Liberty
Matters News Service
January 15, 2004
Eating the Elephant, One Bite at a Time
House Resource Chairman, Richard Pombo (R-CA), has spent
a good deal of his time in Congress trying to make the 30-year-old Endangered
Species Act more user-friendly, but has had little success with the whole-hog
approach. Now, he says he will go at reform one piece at a time. "I think
it's just a lot easier and a lot more practical to break it down," he said.
The change in tactics has environmentalists worried. "It's the
death-of-a-thousand-cuts approach," said Bart Semcer of the Sierra Club.
Many Republicans and even some Democrats believe the law has been used to
subvert progress and trample private property rights. But Rep. Nick
Rahall (D-WV), has promised to fight any attempts to pull the ESA's sharp
teeth. "I think we can build an effective coalition that will block any
wholesale revamping of the law itself," he said. "We will be a formidable
opponent." Pombo isn't too concerned about complaints from environmentalists.
"There's nothing we could possibly do that would satisfy them," he said.
"They keep saying the same things, and yet the problems are still there."
As a start, Pombo wants decisions for listing species and designating
critical habitat to be based on "real science."
Rep. Pombo to Slowly Recast Species Act
Mountain Lion Attacks Bicyclist
A mountain lion attacked
a California woman who was bicycling in Whiting Ranch Wilderness Park last
week. The lion grabbed Anne Hjelle by the head and dragged her into the brush.
The woman was severely mauled and only the quick thinking of her friend
Debbie Nichols saved her life. Ms. Nichols screamed bloody murder as she
held onto Hjelle's legs while the lion dragged them both down a hill.
Other cyclists heard the commotion and drove the animal away by throwing
rocks and sticks. Authorities later found the half-eaten body of a man in
the same vicinity of the attack. The lion, a 2-year-old, 110 pound male,
was later shot and killed. Five people have been killed by lions in 13
attacks over the past 114 years, said Doug Updike, California Fish and
Game biologist. After lions attacked two children in the Ronald W. Caspers
Wilderness Park in 1986, authorities came up with a typical bureaucratic
approach and closed the park to children for ten years instead of eliminating
the big cats. State law forbids hunting or killing the animals and it is
estimated there are now 4,000 to 6,000 lions on the loose. The eradication
programs of the past, all government sponsored to help protect lives and
livestock, have ironically been replaced with new government programs
reintroducing killer predators that are decimating ranchers livestock and killing humans.
Mountain Lion Badly Injures Calif. Woman
Oh Bury Me Not
Some environmentalists
are carrying the Earth-friendly fashion statement to new depths. Dedicated
Earth warriors now are demanding "green" burials that don't pollute the earth
with embalming fluid and tons of metal coffins. Babs McDonald, an
environmental educator with the U.S. Forest Service in Georgia says;
"I don't even want a cardboard box. I want my body to give back to the
earth. It is supposed to decompose and nourish the earth, become food for
all the microorganisms." In response, ecologically friendly burial spots
are popping up across the country. Physician Billy Campbell's Ramsey Creek
Company charges people (who are dying to get in) $1,950 for a space. He says
Ramsey Creek's 35 acres are also ideal for picnics and weddings. If a person
prefers to swim with the fishes for eternity, he can have his ashes mixed with
cast concrete that Eternal Reefs uses to build artificial marine reefs. The
prices range from $995 for a community reef to $4,995 for a private one. "This
is good for the environment [and] the baby-boomer generation wants to give
something back," said Dan Brawley founder of Eternal Reefs. "[T]his is going
to be the next big thing."
Seeking Harmony in a Final Return to the Land
The Weather Channel Goes "PC"
The Weather Channel, the station
87 million Americans watch to catch what is brewing, has a new feature; "Forecast
Earth." The new segment will cover climate change and other environmental issues.
The Weather Channel's policy takes a page from the politically correct crowd by
declaring Earth's climate has increased approximate 1 to 1.5 degrees Fahrenheit in
the past century and "[C]omputer model simulations and other assessments … provide
strong evidence that a significant portion of the current warming is a result of
human activities." "The replacement of vegetation by buildings and roads is causing
temperature increases [and] urbanization and deforestation can cause an increased
tendency for flash floods and mudslides from heavy rains," the statement continues.
Heidi Cullen, formerly with the National Center for Atmospheric Research in
Boulder, CO, has been hired as the on-air climate expert. Ms. Cullen does three
two-minute climate change segments a week and recently produced a five-part climate
change series. It is unclear how the public will interpret the information, but
the cheerleaders for global warming gloom most likely welcome help from such a
distinguished source. Perhaps the Weather Channel ought to study environmental
forest policies to understand that the devastating forest fires these past years
were brought on by the lack of logging and thinning and that's what causes mud
slides, not global warming!
The Weather Channel Position Statement on
Global Warming