The Republican oil-pollution gusher

I don’t have much use for President Obama's bobbing and weaving on offshore oil, or his taking more than $70,000 of BP campaign money. But these Republican geysers are real pieces of work, aren't they? The Republicans are the party of oil, the party of pollution and, dare I say it, the party of global warming. The president sins out of weakness. The Republicans commit far greater sins as a matter of policy.

It was wrong for the Obama team to lower the standards for environmental impact statements for BP, and shame on Democrats who lack the courage to say this. But it is a hundred times more shameful that the same Republican policies of laissez faire that so harmed the nation on Wall Street and banking now work their magic to pollute our gulfs and poison our shores and do even more damage to our economy.

Drill, baby, drill? I hope every Republican runs on this campaign slogan again. Pollute, baby, pollute, is their program. It is true that the lobbyist-industrial complex that I have been criticizing has polluted both parties in Washington. It is also true that the Republican philosophy of laissez-faire now further pollutes our shores, further kills our wildlife, further poisons our air and further destroys our jobs.

On the matter of offshore drilling, the left was right and the right is deadly wrong.