October, 29 2008, 05:00pm EDT
For Immediate Release
Contact:
Kristen Boyles, Earthjustice, (206) 343-7340, ext. 33
Doug Heiken, Oregon Wild, (541) 344-0675
John Kober, Pacific Rivers Council, (206) 778-0883
Dan Kruse, Cascadia Wildlands Project, (541) 434-1463
Joseph Vaile, Klamath Siskiyou Wildlands Center, (541) 488-5789
Bob Freimark, The Wilderness Society, (206) 624-6430, ext. 228
Bush Administration, Timber Industry Deal Challenged in Oregon
Conservationists ask judge to uphold law requiring public input on BLM logging plan
PORTLAND, Ore.
Conservationists filed a legal challenge in federal court today challenging a Bush administration effort to fast track approval for a massive increase in logging on federal land. The legal action comes after the Bureau of Land Management cut thousands of citizens out of the Western Oregon Plan Revisions public process.
"The Bush administration is once again cutting the public out of its decisions and letting private interests determine the fate of our public lands," said Kristen Boyles, an attorney with the environmental legal firm Earthjustice. "It is pretty clear that the Bush administration is dodging the public process because they have a severely flawed plan in their hands."
WOPR map - click for larger image |
Source: Department of the Interior |
The Western Oregon Plan Revisions (WOPR) rezones thousands of acres of Oregon forest managed by the federal Bureau of Land Management to make them available to timber companies. These forest lands have been governed under the Northwest Forest Plan since 1994. The WOPR calls for increasing overall logging on these lands by 400 percent while slashing protections for sensitive streams and waterways in half. Seventy-percent of the logging will be executed via clear-cut logging. The WOPR came about after the Bush administration and the timber industry settled a lawsuit aimed at removing these sensitive wild lands from the protections of the Northwest Forest Plan.
Almost 30,000 people commented on the draft plan, with the majority opposing the drastic increase in logging. These comments prompted the BLM to make substantive changes to the original version of the plan. Conservation groups argue that the public should be afforded the same opportunity to comment now that the plan is being considered for final approval so they are asking the court to order BLM to initiate a 30-day public comment period on the final version of the plan.
In addition to the critical public comments, the BLM also received scientific reviews that were highly critical of the logging plan, saying that the WOPR was based on insufficient study, incomplete modeling, and would likely not comply with laws safeguarding fish and wildlife habitat.
The WOPR represents the most far-reaching decision regarding forest management since the Northwest Forest Plan was drafted. WOPR would undermine the science-based guidelines found in the Northwest Forest Plan at a critical juncture. The proposal comes after prior unsuccessful attempts by the Bush administration to strip Northwest forests of critical protections were soundly rejected in a number of court rulings.
Comments from groups:
John Kober, Executive Director, Pacific River Council:
"The BLM apparently doesn't want to hear the truth about its final proposal: their plan to log extensively near rivers and streams will undermine community-based restoration efforts and cause harm to salmon, steelhead and all who depend on clean water."
Dan Kruse, Legal Director, Cascadia Wildlands Project:
"The BLM could have taken the time it needs to listen to the public's input and carefully consider its options. Instead of careful consideration, we're seeing a desperate frenzy to push a plan forward while the Bush administration still holds office. This is politics, not science or logic."
Joseph Vaile, Campaign Director, Klamath Siskiyou Wildlands Center:
"More than 29,000 people took the time to comment on the draft proposal. It is not fair to citizens who engaged in good faith only to shortcut the public process and deny their right to protest. The Bush administration wants to rush this through at the last minute, but that does not make it legal."
Doug Heiken, Conservation and Restoration Coordinator, Oregon Wild:
"With our old-growth forests impacting so much of our lives, from providing clean drinking water to helping stave off global warming, it doesn't make any sense to cut the average citizen out of the process. We all deserve a chance to have our voices heard when it comes to management of our public forests."
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"As FANFSA and the 702 reauthorization move to the Senate, lawmakers in that chamber need to take a stand for the rights of people in the United States," said one advocate.
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While applauding the U.S. House of Representatives' bipartisan passage of a bill to ensure that "law enforcement and intelligence agencies can't do an end-run around the Constitution by buying information from data brokers" on Wednesday, privacy advocates highlighted that Congress is trying to extend and expand a long-abused government spying program.
The House voted 219-199 for Fourth Amendment Is Not For Sale Act (FANFSA), which won support from 96 Democrats and 123 Republicans, including the lead sponsor, Rep. Warren Davidson (R-Ohio). Named for the constitutional amendment that protects against unreasonable searches and seizures, H.R. 4639 would close what campaigners call the data broker loophole.
