The American Spectator

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Bumps on a Blog

7.21.08 @ 12:01AM

(Page 2 of 5)

I made many trips to the North Slope in '94-'98 when assigned to Elmendorf AFB in Anchorage. Our squadron managed the North Warning system (or the "Dew Line" for you old-heads) -- a series of radar sites with the mission of tracking all air traffic entering the area via the arctic route.

During those trips, it ceased to amaze me how barren the landscape actually was -- the closest relief was the Brooks Range -- the tops of the mountains were within sight about 50-60 miles to the south, depending on where you were on the arctic coast. The coastal plain, where the actual oil reserves are located, has no trees and, other than the odd arctic tern, virtually no wildlife. In essence, the place was a peat bog; the closer to the water you traveled, the deeper the muck became during summer. During the other seasons, the landscape was a solid block of ice.

The bottom line is the coastal plain within ANWR has no redeeming environmental qualities. One has to go 40 miles inland before there is much of a change in elevation. And a change in elevation is what you need to see any "pretty stuff" that the environmentalists deem as worthy of protection, that is, any tundra that is more than six inches in height off the ground.

During a trip between two radar sites, we did see quite a few caribou -- they were mostly scratching their backs against the fence posts that surrounded some sort of storage yard that was owned by Alyeska -- the company that ran the pipeline at the time. Other than during the short migration period, it seemed that when wildlife did congregate on the plain, it was done only where there was man-made development. You could see four-legged critters hanging out by the vent shafts of the pipeline, but they were nowhere to be seen in the spacious open areas on the plain.

If it was up to me, I would expand the restricted 2,000 acres or so that was put aside for oil development in ANWR to allow development anywhere along the coastal plain no closer than 10 miles from where the Brooks foothills started. Why? To increase the presence of wildlife -- it seems they only hang-out where development has been established.
-- Owen H. Carneal, Jr.
Yorktown, Virginia

Can you send this story out to every SMALL TOWN newspaper in the country? The major news outlets seem to routinely censor the conservative point of view.

We need help.
-- Margaret Ripley

SALAD DAYS
Re: Andrew Cline's The Futile Crusades of Dem Quixote:

Thirty years ago when I left the Democratic Party (or, as is more accurately phrased, when the Democratic Party left me) I realized a truth that I have used to guide my life since then: The only good thing about beating your head against a cement block wall is that it feels so good when you stop.

The liberals to whom I talk these days are masters of ignoring reality in favor of the illogical, ridiculous, and sometimes demented visions that they incessantly run on the video screens of their minds. I commend Mr. Cline for his accurate and precise dissection of Democratic foolishness, however, in the face of the forty year catastrophe called the "war on poverty," I am not expecting any change in the near future. After all, if you are capable of labeling the eighties "the decade of greed" when virtually EVERYONE in the U.S. experienced improvement in personal circumstances (even those who refused to work for a living), then you are capable of considering the only failure of the "war on poverty" failure to spend ENOUGH MONEY on the program.

Mr. Obama's refusal to recognize successes and insistence on clinging to failed demonstrably false ideas is normal behavior for his party. He is forced to cling to the idiocies to which he clings in order to keep his "base" energized. To be a loyal Democrat, one must be committed to the party line, ignore any and all conflicting evidence no matter how obvious and strong it is, and celebrate how one feels rather than what one has accomplished.

Just as the Carter presidency helped to lurch the party leftward and away from the ideas that it once represented, the Obama presidency will complete the triumph of style over substance, of feeling over reason. To play on an old political slogan, i.e. "a car in every garage and a chicken in every pot," look forward to a bicycle in every garage and a salad in every bowl.
-- Joseph Baum
Garrettsville, Ohio

I read this editorial with some interest and a feeling of deja vu. Back when motorcycles and motorcyclists were social pariahs, we were spoken of in the same tones as big oil is today. Later, it was gun owners who were the scourge of the planet.

Many was the argument that logic should prevail and we should let those other guys know how wrong they were. Facts! Reason!

We prevailed, but neither of those two were the answer. The Dems make emotional pleas to the public and that is what works. This isn't Rock, Paper, Scissors, and reason doesn't beat emotion. Only emotion counters emotion, and it needs the correct audience, the same one that the Dems are crying to. As long as the audience is on the side of the Dems, the Dems will do as they wish. That is where the conflict must be won.
-- J.D. Dantone

Letter to the Editor

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