I was greatly saddened to read M.D. Harmon’s blasting of what seems to me a blatant need to shift our economy away from oil and toward life friendly power (“Green jobs subsidies don’t perform as advertised,” June 25). He compares the ongoing hemorrhage of oil into the clean Gulf of Mexico sea water to turbulence on an airplane. This is no turbulence. This is a deadly pattern of behavior that evilly compels increasing doses of consumption.

I agree with his assessment that oil is a colossus in that it’s “very portable, energy-dense and easy to use.” He fails to mention how insidiously deadly that means of power is. “All that glitters is not gold.”

I disagree with his thinking that we have lifted ourselves out of an agricultural economy on two counts. Agriculture is a big part not only of our economy but also our existence.

I suspect oil companies, since their inception, have found ways to evade normal taxes and to incur subsidies. Wars are black holes for tax pooled money vacuumed in large part into the banks of oil profiteers colonizing more oil fields.

Burning oil in its many amazing modes cranks carbon dioxide into the atmosphere and cyclically into our water. The earth is about freighted to the max with our poisons. If we pursue Harmon’s big tax breaks for big oil, we kill off more of our living quarters: less air, less water, less dirt, fewer jobs.

Without oil there will be plenty of jobs. It’s a matter of redirecting our societal will and reallocating the taxes we pool.