Chan Lowe: The long finger of blame
Small government, in theory, is an intoxicating idea until you suddenly need the benefits of big government.
Gov. Bobby Jindal of Louisiana, who turned down federal stimulus money for his state last year in a fit of partisan pique, is now screaming about how little the feds appear to be doing to save his coastline.
Sarah Palin is out there, too, condemning the Obama administration for its ineptitude.
These are Louisiana’s wetlands being ruined, though, so isn’t this technically a state issue? Why should the people of Montana have to help pay to clean it up?
I’m being facetious, of course. We all know that BP is going to pay for everything and make us all whole again…the same way Exxon did after the Alaskan spill.
As for blame⎯it’s a long bar, and there are plenty of us who ought to be bellying up to it. Every time we hop in the SUV to tootle down to the store when we could have walked or ridden a bike, every time we leave the engine running to keep the AC cool when we duck into the dry cleaners, we stoke the beast’s appetite.
It’s fine to vent our spleen at BP for plowing up the Gulf in search of riches without a disaster plan, and it’s fine to rail at the government for not regulating enough or not enforcing the few regulations we have.
But it’s a lot like the drug trade. There wouldn’t be the murders, the kidnappings and the cartels if there weren’t a market for the product. Prevention of future disasters must begin at home.
CHAN LOWE has been the Sun Sentinel’s first and only editorial cartoonist for the past twenty-six years. Before that, he worked as cartoonist and writer for the Oklahoma City Times and the Shawnee (OK) News-Star.
Comments
I never know whether to laugh or cry when I see your cartoons and read your blogs. Once again you've cut to the bottom line with your bottom line...
Posted by: JCVINFLA | May 24, 2010 11:10 PM
Chan-Good cartoon & thoughts
Should've-Would've-Could've
We "should've" been smart enough to keep the solar panels on the White House that Carter put on- and Reagan removed.
We "would've" been in better shape if we'd supported more renewable energy ideas.
We "could've" stopped Pappa Bush (and ourselves) from being addicted to oil and in their greasy pockets.
Cheney, the "brain" behind W's curtain, had closed door meetings with oil fat-cats & the Energy Exchange Comm.Regulations were taken off the table,or not enforced.
And here we are...slippin'& slidin' in oil...Surprised.?
We should'nt be......
Posted by: Lorraine Wagner | May 25, 2010 7:22 AM
I really liked Chan's recent Long Finger of Blame creation.
The concept of true costs and responsibility is something I think that needs to be hammered more regarding a multitude of issues.
Now I just need to figure out what to do with my own
responsibility and guilt.
Posted by: Peter Hall | May 25, 2010 8:02 AM
If you wanna blame someone, try getting to the right ones. This is clearly the fault of all the "Environmentalists" who forbid the drilling on terra ferma, where at least if something goes wrong it could be fixed much easier. It could be watched and regulated, not something that you can do at 5000 ft. below the sea, away from watchful eyes. It is not subject to hurricanes and looking back now it is easy to see that there would be far fewer consequences then with what just happened. As far as fixing what is going on , one only has to look at utube to find the answer of how 2 backwoods farmers showed how using cut up straw would soak up all the oil, I guess that's just too simple an answer as opposed to using more harmful dispersing agents to do a not so good job.
Posted by: Rick | May 25, 2010 10:42 AM
Gov. Bobby Jindal of Louisiana can't even get the permits from the EPA to build a sand barrier, due to bureaucracy. The Obama administration has no one in charge ,and you can't even find who is in charge of the clean up, because he don't want to take responsibility or make it his problem . A war is starting on the Korean peninsula, and the stock market and euro are melting away. However Obama will be giving an award ceremony this weekend for Paul McCarthy. I am happy to see that the white house concert series is still underway. There is your big government, and big government priorities
Posted by: Dave | May 25, 2010 1:10 PM
The Obama administration has no one in charge ,and you can't even find who is in charge of the clean up, because he don't want to take responsibility or make it his problem . A war is starting on the Korean peninsula, and the stock market and euro are melting away. However Obama will be giving an award ceremony this weekend for Paul McCarthy. I am happy to see that the white house concert series is still underway. There is your big government, and big government priorities
Posted by: MBT Trainers | February 19, 2011 11:29 PM