People Think Obama Should Oppose Wolf Delisting Because Bush Supported It
March 14, 2009
It appears maybe Barack Obama will have his recent statement that all his decisions will be based on science tested immediately. Shortly before leaving office, the Bush administration once again announced plans to remove protection of the gray wolf. Upon Obama’s taking over the White House, an order was sent out suspending all pending actions by the Bush administration. This included the wolf delisting proposal.
Ken Salazar took over at the Department of Interior and recently it was announced that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service would proceed with the proposal Bush and then Sec. Dirk Kempthorne had devised. Needless to say this angered a lot of people who, it seems, just assumed that Obama would oppose delisting because it was a Bush initiative.
While the White House declined to comment on Salazar’s move, it has clearly caused a headache for the administration. Lawmakers have called senior Obama aides to question the decision, environmental groups have filed a Freedom of Information Act request to probe the decision-making process, and experts inside and outside the administration predict that the issue will end up in court.
Interesting enough, the WaPo article seems to be suggesting that Ken Salazar acted on his own in making this decision, even quoting Norman J. Ornstein, a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute.
“where they’re used to making their own decisions and going ahead with them.”
“It takes a while to get your sea legs on that front, especially if you’re a member of Congress,” Ornstein said.
But it gets better. The article cites an “anonymous” House democrat.
“I just don’t see what this does for us,” the lawmaker said. “Here we are alienating people who did the most — who did a lot to help us in the last election.”
This statement seems to me to indicate quite strongly that certain members must believe that Obama “owes” them, perhaps for campaign votes, and should have opted to not delist the wolf. So much for science.
Bob Irvin, senior vice president for Defenders of Wildlife, seems to think Salazar operated on his own.
“Making the decision to adopt the Bush administration’s flawed delisting proposal the same week that the president pledged his commitment to the Endangered Species Act certainly calls into question whether the Interior Department was coordinating as closely as one would expect to have done with the White House,”………. “This was a controversy that did not need to happen.”
It doesn’t take a rocket scientist’s brain to realize that if delisting was going to proceed, the case would end up in court and that’s surely where it is headed as massive numbers of environmental groups have already promised. What will be interesting in this case is that for the first time, at least in recent memory, you’ll have supporters of the Obama election pitted against Obama’s administration.
Add to that interesting cocktail the question of how will the judges react who have to this point ruled in opposition to George W. Bush, not necessarily for the wolves. If I’m sitting in Idaho, Montana or Wyoming, I’m understanding that we may never get control over wolves and there’s a good chance to be witness to the disappearance of deer, moose and elk, along with many other wildlife species.
We know that Obama stated he will use science in making environmental decisions. The question remains whose science will he use? See ya’ll in court!
Tom Remington
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We’ll be huntin one another in this nation before we hunt wolves.
If Bush had decided to protect the Wolves would Obama supporters have wanted him to reverse that. I don’t think so.
These Wolf lovers have a infatuation with Wolves that is unatural and weird.
Greg is right about hunting each other before we hunt wolves. If that happens they will be on the endangered list.
There are ways around the ESA and it seems a large portion of the Montana Senate is using them. They are introducing a bill that uses state’s rights to manage their animals and in the bill it doesn’t recognize the ESA as having any power, in them managing their wolf population. I do not have a link, but it is SB 183 and to hell with the Fed’s unscientific approach to wildlife management. Wolves were illegally put on the ESL in the 70s because they have never been endangered. Wildlife scientists estimate that there are well over 70,000 wolves in the Northern Hemisphere. That is not endangered, even by ‘their’ standards! Hey Greg, I wonder if the Idaho legislature (mostly Republican I might add) has the nads to pass a bill that would disregard the heavy hand of the Feds off of our state? What do you think?
The biggest problem is the feds blackmail program called their funds, cooperate with the feds or lose the funds, the other trouble we face as does Montana is some of those legislators themselves no matter their party will vote for the fed everytime..This game is rigged deeper than even I myself probably realize. I’ve read every state legislative 10th Amendment document across the board and all of them are doing it wrong, The 10th has been voided by the 14th Amendment and the 17th Amendment, so the 10th Amendment argument will never stand until the problems of the other Amendments is properly dealt with, I have to believe the States Legislators understand this problem, so I think this is just more distraction to satisfy a disgruntled populance per say, while we head into their POST INDUSTRIAL AGE and World Centralized Banking agenda..
Unfortunately the average joe on the street is unaware of several facts concerning the Constitutional argument. For example the Sixteenth, the Seventeenth Amendment, as well as the 14th Amendment were never ratified via the legal Constitutional process, The 14th was done via gun point while the Southern Congressmen were not allowed to vote, since the North considered them traitors, which is false, they were not traitors. The 16th Amendment was never ratified correctly and I have a copy of every ratification letter of that era from each state house proving this to be true.. The 17th also is illegal, never properly ratified via the Founders Constititutional requirements.. So since these are null and void the states could easily prove so in court and disqualify all federal powers over the states..This means the U.N. Treatise is null and void, the ESA is not worth the paper is written on, Agenda 21 is null and void, In fact none of the U.S. Senators who have been elected in the last 94-99 years have been dully elected, None of those treaties which the Senate approved in those years are legal, they have never been lawfully approved..
None of the Federal Judges, including U.S. SupremeCourt justices have been lawfully approved, None of the legislation which required both House and Senate approval has been lawfully enacted..Roe V. Wade dosen’t exist- The Salt and Panama treaties don’t exist, The CIA dosen’t exist, The Internal Revenue Code dosen’t exist, The Federal deficit is a personal debt owed by a handful of pretend legislators…
Until our state legislators are ready to tackle these facts mentioned to diqualify federal intervention in our lives and this attack on our properties and freedoms, like hunting the 10th Amendment argument they propose is for show only…I talked to Helen Chenowith about this 15 years ago, she was aware of it, she also said she was scared as hell of it…George Hansen was getting ready to out this info..Look at what they did to him..He never wrote one bad check, they lied, the media lied, Just SSS… And watch the show..
I of course can prove all this, but you must be willing to read a lot of documents…
I should mention Red Beckman of Montana has attempted for over thirty years now to bring the facts about those Amendments to the attention of the Montana State legislature with no luck..they refuse to even read the documents..
Bill Benson also has tried.. The lawyers are aware of this, they do not wish to relinquish the power of the Feds.. This is a silver bullet, but there are not enough voices yelling about this to help the cause…
We suffer the head in the sand syndrome…
“What will be interesting in this case is that for the first time, at least in recent memory, you’ll have supporters of the Obama election pitted against Obama’s administration.”
I got hoodwinked into supporting Obama last year, especially during the primaries when he seemed to represent an alternative to that corporatist corruption queen, Hillary Clinton.
By now we see that Obama is just another tool for the moneyed interests, and that the bundled campaign contributions he received from the Wall Street investment bankers meant a lot more to him than the umpteen-millions that regular working people donated.
YUP! And the door swings both ways.