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The Gulf Of America?

Bestofneworleans.com reported that Mississippi state Representative Steve Holland has introduced a bill to rename the Gulf the Mexico the Gulf of America, well, not all of it, just part of it. He has said that the bill was only a joke, and was a commentary on the immigration debate. The bill would “provide that for all official purposes within the state of Mississippi, the body of water located south of Hancock, Harrison and Jackson counties shall be known as the Gulf of America.” This is not the first time this name change has been proposed.

The Mexican coastline is 1,394 miles, while the United States coastline is 1,680 miles, so, by 286 miles, it is more ours than theirs. But Stephen Colbert may have had the best explanation for supporting this idea, the so-called “Pottery Barn” rule: “We broke it, we bought it.”

He’s right, and not just because of the BP spill, which occurred in international waters. Between the agricultural run-off of all the bordering states and the entire Mississippi watershed, and the 33,000 oil and gas drilling operations that we have carried out, we are responsible for all the dead zones in the Gulf.

But calling it the Gulf of America wouldn’t be accurate. The entire hemisphere is “The Americas” – North America, South America, Central America, and most of it is called Latin America. There are people among that “most of it” who resent the fact that we call ourselves “Americans” and left them out of the name. But, United Statesians, United Statesites, United Statesiacs, USians, they all sound so unwieldy. How about the Gulf of THE Americas? That would be more diplomatic, wouldn’t it?

 

　

 

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