Haunting Images of the BP Oil Spill

These photographs give a hint of the magnitude of this disaster.

So what is the solution?

I value simplicity and minimalism in government, but that is different than being a strict libertarian.

Mainstream democrats and republicans (i.e. today's congress) will hold hearings and purpose new legislation. The problem is it probably won't simplify the existing law by weeding out the ineffective rules.

We already have multiple government agencies involved in offshore drilling (EPA, U.S. Minerals Management Service, and the Department of the Interior) - yet we still had this disaster. They probably have too many laws - most of them covering trivial issues.

If you have complex laws and bureaucracy, it is too easy to "miss the forest from the trees" (enforcing nitpicky stuff but missing bigger issues.) There also might be loopholes inserted by lobbyists.

The libertarian view, of course, would be that BP should never be overseen in the first place. They are taking a publicity hit for this disaster, and it should be left to the markets to punish them.

But there is a third way - the simple, elegant way. We should go for quality over quantity:

1. Eliminate loopholes and trivial rules. Enforce a few, basic practices to prevent a repeat of this disaster.

2. Let oil companies be aware that future incidents will result in massive fines. By "massive", I mean a percentage of quarterly revenue - so if a company the size of BP is found to have cut corners, they will pay billions of dollars.