Gov. Jindal: We're Not Waiting For the Feds

Yesterday I said that Louisiana needed to act on their own and quit waiting for Federal approval of their plans to build barrier islands to stop oil from getting to Louisiana shores.  Today, that's what they're doing:

Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal (R) said the state will stop waiting for federal approval to begin building sand barriers to protect the coastline from the Gulf of Mexico oil spill.

Oil has pushed at least 12 miles into Louisiana's marshes, with two major pelican rookeries awash in crude.

Gov. Jindal was critical of the amount of boom his state received to ward off the oil seeping toward the coastline. But his major gripe comes at the expense of the Army Corps of Engineers, who have yet to give the go-ahead for the building of sand booms to protect the Louisiana wetlands. He used photographic evidence of oil breaking through hard booms, soft booms and another layer of protection, before being finally being corralled by a sand boom built by the National Guard.

"It is so much better for us. We don't want oil on one inch of Louisiana's coastline, but we'd much rather fight this oil off of a hard coast, off of an island, off of an island, off of a sandy beach on our coastal islands, rather than having to fight it inside in these wetlands," Gov. Jindal said, making the case for sand booms.

The governor said he has been forced to protect Louisiana without the approval of the Army Corps of Engineers, which is weighing the ecological impact of the construction of more sand booms.

"We are not waiting for them. We are going to build it," Jindal said.

The Feds have no idea what they're doing. The Gulf states need to act on their own and ignore any threats from the environmental wackos and ignorant bureaucrats and do what they need to do to protect their coastlines.