United States of British Petroleum

1.6 million gallons. My question is this: how many more gallons will it take for the United States to realize that something needs to be done about off-shore drilling rigs?

Better yet, how many more gallons will it take to actually hear a Republican make a sound? Notice how quiet they have been recently...

This is more than an oil spill. This is now so much more. Yes, I will admit the government response has been disappointing, however, we must examine further into the situation our President is now in.

Ever since our President was elected, we have heard shouts of “socialist, communist, nazi, big brother, big government, government take-overs, ignoring the will of the people,” etc. Even though President Obama is none of those things, no matter what he ends up doing in this response will result in an outcry from either side, the Democrats or Republicans.

And, I think, as a President, he has done a fantastic job at one thing: taking the blame. Even though this is not President Obama’s fault, on a broader scope it is President Bush’s failed policies of thinking that regulation is always wrong and big business is always right, it is nice to see a President who does not bicker and does not lay the blame on others much like President Bush and the Republican party did for eight straight years.

However, when it comes to the perpetrators of this disaster, I think there should be finger pointing. We should be pointing to BP, we should be finding out who did this and who is responsible and who should be locked up behind bars for destroying our oceans.

This is no longer the United States of America. This is the United States of British Petroleum, of Exxon Mobil, of Halliburton, of Bechtel.

This is a defining point in our history. For the first time in recent memory the effectiveness and the influence of private corporations on our political system is being questioned by the majority of Americans. Sarah Palin is agreeing with James Carville that President Obama should be BP’s “daddy,” conservatives on the Gulf Coast who once denounced and refused federal money from the stimulus package (Bobby Jindal) are now practically begging the federal government for assistance. Bobby Jindal has been quoted as saying that “this is what we need the federal government for.”

When the money spent by Big Oil that poisons our political system leads to the poisoning of our oceans, something needs to be done. It’s time for America to say enough is enough. President Obama has said he is furious, and I do believe him, he is not an actor, he is an intellectual who still tries to keep his cool in a situation like this, he wants to show poise, he wants to show that he’s doing all he can, and he wants to stop this from ever happening again. With that, he needs our help. We must fight back against Big Oil, we must make this Big Government v. Big Oil. If there is one thing all Americans can agree on it is that if government is ever big, it should be big against Big Oil, to save our oceans, revive our politics and strengthen our economy.

So, with this all in mind, ask this question to yourself: Would you rather have a wind farm off the coast of Massachusetts that creates green jobs and is not harmful to our environment, or an oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico controlled by an unregulated industry who can charge whatever they want on the American people, who also pay off politicians to write their rigs off as “safe,” when they are in danger of exploding and gushing 1.6 million gallons of water into our oceans?

If you can answer yes to the latter, after seeing the photos of dying fish, pelicans, and filthy beaches, you should go to www.gop.com and sign up today.