offences, but the fairly unbalanced (or rarely balanced) crew at Fox News and Rush Lintball would have viewers and listeners believe that both are etched in stone.

British Petroleum, or BP as they are usually referred to, is to blame for the Gulf Coast oil spill. BP and lax safety regulations and inspections of oil rigs. It's that simple.

Rather than send a horse show promoter to check on this disaster like America's greatest disaster, the Bush Administration did in Hurricane Katrina with FEMA Director Michael "Brownie, you're doin' a heckuva job" Brown, the Obama Administration does seem interested in containing the Gulf Coast oil spill, even if the interest came a little late.

There have been reports that Deepwater Horizon, the BP leased oil rig that exploded causing the massive Gulf Coast oil spill had not been properly inspected over the past few years, probably as a result of the Bush administration's hands off policy towards the oil industry.

The oil industry has fought acoustic switches that shut off the flow of oil in case of such an explosion that are required in some countries. These switches cost only about $500,000, a drop in the bucket compared to the billions of dollars of oil being spilled into the Gulf of Mexico and the cost of this cleanup.

The hit taken by the fishing and tourism industries in Louisiana and other Gulf Coast states is bad enough, but let's not forget that 11 workers who were on that oil rig have never been found and have long since been presumed dead,

The human toll taken by lax safety regulations when Presidents like Reagan and both Bushes allow big business, particularly Big Oil, to regulate themselves cannot be measured in dollars and cents. It was common practice in the Reagan and Bush Administrations to allow "Big Bidness" Poobahs to write the regulations for the industry they made their living in.

If offshore drilling must be done to satisfy our national thirst for oil before alternative fuels become more mainstream, let's at least make MMS, the U.S. Minerals and Management Service do their duty and properly inspect oil rigs before we have more oil spills of this magnitude.

Of course, that's after something is done to change the MMS, which regulates an industry many of the officers of which rake in big bucks off of oil and gas leases.

Lessening our dependence on foreign oil is important, but not at the expense of human lives and massive oil spills like this April 20 disaster in the Gulf Coast.

Tea party crackpots such as Sarah Palin and Rand Paul, the GOP nominee for the U.S. Senate in Kentucky, have only made fools of themselves with recent comments about the Gulf Coast oil spill. Rand Paul, son of Ron Paul, is proof that the nut doesn't fall far from the tree with his asinine little diatribe that Barack Obama's hard line approach with BP is "Un-American."

Is Mr. Paul aware that BP stands for British Petroleum? Probably not considering his "tea party" credentials.

If we are to ensure that more Gulf Coast oil spills do not occur, oil rigs such as Deepwater Horizon must be regularly inspected and shut down until any hazards are fixed. it's only right that BP pay the bill for the Gulf Coast oil spill. They broke it, they should buy it.