Three reasons Karen Budd-Falen is unfit to lead the Bureau of Land Management

Medium.com ^ | June 21, 2017 | Greg Zimmerman

[Twotone]

Rumors are swirling that President Trump will nominate Wyoming lawyer Karen Budd-Falen to direct the Bureau of Land Management.

Budd-Falen is uniquely unqualified to oversee the BLM, a department charged with managing 258 million acres of America’s public lands — and nearly 700 million acres of oil, gas, and other minerals — on behalf of the American public. She has spent her career fighting against the very existence of U.S. public lands, filing frivolous lawsuits against the BLM, working to subvert public land managers, supporting unpopular efforts to dispose of public lands, and even aligning herself with fringe extremists.

Here are three important reasons Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke and the Trump administration should look elsewhere rather than nominate Budd-Falen to run one of America’s most important agencies.

[pacpam]

Bingo

[glasseye]

Yes, she sounds perfect.

[Bob]

I'm assuming you mean this portion:

...and to exercise like Authority all Places purchased by the Consent of the Legislature of the State in which the Same shall be, for the Erection of Forts, Magazines, Arsenals, dock-Yards, and other needful Buildings;

That's one huge penumbra, or is that an emanation?

Does that seem anything close to what makes up federal land today? How much of that area is actually being used for its specific intended purposes?

[Tolerance Sucks Rocks]

Does that seem anything close to what makes up federal land today? How much of that area is actually being used for its specific intended purposes?

And how much of it was obtained with the actual permissions of the state legislatures?

[Bob]

Good point.

Another question: How much of it was, as stated, purchased versus acquired by other means?

[TXBlair]

Lol, I knew someone would beat me to it!

She’s unfit to lead the BLM because...hellooo...she’s white!!! Who does she think she is? Rachel Dolezal???

[TXBlair]

Why does this article make me think of Larry Bud Melman?

[FredZarguna]

She identifies as a land manager, so it’s fine.

[sphinx]

Re: federal lands. The original 13 states surrendered their expansive and conflicting western land claims to the federal government in the 1780's, in the years immediately following the Revolution. Everything from the crest of the Alleghenies to the Mississippi became federal territory. Most of the rest of the present day U.S. entered the Union via federal purchase or conquest and treaty: the Louisiana Purchase; the acquisition of Florida from Spain; the Gadsden Purchase; the settlement with Britain in the Pacific Northwest; and the purchase of Alaska. The exceptions were Texas and Hawaii, which were independent republics prior to entering the Union.

So: 35 of the 50 states were created by Congress out of pre-existing federal lands. Most of the federal estate today consists of lands the federal government has always owned and that were retained at the time of statehood. In addition, much smaller tracts have been purchased (or donated by private owners) over the years for various purposes. Many of the Civil War battlefields now owned and managed by the National Park Service, for example, were acquired by purchase and donation, but the acreage involved in such sites is dwarfed by the lands retained by the federal government at the time of statehood.

The real argument is whether the federal government should have deeded all public lands over to the various states at the time of statehood. This has never been done automatically. Remember that in the early federal period, the ongoing sale of federal lands to the public was a major source of federal revenues (along with tariffs). What happened in the 1880's, however, was that the arable lands had largely been sold, and the remaining federal estate was largely in the desert and mountain west (and later in Alaska) where yeoman agriculture was no longer the driving interest. Congress realized that timber, mining, and grazing interests were the primary drivers, and that huge tracts of federal lands were now being acquired for a song by large corporate interests, not the pioneer families of historical memory. Congress balked at selling millions of acres at a time to the robber barons, so it shifted to a leasing orientation.

Western lands advocates argue that these lands should be shifted to state ownership. That is a defensible argument, but it would take an act of Congress. These lands have always been federally owned.

[sphinx]

P.S. I left out the acquisition of the present day American southwest from Mexico. The principle holds: Arizona, New Mexico, Nevada, and California were first federal estate, with the later states being created by Congress. Not the other way around.

[BobL]

Trump SCORES! yet again.

[Original Lurker]

You’re correct.

[BobL]

I remember the early days of Reagan, when he was trying to sell off federal lands. The Left had a cow and I wondered back then what the big deal was...since the the management of the lands seemed to be reasonable.

But now, after Clinton and Obama LOCKING UP much of those lands, I see that the Left was thinking long term the whole time...and needed Reagan to back off so that the lands would be available when the stars lined up (Obama and Clinton’s terms).

The only option is for the feds to get their hands off the lands. Ideally, give them over to private hands, but certainly states. The feds do have a right to some lands, such as on the border, military bases, etc., and I don’t mind them keeping most of the older national parks - but the rest of the land simply NEEDS TO GO.

