Sometimes you just gotta do what you gotta do.  I’m glad that there are people left in this world with gumption.

Jamie Hinton, the volunteer fire chief of tiny Magnolia Springs, Ala., has a plan to use a blockade of barges to stop the Gulf oil spill from entering the Magnolia River. For a time, he went ahead with the plan, even though it might have landed him in jail.

via How an Alabama fire chief risked jail to save town from Gulf oil spill.  It sure is better than sitting around waiting for the “government experts.”

The Coast Guard has admitted that it has failed to both anticipate and control the 2,500 square mile oil slick that’s hiding in the waters off places like Perdido Key, Orange Beach and Plaquemines Parish, resolving to do better.

But local officials say they’ve seen little improvement as their requests get bounced around, ignored or even opposed.

The main problem, they say, is the confusing command structure, which to them seems to have too many generals and not enough battlefield commanders, thus gumming up the ability of local leaders to react to approaching oil.

“How can you fight a war when you don’t let the people on the ground make decisions,” says Escambia County Commission Chairman Grover Robinson. “You’re going to lose that war.

We must not allow ourselves to become victims of  the beauracrats.

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