Interior Dept. shutting down mining in 10 states

Posted by ewv 8 years, 6 months ago to Politics
195 comments | Share | Best of... | Flag

From the Congressional House Natural Resources Committee. This action by an Obama political appointee, the Secretary of the Interior, shows the importance of which party is in the White House regardless of what you think of the president himself. Democrats since Clinton-I have appointed radical viros to run the government.

According to Mark Levin there are almost 4,000 political appointees assigned by the president and those he appoints to do the radical appointing. That is in addition to those they hire to be entrenched in the protected civil service. It is also in addition to Federal judges, about 40% of which have now been appointed by Obama. Another eight years of this means a nearly complete loss of control over how the Federal government functions for what political purposes, regardless of what Congress does or what new laws are passed making it worse.


USGS Study Reveals Extensive Impacts of Obama Administration’s War on Mineral Development

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: October 7, 2016
CONTACT: Parish Braden, Elise Daniel or Molly Block (202) 226-9019

Washington, D.C. – U.S. Secretary of the Interior (DOI) Sally Jewell is developing controversial plans to cordon off approximately 10 million acres of federal lands located in Idaho, Montana, Nevada, Oregon, Utah and Wyoming from mineral development. The withdrawals are one plank of the Obama administration's broader regulatory scheme to create a de-facto Endangered Species Act listing for the sage grouse. Earlier this week, the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) released an 800-page assessment of mineral potential within each state subject to potential future withdrawals.

House Committee on Natural Resources Chairman Rob Bishop (R-UT) issued the following statement:

“This assessment shows significant negative impacts for western states if these withdrawals proceed. But let’s not miss the forest for the trees. Despite successful species conservation efforts at the state level, and a finding last year that listing the bird under the Endangered Species Act is not warranted, the Obama administration wants total regulatory control and a much more permanent trophy for litigious environmental groups. Along with oppressive land use plans covering parts of 10 states—with restrictions for all types of economic activities—these withdrawals have the potential to be even more punitive and damaging to energy producers and rural economies than an endangered finding. This is a de-facto listing and then some. USGS’s report is small snapshot of the pain to come. This issue will require continued oversight even after the Obama administration is finally gone. Blocking mineral development by another executive fiat is inexcusable, and the Committee will be sure to keep a close eye on it.

“Secretary Salazar told the states they should adopt sage grouse protection plans and they would be accepted. States have spent time and money to create good plans. The current Secretary is now reneging on that promise. The state plans work and the department’s proposal does not. The department’s proposal hurts military preparedness and military ranges in the West, a fact that has never been taken into consideration.”

Background:

At a minimum, the USGS report suggests the withdrawal of such a massive area could have significant negative impacts to nearly 1.3 million acres of moderate to high resource potential. The withdrawal could also affect over 7,000 mining claims across several Western states, including Nevada, Idaho, Utah, Oregon, Wyoming and Montana.
###


All Comments


Previous comments...   You are currently on page 5.
  • -1
    Posted by 8 years, 6 months ago in reply to this comment.
    Your repetitive off-topic posts do not contribute to this thread. The reasons for rejecting your rationalist slogans have been explained many times.
    Reply | Permalink  
  • Posted by $ allosaur 8 years, 6 months ago in reply to this comment.
    This your created post here is in no way about any ballyhooed wonderments of the Libertarian Party.
    Reply | Permalink  
  • Posted by $ CBJ 8 years, 6 months ago in reply to this comment.
    It looks like someone is marking me down because they disagree with my opinion. I won't return the favor.
    Reply | Permalink  
  • Posted by $ CBJ 8 years, 6 months ago in reply to this comment.
    It looks like someone is marking me down because they disagree with my opinion. I won't return the favor.
    Reply | Permalink  
  • Posted by $ CBJ 8 years, 6 months ago in reply to this comment.
    It looks like someone is marking me down because they disagree with my opinion. I won't return the favor.
    Reply | Permalink  
  • Posted by 8 years, 6 months ago in reply to this comment.
    A handful of Libertarian Party publicity seekers have hijacked the thread with multiple off-topic self promotion sophistry, burying the serious discussion https://www.galtsgulchonline.com/post... on an important topic. They trash rejection of their antics with repetitively annoying, non-responsive and evasive 'sound-bite' sloganeering and 'downvoting'. It illustrates the anti-intellectual, a-philosophical mentality of the Libertarian Party that Ayn Rand denounced for good reason. They are well known for not operating in the real world of politics and having no effect on policy. They expect people like Flootus5 who are directly threatened, as explained in his post, to sacrifice themselves for the LP frivolous fringe publicity spree.
    Reply | Permalink  
  • Posted by freedomforall 8 years, 6 months ago in reply to this comment.
    If you actually care about individual liberty you can't rationally repeat the same mistake that has failed for 30 years. Supporting the GOP is a losing battle against statist control because you are allied with your enemy. You claim your support is based on defending liberty by slowing the enemy, but this tactic has always failed. Has the Libertarian Party been ineffective? Yes. The statist DemRep party has passed laws that prevent effective competition by any third party. Continuing to support the statists makes third parties ineffective by law. If you truly want to support individual liberty and free markets you must stop supporting the enemies of individual liberty and free markets. The defensive battle you have been fighting has failed. Support of libertarian candidates like Gary Johnson is one way to go on the offensive instead of continuing a losing battle of attrition that can not succeed. Local and state resistance to federal intrusion is another battle that should also be fought against leviathan (i.e., relevant to the original post topic.).
    Reply | Permalink  
  • Posted by libertylad 8 years, 6 months ago in reply to this comment.
    And that is the way you want it to be so that the statist GOP cowards you support retain control, wreak havoc on free markets, and continue to destroy individual rights betraying the people they claim to represent. Your baseless insults to those who you disagree with is not effective or rational argument.

