Caswell, the new BLM chief, thinks Democratic Party gains in the West are not due to a backlash from all the oil and gas drilling in prime wildlife and scenic areas.
Drilling backlash is overblown according to Jim Caswell, new BLM head. By John Heilprin. Casper Star Tribune.
I don’t see evidence one way or the other from this article. It’s just Caswell’s opinion.
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Ralph Maughan
Dr. Ralph Maughan is professor emeritus of political science at Idaho State University with specialties in natural resource politics, public opinion, interest groups, political parties, voting and elections. Aside from academic publications, he is author or co-author of three hiking/backpacking guides, and he is past President of the Western Watersheds Project.
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If there are no negative comments concerning the “pock marked” landscapes it means that our urbanized society is becoming deadened to the horrors of the energing brave new industrialized world. The Chinization of this country grinds on. Recently, there was a picture in the New York Times, of a Chinese village in the foreground where all of the people had masks on with a background view of “mountains” of spent mining tailings with not a twig of vegetation in sight. The Chinese are also paying a price for America’s unstainable existance.
Well, everyone is paying the price for a global population of over 6 billion. It is more correct to say the Chinese environmental problems are the result of their decisions and governmental corruption, than to blame the U.S. China doesn’t even enforce the weak environmental laws they do have, and this is due to the extraordinary pressures of providing food, energy, and jobs to their own population of over 1.3 billion.
The whole world is paying the price for global civilization’s march of technological progress, and it seems that the majority of humankind doesn’t think the current price is too high to pay for the rising standards of living.
Let’s face it, the vast majority of the world would eagerly trade their parks, clean air, and wildlife for a comfortable and technologically advanced standard of living.
In fact, isn’t that what is really happening?
I recently read that you can travel throughout most of more populated part of China and never see any blue sky because the industrial and auto smoke is so thick nowadays.
My neighbor travels there on business and said the first time it snowed while he was there the first two inches were black. He thought a vilcano had erupted or something.
So, “Chief Jim” thinks the drilling backlash is “overblown” does he? …well, certainly not as overblown as his alleged qualifications to head the BLM.