[sphinx]

You've put your finger on the current issue. Until the last couple of decades, federal land managers in the western states tended to view themselves as partners in economic development. The feds were pro-logging, pro-mining, and pro-agriculture. The Forest Service, for example, had this wild idea that trees were a renewable resource and that controlled logging with reforestation was a good thing for foresters to support. And so on, in other sectors. Yes, there were tensions. The feds always wanted to protect the crown jewels in the National Parks and Monuments, and the feds undoubtedly insisted on a higher degree of environmental stewardship than a pure free market would have produced, but within those constraints, the federal land managers wanted to help people make a living off the land.

As late as Reagan, the legacy culture of the federal land agencies was therefore multiple use and sustained use. But that has changed. The left went on a crusade to lock up federal lands. The left today wants federal lands managed as parks and wilderness areas, essentially as nothing more than vacation destinations for easterners and Californians on holiday. The people who actually live in Montana or Idaho or Utah are of no account, excepting of course the enclaves of jet setters in their exclusive ski resorts. We've reached the point at which locals no longer regard the feds as reliable or trustworthy partners; the feds are more likely to be regarded as enemies. I imagine that there are still many federal employees in the field, and some hidden away in headquarters as well, who hold to the older view, but the Democrats have worked hard to institutionalize the new non-use ideology. It will be hard to put Humpty Dumpty back together again.

If it were up to me, I would set aside the national parks and monuments (i.e., protect the crown jewels) and then privatize much of the federal estate that has traditionally been leased for economic use. This could be done with suitable 21st century environmental safeguards; no one wants to repeat the mistakes of uncontrolled sprawl development. (One Las Vegas is one too many; no more boomtown cities in the desert ....) Start with a midrange goal: for example, no state should be more than a quarter or a third federally owned. (Let future generations worry about whittling it down from there, if it seems appropriate.) I would use the proceeds from land sales to expand federal park holdings in the eastern half of the country, which are clearly underserved in this area. Start with historic sites, floodplains, and waterfronts, of which the east has an abundance. Aside from the intrinsic importance of saving such sites, this would be good politics. We will get a lot further with privatization of BLM lands in the West if we can put it in the context of a strong, affirmative national parks and national forest initiative in the rest of the country.

[BobL]

Jeeze, what an EXCELLENT write up!

I was expecting comments to be more of the snot-nosed Ann Rand types: “The Constitution does not allow for federal lands other than for national security, so we should sell Yosemite and Yellowstone (and the others) to the highest bidder”. (just like selling out Interstates) “If people still want to visit, they can pay market rates, assuming that mining and drilling operations are not consuming the entire Yosemite Valley floor.”

Yep, do it in a controlled manner, in a way that respects all aspects of these lands.

This quote brings back memories: “As late as Reagan, the legacy culture of the federal land agencies was therefore multiple use and sustained use.”

...as in “Land of Many Uses” when you left a national forest. Not anymore, I guess.

[marktwain]

What they have done to wild horses is horrific and a violation of stewardship.

---

I do not blame them too much on allowing the wild horse herd to multiply out of control and destroy so much of the environment. Every attempt at rational management of the horses has been met with extreme emotion based propaganda from the Establishment media.

The management of horses and burros on federal lands has been an environmental disaster.

But that is what you get with irrational emotion being substituted for logic and reason.

[DoodleDawg]

Congress could end the BLM entirely by just passing a bill that sells federal land back to the states. Let them deal with it.

[Truth29]

This article should be submitted as exhibit #1 is support of her nomination. She sounds like just what is needed to cut back the Federal land management behemoth.

[Man from Oz]

Would you believe that because of the population explosion of wild feral horses and donkeys they are being relocated to several states to be warehoused?

I personally know several ranchers who lease their land to the FEDS for @ 2 dollars/head/day just to give these feral animals a place to get old and die.

Makes sense to the ranchers to do it when the alternative is equivalent to @ 200 - 250 dollars / year per cow/calf pair.

Ludicrous....

[JenB]

I am the farthest thing from a BLM fan. What they have done to wild horses is horrific and a violation of stewardship. And the stances they have taken on a myriad of other matters, like land grabs, also stinks. That’s one agency we could do without

Not sure exactly what you're referring to unless it's their failure to regularly round up and ship a bunch of the horses off to the glue factory. They're pretty, but they're essentially hoofed vermin that drive out other large herbivores and with the last couple wet springs we've had I'm worried they'll be starving to death all over the place pretty soon.