National Review Online and the Russians Suggest Nuking BP Oil Well
What's the best way to deal with an environmental disaster? If you're aNational Review Onlinewriter in June 2010 or, say, the Soviet Union three or four decades ago, the answer is simple: Drop a nuclear bomb on the leaking wellhead in the Gulf of Mexico. If the Rooskies used to do it, it must be a great market-driven solution, right? Besides, you could maybe "trap virtually all of the radioactive fallout within the sub-oceanic bedrock."
Typing person atNRO types:
Of course, the risks of an atomic blast — not just of catastrophic malfunction or ineffectiveness, but of post-blast “venting” or “seeping” of radioactive gases from cracks in the ocean floor — have to be measured against those of the alternatives. But it seems a reasonable conjecture that the dissipation of a limited amount of radioactive material across the vast Gulf is preferable to the blanketing of thousands of miles of American coastline in ribbons of tar.
Indeed. The "catastrophic malfunction" of a radioactive explosion on the Gulf sea floor with who knows what kind of long term fallout and a potential giant dead zone of nuclear devastation along the entire southern coastline of America is far superior to .... well, to anything, really.
Is anyone in the non-wingnut-website world actually considering dropping nuclear bombs on a bleeding oil well? Maybe! Bloomberg reported on May 14 that Energy Secretary Stephen Chu sent a team of America's Top Scientists to come up with wacky ideas just in case BP's next twenty solutions also fail to work. And to thisNROperson, that means we are literally hours away from nuking our own seawaters! Just like the Soviet Russians, who kick ass! So as soon as our Mighty War President 4 Life Barack Obama starts cold bombing New Orleans or whatever, then the wingnuts will finally love him for finally being as hardcore as the Soviet Communist Russians, who are the great heroes of every American Wingnut:
The Soviets repeated the trick four times between 1966 and 1979, using payloads as large as 60 kilotons to choke hydrocarbon leaks. Now, as the Obama administration stares into the abyss of the Deepwater Horizon spill, and a slicker of sweet, medium crude blankets the Gulf of Mexico, slouching its way toward American beaches and wetlands, Russia’s newspaper of record is calling on the president to consider this literal “nuclear option.”
As well he should.