Posted on 08/21/2002 6:20:28 AM PDT by Grampa Dave
Bush to push for thinning
The Associated Press, 8/21/02 4:21 AM
MEDFORD, Ore. (AP) -- President Bush will address forest health issues when he visits Medford on Thursday, most likely pushing for more intensive thinning of Western forests to reduce fire danger.
When they reach Medford, the president and U.S. Sen. Gordon Smith will receive a briefing on Oregon wildfires, according to Joe Sheffo, Smith's press secretary.
Bush and Smith will then be taken on a tour of the area burned by the Squire fire southeast of Ruch. The fire scorched nearly 3,000 acres of public and private land after it was sparked by lightning July 13.
The president's visit comes as Western lawmakers draw up legislation to speed cutting of overgrown forests. Administration officials have blamed tangles of environmental rules for slowing logging on federal lands and want cutting accelerated to meet targets set by the 1994 Northwest Forest Plan.
Environmental groups, long critical of the president for appointing friends of timber and other industries to top posts, said the president is simply using Western wildfires to justify increased logging.
"This administration was pushing logging before these fires, it's pushing logging because of these fires, and it'll be pushing logging after these fires," said Nathaniel Lawrence of the Natural Resources Defense Council.
The White House on Tuesday invited Oregon Gov. John Kitzhaber to join the president in Southern Oregon on Thursday, when Bush will ride in a helicopter over the huge Biscuit Fire and visit a smaller fire closer to Medford.
Kitzhaber has led an effort by the Western Governors' Association to address wildfire threats across the West.
The Bush administration has signed onto the governors' plan of stepped-up thinning, and Bush will promote that Thursday. But the administration has so far not committed to the funding the governors want and in some cases has suggested firefighting costs have escalated out of control.
Governors from Idaho, Arizona and Montana also have been invited to join the president in Medford.
The president will also have politics on my mind.
"This is very significant for us," state Republican Party Chairman Perry Atkinson said. "We know that Oregon is one of the targeted states in the next election cycle."
If Atkinson had any doubts, he was jokingly reminded of that in the days just before Bush's inauguration.
"When I met with the president, he leaned over and said, 'Just 6,776 votes, are you going to make it up to me next time?' " Atkinson said, referring to the number of votes that Bush lost Oregon by in the 2000 election.
"I told him we would do our best."
The current Oval Office occupant will not be the first President Bush to have visited the Rogue Valley.
His father made a presidential visit to Medford in mid-September, 1992. Before that, the last presidential visit came when President Gerald Ford arrived in 1976.
Rutherford B. Hayes was the only other sitting president to visit the Rogue Valley, arriving in September of 1880.
This means that as soon as he can find another billboard, he'll just stick another one up. Sickening.
Me too. It's the snot nosed kids, fresh out of college, who think a piece of paper makes them smarter than people with 20 years of field experience who give the whole show a bad name.
By fighter I meant that he wouldn't cave into pressure to remove ours if we got it put up.
EBUCK
Who's holding him accountable? Not people who say "everythings alright, The President is a Republican".
The fish are more important than my crop, but thats OK, the President is a Republican.
We are buying oil from the people who murdered 3000 of us and the President won't put that fact before the public when a weak 1 vote majority in the Senate won't let us drill in ANWR, but thats OK, the President is a Republican.
W's Secretary of Transportation says we can't search Arabs in airports because its racist, but put on the rubber gloves and take granny to the back room because she might be a terrorist. Thats OK, because the President is a Republican.
The right of free speech is suspended for 6 weeks before an election, but thats OK, the law was signed in by a Republican.
Lets federalize a bunch of illiterit burger flippers that we can never fire, that must be a good idea too, because a Republican President signed off on it.
We support a small govt candidate and get BIG GOVT, but thats OK, because the big govt is run by a Republican.
I have this great bridge in Brooklyn for sale at a good price, are you interested? You can trust me, because I'm a Republican.
And if he did say something, what then? Daschle is under no obligation to do anything the President says. None. Nada.
Daschle is in control of the Senate, dictates what comes to the floor and what doesn't, yet you still blame Bush.
That's dishonest and you know it.
The Reagan argument is a non-starter. You don't know what Reagan would have or would not have done. All you have is speculation and you are passing it off as fact.
It's not.
If you want to blame someone, blame Jeffords for tossing control of the Senate to the Democrats, making Daschle the truly illegitimate Senate Majority Leader.
But I already know such facts are lost on you because no matter what, you will blame Bush. Even when it can be proven that he is not at fault.
Sounds like you could use a trip up the Olympic Peninsula in Washington state....
There's lotsa profit to be made by thinning and management of forests so that acreage can be harvested every decade or so as long as we wish.
In addition to profit, forests are healthier and more disease/pest resistant overall, and deadfall is cleaned up so that the danger of these incredibly hot infernos is nullified.
There are people who do condone and practice clear-cutting. Be that as it may, I'm not really condemning it as a general rule.
My point was made in response to the claim that logging does not destroy ecosytems. It's rather obvious that logging does damage ecosystems. The damage is to some extent reparable. Left untreated, though, logging can permanently change (i.e., "destroy") an ecosystem.
Clear-cutting is an obvious example where there are potentially significant environmental impacts due to erosion and other factors. IIRC, the USFS did some studies a few years back in Oregon's Deschutes National Forest, on the environmental impacts of various types of logging. Un-restored clear cuts showed very significant erosion problems. (I could probably drive you to the very spot...)
By the same token, I encourage anybody interested to visit Camp Sherman, OR -- worth visiting anyway -- to take a look at the forest thereabout. Historically the area has been quite heavily logged (selectively, for BIG trees, for real profits), but the forest shows no obvious signs of it having happened. In that same area there's also a very interesting on-going demonstration of various thinning methods, the results of which look quite encouraging.
Your MOUTH (and chainsaw hehe)is the is one of the best weapons "in reversing their rural cleansing of America". All this country would need is around 100,000 people like you grampa.
I hope it is clear by now what Hubby does for a living. Fifteen years ago, he did a "test grid" on NYS Forestry land. The grid was an experimental checkerboard of acreage plots. For instance, some plot was clear cut; on some the stumps had to be a certain height with "ramp access" made from the tree originally cut, no matter what grade the tree was, so the male ruffed grouse to mount, make his mating dance and make little grouse; some plots were fenced in to keep the deer out; on some they thinned the brush; one they only "ringed" trees of certain sizes; some they had to lodge a huge pine log into a stand of oak in order to make cover; some they thinned; some couldn't be touched.....
The moral of this rather long story is that most of the test plots showed little impact on the number or habits of the native species inhabiting them.
This was a scientific habitat study. It had many stupid aspects, such as not taking into account that the ruffed grouse doesn't need a ramp made from a vaneer log to get on top of a stump...it has wings. It can fly. Rabbits don't need special habitat impact studies because the information is there for the taking in cities, suburban neighborhoods, whathaveyou. However the study was checking the impact on the entire ecosystem....perhaps they were too careful, because out of all those acres of logged-for-profit and felled and left lie trees....there was no impact to species.
That's a problem with environmentalism: it does not take into account the inherant toughness of nature...instead believing that nature is so delicate that the least little disturbance will kill off thousands of species.
That ain't so. Species have been spontaneously becoming extinct for millions of years. With careful management, rather than hunting to extinction...in general....what is that line from Jurassic Park..."Life will find a way."
Me, I do not like clear cutting on steep hillsides. It causes soil erosion and severe degradation, especielly where topsoil is thin.
He!! pf a thread tonight Grampa.....he!!uvathread.
Good work and dedication BUMP!!
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