Cross Posted at Legal Schnauzer
Of all the words written and spoken about the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, perhaps the most off-the-charts statement comes from Charles Krauthammer, a conservative columnist for the Washington Post.
Who deserves the No. 1 spot in the blame game for a spill that is on the verge of reaching catastrophic proportions? Is it BP, Transocean, Halliburton, incompetent and corrupt government regulators?
Nope, Krauthammer tells us, it's none of the above. In his most recent piece, our guy Chuck seems to lay heavy blame at the feet of environmentalists. And as Dave Barry might say, "I'm not making this up!"
Consider the lead on "A Disaster With Many Fathers," Krauthammer's piece from last week:
Here's my question: Why were we drilling in 5,000 feet of water in the first place?
Many reasons, but this one goes unmentioned: Environmental chic has driven us out there. As production from the shallower Gulf of Mexico wells declines, we go deep (1,000 feet and more) and ultra deep (5,000 feet and more), in part because environmentalists have succeeded in rendering the Pacific and nearly all the Atlantic coast off-limits to oil production. (President Obama's tentative, selective opening of some Atlantic and offshore Alaska sites is now dead.) And of course, in the safest of all places, on land, we've had a 30-year ban on drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
So we go deep, ultra deep -- to such a technological frontier that no precedent exists for the April 20 blowout in the Gulf of Mexico.
So "environmental chic" caused the Gulf oil spill. To borrow a phrase from Alabama political candidate Dale Peterson in his widely parodied ad, "Betcha didn't know that."
Krauthammer does admit that environmentalists aren't the only ones who deserve blame. In fact, he concedes that BP should shoulder a smidgen of the blame. What a guy, that Chuck!
But then he balances out any signs of sanity with this classic conservative talking point. If the well continues to gush through August, as it almost certainly will, the disaster becomes "Obama's Katrina."
Sounds like the Washington Post has set the bar pretty low for its op-ed columnists these days.