APNewsBreak: Obama abandons wilderness plan

Source: AP/Seattle PI

The Obama administration is backing away from a plan to make millions of acres of undeveloped land in the West eligible for federal wilderness protection.

Interior Secretary Ken Salazar said in a memo to his agency that officials will not designate any public lands as "wild lands." Instead Salazar said the agency will work with members of Congress to develop recommendations for managing millions of acres of undeveloped land in the West. A copy of the memo was obtained by The Associated Press.

Salazar's decision reverses an order issued in December to make millions of acres of public land eligible for wilderness protection. A budget deal approved by Congress prevented the Interior Department from spending money to implement the wilderness policy. Several Western states filed suit to block the plan.

Read more: http://www.seattlepi.com/news/article/APNewsBreak-Obama-abandons-wilderness-plan-1404818.php

That's bad.

here comes the 'uh oh' squad.

And I think they're wearing flip-flops.

our pockets. Less and less.

Fucking congress blocks Interior from spending money on the plan. I can't express my disgust with Republicans enough, dirty bunch of skidmarks.

A budget deal approved by Congress prevented the Interior Department from spending money to implement the wilderness policy.

Then, because you don't have a system of firebreaks, the total amount of land destroyed is vastly larger.

so much of the larger context in which that would happen has changed too . . . ?

I wish it was possible to let at least some wild places be just what they actually are. Screw the systems of firebreaks. Burnt land isn't destroyed, it just isn't "useful" to us in the manner that we demand of it, right?

Maybe it would be good for Earth and us if there were just ONE thing that wasn't measured by man's values, one thing that did not exist or survive due to our "good graces", or due to our forbearance. Maybe Gaia actually is that thing, but she doesn't speak in words we can hear until we have passed the point of no return.

We're the first species (that we know of) even trying to do anything about it. Gaia wiped out the last 99% of all species that have lived here, because, well, nature is fundamentally evil (if not in motive, in action).

We do it because we want to use those lands for our own desires. In doing so, we are also "violent, cruel, and ugly" to the species that are dependent on burnt-over land, such as jack pines and Kirtland warblers, sometimes to the point that we drive them to near-extinction through fire suppression programs.

I guess that's the take-away.

Preventing wildfire with a system of firebreaks is unnatural and causes more damage when it eventually burns.

Either humans, and their actions, are natural, or they aren't, no?

Since you appear to be advocating for adding roads to wilderness areas for the purposes of fighting forest fires, is it your contention that we should actively be extinguishing species and devasting their lands?

If you want to define all actions of humans as natural, fine. We finally have a location for storing nuclear and other hazardous waste, your back yard. I'll pull into your yard, the tire tracks are natural, pull the oil pan plug, drain the oil onto your front yard (don't worry, it will soak in and it's natural) and complete the oil change by tossing the empty bottles, used filter and packaging from the new one around your yard. It's all good and natural. Then, since that Big Gulp and Burrito from the gas station are weighing me down a bit, I'll seek some relief in the landscaping next to your front door. We are still good, right? After all, anything we do is natural.

:grr:

Just read about how he abandoned any chance of a WPA-style jobs program. How he rubber stamped 4 more years of illegal searches under the Patriot Act. How he visited Joplin and then went and played Golf? I mean...

It's getting hard to keep up the facade....

they're BFF

Now, watch this drive.

...and he made it clear it was a response to Interior's "wild lands" policies.

I am hopeful for a language makeover that will allow Sen. Lee to save face, or whatever he needs to shut up, and big "W" Wilderness designations to continue.

a hold on the head of Fish and Wildlife than see this plan abandoned. And a hold is no reason to abandon the plan entirely anyway.

"NEW ORLEANS — U.S. Sen. David Vitter says he will release his hold on Dan Ashe, the president’s nominee to head the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

The Louisiana Republican said Wednesday that he made the move after the U.S. Department of the Interior issued its 15th deepwater petroleum exploration well permit, following the end of the deepwater moratorium in the Gulf of Mexico."

"... because of his concerns about Interior's "wild lands" policy."

Link: http://www.nola.com/politics/index.ssf/2011/06/boemres_issues_15th_permit_sen.html

Battle vs. War. Nothing wrong with "abandoning" a policy -- flawed, I'd add, not strong enough to withstand Congress -- to re-tool and come from a different direction for the same goals.

walking trails and small places to eat & to buy crafts/bookstores and community/state education resources, to teach Wilderness info & skills.

Americans. nt

Such optimism!

we could strongarm the GOP the way BushCo did the Dems...if we had the stomach for it.

...*SIGH*...

So they will end up in the "drill baby drill" groups hands some day?

Dems...where the HELL are your spines?!?

AGAIN... this country is fucked, and things will get worse unless we get a real fucking President who has the balls to get shit done.

strength. I don't know if that's a safe assumption.

Not again!

Doesn't sound too good.

A total opposite of what candidate Obama ran for. You can't blame the GOP for everything, Obama and still be the President.

Anyone notice how this little secret agreement was hidden from we the people, while Obama was running around the Lincoln Memorial saying he had reached a historic agreement with the GOP.

oy:eyes:

n/t

:party:


The DLC New Team
Chamber of Commerce APPROVED!

(Screen Capped from the DLC Website)

http://www.dlc.org/ndol_ci.cfm?contentid=254886&kaid=86&subid=85

These lands can NOT be designated "Wilderness".
Ya GOT ta have some way to get the Drilling Rigs, Timber "Harvesters", and Mineral Extraction teams in
if BIG Corporations are going to plunder Public Resources for Personal Profit!!!
Its the "Uniquely American Solution".


"There are forces within the Democratic Party who want us to sound like kinder, gentler Republicans.
I want a party that will stand up for working Americans."
---Paul Wellstone


"By their works you will know them."

For example, Gates and Geithner are Republicans and the newer the crop of Democrats, the more right they seem to be.

when measured against the group in the WH they are the most Liberal.

Disgusting.

Just wanted to point that out, before we lay it all at the president's feet.

The Obama administration has fought and won many court suits.

Granted, few of those were for things I wanted, but there is no reason to assume that mere filing of a suits is enough to block Obama from something he wants to do.

What a country this would be if all the other side had to do to block the President and Congress was to get a few of its Governors to file a lawsuit.

Not happy to hear that news. :(

that Obama genuinely does not give a shit about the environment.

:-(

Any initiative, policy or law that limits the oligarchy's ability to make a profit is pretty much DOA. Big corporations rule the roost, everywhere, period.

By "managing" I'm sure that means leasing out lands to big energy for pennies per acre so they can drill the shit out of it and reap insane profits.

which are some of the most corrupt institutions in the country right about now.

Why wasn't this passed in 2008-2010 when Dems dominated everything?

I have been saying over and over, the "liberal" media is not here to help.

The "plan" referred to here is Secretarial Order 3310, acknowledged by a single post in December and but six DUers replying to it. In in, Salazar directed the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) to "...use the public resource management planning process to gather public input and designate certain lands with wilderness characteristics as 'Wild Lands.'"

OK.

So in April, Congress passed the appropriations act ("Department of Defense and Full-Year Continuing Appropriations Act of 2011") which SPECIFICALLY PROHIBITED use of any federal funds therein appropriated "to implement, administer or enforce Secretarial Order 3310."

Now then. Tell me why, when the first line of Interior's press release ("obtained by the AP" sounds much more exciting, but there you have it) says "pursuant to the 2011 Continuing Resolution," it's not mentioned that Congress had a thing to do with this until the article got a rewrite (now at the link, used to be just these three paragraphs) and even then quite obliquely in the fourth paragraph??

(edited for grammar)