The Shellys. No, the other Shellys

Hello my few dedicated followers, most (if not all) of whom are related to me. We haven't done much blog-worthy recently (I'm not sure if we ever really do, honestly) but Sandy's right, I should try and write more, whatever it is, so I'm going to *try* and be better at this.

Anyways, this whole BP thing ... yikes. I read somewhere that if BP had invested in a roughly $500k sonar detector designed to shut down oil rigs in case of imminent leaks, this could have been avoided. I'm guessing with record profits for the oil industry over the past few years, BP coulda shaken a few couches and checked under the car seats for a little change to cover that. Major fail on their part. Aside from failed cleanup attempts and reading about environmental effects (and for great bedtime stories, you can read about what could happen if a hurricane hits the oil in the gulf), I find it's pretty interesting how it's being covered in the media at large. Of course, BP has taken a beating, and deservedly so, and even without disasters like this, oil companies generally aren't liked all that much (see: record profits and $3 or $4 gallon gas). But let's read a little story.

Presidential candidate receives loads of campaign money from an oil company. The candidate goes on to win the presidency. After being in office for a while, despite his former candidate being widely detracted for holding similar views, he starts pushing for offshore drilling expansion. A few weeks after that, that major oil company who supported his campaign has an offshore oil rig basically blow up and leak oil everywhere causing an environmental nightmare which also impacts the industry of an entire region. And the president? He does nothing but stand back, make a press conference or two, slide back from openly supporting offshore drilling at such a politically inopportune time, and basically twiddle his thumbs over the whole matter until he feels greatly pushed into that role by an increasing outcrying public.

This is not to condemn the actions taken (or not) by Barack Obama. I'm not entirely sure what a president *should* (much less *can* do) in a matter like this, where the bulk of the blame lies on a private enterprise. There's not a direct correlation between this matter, and say, Hurricane Katrina. But just imagine for a moment what the media coverage and public outcry, particularly in online blogs and commentaries, would have been if, say, GW was still president. It would have been ugly and full of vicious attacks both politically and personally. Obama? Well, he's not exactly getting a free pass, but it seems fairly mild to me at least.

I guess it's interesting to see how much perspective on something can be changed simply by the fact if one of the principle characters is generally liked or not. I know this is a sweeping generalization, but the media more or less likes Obama, while they more or less hated Bush. I don't think the same questions are being asked of Obama as they would have of Bush. The analysis seems to shift more blame to the Big Bad Oil Company (and probably rightfully so) and give the president more of a free pass. People who question the president's role and (lack of) actions (I don't listen to them, but I assume the usual chorus of Beck and Limbaugh and the like) seem to written off as right wing nuts and not having a valid point to make on this matter.

From the official White House webpage, Obama is meeting with his newly minted Oil Spill Commission with set goal of "pledging accountability for BP and government officials who have been too cozy with the oil industry over the years." Bush was certainly accused of that, and I would be surprised to see his name bandied about once again before this whole mess is over with. But let's not forget, Obama is one of the "too cozy" politicians too, and with his stated pledge of transparency to the American public during his inauguration, I hope he doesn't forget that either.