Just when you thought it was safe to turn on the computer: Snark Attack II !!
The Gulf Coast economies of Florida, Alabama and Louisiana are facing a challenge far more profound than what Nashville dealt with in this past weekend. We're soggy, and we've lost loved ones, and the Opry is soaked, but just as we did in 1926 we'll recover.
Fishing and Tourism industries along the Gulf Coast, which have provided careers for generations of people, stand a chance of being wiped out for at least a generation by the after-effects of the Deepwater well explosion and subsequent oil gusher in the Gulf.
It would be similar to what might happen to the Nashville economy if suddenly, publishing, banking, and health care were ruled illegal by the Supreme Court.
Nashville can not live by Country Music alone. So that's a perspective of where the folks in Florida, Alabama and Louisiana find themselves, which is not in a good place.
But wait, there's more: As if to add insult to injury, one week after after the explosion, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) buzzed the residents of Mobile with an airplane dragging a banner that read: “Meat on your grill=Oil Spill. PETA”
One might wonder if PETA was just being theatrical or if it was hoping to nudge the citizens of Mobile into an Epiphany: "I'm like OMG it's all my fault because I eat meat that places such a heavy demand for energy AND I have a HUMMER!!!"
A quick peek at the PETA blog will erase any doubt from your mind. Karin Bennett writes: "At times like this, I know it's popular to blame big business, and that's fair enough. But in a free-enterprise system, business only gets big (and sloppy and greedy) because of consumer demand.[...] Raising animals for food causes environmental devastation on a massive scale, and oil spills can be blamed in large part on the oil-guzzling meat industry—which owes its existence to the meat-guzzling public."
