We've concluded that informed and aroused activists like you, along with a vigilant Congress, are essential to blunt the administration's anti-environmental actions.
You can download the full report from www.wilderness.org...
UNDER THE RADAR
While our country wisely focuses on countering terrorism, the Bush
administration continues to move at full speed to implement its
anti-environmental agenda -- mostly under the radar.
Since September 11, Interior Secretary Gale Norton and others have invoked "national security" to justify massive oil development not only in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, but also on fragile western public lands across the lower 48 states.
But homeland security includes wildland protection. The clean air and water, biological diversity, and inspiration that our national parks, wilderness, and other natural reserves provide are of vital importance. ***The truly patriotic course of action is not to plunder the most stunning lands we have inherited, but to protect them. Each generation serves as trustee of these natural treasures, and this administration is breaching that trust.***
IGNORING ENERGY STRATEGIES THAT WOULD HELP AMERICA The White House is championing an energy plan that is a half-century out of date and appears to draw more on the advice of Enron and other fossil-fuel industry executives than on anyone else's. Under this blueprint, our environment would be sacrificed in a host of ways.
IGNORING SCIENCE
The new administration has ignored or misstated findings of the
scientific community. Scientists extol the value of roadless forests,
but the Bush administration is trying to undermine the policy that
would protect 58.5 million acres of roadless national forest lands.
Interior Secretary Norton gave inaccurate testimony to Congress on Arctic caribou calving facts, claiming later that it was a typo. She told the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers that she supported its wetlands proposals -- but failed to pass along criticism from biologists at the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service.
IGNORING THE PUBLIC
The administration also ignores the public's views -- despite pledges
to the contrary from Secretary Norton and others. Citizen comments
overwhelmingly supported a snowmobile phase-out at Yellowstone
National Park and protection of national forest roadless areas, but
the Bush administration is trying to roll back these initiatives.
In California, despite broad-based opposition, the administration is championing offshore oil drilling on 36 sites. Eager to give forest product companies the green light to log 41,000 acres in Bitterroot National Forest, the administration tried to use an end run to avoid the law that requires public comment. The only voices that this administration wants to listen to are those pushing for exploitation of our natural resources.
APPOINTEES
Many, many appointees to key positions in the Administration are
former lobbyists or employees of powerful timber, oil and gas, coal
mining, and energy companies. They include: Mark Rey, Steven Griles,
James Connaughton, James Cason, William Myers, Paul Hoffman, Drue
Pierce, Rebecca Watson, Bennet Raley, and Camden Toohey. Read their
bios on-line at http://www.wilderness.org/newsroom/rls012402.htm
OK, A FEW POSITIVE STEPS, BUT...
On occasion, this administration has acted to protect the environment.
But most of what the Bush Administration takes credit for amounts to
allowing existing rules and decisions to stand, like deciding to keep
arsenic standards for drinking water (and only after a public uproar).
WHAT YOU CAN DO
The items above are just the big ones. A laundry list of other issues
is covered in our report at
www.wilderness.org
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