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Dear editor:
Sen. Pete Domenici (R-NM) recently introduced a
"leaner" energy bill (S. 2095) that still takes America
in the wrong direction. But as Taxpayers for Common Sense observes,
"If you put a pig in a dress, and add lipstick, it is still
a pig."
The oil and gas title in the bill would make oil
and gas development the dominant use of America's western public
lands. The myriad other uses and values of these lands - water quality
and quantity, livestock grazing, the private property rights of
ranchers and farmers on "split estate" lands, wildlife
and wildlife habitat, recreational uses, wild land preservation,
and cultural and archeological values - would take a back seat to
oil and gas production on lands managed by the Bureau of Land Management
and on national forests. The bill represents a big departure from
the approach by Congress to managing our public lands over the past
50 years.
The bill is an assault on the property rights of
landowners who do not own their underlying minerals, offers a grab
bag of unnecessary subsidies to the oil and gas industry at the
expense of taxpayers, and provides a legislative mandate for the
federal government to go faster, when oil and gas development is
already going too fast in many places in the West.
Drilling the West won't make America energy independent.
Making oil and gas production the dominant use of our western public
lands will destroy western landscapes and communities, and the multiple
use values of those lands. All Americans will suffer - now and in
the future - if this legislation, written by and for the energy
companies, becomes law. Call your Senators and encourage them to
abandon S. 2095 and craft a better energy policy for the 21st Century.
Sincerely,
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