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The Gulf Oil Spill |
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On April 20th, 2010 there was an accident in the Gulf of Mexico involving an oil drilling platform. Oil has been spewing for over 50 days now, mostly unabated. As I sit back and watch all of the scurry of activity with not much apparent progress, I wonder if anyone has realized what I have. We have become a nation paralyzed by bureaucracy, fueled by greed, selfishness, and the general lack of entrepreneurial drive that made our country great in the first place.
With the exception of someone to blame, this oil spill is the same drill in knee jerk decision making that the Hurricane Katrina recovery operation became. Everyone was so mired in protocol, chain-of-command, and what ever else that nothing could get accomplished. In my opinion it's time to call it like it is. Paralysis by analysis. Each coastal location effected by this oil spill knows what needs to be done in their respective areas and they have the resources minus the money. BP has plenty of money, the responsibility for the situation, and no infrastructure in place to disseminate everything. Here's my plan. For starters, give every city, town and port on the Gulf Coast five million dollars to spend as they see fit for skimming, clean-up and other protectivce measures. In exchange, each town receiving payment must submit an accounting of how the money was spent or abused and subjected to public scrutiny so we can see who is and who is not a competent public servant. Given the time you can argue the many pitfalls this simple plan has and your reasons would be correct. However, time is something we do not have right now. Sometimes you have to invest less in your bean counters and more in the integrity and abilities of the human beings here in our communities. Charlie Jones |
I went to pay my respects to the little actor but they had a closed casket :(
