President Barack Obama visited the Alabama Gulf Coast Monday to see firsthand the BP oil spill’s impact.

He spoke to a crowd at Theodore, then took the Dauphin Island Ferry to Fort Morgan for a trip along the beach road to Gulf Shores.

People watched.

A good many livelihoods are at stake there on the Alabama coast.

As Gov. Bob Riley pointed out to the AP, many of those businesses in places such as Gulf Shores are mom-and-pop organizations, less designed to take a huge economic hit, unlike the corporate monsters with tentacles all over the nation.

Workers continue to construct a barrier system at the mouth of Perdido Bay to keep oil from rolling inshore.

A sheen of oil has already made it into the bay.

Tonight, the president is expected to address the nation about the oil spill. He will do so from the Oval Office, the traditional spot of bad news.

Obama will talk about the oil spill and promise recovery, but nothing soon. In Alabama, he made that point to a group.

Although Obama has promised things will return to normal, we all know that is untrue.

Many lives will never be normal again because of this oil spill, no matter how quickly the recovery.