Sunday, October 21, 2007

Mark Udall, A Practiced Liar

It should make people outside Colorado angry when they read a statement like the one Mark Udall recently issued promoting his very limited bill to thin Colorado forests:

“As quickly as the beetle epidemic is spreading throughout Colorado, the needs related to forest health and fuel reduction in our national forests are vast and urgent. These funds are critically important for the health and safety of our forests and communities--and ultimately the west, as Colorado stands at the source of life giving rivers that can be impacted by our unbalanced forest condition," said Rep. Mark Udall.

That statement is very impressive until one realizes that Udall's bill does nothing to promote fuel reduction in "our national forests" except close in to mountain towns. In fact, he and the Sierra Club strongly oppose "promoting forest health and fuel reduction" in our national forests

Colorado, as Udall correctly states, is at the source of rivers that can be impacted by "our unbalanced forest condition." Neither Mark Udall nor his environmentalist extremists give a whit about those rivers or the 17 downriver states they irrigate. Instead of allowing the management of the forests in a way that would protect those rivers, Udall wants to make the forests into wilderness areas that cannot, by law, be managed.

Udall's bill does allow and fund very limited fuel reduction near Colorado ski towns and some very local watersheds. No roads are to be built. His goal is to get elected US Senator. Having ski areas burned out before the election wouldn't help. That is why he is so willing to give the Sierra club what it wants while publicly pretending his bill does something it doesn't do.

No comments: