If you think the BP blowout is bad, you ain't seen nothing yet. Try Gasland.

The BP blowout at the bottom of the Gulf of Mexico looks bad. Really bad. There it is, one massive spew of toxic oil gushing out into the waters that we get our food and recreation from. But, what if you multiplied that by hundreds of thousands of wells? And, scattered them all over the country?

You’d have the most monumental environmental disaster of all time on your hands.

It’s called drilling for natural gas by the use of hydraulic fracturing, or ‘fracking’.

If you haven’t watched the new HBO documentary by filmaker Josh Fox, then you really should, because with a few exceptions you probably live in or very near an area that has been, or is slated for natural gas drilling.

Have you ever seen tap water ignite?

I blogged about ‘Gasland’ on Monday, asking my readers to tune in, but not everybody has HBO. I get it. Times are hard and you have to save where you can. You should go prevail on a friend that has the full cable package.

We watched it again tonight, since we’d missed the first 20 minutes or so on Monday, and then I thought I’d just remind folks. When I googled up ‘Gasland’ though, I got a surprise.

There at the top of the Google search was something called ‘Debunking Gasland’.

Being the curious and intrepid reporter that I am, I took a look. Then a closer look. You know how I am about shady ‘front groups’.

Yup.

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The HBO Bill Moyers/Bill Maher discussion continues

Well, I got an email from YouTube today suggesting that I may want to consider joining their program to ‘monetize’ my video - since it has been so WILDLY popular. Who know that would happen? Yes, there have been more than 400 comments between the four video segments I posted.

Are you listening, HBO?

People want to hear the message. Don’t put people like Moyers on and then restrict access to only the paying public. The Moyers interview is bigger than that, and you should be, too.  Furthermore, think of all the potential customers there are within these 400 who just might sign up for HBO.

Somebody brought up an excellent point the other day about posting these interviews on a blog. What’s the difference between that and clipping an article from a magazine or newspaper (in the digital virtual sense), posting it or quoting from it for discussion in a public forum?

So many of the comments on YouTube are so good, and thought provoking that I thought I’d post them again here.

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HBO and YouTube censorship

I’m wowed by the response of very thoughtful ( except for one, at least ) commenters on my YouTube post of the three segments of the Bill Maher-Bill Moyers interview. People are getting pretty annoyed with HBO’s heavy handed treatment of Youtube posts - doing ‘take downs’ right and left. Most notable was the ‘take down’ of the Pete Seeger “This Land is Your Land” song during the Obama inaugural.

How lame

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Friday Fish Wrap: April 3, 2009

TV Fare: HBO has gone and done it again, offering us a literate, richly textured slice of African life as seen through the eyes of a woman - who goes completely against type by opening The #1 Ladies Detective Agency with money from the sale of 180 cows left to her by her recently expired father. Our heroine, Precious Remotswe, throws an smarmy ex-husband, his equally weasel like attorney, and conventions to the wind to find her own unique place in her beloved Botswana.

We were both absolutely captivated by this show.

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'Too hot not to handle': Must see television

Heat waves. Melting glaciers. Rising sea levels. Catastrophic storms. Migrating viruses. Population displacement. Over the past 100 years, the mass consumption of fossil fuels, especially in America, has contributed to a dangerous warming of the earth that has adversely impacted the way we live. The cautionary documentary TOO HOT NOT TO HANDLE offers a guide to the effects of global warming in the United States.

This is without a doubt, the best, clearest explanation we’ve seen yet to define the problems and offer solutions.

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