Turn all federal lands back to the states, with the exception of actually active military reservations.
Klinton did this at least once, in deference to the wishes of his campaign donations/donors that were entangled with the Riyadi’s and the Chinese.....who own/manage the big coal company in Indonesia, IIRC
GRAND CANYON NATIONAL PARK, ARIZ (AP) — “Siding with environmentalists in one of the nation’s biggest wilderness battles, President Clinton declared 1.7 million acres of southern Utah’s red-rock cliffs and canyons as a national monument Wednesday. The election-year move effectively blocks development of one of America’s largest known coal reserves, to the dismay of political leaders in Utah, the nation’s most Republican state.”
” ‘We can’t have mines everywhere and we shouldn’t have mines that threaten our national treasures’, the President said. Standing at the south rim of the rust-colored Grand Canyon, Clinton invoked a 90-year-old law to create the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument without Congressional approval. He announced his decision near the same spot where Theodore Roosevelt used the same law, the Antiquities Act, to protect the Grand Canyon from development in 1908.”
” ‘We are saying, very simply, our parents and grandparents saved the Grand Canyon for us’, the President said, bathed in sunlight breaking through the clouds. ‘Today, we will save the Grand Escalante Canyons and the Kaiparowits Plateaus of Utah for our children.’”
“Seven weeks before the election, Clinton’s action delighted environmentalists, but brought threats of political retaliation from Utah. Mike Matz, executive director of the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance, called it, ‘one of the most significant land actions that any president has ever done.’ Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, said Clinton was declaring ‘war on the West’. Yet, with just five electoral votes in Utah, there was not much political risk for Clinton in offending the state’s political establishment.” (Seattle-Daily Journal of Commerce, 9/19/1996)
If Peak oil is truly here (big if) then all energy assets are on the table. I mean really - if the country is grinding to a halt and mass riots are breaking out over energy, does anyone think silly things like monument designations are going to protect against going in and developing these resources? Same goes for offshore. Fight them tooth and nail, but remember when it comes down to it, these assets WILL be exploited.
Hi sionnsar,
I questioned bothering with a Washington ping then looked closer and saw that not only was it a Washington State Rep (Hastings) mentioned in the story but they’re looking to annex the San Juan Islands (the bastards!)...
More Federal land = More Federal union workers to “administer” it. Plain and simple.
I hereby designate Washington DC a jacka** zone.
The WSJ had a superb article on small nuclear plants and how they could revolutionize electricity production. Hopefully this will allow even more nuclear plants in the West, allowing more development. It is a shame the Feds are thinking of locking up more land.
The land should all be sold to pay down the public dept.
It doesn’t really matter who buys it, the minute the land is outside of the Federal government’s hands, the Federal government loses any and all authority to uses it as a legal clam to control over policy in our states.
I don’t care if you sell it to private interest in communist China, anyone and everyone is better then the United states Federal government owning it.
Once its out of Federal hands our states can eminent domain it back if we need to.
Besides we need the money to pay down our dept.