Today, I heard that BP’s cap may be leaking. An editorial in the New York Times calls Congress to the carpet for not taking detector tampering in the Massey Mining explosion that was the industry’s worst in 40 years. But the furor and public outcry seems to be losing steam.

Certainly, the intensity and speed with which information moves creates some unique and new challenges for crisis communicators….but does it also create opportunities? Are memories shorter? Does interest wane more quickly? Do we move on to the crisis du jour and give reputations a pass?

Has the plethora of “worst events in history” in the past few years desensitized us to the significance of these issues? Or does the pervasive mistrust of all things big – big banks, big companies, big governments caused us to expect the worst?

Big questions for a rainy Monday morning…