“In the same way that our view of our vulnerabilities and our foreign policy was shaped profoundly by 9/11, I think this disaster is going to shape how we think about the environment and energy for many years to come,” he told the US political website Politico
Finally a president with guts enough to put the WTC-attack in its proper perspective! A horrible incident in USonian history, but nothing more than that.
And again the world is faced with the USonian ignorance and arrogance that make the majority of USonians look dumb, self-centered and boorish:
“He’s off-base,” said former New York fire department deputy chief Jim Riches, whose son died at the World Trade Centre. “These were terrorist attacks, not something caused by people trying to make money.”
From the perspective of the impact on the minds of normal, sane and thinking human beings, the leaking, burning oil-well that is spewing its deadly innards into the sea, unto beaches and wet-lands, is a disaster no less in magnitude for the sea-life, wild-life and ecology of the Gulf Coast, than “9/11” was for the citizens of NY.
The President is right on the money. Almost.
Considering the damage to the sea-life, wild-life and ecology of the Gulf Coast – including several species of animals and birds that live only there – in the wet-lands of Louisiana – and are either endangered or on the brink of being endangered – like the Brown pelican and the manatee, he is actually falling short in his ‘comparison’. More Wild-life will be lost as a result of the USonian short-sighted and egotistical use of fossil-fuels than the 2500+ human lives that were lost in the toppling of the WTC. While those humans are gone forever and their relatives have every right to mourn, they in no way make even a small dent in the human population on this planet. Yet every Brown pelican lost, every Manatee or other animal dead, either to the oil spill itself or to the ensuing starvation that will follow because feeding grounds are destroyed, will deprive the endangered birds, animals and sea-life of diversity in their gene pool, and in the end they will be extinct. Gone forever.
Now, that is a true catastrophe, a disaster that if not understood in its entirety is worthy of human grief and USonian shame. Jim Riches lost his son, true, but does that mean others have to suffer the loss of never seeing a Brown Pelican or a Manatee?
Jim Riches sees only himself and his loss. Barack Obama sees beyond all the Jim Riches, and realizes that the Deepwater Horizon continuous attack on the coast of the Mexican Gulf is an attack much more devastating to the USonian people living along that coast, in terms of having their environment, livelihoods, families and damaged, destroyed and decimated for YEARS to come, and for what? USonian greed, isolationism and arrogance.
SOB's Grins & Grumps 