Steven Colbert has proposed a solution to the BP spill problem (which seems to just get worse and worse every day). Maybe I’m just punchy, but….well, you watch and see if it doesn’t make you smile, too.

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A new organization, Seize BP, has a novel idea: Let’s (the USA) seize BP and manage them till they do right—sort of the way we seized the big banks.

Doing that—or even the possibility of doing it—might just cause some other big polluters and wrong-doers to straighten up and fly right—for awhile at least.

When corporations become so large and politically powerful that they act as though they are above the law, and the corporate officers have no accountability for the deaths and damage they cause, maybe seizing the company and reforming it is the only viable solution.

I had a PR client many years ago that that had happened to. A natural gas distribution company had sold exclusive natural gas supply contracts to several large Texas cities. They planned to buy the gas later, whenever the prices were at their lowest, and make a killing.

My client had sold natural gas that they did not actually own. Then the US deregulated the price of natural gas. Prices soared.

Merely having signed contracts to provide a product at a certain price, the super-rich owner felt, did not obligate him to actually deliver the natural gas at that price. After all, he would have lost a lot of money.

The cities who had contracted for the gas felt differently.

A U.S. Federal court agreed with the cities, upheld the contracts and took control of the gas distribution company. The court then installed new acting management (chosen from within the company) and continued to oversee the company operations.

The acting management had hired the PR firm I worked for. My task was to help restore the company’s reputation. I suggested renaming the company, came up with a corporate identity program, and sold it to the client.

Unfortunately for my agency (and my job security), the federal judge did not agree. When he found out the company was spending money on PR, he put a stop to it.

So the BP seizure idea is not so novel after all. Taking permanent ownership would be unusual. But taking control for a few years would not.

What do you think will happen?

What do you hope will happen?

What would you do?

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It has been obvious for some time that Republicans suffer from (or enjoy) factophobia. They fear the facts.

They hate science and distort, deny, or subvert it at every opportunity. They claim there is no global warming (or if there is, it’s caused by chipmunks, or something). Remember when Ronald Reagan asserted that “trees cause more pollution that cars”.

It’s wacko science! Asbestos, smoking, air and water pollution, the fact that abstinence-only sex education fails kids—you name it, they deny it. If the general population knew the facts, the GOP would be in real trouble. Oh, wait, they are.

Despite the lie factories such as Limbaugh, Coulter, Beck, Rove, and the Astroturf (fake grassroots) organizations such as the FOX-TV-organized, corporate-sponsored, so-called Tea Parties, the general population doesn’t seem to be drinking the Kook-Aid anymore.

Still the factophobes are out there, dancing around with their “I hate Obama” signs waving. As long as they keep moving, bobbing, weaving, and spinning, I guess, they don’t have to face the inconvenient facts.

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• Earth Day 2009 Matters. Here’s Why. (0)

Want to know more about the importance of Earth Day? How it got started? What it has accomplished so far? Take a look at the following Earth Day video and find out.

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Earth Day began in 1970 when 20 million people across America peacefully demonstrated to save the environment by ending pollution and the wanton destruction of species and ecosystems. Legislators got the message.

Several pieces of landmark legislation to clean up toxic waste, alleviate air pollution, and clean up rivers and streams directly resulted from that Earth Day demonstration. Naturally the big polluters and despoilers immediately started to fight back.

It has become every more clear that the opposition to protecting the Earth is not just about the money. In many cases doing the right thing would actually be cheaper or more profitable for corporations.

The right-wing seems to be actually waging some kind unholy war on the environment, especially the animals and the indigenous people. From their actions, their idea appears to be that if they kill off all the endangered species and indigenous people, there will be nothing left to protect, and they will be able to do as they please.

Even worse, there seems to be a deep hatred for all natural things such as animals, wild plants, and free people. Sarah Palin’s War on Wolves is a good example. Why does she hate wolves so much?

Another example is the Bush administration’s determination to kill as many buffalo as possible in the Yellowstone area, despite scientific evidence that they do not spread disease to cattle, and despite the danger of reducing their numbers to a genetically unviable number.

Some people say that a willful misinterpretation of the Christian Bible is behind the unholy war on the environment and the primal peoples. But they also hate the poor people in America, blaming them for—just about everything. And they hate poor indigenous people who come to the United States to do low-paid labor worst of all.

Clearly they are interpreting their Bible selectively. In fact, Jesus said, “Whatever you do to the least of these, you do to me.” That sort of rules out a biblical justification for their hatred of the poor, the weak, and the animals, doesn’t it? One would think so.

Most people do not hate the earth, the animals, and the indigenous people. Most folks, when they think about it, do not blame their financial woes on the poor or hate the undocumented aliens who make their lives easier by working hard for a pittance, paying taxes, and doing the jobs no one else wants.

Most people do not want any more animals to become extinct. Most people do want something done to stop global warming, and most are willing to make some sacrifices to secure a safe, healthy future for their children—and for all children.

But not everyone understands the issues. And there is plenty of vicious right-wing propaganda, thoughtfully paid for by right-wingers and broadcast by the corporate media, to mislead them.

People of good will and good sense need to be armed with facts and rallied around the cause of saving the environment—to save our own lives and those of our children—as well as to save the beauty, the grace, and the awe and wonder of exotic animals and plants and indigenous peoples.

So Earth Day matters, because it gets the attention of people who would otherwise not notice the dangerous degradation of our environment and fosters in some of them a need to find out more, maybe to do a little something to help, donate a few bucks, vote for environmental candidates, conserve energy, take a stand.

April 22 is Earth Day 2009. Where will you be? What will you do for the Earth? For the animals? For your children and all the other children of Earth?

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Congress is “this close” to passing a bill to restore the Clean Water Act to its pristine glory, cleaning up the mess made by the Bush administration. You see, to please the coal industry, the Bushites passed a rule that it was OK to blast the tops off mountains and dump the resulting millions of tons of coal waste into streams—-even to cover up and block streams entirely.

The result was literally coal black tap water for many residents of Appalachia. And even when it was not black, some of that water was toxic. Oh, and incidentally the destruction of over 1200 miles of streams in (formerly beautiful) Appalachia.

The rule-change was made so that it would be cheaper for coal companies to blow the tops off ancient, forested mountains in Appalachia (hundreds of mountains so far!) and bulldoze the leftover, dirt, stones, trees, and toxic waste into the valleys and streams below.

The problem with that is that it polluted the drinking water (coal black tapwater!) for millions of people downstream.

Never mind the millions of people who got their drinking water from those destroyed streams, one way or another. And certainly never mind the destruction of the environment.

You see, the streams of Appalachia not only feed the wells and water supplies of local people, they also are the headwaters of the rivers that supply drinking water to much of the East Coast. Uh-oh

So now we finally have a Congress that is trying to go back and fix that—and a President who is a friend instead of an enemy of the environment. It’s about time!

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