How to Repeal an Executive Order

January 20, 2017

I am willing to bet that you have never heard of Executive Order 13497. There is no reason you should have, except that it is enormously important to the process of governing America. The simple reason most people never heard about it is that President Obama signed it less than a week after his inauguration. […]

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Army, Navy, Air Force, EPA!

January 6, 2017

From the halls of Montezuma to the shores of – Federal Triangle? If sending Marines, Navy Seals, and Delta force to the world’s trouble spots doesn’t work, we could also send the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), or the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS). Both agencies have military equipment, weapons, SWAT teams, drones, and […]

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Green, Greener, of Greenest

December 30, 2016

“No animal says America like the bald eagle,” says Dan Ashe, Director of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in a new statement calling recovery of the bald eagle “one of our greatest national conservation achievements.” He is right about the importance of the bald eagle to Americans. It was adopted as our national emblem […]

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See You in Court!

December 23, 2016

A Cornell study of litigation in America a few years ago tracked some 260,000 civil lawsuits by type and disposition, showing an alarming expansion of Americans suing each other. The total number of such lawsuits had increased about nine percent between 1987 and 2000, but lawsuits related to environmental matters during the same period had […]

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The Many Uses for a Live Cat

December 13, 2016

In 1981 the illustrator Simon Bond published “101 Uses for a Dead Cat,” a collection of cartoons showing dead cats being used for various purposes: door stops, boat anchors, wine bottle holders, and others. It was funny in a sort-of Far Side way, was on the best seller list for 27 weeks, and spawned at […]

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Institutionalizing Economic Failure

December 12, 2016

British Prime Minister Edward Heath called protectionism “the institutionalization of economic failure.” Thriving businesses, he reasoned, do not need subsidies, tariffs, or any other protection against competition. That theory has underlain economic policy debates from the beginning of our republic. Even in this year’s campaign, foreign trade agreements became central issues – protectionism v. free […]

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A Time for Gratitude

December 2, 2016

The day of Thanksgiving most Americans celebrated yesterday is a tradition as old as our country. Americans have always had much for which to be thankful. The first official Thanksgiving proclamation, written by George Washington in 1789, expressed the American people’s gratitude for “an opportunity peaceably to establish a form of government for their safety […]

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How Long is Forever?

November 26, 2016

A growing national debate about the difference between “perpetual” easements and “term” easements should pique the interest of Colorado leaders, again. Years ago when I was at Club 20 during the 1990s, Western Slope leaders became part of a new national movement in support of the idea of conservation easements to preserve agricultural land and […]

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Draining the Swamp

November 18, 2016

Donald Trump’s stunning victory in the presidential election has already created the usual swarm of “experts” who know exactly what the new President must do. The chattering class, editorialists, columnists, and bloggers everywhere are rushing to get their ideas heard. From appointment suggestions to major policy initiatives, all seem to know exactly what Mr. Trump […]

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Good Samaritan, Bad Samaritan

November 12, 2016

America’s most influential liberal think tank just published a report advocating reversal of decades-old environmental mitigation policy. It calls for mitigation not by those responsible, but simply by those with deep enough pockets. The plan suggests that organizations proposing new projects must first pay for cleaning up messes left by others. More euphemistically, the report […]

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