BP Spill recap and The First Ammendment... particularly the freedom of the press

The crisis in the gulf has been a great learning experience for the corporate machine and the U.S. government, but the greater impact has yet to be known. Now that it seems British Petroleum has got the spill under control, the question "can we prevent this from happening again?" becomes an issue.

Currently the Obama administration has a "freeze" on off shore drilling but that doesn't mean contracts aren't being given out to oil companies like BP. It seems like the next "black gold" mine is north, towards the arctic. This posses a problem. If another spill like this were to happen further north, not only will it cause great damage to the eco-system, it might take two or three times as long to fix (keep in mind, it took BP over three months to fix this problem).

A recent article in Rolling Stone went into detail on how damaging drilling in the arctic is and the potential dangers. For your reading pleasure: http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/17390/120130

The next big problem is the denial of the press. One of the greatest, if not, the greatest concept ever created by our government was a free press. Although personally I think a free press is taken for granted by many citizens, nonetheless it is a right given to all citizens.

An incident like this does cause much embarassement to BP and seeing it everyday on TV, in the newspapers and on the radio for three months can be irritating for some.

But preventing cameras and reporters into certain areas that are public, or putting a distance order on journalists to prevent getting any graphic images is a assualt on one of our biggest rights. If a problem happens in public, journalists have the right to report on what is happening.

When access to information is restricted, it allows lies, misconceptions and details to be overlooked.

Here's a video of CNN anchor Anderson Cooper talking about the restrictions. Personally, I'm not a huge Cooper fan, I think during the course of a year he's 90 percent "talking head" and 10 percent journalist, but here in this clip from July 2, I think he's got it right.