No crystal ball on my desk

This from a reader:

"Saved the Oct. 18, 2009, Real Estate section of the Herald-Tribune because of the article about Bird Key and Arvida's influence on Sarasota's land. ... Next to it was your column, 'Oil drilling, perception and Florida.' You stated: 'For decades, drilling has been banned. But now, we are being told that we have nothing to fear. Don't worry about spills, the boosters say. Today's drilling equipment is really, really safe.'

"It looks as if you weren't 'overreacting to this threat (drilling)' ... My friend and broker, Fred, at WellsFargo/Wachovia investments, wants to know if you've written anything recently about the stock market. ... Is there a crystal ball in your office? I'll be checking the Tribune's website to see your recent opinions about the oil disaster. THANKS."

-- Pam in Kansas City, and owner of Sarasota property.

In response: I do not have a crystal ball, but I can state with certainty this prediction about the stock market: It will go up. It will go down. It will wobble along, depending on current events and changes in tax law and corporate earnings.

Back to reality: Of course, I can't say when these things will happen, just as I could not predict the timing of the recent oil leak. I will predict, though, that some proponents of drilling will read this and say, "The BP leak is a deep-water accident. Shallow-water drilling is very safe, and should be allowed off Florida's coast."

It may be much safer to drill in 100 feet than 5,000 feet, and an accident may never happen in those conditions if drilling were to be allowed here. But never is a long time. And as I said back in October, it's all about perception. Putting drilling rigs off the coast of one of the world's great resort destinations would be foolish, and most certainly detrimental to our real estate and tourism economies -- spill or no spill. We are seeing a negative effect on waterfront property already, as I predicted last fall. And the BP oil remains far from our waters.

I just returned from a couple of weeks in Brittany, which suffered the massive oil spill that resulted when the supertanker Amoco Cadiz ran aground in 1978 and dumped several inches of black goo on 150 miles of coast. The BP spill is very much on the minds of the French; they asked me about it a lot. And British callers to BBC radio programs I picked up were talking about it, too, claiming that Americans, from the president on down, are too tough on poor BP.

One English friend joked that the kick that bounced off the hands of the England goalkeeper and into the net in the World Cup soccer match against the United States, giving the Yanks a 1-1 tie, was partial restitution for the oil spill. If voters someday allow drilling near Florida shores, they will have no one to kick but themselves if things go wrong.