To me, oil is a natural substance that is completely organic.   There are natural oil wells and places where it seeps up into the water.

My guess is that whatever short term harm occurs, later on the oil will be like natures fertilizer, revivifying the environment.

Jabailo, have you ever seen the misery of a living, dying, oiled creature up close?

Yeah, yeah...you all know that we use fossil fuels to run our tractors, ship our food, fertilize our fields, etc.

But I've heard there are types of yeast that can actually eat crude oil.  We, in turn, can consume the yeast.  So, I propose we skip shipping the oil across the oceans and just set up a food "synthesis" facility in Saudi Arabia or Iraq.  We can let all of North America's farmland revert to wilderness.  In fact, we could all just move to Saudi Arabia.  We can "eat" the oil and have solar-powered seawater desalinization for water.  Everything we need!

Wildlife is not "largely safe."  At last report, 60 animals were seen coated with oil, and those animals will all almost certainly die soon.  If it were 60 people who were eventually killed due to something like this, would Grist's subheadline read, "People largely safe from oil spill"?