One of the biggest oil disaster was BP blowout in the Gulf of Mexico a year ago, which panicked the nation for weeks. The incident raises the question of safety for offshore drilling. After a year of Gulf oil spill commercial fishing in the region has resumed. But that’s where the good news ends. Nobody really knows the long-term environmental or economic impact of the explosion that killed 11 and loosed nearly 5 million barrels of oil in windblown sheets and current-driven plumes across the Gulf.
Even after one year of tragedy, offshore drilling is back and even expanding. Several deep-water permits have been issued since President Barack Obama’s drilling moratorium was lifted last fall, while more than a dozen are in review. And Congress seriously weighs legislation that would expand areas open to offshore drilling while speeding the permitting process. Now the question arise whether to promote offshore drilling without knowing the facts that it is safe or not.
The answer should be no until we have evidence otherwise — something Congress, regulators and the industry must provide before the BP debacle is lost entirely from memory. In their budget-cutting zeal, Republicans are demanding harsh sacrifices from the country’s most vulnerable citizens. At the same, they are determined to leave one of the biggest areas of wasteful government spending untouched: the Pentagon budget.
