Posted on 11/12/2008 9:46:39 AM PST by jazusamo
The US Supreme Court has removed restrictions on the navy's use of sonar in training exercises near California.
The ruling is a defeat for environmental groups who say the sonar can kill whales and other mammals.
President George W Bush intervened in the long-running dispute, citing national security interests.
In its 5-4 ruling, the Supreme Court said the navy needed to conduct realistic training exercises to respond to potential threats.
The court did not deal with the merits of the claims put forward by the environmental groups.
It said, rather, that federal courts abused their discretion by ordering the navy to limit sonar use in some cases and to turn it off altogether in others.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.bbc.co.uk ...
I have to ask.... how can sonar (err... sound reflections) kill anything?
“I have to ask.... how can sonar (err... sound reflections) kill anything?”
Not to mention, don’t whales already sort of use their own sonar?
They are not talking about passive SONAR.
Lets see, well the wacko environMENTALists probably believe the navy’s sonar confuses the whales sonar causing the whales to crash into each other or some such nonsense.
If they didn’t do this, we might as well pull all our ships into their home ports. This should have never gotten to the courts.
I’m sure Obama will reverse this.
Federal courts abuse their discretion all the time. Will the USSC do anything about that? No, I didn’t think so.
In dissent, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg said that the Navy's own assessment predicted substantial and irreparable harm to marine mammals from the service's exercises. She said that "this likely harm ... cannot be lightly dismissed, even in the face of an alleged risk to the effectiveness of the Navy's 14 training exercises."
Roberts pointed out that the federal appeals court decision restricting the Navy's sonar training acknowledged that the record contained no evidence marine mammals had been harmed.
Someone needs to rip her a new one. How patently absurd when highly speculated harm to marine life trumps our national security interests! Can you imagine China or Russia dealing with this issue?
It's a possibility but hopefully Adm. Mullen can convince him otherwise.
How can environmentalists get to the Supreme Court without any actual evidence, let alone get a narrow ruling of 5-4???
This does not bode well for potential ‘Global Warming’ lawsuits.
Well, I assume Kennedy jumped to our side with the Fab Four, at least this time.
It won’t be long before you can kiss any decisions like this goodby.
Common sense prevails in our countries security over the enviro wackos.
These sub sonars project enormous power.
I don't know and don't really care what the enviros claim, but I don't doubt there is potential damage to whale hearing (if that is the correct term) or perhaps other internal organs if they are close by.
It is important that this was an issue involving a federal statute, not the U.S. Constitution.
The Congress can overturn this decision via the legislative process.
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