An unremarked disaster

If it had not been for a little political diversion here, and Obama getting tough with Wall St over there, the disaster in the Gulf of Mexico would surely have led the TV news on the national networks both sides of the Atlantic. As it was, it occupied less than a minute on BBC News at 9 this morning. It seems to me that the incident is going to be more damaging to the North Atlantic, because of the drift from the Gulf of Mexico, than the shipwrecks of the Torrey Canyon and Exxon Valdez. It is difficult to see how the economies of the Gulf itself and the Caribbean are not going to suffer for some time to come.