Going to Extremes

While it wasn't perfect, the series Extreme Oil on PBS, which finished its run here in Louisiana last night, was noteworthy. If nothing else, it allowed interested viewers a chance to look behind the curtain at what's required to ensure plenty of gasoline at the local pump. Oil is big.

The image that really leapt out last night was file footage of a breach on the Alaska pipeline. Crude flew out like water from a firehose. A previous episode focused on problems associated with drilling in Ecuador. Funny enough, once big oil moved into the producing regions in South America, health issues familiar to anyone here in Louisiana arrived down there too.

I'm not a tree-hugger, but you can't watch this kind of industrial-scale devastation without asking questions about policies and priorities. We're stuck in the hornet's nest that is Iraq, we consider the fiefdom of Saudi Arabia an ally (recall that fifteen of the nineteen hijackers on 9/11 were Saudi nationals), Russia under Putin is clamping down on civil liberties in a desperate attempt to stop terrorists there, Iran is a declared enemy, guerrillas in Nigeria are threatening war (another cause for the recent price spike)--and what's the response here? More and bigger SUV's and pickup trucks...