The Test of Time

When couples fall in love, the more cynical of us take from their joy with our "yeah, but what about it lasting for the long run" comments. What seems so wondefully right today can become horribly wrong in the snap of a finger, and undoing the bad is so much more difficult than simply not making the mistake in the first place, but no one wants to hear the "what if," just the ah, you're in love!

News is like that: in the frantic rush to be the first on-air, we make huge leaps from what we see to what we want to see, from what we know to what we want to be true. Once those words are sent into the media, they are impossible to take back. The optimisitic news reports about the horrible accident on the oil rig in the Gulf have turned ugly as the worst possible outcome is now depositing oil on the shores. Wildlife is dead; ocean creatures are dead; wetlands are dying; and all we can do is talk about what we should have done, what we could have done, and what we would have done "if only."

The President toured the Gulf Coast this week, picked up sand to feel the oil, talked to the (perhaps well-staged) boots on the ground, listened to the rationalizations/justifications for the failure to stop the oil from pumping into the ocean. When he spoke to the American people, the President assured us that this problem is "his" problem, although there is literally nothing he can about what is happening -- unless he is a geologist who understands the topography of the Gulf Coast, as well as the geology of the ocean floor and depths that hides huge oil reservoirs that can be sent to the surface by punching a hole into them with a drill designed for that purpose. He can act in a concerned manner, stroke his chin in a thoughtful pose, and make all the heart-felt promises he wants, but he -- nor anyone else -- can do other than what is already (not) being done.

It's so easy to punch a hole into the ocean floor and use the natural internal forces of the earth to send oil gushing to the surface, but how does one plug up a hole, especially when all the internal forces of nature are determined to "pass gas" through that hole? Putting a lid on the hole simply stems the flow of oil until the pressure builds up and blows the lid off. Pumping fill material into the hole provides nature with something other than oil to spew into the Gulf and, when the filler explodes from the ocean floor, the oil cannot be far behind. There is no going back, and there does not seem to be a good future for this situation, so what else can be done?

Probably nothing: in the battle between man and nature, nature always wins. Always. We may be able to minimize the aftermath, but we cannot stop the process nor the damage this oil leak is causing and will continue to cause. The damage is forever, but we may be able to minimize it somewhat if we stop posturing and start producing counter-measures.

Sop up the oil would be my first option, especially since it continues to pump from the depths of the ocean floor. It does not matter which of the many, many alternatives have been demonstrated by people who say they have "the" answer to the problem: try them all. If each idea only works a little bit, the end result could be a lot better than doing nothing. Put unemployed workers on the beach, shoulder to shoulder Asian style, from one end of the oil slick to the other -- and let them scoop it into containers. Store the goo until someone figures out how to recover the oil and make it viable for the oil refinery to turn it into usable product. Send workers down to the leak in a submarine such as the ones used to probe the Titanic wreck and have them use the robotic arms to install a new fitting and attach a mile-long length of pipe to it and pump the oil to the surface and into a waiting tanker.

Or, stand on the shore, look toward the horizon, and wail about what's already done as if lamenting the accident or harranguing the authorities will change what's happening. Meanwhile, shut down all the other oil platforms and retrofit them so it doesn't happen again. We may be able to adapt to what now is, but I doubt we can be that lucky twice.