Should Agency Experts be Experts?

May 12, 2023

In 2021 President Biden nominated Martha Williams to run the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS). Several powerful environmental industry groups objected and several lobbied intensely against Senate confirmation. This is a position once considered mostly nonpartisan, and historically held by scientists, not political activists. So, a political battle over that nomination has only happened […]

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A “Can and Will Doctrine” for Public Resources

May 5, 2023

Let’s say you have a spring on your land, and you are surrounded by people living in the desert who are desperate for water. You make your living selling it to them, but I like the looks of the spring and I’m rich, so I might offer you even more than it’s worth – not […]

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A “Can and Will Doctrine” for Public Resources

May 5, 2023

Let’s say you have a spring on your land, and you are surrounded by people living in the desert who are desperate for water. You make your living selling it to them, but I like the looks of the spring and I’m rich, so I might offer you even more than it’s worth – not […]

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Plastic in Oceans is Un-American, Literally

April 28, 2023

Steve Moore’s “Committee to Unleash Prosperity” often shares charts and graphs that graphically illustrate otherwise complex arguments, a simple picture often being worth a thousand words. One especially impressive bar chart calls attention to a thorough study, published in the journal Environmental Science, analyzing plastic debris in the world’s oceans to find out how it […]

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Lighting the Way to More Government

April 19, 2023

Light bulb jokes were popular for years as a way to poke fun at stereotypes. I remember an old one during the Reagan years, about how many Republicans it took to change a light bulb. It took one to screw in the bulb, one to steady the chandelier, one to claim the bulb wasn’t truly […]

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Will They Ever Get Tired of Losing?

April 11, 2023

The Detroit Lions have not won a playoff game since 1991 and have never been to the Super Bowl. But no defeat stops them from trying again and again. Just like the EPA. A month ago in this space, we talked about a new round of litigation regarding the Administration’s latest attempt to control all […]

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When Politics Overrules the Science

April 5, 2023

A few days ago on Capitol Hill, I attended a truly bizarre committee hearing. The Water, Wildlife and Fisheries Subcommittee heard testimony on bills to remove gray wolves and grizzly bears from the endangered species list. Both species are fully recovered and no longer in danger of extinction, but the hearing wasn’t really about that. […]

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Still Not Good Enough

March 29, 2023

When Vincent Van Gogh painted “Starry Night” in 1889, he did not consider it a masterpiece, certainly not the third most famous painting in world history, although Internet searches have given it that distinction (behind only DaVinci’s Mona Lisa and Last Supper). In fact, Van Gogh didn’t even think it was very good, as he […]

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How to Unite a Divided Region

March 24, 2023

With the departure of Club 20’s executive director, and the search for a new one, several observers openly wonder whether the organization can still accomplish what it became famous for, uniting the Western Slope to speak with one voice on important issues. Two weeks ago we discussed why that still matters, but also had to […]

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Are We Encroaching, or Are They?

March 17, 2023

A little girl was playing in the ocean with her family at Huntington Beach, California when a coyote came charging across the sand and attacked, putting the little girl in the hospital. Another coyote went after a child on her home’s front porch in Dallas. Human encounters with angry wildlife are rare but seem to […]

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