    Libertarian ideas are the most relevant things in this election. Loyalists held control of the colonies for decades and American revolutionaries were "irrelevant" until enough brave rational people supported their claims for individual liberty in defiance of the statists of that era. Libertarians are irrelevant to you, but brushfires are growing in many young minds that will make the statists you support irrelevant. Every vote for Gary Johnson adds to the fire of liberty.
    Reply | Permalink  
  • Posted by freedomforall 8 years, 6 months ago in reply to this comment.
    It appears that making the same mistake repeatedly is your addiction, ewv. I have not told anyone that they should not vote. Your argument based on that false premise is irrelevant.
    Again you propose actions that have failed in the past and you refuse to learn from that history. You also refuse to take responsibility for those mistakes and their effects. The rest of your commentary is baseless, insulting, beneath you, and undeserving of reply.
    Reply | Permalink  
  • Posted by $ CBJ 8 years, 6 months ago in reply to this comment.
    Please tell me exactly how your one vote is going to influence the outcome of the election. I'm all ears.

    Also please tell me how voting for Gary Johnson "isn't participating in the election." I go into the voting booth. He's on the ballot. I vote for him. His vote totals are counted and reported. How is that not participating? My vote will have exactly as much influence as yours on the outcome of the election - i.e., none at all. But future historians looking at the 2016 vote totals will see one more vote for liberty and against the two-party system than if I had cast a meaningless vote for one of the candidates the "major" parties had seen fit to foist on us.
    Reply | Permalink  
  • Posted by $ CBJ 8 years, 6 months ago in reply to this comment.
    The socialists were both intellectually and politically active. So are today's libertarians, and they are gaining public awareness in both arenas. The LP presidential ticket has been endorsed by six major newspapers. "Libertarian Party" returns nearly as many Google hits as the Cato Institute. We reach voters that wouldn't otherwise hear of us if our efforts were confined to the "educational" sphere. And with Gary Johnson polling between 5 and 10 percent, the "fringe" is beginning to eat its way into the mainstream. That's reality.
    Reply | Permalink  
  • Posted by $ CBJ 8 years, 6 months ago in reply to this comment.
    The purpose of the Libertarian Party is to get votes for the Libertarian Party. The fact that the LP is currently hurting Clinton is incidental, but it is a fact. You're welcome. As for Johnson and Weld's personal and political qualities, I'll be happy to compare them to Trump's and Clinton's any time.
    Reply | Permalink  
  • -1
    Posted by 8 years, 6 months ago
    So now it's the purpose of the Libertarian Party as closet Trump supporters to appeal to unserious Democrat pot heads to take votes that you say don't matter away from Clinton. People who would vote for Trump to oppose Clinton are supposed to instead drop out and vote for a fringe candidate, losing half the impact of their vote against Clinton that you say doesn't matter anyway, to somehow take votes from Clinton. And this goofy nonsense is supposed to be the grand scheme to end statism in contrast to those who take the election seriously.

    Votes matter when they are counted and the total is more than the opposition, which determines who won the election, not how many votes for nothing that you add up after years of not participating in the real election. No establishment politicians have modified their actions because of fringe LP votes.

    The people who are having an impact on specific policy are those who know how the system works and actively work to influence it on issues they know about to be able to talk intelligently about them and know what to do about it. That does not include fringe Libertarians engaging in pretend politics with floating abstractions and goofy sophistry every four years to vote for them because votes don't matter -- now on behalf of the likes of has-been 'liberal' Republicans like Johnson and Weld with a soft spot for getting high on drugs and abdicating the field of foreign policy, all supposedly in the name of a free society based on rational individualism -- if that is what these "Libertarians" want at all.
    Reply | Permalink  
  • Posted by $ CBJ 8 years, 6 months ago in reply to this comment.
    Voting for the LP instead of Clinton takes votes away from Clinton. If you care to investigate, you’ll find that this is happening frequently enough that the Clinton camp is seriously attacking Gary Johnson.

    http://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/07/us/...

    http://www.realclearpolitics.com/vide...