"The privacy violations that flow from law enforcement entities circumventing the Fourth Amendment undermine civil liberties, free expression, and our ability to control what happens to our data," said Free Press Action policy counsel Jenna Ruddock. "These impacts affect everyone who uses digital platforms that extract our personal information any time we open a browser or visit social media and other websites—even when we go to events like demonstrations and other places with our phones revealing our locations."
"We're grateful that the House passed these vital and popular protections," she added. "The bill would prevent flagrant abuses of our privacy by government authorities in league with unscrupulous third-party data brokers. Making this legislation into law with Senate passage too would be a decisive and long-overdue action against government misuse of this clandestine business sector that traffics in our personal data for profit."
Wednesday's vote followed the House sending the Reforming Intelligence and Securing America Act to the Senate. H.R. 7888 would reauthorize Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), which allows for warrantless spying on noncitizens abroad but also sweeps up Americans' data.
The House notably included an amendment forcing a wide range of individuals and businesses to cooperate with government spying operations but rejected an amendment that would have added a warrant requirement to the bill, which the Senate could vote on as soon as Thursday.
Noting those decisions on the FISA reauthorization legislation, Ruddock stressed that "today's vote is a victory but follows a recent loss and ongoing threat as that Section 702 bill moves to the Senate this week too."
"As FANFSA and the 702 reauthorization move to the Senate, lawmakers in that chamber need to take a stand for the rights of people in the United States," she argued. "That means passing FANFSA and reforming Section 702 authority—and prioritizing everyone's First and Fourth Amendment rights."
Jeramie Scott, senior counsel and director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center's Project on Surveillance Oversight, also praised the House's FANFSA passage on Wednesday.
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Kia Hamadanchy, senior policy counsel at ACLU, similarly said Wednesday that "the bipartisan passage of this bill is a flashing warning sign to the government that if it wants our data, it must get a warrant."
Hamadanchy added that "we hope this vote puts a fire under the Senate to protect their constituents and rein in the government's warrantless surveillance of Americans, once and for all."
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While claiming that President Joe Biden backs "Palestinian aspirations for statehood," one of the cables asserts that "it remains the U.S. view that the most expeditious path toward a political horizon for the Palestinian people is in the context of a normalization agreement between Israel and its neighbors."
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As The Intercept's Ken Klippenstein and Daniel Boguslaw noted:
Since 2011, the U.N. Security Council has rejected the Palestinian Authority's request for full member status. On April 2, the Palestinian Observer Mission to the U.N. requested that the council once again take up consideration of its membership application. According to the first State Department cable, U.N. meetings since the beginning of April suggest that Algeria, China, Guyana, Mozambique, Russia, Slovenia, Sierra Leone, and Malta support granting Palestine full membership to the U.N. It also says that France, Japan, and Korea are undecided, while the United Kingdom will likely abstain from a vote.
Along with the United States, China, France, Russia, and the United Kingdom are permanent members of the UNSC, so they also have veto power.
Ahead of Thursday's planned vote, Spain has been doing its own lobbying in Europe to build greater support for Palestinian statehood. At a joint Tuesday press conference with Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez, Slovenian Prime Minister Robert Golob said the question is "when, not if, but when is the best moment to recognize Palestine."
Belgium—which is seeking economic sanctions against Israel in response to its genocidal war on Gaza—is expected to join Spain's push for Palestinian statehood after the country's European Union presidency expires in June.
Currently, 139 of the U.N.'s 193 member states recognize Palestine as an independent state.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu—who has also claimed to support a so-called "two-state solution"—has alternately boasted about thwarting Palestinian statehood.
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PI calls it an "illicit network undermining democracy around the world."
"Today is a mask-off moment for the Reactionary International and the parties, politicians, judges, journalists, foundations, think tanks, tech platforms, NGOs, activists, financiers, and entrepreneurs that comprise it," PI said.
"After a year of preparation, we finally open the doors to our new research consortium, exposing the global network of reactionary forces that corrode our democracies, destroy our planet, and drive us closer to world war," the group added.
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Ultimately, PI aims to "support democratic systems to become more resilient to their insidious tactics."
From leaders like Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, and former U.S. President Donald Trump—the presumptive 2024 Republican presidential nominee—to evangelical Christian groups influencing laws in African countries criminalizing LGBTQ+ people and tech companies empowering ubiquitous state surveillance, Reactionary International is a who's-who of the world's right-wing forces.
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