Too much fight ~ not enough industry. Three cheers for Grijalva.
Grijalva sizes up why he didn’t get Interior
Congressman, still upbeat, says, ‘I have a good job’
Post Interior Interview with Grijalva
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Too much fight ~ not enough industry. Three cheers for Grijalva.
Grijalva sizes up why he didn’t get Interior
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In the Grijalva interview, he spoke of Salazar as a “caretaker”.
Caretaking
the status quo.
Chump change for the environment from Obama.
http://www.lasvegassun.com/news/2008/dec/18/interior-nominee-salazar-likely-
push-update-not-ov/
Harry Reid’s work seems to me to be all over the Salazar
appointment and the Do Much of Nothing – path Interior is already on.
Gracious, smart man who would have been much better than what we got. He got it exactly right when he said Salazar is a caretaker model; but covered it up nicely…VBG. Harry certainly weighed in, and through him the mining industry. And when the cattlemen are happy….sigh.
Obama in selecting Salazar for Interior is sending the same message to people who care about public lands and the environment as he is sending to gay people and folks who have an inclusive view of “diversity”/prgressives as he is in the Rick Warren business:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/chris-durang/gay-and-feeling-hurt-by-o_b_152348.html
Grijalva makes a great point in the Interview article Brian posted, and also hints that maybe it is time for the Reids and Pelosi and Obamas of the world to NOT be able ot always count on that vote.
Since the smarmy Big Dem Emanuel type politicians take the progressive vote for granted, and this is being blared out in a big way by the Warren controversy, there needs to be more interplay and interaction (on-line in one voice, in particular) between social justice progressives and grassroots environmentalists. The Big Green groups are a lost cause, really at this point. Their roaring silence in the Interior process over the past few weeks, and now their pathetic post-Salazar nomination comments show that.
As an alternative to taking your ball and going home, I suggest sending lots of comments to the transition team to let them know how displeased you are with the choice of Salazar and warn them of a coming “green migration” (i.e. Nadar 2012) in the next election should things continue down this path. You can still affect other important posts and build some room for Grijalva to maneuver.
I agree with the observations that the DP does seem to take the green vote for granted AFTER it is delivered, but please, not Nader. Ralph had his heyday..let the man rest in peace.
Comments and input need to be steady, not sporadic. This kind of attention to Interior’s agenda needs to be a constant din in the Secretary’s ear. Ken can’t be Sec. DOI forever, and may want to hold office in Colorado again. He needs to be reminded we have long memories…~S~
I don’t think anyone is suggesting anybody take their ball and go home – I think it is important that Obama and the Blue Dogs like Reid get pelted with a LOT of diverse progressive-of-every stripe balls.
If progressives (be they those who care most about environmental issues or social equality issues – and more and more the dividing line is not clear) aren’t part of the Obama “inclusiveness” then it is time to act up, speak out and work with others for common goals.
How do we effectively draw parallels between the brutal mindset of the western ranching culture (prairie dog slaying to barbed wire to Big Ranching taxpayer welfare) that Salazar represents, plus the exploitation of lands, landscapes, and the Public Commons that Salazar’s record shows —– and diversity, social justice, peace – issues?
Great point, JimT. If he ever wants to hold office in Colorado again, he’d better listen to us.
To his credit, he has opposed oil shale development as it uses too much water and more energy to extract the oil from shale, a resource we don’t have enough of here in Colorado. I know they do it (limited) in Canada but it is an expensive, time consuming process.
Dark threads of Info are starting to surface that Obama very much views public lands as a political chit to be sacrificed for higher gain. Including the higher gain of foreign investors.
Like the gain of hedge funds invested in foreign owned uranium (Grand Canyon country) mining claims where the Grand Canyon Trust and others have been involved in fighting this. Lie the gain of foreign-owned gold mines (Nevada where all the gold nines are foreign-owned-and I might add increasingly employing an underpaid exploited non-union Hispanic work force). Now too there is a huge Chinese-owned molydenum mine near Eureka in the works.
So a progressive like Grijalva that who will hold firm on basic protections for these lands and real reform of the 1872 mining law was just not acceptable.
Instead, showing their disdain for public lands – the Obama folks chose Salazar as another Cowboy Hat frontman for continued “multiple use” destruction of the American West. And it is no longer “multiple use” where U. S businesses are the ones here – no indeed – it is Barrick Gold (Canada and who knows where else), the Chinese-owned moly mine near Eureka, etc.
Folks in the know on this need to speak out publicly – and the concerns that all signs now point to Obama throwing public lands under the bus for foreign interests and hedge fund investments too – needs to be aired.
Plus I keep coming back to Obama when he introduced Salazar talking about importance of ranchers – he must mean the Barrick grazing permit ranching, or the Chinese gold mine public lands grazing permit ranching, or the Las Vegas Spring Valley Water miners/ranchers.
