In wake of disaster, we must find alternatives

To many North Idahoans, the Gulf of Mexico might seem a million miles away, and those who live and work there are probably just as unfamiliar. Most of us have never seen an offshore oil platform, much less worked on one. We have probably never seen a miles-wide oil spill, a fouled beach or a major bird or fish kill. It’s even hard to imagine.

But turn your gaze to Lake Pend Oreille, or to Priest Lake. It’s 10 p.m. That oil rig, five times taller than Panhandle State Bank, is suddenly engulfed in a huge fireball. It burns for days, and then it collapses and sinks to the bottom. Seventeen of your friends and neighbors are rescued but seriously injured - 11 more are never found. Some 80 days later, the oil is still pouring from the lake bottom. The beaches are closed, there’s no fishing, sailing, skiing or sightseeing, and there won’t be for many years to come. The summer tourism economy collapses. If we aren’t driven out financially, many of us who can’t tolerate the toxic air have to leave. Those responsible for the disaster can’t fix it. They’ll probably declare bankruptcy and disappear.

Then a corrupt federal judge down in Coeur d’Alene, one heavily invested in oil stocks, says the oil companies can resume drilling their exploratory wells, and soon, as the oil continues to pour into our lake and pollute our shores, new platforms are going up and the rigs are drilling down again. Our government regulators are as absent as they were before the disaster.

Is this the life you imagined for yourself?  Should any American have to bear it?  Can we live without the industry and the economy that created it?  Yes, we can, and we must.

CURTIS HEWSTON

Sandpoint