The Gulf Oil Tragedy and the Death of American Exceptionalism

This President has spent nearly his entire term erasing any touchstones to the concept of American Exceptionalism. From the World Apology Tour, to physically bowing to hosts of other heads of state, to the dependence on BP to fix the spill, there is nothing about this administration that conveys world leadership.

The spill shows us as bumbling at best, and at worst as criminally conniving - letting the crisis happen, in "never let a crisis go to waste" fashion, all to push forward a cap and trade bill that had previously stalled out.

Toward that end, I have a whole bunch of questions: Does anyone remember this?



Why hasn't this happened yet? Why haven't the best and brightest of the Army Corp of Engineers and the Navy been sequestered in a room with a 48 hour deadline and good supply of coffee and told to not come out until they've solved the problem? Could it be that "sticking it to BP" is more important? Would this situation been allowed to exist under the Kennedy or Regan administrations? Would this situation be allowed to exist if the area impacted were Malibu or the Hamptons?

"Leadership" under this administration translates into extracting money out of BP and interrupting clean up efforts to ensure that the proper amount of life jackets and fire extinguishers are on board the boom ships. We are witness to a tragedy, occurring before our eyes and in near slow-motion, and our government operates with a continual lack of urgency, creativity, or common sense. But, according to the Liberal Elite, hey, it's just the gulf coast. Nobody really goes there, and the people that live there are just a bunch of bible thumping, gun toting red-necks.

You'd think that after Katrina, they would have learned and moved away...

We close with a line from Jay Leno, because sometimes when you're left with nothing else, laughter is the best medecine:

“President Obama said he is going to use the Gulf disaster to push a new energy bill through Congress,” observed Jay Leno. “How about using the Gulf disaster to fix the Gulf disaster?”