Obama’s “warmed-over-Dubya plan” for salmon is good enough to irritate Rep. Doc Hastings, however-
We posted on this earlier. Reaction continues to come.
Under Obama’s new salmon plan, breeching the dams on the Snake River in that state of Washington would be a last resort, rather than the plan salmon recovery advocates had hoped for and kind of expected. Under Bush breaching the dams wasn’t to be considered under any condition.
However, the new plan’s critics call it “warmed over Bush.” It isn’t so much salmon advocates that Obama has to please, however, it is federal judge Redden. Redden in the past has rejected five biOps (biological opinions from various Administrations) of how they can keep the dams and recovery the salmon too. The standard they have used is that their plan will keep the salmon “trended toward recovery.” This standard is not recognized by Endangered Species Act, but Obama, like Bush uses it.
Conservation groups hope the Redden rejects this plan and says he is out of patience. Tear down the dams. Redden has said in the past that he might do just that.
Nevertheless, the hint of breaching in the new plan has the local Republican representative “Doc Hastings” upset. It seems to me that this is another situation where the President could educate the Republicans that militant opposition to his policies has a cost.
Rocky Barker put up a video of Hastings cross examining the NOAA Administrator explaining the dam breaching possibility.
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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 President of the Western Watersheds Project.
The word parsing that goes on in such testimony is amazing. Hastings will be against breaching the dams regardless of the science. And then he has the gall to accuse Lubcheno of using political means instead of scientific rationale to include the breaching of the dams as a possibility.
IF the administration was true to its word that SCIENCE would be the deciding factor in these types of decisions (as Obama promised in his election campaign) then they would NOT have allowed the wolf hunts without a comprehensive strategy including Idaho, Montana, Wyoming and neighboring states gaining wolf packs, and they WOULD have recommended that the dams come down.