Margie Robben

The Gulf Oil Disaster

The on-going Gulf oil disaster’s most revealing fact is that no one was “minding the store”.

We already knew no one was minding the store with the banks, with the Madoff’s investment scheme along with other investor creeps. We knew there was no oversight with the automobile, toy, drugs and food industries. We knew it big time in the health care insurance industry.

Somehow America seemed to be fooled or lulled into believing that if the oil industry was drilling miles under the sea, they knew how to do it and if something went wrong, they knew how to fix it. We mistakenly thought, also, that because a government agency like MMS was watching them, our beautiful birds, fish, water and beaches were safe.

How wrong we were!  The very people watching the oil industry were in bed with the oil companies, doing drugs with them, and taking favors from them.

Not only have the American people lost trust in the Corporations of America and other nations, but we now have a monstrous and disastrous cleanup on our hands which may have destroyed our wildlife, water, and beaches for decades.

The damage continues. The clean-up continues. There is some hope the containment of oil leaking is starting to work.  As part of the clean-up we must not make the same mistake we made after 9/11 when so many authoritative people told us the air was safe. Many of our first responders got sick and died. We trusted them too.  Now we must not trust. We must demand that our responders are well cared for. We must demand they are given the tools they need to do the job. We must protect their lungs, their eyes and their skin. We must make sure one of the culprits, British Petroleum, uses our “pay as you go system” and not allow BP to use their lawyers to fight the costs of the clean-up, and the lost revenue of our fisherman in the court system as everyone waits to get paid twenty years from now.

The American people are sick and tired of the advertised slogans of the past, which indoctrinate us with the false idea that by giving tax breaks to the wealthy somehow the benefits will “trickle down” to the middle class and poor. It doesn’t happen.  Very few rich people give away what they think they have rightfully earned on the backs of the poor and middle class unless there is a benefit to them.

Someone once said that a parent is as happy as the least happy of their children. In the same way, the rich cannot be happy unless the middle class and the poor get an equal chance of making a decent wage and that our old, sick and disabled are cared for.

With the oil disaster, many people are asking why the government can’t plug up the hole. Much of the criticism comes from the very same people who previously condemned the administration for “too much government intervention”. Somehow now the government is not big enough.

In a New York Times article (6/6/10) Tad W. Patzek, Chairman of the Petroleum and Geosystems Engineering Department at the University of Texas in Austin, was quoted on the oil leak. He said, “It’s a very complex operation in which the human element has not been aligned with the complexity of the system”. It was pointed out that the laws of physics are involved in the challenge and one of the challenges is that one mile down there is a ton of pressure every square inch. He said that the laws of physics are largely in control.

In the Gulf oil disaster, not only was the law of physics breached but the human element was breached as well. Both elements were certainly not in alignment. On the oil rig there were reports of disagreements, loud arguments, confusion as to who was in charge, slipshod workmanship, taking risky chances, and rushing to finish unsafe work in order to make a buck and get on to the next job. The human element took shortcuts and there was no separation between the workers and government oversight. Government and oil executives accommodated each other and looked the other way when it came to adhering to safe rules and regulations. They told us they could operate deep within the center of the earth and they were not prepared for the consequences. By their own behavior, they are showing us they were not able to protect us from a catastrophe.

It may be that we are at a crossroad in America. It may be that it is time to listen and evaluate more carefully. Stop, step back, listen and evaluate the facts. Start to identify what is hype and what is real. We may have to trust only when trustworthiness is proven. It may be that we have to hold all those people accountable who make their living by manipulation and lying. If we have to conserve, we will have to do it. If we have to do our homework, we will have to do it. If we have to give up something to help someone in need, we will have to do it. As Americans it may be a time for us to grow up. We have no other choice.

By Margaret and John Robben

Memorial Day 2010 is upon us and it’s appropriate now to remember what the Vietnam War was like when Richard Blumenthal was still in college.

Like many other young men of that time, Blumenthal was in no hurry to put his life at risk for a war that most of the country didn’t believe in.  One of the few legal ways of avoiding the draft was to seek college deferments and hope that the war would be over by the time you graduated.   Blumenthal, and thousands of others, chose this route.  But the Vietnam conflict seemed to drag on forever.  Preferring the Marines to the other services, Blumenthal signed up for the Marine Reserves.   As it turned out his unit wasn’t activated and he served his five years Stateside.

The aircraft Carrier, USS HANCOCK, (CVA-19), was deployed to Vietnam numerous times between 1962 and 1969.  On board the HANCOCK during one of these tours was Yeoman Ken “Jake” Jaccard.  While Jaccard was serving on active duty in the waters off Vietnam, Blumenthal was billeted in Washington, D.C. Both young men served their country, the former on active duty in the Navy, the latter in the Marine reserves. Jaccard, now in his 60s says he still suffers from Survivor’s Guilt. Is it possible Blumenthal does too?  If so, that might account for the few times he’s misspoken about his military service.

When Jaccard returned from Vietnam he found himself coping with the fact that he’d survived the war.  To help himself deal with these feelings he undertook the task of working on special websites for other veterans, as well as writing poetry like many other veterans have done down through the ages.  His poem,”Survivor’s Guilt,” is included in this column.

Blumenthal, whatever his feelings were about the Vietnam War, has been working with passion aiding American veterans.  As Connecticut’s Attorney General he’s been in a unique position to help bring them back into the mainstream of American life.

Young Americans have been “called to serve” during our country’s wars and depending on the climate of the times have gone willingly, or reluctantly, or in some cases not at all.  The latter have been called “draft dodgers, or “cowards,” and some have even been imprisoned.  Many of them became permanent exiles of their own country as a result.

The Vietnam War did such serious damage to the young people of this country that it’s resulted in the Draft being shelved in favor of Voluntary Enlistments.  No longer do Americans rush off to sacrifice their youth on the altar of war when other means of protecting our way of life might suffice.  Having a military reserve, such as the one Dick Blumenthal served in, could prove as much of a deterrent to our enemies as having a large-standing presence of military might around the world.

                 SURVIVOR’S GUILT–A Vietnam Legacy

                                             by Jake Jaccard, YN3, USNR

                                 Sometimes I ask WHY they had to die
                                 And WHY I was left alive to grieve…
                                 The answer seems we shouldn’t try
                                 To question mysteries we can’t perceive.

                                  Life at best, is happenstance,
                                  We’re here to live life the best we can
                                   The rest then, must be left to chance…
                                   and accept Fate as a man.

                                   Our Birth was much like being vexed,
                                    for in the Womb, we feared to leave.
                                    No one can tell what happens next,     
                                    No answers come, our doubts relieve.

                                    You may miss those who did not

                                    survive,

                                    For those whose blood was spilt…
                                    But more: Be happy that you’re alive,
                                    And dwell not, on all this guilt.

                                     For that is what they’d want you to do,
                                     To live your life for them…
                                      Life goes on, and so must you! 

                       And in this way, you’ll honor them.

Copyright 1996 – All Rights Reserved (with permission to reprint)

Jake Jaccard, lives in Winchester, Tennessee. We found his poems and the poetry of other Veterans on the following website.  http://www.usshancockcv19.com/poetry/vietnam/index.htm

(Published in the Greenwich Time and Stamford Advocate on 5/31/10)