Reporters need to do some digging …
As a follow-up:
Here are links to a Blog Post and articles that provide insights into how Obama plans to deal with mining, and deal with “resources” of the public lands:
http://www.longestwalk.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=380&Itemid=121
http://www.indypendent.org/2008/02/27/1504/
http://www.ecoearth.info/shared/reader/welcome.aspx?linkid=71647 This is a link to article originally at this URL:
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/28/business/28uranium.html?_r=1&ref=business&oref=slogin
So here is the question – With all the Obama Admin. talk of science coming out today, will the Obama administration turn a blind eye to the science related to the ecological devastation to lands and communities that such land abuse causes?
And how will Obama admin. deal with the unfitness of someone like Salazar to apply any valid science related to effects of livestock grazing in the arid West?
I am deeply disappointed about Salazar heading the DoI. I expect nothing to change…. I hope I am wrong. But I see it as a continuation of a longstanding unjust tradition of the west.
Public lands unfit for our native wildlife, desertification, and the bison won’t be the only animal on a $17.50 postage stamp that most folks cannot afford to collect anyway….
I can see the headline now…”Limited edition wildlife stamps, get yours now before they are a thing of the past too!”
KT,
You’re dreaming if you think reporters are going to dig. Look at the environmental reporters we have now. Rocky couldn’t report his way out of a wet paper bag. He worships the collaborative process along with ICL and it would offend his heroes like Kempthorne and Crapo. McMillion in Bozeman writes the same report every week about buffalo but re-arranges the paragraphs. And the AP reporters don’t look farther than a government source for any information about issues.
Reporting nowadays is just rewording government or corporate press releases and calling it your own. They’re lazy, and if they report any controversy their bosses fire them. They don’t want to rock the boat because they will lose their precious access and won’t have friends at parties.
Sorry to be so cynical but the media is never going to get it. We have to do it ourselves and that’s why I think blogs like this one are so important.
But they can parrot, can’t they?
Here is a NY Times article with some insight intothe uranium mining boom, and that may help explain why Ken Salazar was chosen for his commitment to selling out public lands to miners, speculators, Canada, China, etc.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/28/business/28uranium.html?_r=1&ref=business&oref=slogin
On McMillion … he left the Chronicle this summer. In his farewell, he said the bison situation was perhaps the most upsetting thing about his time with the paper.
He was bought out of his contract in August when the Chronicle reduced its staff. That also affected another reporter there who has since become a friend of mine.
I myself in many instances have contacted various reporters in the West regarding conservation issues such as bison and elk feedgrounds and have essentially rewritten stories for them to ensure that the facts are addressed in the future, and in every case, the reporter–or more likely, the editor–has failed to incorporate the facts. In a sense, the time I have spent trying to educate reporters and editors on these issues has been a waste of time. They just keep repeating the lies that the government and special interests like the livestock industry or the collaborationist “conservation” groups like the Greater Yellowstone Coalition tell them.
We are in the same situation that all progressives in this country are in–we cannot break into the mainstream press or mainstream politics because the mainstream has already sold out to special interests. We are beginning to see that the Obama administration is doing the same thing with environmental issues, despite the strong support that progressives gave to his campaign and election. Now, with his cabinet appointees, he clearly has decided he can get away with betraying progressives. It appears that we are going to be seeing merely a repeat of the Clinton administration, which was a huge disappointment.
Yes, we should flood change.gov with letters of protest.
To take charge of the public debate about progressive issues, we are going to have to take charge and follow the first rule of advocacy, endless pressure endlessly applied, and no compromise. This is not a tautology. We cannot expect the mainstream press to tell the truth or dig for the truth. The days when every reporter wanted to be Woodward or Bernstein have passed.
One (small?) way we are taking charge is that bison conservationists are working to put together a public hearing on bison sometime this coming spring, probably in Bozeman, Montana. We will be running the public hearing–not gutless government agencies operating as agents of the livestock industry, or collaborationist enviro groups–and the pent-up public emotions about the abuse of Yellowstone bison will be given a voice. We think this will be a way to take control of the public debate on bison.
RH
Another thing we could clearly launch – sites like this make it possible – is a true Greater Yellowstone Independent Media Cooperative. It’s very easy to set up the Web site, to put together editorial policy, etc. The hard part is getting people to contribute on the vast array of environmental and other issues that aren’t seeing the light of day anywhere else.
My organizing space is full right now, but if there were initiative to get such a cooperative together, I would certainly support the effort to the best of my abilities.
But, as for the public hearing that Robert is talking about, yes, it’s a very exciting thing we can do ourselves to get our own word out there, and I hope people here will support the effort – as we develop more details, we will certainly be asking for advice and support.
One of the best progressive left-leaning blogs on the internet is the Dailykos. I wonder if any of the articulate people who frequently comment on Ralphs’ blog could submit an article to the Kos. The readership seems to be enormous, and if I understand correctly, these left-leaning blogs are having some impact on (or at least being noticed by) the MSM. It would be a great way to inform the readers of this blog about the wildlife/environmental issues. They seem to be very politically proactive and interested in progressive issues. (Brian, Ralph or Robert?)