    And voting does matter, just not in the way you describe it. By voting for my principles, my votes over the years have had far more impact than if I had allowed the two “establishment” parties to dictate my choices. By voting Libertarian, I am adding to the vote totals of the only party that supports individual freedom. And those vote totals matter – the establishment parties pay close attention when a significant number of voters break with the two-party system, and they will often modify their stands on certain issues to protect their base and prevent further defections.
    Reply | Permalink  
    • ewv replied 8 years, 6 months ago
  • Posted by 8 years, 6 months ago in reply to this comment.
    And we have the intellectual vacuity of the Republican establishment to thank that Trump was the only one left, in a sincere but ignorant protest against them. He is the chickens coming home to roost.
    Reply | Permalink  
    • allosaur replied 8 years, 6 months ago
    • allosaur replied 8 years, 6 months ago
  • Posted by 8 years, 6 months ago in reply to this comment.
    The Libertarian Party is inept at effecting meaningful reform of anything in politics. That does not mean that voting doesn't matter. This has already been answered. https://www.galtsgulchonline.com/post...

    The arguments for supporting the Libertarian Party are increasingly bizarre. Now are told that it is helping Trump, as if voting for the LP instead of Trump takes votes away from Clinton. That leftist potheads might find the LP more attractive is no argument for the LP as the road to reform.
    Reply | Permalink  
  • Posted by $ allosaur 8 years, 6 months ago in reply to this comment.
    At least the flawed Trump isn't a RINO weasel.
    I agree that voting Trump is not what the vote is for.
    Toward that end, he happens to be all that's left.
    I preferred Ted Cruz, though he managed to turn me off shortly after I voted for him in the primary.
    Reply | Permalink  
  • Posted by $ CBJ 8 years, 6 months ago in reply to this comment.
    If the Libertarian Party is so “inept”, then why are you so concerned about whether people vote for it or not? If the polls are correct, the LP’s presence in the race is helping Trump, not Hillary. Would you rather that we disappear?
    Reply | Permalink  
  • Posted by 8 years, 6 months ago in reply to this comment.
    How many times does it have to be explained to you that the election is determined by counting the votes and comparing the totals, not by "one vote" ignoring the rest. That is the way the system works. Understanding the principle is to understand why voting matters. If it didn't they wouldn't bother to count the votes.

    Those who want to make a difference don't pretend that it doesn't matter. The two parties battling for votes certainly know it, which is why they are spending hundreds of millions in voter drives and campaigning. Telling people that voting doesn't matter so vote for my fringe party, where it would also not matter, is just stupid.

    You can "feel comfortable" with a fantasy vote if that's what you want, but it isn't participating in the election. If you don't know enough about the candidates to understand the difference and how it matters, then don't vote, but the rest of it is subjectivist sophistry outside the realm of the election.
    Reply | Permalink  
  • Posted by $ CBJ 8 years, 6 months ago in reply to this comment.
    Re: “One of the two major candidates will be president. There is no other choice in reality.” The reality is that your vote will not affect the outcome, so it’s not really a choice. You do have a choice whether to participate in the two-party charade, or vote for the candidate whose views are closest to yours. I’m comfortable with my vote for Gary Johnson.
    Reply | Permalink  
  • -1
    Posted by 8 years, 6 months ago in reply to this comment.
    The Socialists became influential because they were intellectually engaged in philosophy and politics, not just because they happened to be politically active. The Fabians were an English organization known for their intellectual influence permeating the leadership of society. They had an intellectual collectivist/statist/altruist base to build on and exploit in a way that we don't. Their activity in the US was through surrogates, including in the Roosevelt administration. Spreading ideas that become popularly accepted means that those absorbing them don't have to know the names of the activists.

    To compare that with the anti-intellectual Libertarian Party and its isolated election year antics is a joke.

    You can expect the current system to become worse, not because of "two parties" but because of the intellectual forces driving both of them. Copying them in election formalities and expecting anything different than fringe status in opposition to the status quo is indeed cargo cult science.

    To understand the history of what the Fabians and their surrogates did intellectually and politically, based on a pre-existing intellectual basis in the culture, see

    Martin, Fabian Freeway
    Dobbs, Keynes at Harvard
    Cole, The Story of Fabian Socialism (written by one of its long-time leaders)
    Reply | Permalink  
  • Posted by $ allosaur 8 years, 6 months ago in reply to this comment.
    Point taken. Dang you're a sharp thinker.
    Me dino didn't really mean YOUR reality.
    Shoulda worded that better.
    Reply | Permalink  
  • Posted by $ CBJ 8 years, 6 months ago in reply to this comment.
    The socialists became politically more influential in part because they were deeply engaged in politics. Most of the people who voted for them (and there were plenty) probably never even heard of the Fabians.

    Your “cargo cult” example applies more to the Republican and Democrat parties than to the Libertarian Party. Every four years we go through all the formalities of an election, but we’re missing something essential, because nothing really changes regardless of which of the two major party candidates wins.
    Reply | Permalink  
  • Posted by 8 years, 6 months ago in reply to this comment.
    The idea of voting for Trump turns our stomachs, too, but that isn't what the vote is for.
    Reply | Permalink  

  • Comment hidden. Undo