Matthew Simmons: Lightning Rod for Gulf Oil Controversy

from Washington's Blog. This is the part of the article that is most distressing to me:

The bottom line is that the use of so much Corexit in combination with such huge amounts of oil is a science experiment, and no one knows the outcome. This might kill the Gulf. Or the Gulf might bounce back surprisingly fast.

Rob Kendall, director of Texas Tech’s Insitute of Environmental & Human Health, says:

    This is a catastrophe of enormous proportions. To me, this is the biggest environmental toxicology experiment we’ve ever conducted.

And Kim Withers, a coastal ecologist at Texas A&M University in Corpus Christi notes:

    It's like the biggest science experiment ever. Unfortunately, it's a completely uncontrolled experiment.

It seems so overwhelmingly obvious to me that all oil/fossil fuel companies, because their operations have potentially enormous consequences on the environment and public health, should be under public ownership and control.