Yes, Mr. President, It Was Your Katrina - Three Weeks Ago. Now it May Be Your Chernobyl

Dear Mr President,

You're
a man of vision, intelligence, stamina and nerve. And you're blowing
it. A hemorrhage of poison is sickening the Gulf of Mexico. And has
been, for a month. What action have you taken? What direct response have you made?

Friends,
enemies, drillers' families, fishing families, anyone and everyone who
has been appalled by the ecological horror show: we are all asking you
this question. At first you gave us a rhetorical performance, a promise
to be tough, while BP invested as much effort in limiting information
and liability as it did in limiting the extent of the spill, and coast
guard vessels continued to monitor plankton drift on the far side of
the Gulf. We don't deserve the insult of your obfuscation. No law
allows you to intervene? Rubbish. Did that ever stop a president from
pursuing his notion of national security? Did it ever stop you? And if a crippling blow to the Gulf ecosystem and economy doesn't constitute a national security threat, what does?

You
have every freedom to act. The heartbreaker is that you've chosen not
to. Maybe your usually-flawless political senses told you this was a
losing bet. Maybe you were overworked, overtired. Maybe your daily
briefings from the Gulf produced a spike of denial--"it can't be as bad
as they say." I don't know, or deeply care. I couldn't do you job. But
you, Mr President, spent eighteen months and countless millions of
dollars telling us you could.

What you did not
do was soberly and responsibly decide to leave BP in charge of the
disaster response. Of that I'm certain, because no such sober,
responsible conclusion could possibly be reached. A child (or a fiction
writer) could have told you that BP had long ago--weeks ago--proven
themselves duplicitous and inept. They are naked, and so is your
failure. We have cringed before this farce, even as we cringe before
the sight of oiled beaches, dying birds and fish, dying hope for a way
of life.

Every
day hundreds of thousands of gallons are belched from that open wound
on the sea floor. This is a vast, underwater chemical burn, a massive
trauma incident, a body blow to America. You're treating it like a
tickle in the throat. You offer stern words and stoic looks and a
carousel of indignant underlings on the talk shows. Today it's a
blue-ribbon commission. Bipartisan, of course. The better to protect
you and your circle, if nothing much else. The insults accumulate. The
denial marches on.

This
isn't about spin or power or next fall's elections or the predictable
sleaze of a largely-above-the-law behemoth like BP. It's not about you
or your legacy--though the latter may well be written on the poisoned
waters of a marsh. IT'S ABOUT THE GULF OF MEXICO. Period. It can't
wait. You cannot, must not wait. Don't let another day go by.