Unmoved and Then...

I was as unmoved as I've ever been watching President Obama give his first Oval Office address to the nation. Why? Because it's all stuff we've heard before. Reducing the gulf oil spill to a war is inane.  This isn't a battle or an attack on our shores.  It's a man-made catastrophe that was totally avoidable.

How many times have we heard presidents claim to be battling great enemies?  Our splendid war in Vietnam was a terrific way to introduce the country to prime time machismo of a vital threat that never really existed.  The war on drugs, the war on terrorism and now the war on oil?  It's all the same.  Mere rhetoric.  What we have is an addiction to fossil fuels.  It's not a war.  Waging war against it doesn't do much of anything to curb the addiction.   It just wastes tons of money.

But then the president actually got BP to setup a $20 billion escrow to pay for damages.  Given the lackluster speech, I'd have to say the escrow fund was actually proof of some bold action from a much over-dramatized speech.  I hope it continues.  I'll take tough guy war speeches that bore me to tears if it means we are actually going to hold BP responsible and see to it that it never happens again.  Of course the escrow fund doesn't ensure any of that but it is a monumental beginning to what I hope gives us an energy bill and a future without our crack addiction.