Tag: Politics
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‘Carbon Curtain’ exposes suppression of science at a state university
By Erik Molvar, Executive Director, Western Watersheds Project While Trump administration issues directives banning discourse on climate change and muzzles scientists in federal agencies, the fossil fuel industry may have an even tighter stranglehold over state institutions. In his new exposé of industry meddling in higher education, Behind the Carbon Curtain (slated for an April…
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Privatized or Not, Public Lands Will Suffer Under Trump
The straw-grasping began almost as soon as the shock wore off. Conservationists began searching for a sign that Donald Trump might care about something other than money and winning. They dug up a January 2016 interview with Field and Stream and Outdoor Life, where he said that he doesn’t like the idea of divesting federal…
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Grazing Provisions in Bishop’s Utah Public Lands Bill Are Poison Pills
By Jonathan Ratner, Wyoming Director, Western Watersheds Project Representative Rob Bishop’s Utah Public Lands bill isn’t just a bad deal for Utahns who want to see Bears Ears protected as a national monument, but it’s also a terrible bill for public lands in general. Included in the sweeping language is binding provisions that would require…
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Malheur was taken over by ranchers long before the Bundys came along
Casual readers of news coverage of the recent armed takeover of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge might reasonably assume that the Refuge is strictly protected from livestock grazing. After all, that’s one of the things the vigilantes were protesting, right? The big, bad federal government locked up the lands from grazing and they were there…
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A Bird’s Eye View of the 2016 Budget: Sage-grouse and the Federal Spending Bill
When President Obama signs the 2016 Omnibus budget bill as he’s expected to do later this week, he’ll be signing off on a lot more than hard-fought spending agreements. In what appears as a victory for conservation, he’ll be approving funding for the new west-wide management plans for sage-grouse habitat, approved by the Bureau of…
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The Self Preservation of Land and Wildlife Managers
The art of land and wildlife management has fallen into the hands of political actors who are beholden to powerful interests who only care about how much money they can squeeze out of our wildlife and public lands. When faced with making tough decisions, these professional bureaucrats have learned special skills to move up through…
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Defense Bill Threatens Sage Grouse With Free Pass for Livestock on Public Lands (updated)
WASHINGTON — The National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) soon to be considered by the U.S. House of Representatives contains several provisions that would undermine current efforts to protect greater sage grouse on nearly 60 million acres of public lands, and would lead to listing greater sage grouse under the Endangered Species Act. The livestock lobby…
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Governors Vote to Further Endanger Sage-Grouse
The Western Governors’ Association met earlier this month in Colorado to discuss, among other things, plans to oppose federal Endangered Species Act (ESA) protection for Greater sage-grouse and undermine federal conservation laws. The sage-grouse is in grave decline across its range in the western United States, but rather than spend time developing ways to restore…