The Miami Herald website finally put up AP photos of the Gulf Oil Catastrophe. The Boston Globe has put the same series of AP photos that the Herald features on its website, except the Globe has them in large scale, high definition format. The Herald's is a puny slide show. The Globe's section is titled, "The Big Picture". As of Saturday PM, the Boston Globe comment section has more than 2800 online reader responses as of early Monday morning. That's huge. So why doesn't the Herald website both feature the AP photos more prominently AND provide a comment section? Hard to know why a Massachusetts paper has figured out what a Florida paper, can't: that readers are transfixed by the Gulf Oil Catastrophe. Maybe people in Boston are just smarter. Or, maybe, it's easier for a newspaper to deal with the catastrophe from 2000 miles away than from around the corner. Maybe all those Pensacola visitors will reschedule their vacations to Miami Beach. Maybe the Herald is guilty of mere inattention. Wouldn't be the first time.
And speaking of inattention, a few weeks ago Herald columnist Fred Grimm wrote: "The Herald's Curtis Morgan and Scott Hiaasen reported that MMS officials, who were co-opted with gifts, paid vacations and liquor from oil executives, failed to collect billions in royalties and fees due from the drilling operations." Reading this, one would be lead to believe that Morgan and Hiaasen broke a story worth crediting to them. They did not.
The Minerals Management Service disgrace is an old story. For a complete account of regulatory capture--the pre-eminent example-- under the Bush administration, read the 2008 by the Project on Government Oversight that should have been credited by the Herald: "Drilling the Taxpayer: Department of Interior's In-Kind-Royalty Program." Knock, knock: anyone home? Maybe the Herald's ombudsman can answer.
3 comments:
Bush has been out of office for 18 months. Don't these MMS officials work for Obama, or did they stop taking bribes on inauguration day out of fear that the integrity of the executive branch had just run up a notch once Obama was seated?
At what point does the sitting administration become responsible for anything that happens on their watch? Could be this is really all Jimmy Carter's fault!
Huh!?
The Herald story exposed the Minerals Management Service corruption and ineptitude under Obama. As a good Obama lackey, you have attempted to deflect attention to the Bush years. It doesnt wash. The lack of regulation is Obama's fault and the fault of the Democratic congress. Take ownership of it.
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