Here’s some more fun with that most liberal of topics, the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. I already wrote about how Obama played golf while the gulf was polluted. The press would have crucified George Bush; Obama deserves to have been crucified, too. Cleaning up the mess is of concern to all Americans, regardless of politics.

When you’re a liberal, however, your driving concern is using everything to advance the liberal agenda along the Road to Socialist Utopia (or as we conservatarians like to say, the Road to Serfdom).

Remember that on June 4th, BP finally got a cap that worked. The AP’s headline:

BP: cap gets some Gulf oil, crude still spews

Guess the glass was half-full for the AP. I pick on the AP because their stories are picked up and repeated by a lot of new organizations. Well, BP was not content with that cap of course, so they remove it so that they can replace it with a better cap. AP’s  Tom Breen writes on July 10:

BP: Cap on gushing well removed, oil flows freely

Damned if they do, damned if they don’t. BP and the U.S. Coast Guard had said that fitting the new cap would take a couple of days. Tom Breen of AP writes on July11:

For Now, Oil Spews Unchecked in Gulf: Hundreds of thousands of gallons of oil are being allowed to spew into the fouled waters of the Gulf of Mexico…

He really likes the verb “spew” doesn’t he? On July 12, the new cap is put in place on schedule. Here’s the lead from Breen, assisted by Harry R. Weber:

BP affixes new cap on Gulf oil well; tests ahead. BP robots attached a new, tighter-fitting cap on top of the gushing Gulf of Mexico oil leak Monday, raising hopes that the crude could be kept from polluting the water for the first time in nearly three months.

Well, maybe the bumbling capitalist exploiters might get it right yet. Remains to be seen. I almost hate to report the New York Times headline, which is quite neutral by comparison:

Critical Test Near for BP’s New Cap

Looks like someone could take lessons in objectivity from the New York Times! <giggle>

Although it is totally unrelated, I just have to report this AP headline about Louisiana U.S. Senator  Vitter, also from July 12:

Republican senator says he backs birther lawsuits

And just the other day Peter Boyles was saying he hasn’t heard the term birther lately. Looks like somebody was too busy with spewing oil and didn’t get the memo.

The idea that anyone in the government–whether it is Obama or Colorado’s own John Salazar–did anything to cause it or can do anything to fix it is pretty silly. Sure the president’s daughter may have asked him whether he fixed it yet, but we ought to be more mature in our understanding.

As usual, the Cato Institute has a very perceptive piece on  the subject called “Do Something, Superpresident!“

Maybe he could Nuke that Slick! There’s even a video from Russia Today on how to do it. The irony of getting advice from the former Soviet Union is rich, especially considering the statist tendencies of the present government.

Imagine what the environmentalists would say about that! But that idea was floated around May4 so I’m thinking Mr Hope ‘n’ Change is just going to hope for the best while vacationing in Chicago and then change things so that  the Evil Capitalists never, ever drill for oil again!

Of course, this is exactly what the Democratic socialists who run the government  are counting on.  Now that the health care law is enacted, they hope the reported 110 new boards and other goodies will prove impossible to kill. Even worse, they have shown the danger of permitting sometimes obscure, arcane and even irrelevant government agencies to continue to exist. An example that came to light this week is the expansion of the Public Health Service–removing all manpower caps and making them liable to involuntary call to active service

during national emergencies and public health crises, similar to the uniformed service reserve personnel;… be available for backfilling critical positions left vacant during deployment of active duty Commissioned Corps members, as well as for deployment to respond to public health emergencies, both foreign and domestic;

It’s on pp.1312-1315 of the 2400 page bill. Do you think the Democrats have a purpose in mind for these officers beyond that of the current staff? I don’t mention this to disparage the PHS or its current mission or to question why this service exists or whether its functions duplicate those of other agencies. You can go to their site and judge that for yourself.

My point is that because it exists it can easily be re-purposed. I’ve been thinking about this re-purposing for a while now. It is clearly one of the strategies of the left as they seek to  subvert everything to their cause. It is easier to subvert an existing agency than to create a new one–and it attracts a lot less attention.

The only solution is to starve the beast: cut the funding and let these organizations wither and die. It will be good for the bottom line, too.

Capitalism works by way of creative destruction.  I like to think of it like yeast–maybe because yeast makes things I enjoy, like beer and bread.  Put the yeast and sugar in warm water and it takes off.  That’s the free market.  Bubbles form, grow and eventually burst.  That’s the Detroit car companies.  But when they do, they reveal little bubbles already growing under them which in turn grow themselves.  They are the new companies with new technologies–green, efficient, and innovative–that are going to take their places.  The whole mass of yeast just keeps getting bigger.

A friend of mine said today that she’s actually excited about what’s going to happen.  She said that Deming tried to show Detroit how to become efficient.  They didn’t listen but the Japanese did.  You know, the car companies that are still doing well in the southeastern US.

Only the federal government can screw this up.  They’ve poured billions of taxpayer dollars down the Detroit rathole and they’re going to use that excuse to give ownership to the unions who spent $65 million to get them elected.  That is just so wrong on so many levels.

Detroit too big to fail?  I think not.  The Big O isn’t too big to fail either.

Come to think of it, I’m excited too.  Can’t wait to see what ‘s going to replace Detroit and Washington.

…to quote Dave Barry’s famous words.

Obviously this graphic has a political message attached but that’s not why I show it.  It’s because a couple of posts ago I wrote “Liberals Lie.”  I couldn’t have been handed a better example.  An “anonymous” White House spokesperson said this wasn’t a bow, it was merely that the King is so short.

Yeah, right.

T. Boone Pickens does a good job of describing that relationship in an “Oil Price Wars” email he sent to Pickens Plan members today. If you haven’t been to his site and read the plan, you need to. It’s not just about wind energy–it’s about ending our dependency on Middle East oil.

If you were fighting for your life and you had a weapon to use, would you use it? Of course you would. Radical Islam thinks it is fighting for its life and is even willing use its members to blow themselves up to achieve their goals. Why would they not use our dependency on their oil? They will and they have.

Gas got down to $1.39 in Colorado the other day; it’s on the way back up. At the same time, the Democratic governor and state legislature passed a bill to make new exploration and drilling almost impossible. Who are they working for: us or Al Qaeda?

Consider that every time you fill your gas tank, 70% of the money is going to people who hate us. Do you think the Washington Democrats are going to do anything different than the Colorado Democrats?