What Are You Doing, Arkansas?

I have a personal interest in Exxon's recent oil spill. I learned to fish in Lake Conway as a child, and later I lived in Mayflower. My fond memories have been overshadowed by the depressing news. Things aren't going to be the same for the affected Arkansans for a long time.

What's more depressing is the surrender of Arkansan leadership to Exxon. I'm talking about the media restrictions on the cleanup site.

Now I know that on a project like this, the performing company needs to have at least some access control in order to do their job effectively. You see a simple example of this in road construction sites where a flagman is directing traffic. I go along with the flagman in such cases.

And if I drove up to a disaster cleanup site and was told I couldn't drive through the neighborhood, I'd probably comply too, at least if it wasn't my neighborhood. Even though I'd be mightily interested in how a multinational corporation is handling operations on American soil, I'd probably cooperate because I don't need to see everything myself.

We have the press for that.