Uh...No
Gale Norton, Secretary of the Interior, has announced that she will be leaving her post. The Washington Post today bade her a not-so-fond farewell in an editorial. Unfortunately, the piece didn't quite capture the wrongheadedness of her tenure within the wrongheadedness of this regime.
...the truest thing that can be said about Gale A. Norton, who resigned last week as interior secretary -- a job that gave her oversight of national parks, federal lands, and the Indian tribes, oil producers and hikers who use them -- is that she did not manage to bridge the deep gap between the mining and drilling companies that view America's federal lands as an untapped source of mineral resources and the environmentalists who see them as pristine wilderness that must be preserved for future generations.
...Down the line, she chose to support the business argument. She gave out more permits to drill and mine on federal lands, effectively placed more federal lands in line for development, and came down, not unexpectedly, on the side of the snowmobilers. Not all of these decisions were wrong: In a meeting with Post editors last year, she made a persuasive case for the fact that not all federal lands are scenic, pristine or otherwise environmentally significant -- and there is a great national need for oil and gas. Nevertheless, she made little attempt to create a broader constituency for her policies, little attempt to see both sides of the picture. She leaves behind even more bitterness and division than she inherited. [Emphasis added]
Apparently the Washington Post wants our 'wildlands' preserved only if they are worthy of postcard photography, biodiversity and ecological integrity be damned. Once again, the press falls into the trap that there are two sides to every story, even if one side has all the science and fact, and the other side has only the money.
What is more astounding, however, is that the editorialist seems so surprised by Ms. Norton's failure. It has long been clear that in this regime, everything is for sale: votes, national security, international policy. Why should there be any surprise that Ms. Norton came down on the side of business with every drilling, logging, and snowmobiling argument?
Ms. Norton's tenure was a failure, but not because she failed to bridge the divide between mining interests and environmentalists. It was a failure, ironically, because she intended her tenure to be marked by the grand give-away of America's resources to business interests and she succeeded.
...the truest thing that can be said about Gale A. Norton, who resigned last week as interior secretary -- a job that gave her oversight of national parks, federal lands, and the Indian tribes, oil producers and hikers who use them -- is that she did not manage to bridge the deep gap between the mining and drilling companies that view America's federal lands as an untapped source of mineral resources and the environmentalists who see them as pristine wilderness that must be preserved for future generations.
...Down the line, she chose to support the business argument. She gave out more permits to drill and mine on federal lands, effectively placed more federal lands in line for development, and came down, not unexpectedly, on the side of the snowmobilers. Not all of these decisions were wrong: In a meeting with Post editors last year, she made a persuasive case for the fact that not all federal lands are scenic, pristine or otherwise environmentally significant -- and there is a great national need for oil and gas. Nevertheless, she made little attempt to create a broader constituency for her policies, little attempt to see both sides of the picture. She leaves behind even more bitterness and division than she inherited. [Emphasis added]
Apparently the Washington Post wants our 'wildlands' preserved only if they are worthy of postcard photography, biodiversity and ecological integrity be damned. Once again, the press falls into the trap that there are two sides to every story, even if one side has all the science and fact, and the other side has only the money.
What is more astounding, however, is that the editorialist seems so surprised by Ms. Norton's failure. It has long been clear that in this regime, everything is for sale: votes, national security, international policy. Why should there be any surprise that Ms. Norton came down on the side of business with every drilling, logging, and snowmobiling argument?
Ms. Norton's tenure was a failure, but not because she failed to bridge the divide between mining interests and environmentalists. It was a failure, ironically, because she intended her tenure to be marked by the grand give-away of America's resources to business interests and she succeeded.
posted by Diane at 4:20 AM
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