Tired of your old hell? Well weāve got a new fresh hell for you!
This guy is Zinke accelerated without the idiotic drama.
Sales of O&G leases have continued throughout the shutdown.
O&G leases no longer go through the NEPA process. The excuse is that it will be conducted during the drilling process (which is complete BS).
Parks that stayed open through the shutdown experienced damage (offroad vehicle damage, campfires outside of campgrounds, human waste everywhere) due to the absence of oversight and maintenance. And I expect thatās the direction that the Interior intends to head.
Bad news.
Superior Posterior Announces Acting Interior Inferior.
Yes, and I doubt Mr. Bernhardt has any real plan to clean up and fix up any of this, or to fund the effort. So the on-site NPS rangers and scientists and organizers, who just got back from a month without income, now are in the midst of figuring out how to catch up and do all this extra vandalism-caused work, without any extra budget. And theyāre trying to do this when their necessary maintenance was already deeply backlogged due to budget skimpiness.
He came to this brilliant conclusion after spending many many days thinking about it during executive time. See, now arenāt you glad he uses his time this way instead if wasting it in boring meeting listening to supposed experts like his trust worthy but not as smart as him, Intel Chiefs?
Weeeee ā¦
Letās go get drunk and kick over some goblins to celebrate ā¦
I donāt want to spend .10 more for any gas ā¦
already costs too much to race around in my 4-wheeler
in a motorized vehicle restricted wilderness area ----
"Ladies and gentlemen, buckle up, itās going to be a bumpy ride!"
Bad news, but he only has another two years to continue inflicting damage (letās hope). And maybe there can be some House oversight now, on the worst of it.
The good news is that oil companies donāt necessarily follow the Interior Dept. lead. They might be hesitant to start any new exploration or wells on public lands, when weāre just 2 years from the possibility that a Democratic administration would put the brakes on it. Oil companies have to take the long view past current administrations.
I hope that applies to relaxed regulations on offshore wells too. Itās expensive to discard current safety gear, and then retrofit it again later on.
A Breath of Fresh Air
With a motive completely ulterior,
He was named as the head of Interior.
āSomething newās in the air.
I can smell it from here,ā
He exclaimed, nose-deep in Trumpās posterior.
a veteran lobbyist who has helped orchestrate the administrationās push to expand oil and gas drilling as the Interior Departmentās number-two official, to serve as the next secretary.
With āunrelenting work habits,ā he might make some terrible things happen. Burning the midnight oil, so to speak.
If confirmed, Bernhardt, a 49-year old Colorado native known for his unrelenting work habits, would be well positioned to roll back even more of the Obama-era conservation policies he has worked to unravel since joining Interior a year and-a-half ago. He has helmed the department as acting secretary since Jan. 2, when Ryan Zinke resigned amid multiple ethics probes.
@canyoncountry Agreed, and to steal a cliche, Zinke on steroids.
Or even listening to experts on who woukd be a good Secretary if the Interior. My recollection is that he was the numbers guy, good at the cogs and gears but knowing nothing about policy or the substance of the Departmentās work. He was there to ācomplementā Zinke not to add to his actual expertise in the relevant areas.
This increasingly seems to be Trumpās approach: use folks who donāt know anything about the area they are working on but who are happy juggling numbers to save money. Without understanding, they are happy to slice and dice any functioning government unit,agency, department, office, etc., just as long as the bottom line reflects well on them. Iāve seen this happen in another setting and i know you can rapidly strip a once very helpful and innovative office and turn it into a place populated by ciphers doing the basics and nothing more.
Do you really think Donald thinks things through that much? Maybe someone in his cabinet does, but I canāt believe he can or does. I think he just wants loyal yes men.
Bernhardt is a super smart policy wonk and attorney, is a quintessential Washington insider, and has a solid agenda based on his ties to big Ag and Oil and Gas. He is far more dangerous to our natural resources and wild places than Zinke ever was. He has basically been running things for two years, with Zinke just playing Secretary.
The slightly positive flip side to this is that they usually donāt know how government rule-making actually works, so many of the things they do either fail outright or can be easily reversed. Properly developed rules, like the Obama admin put in place (and the Bush admin for that matter, which is why it took Obama 8 years to undo some of them), can only be undone by going through the whole process over again with new data and justifications. Trumpās crew of merry madmen have simply been going through and saying āthis no longer applies!ā, which can work temporarily for things like leases that are direct executive orders, but donāt put anything viable in long-term. Theyāre more to score points with the lunatic base than to actually get anything done.
Unfortunately, four years is plenty of time to do irreversible damage to some places.
I donāt think itās all him. He doesnāt really know most of the people he appoints. But I do think heās happy with the idea that whoever they are, they will cut back on the dreaded government - except, of course, for wall building. I do think that general idea motivates him - smaller government and far less regulation.
And more military.