This One Hurts

I couldn't take my gaze away from the images. The dense black cloud moving out and rising continuously. The tally meter shows more than fifty million gallons already released in to the Gulf of Mexico with no end in sight. Twenty gallons every second for what now is sixty days.

I have to wonder what recommendations a coastal fisherman would have made years ago when British Petroleum first wanted to drill for oil in deep water off the coast of Louisiana? I wonder what a true "Elder" would have said when told that the valve that was supposed to shut off the flow in the event of a break had never actually worked in practice?

I hope that we learn from yet another environmental catastrophe that our decision making process for these type of things is dysfunctional when we only look at the revenue and balance sheets as our source if information.

If ever there was a need in the world for elder wisdom it is now! As we look to worldwide deep water oil wells, increased nuclear power proliferation, and renewed toxic strip mining for materials to make batteries for our electronics, where are the voices of wisdom and compassion? The voices to speak up for the environment and the human species? It is not enough to speak up after a catastrophic occurrence...voices need to be heard at the other end of the process...the beginning.

This one really hurts!