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“Our culture is not up for sale”: The stakes of Trump’s push to drill in the Arctic refuge

Rogue Valley

Lead or get out of the way
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12/10/20
The Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, an expanse of public land in Alaska the size of South Carolina, is one of the last untouched landscapes in the world. The native Gwich’in people — who have lived in harmony with the area’s migratory Porcupine caribou herd for centuries — call the refuge’s vast coastal plain Iizhik Gwats’an Gwandaii Goodlit, or “The Sacred Place Where Life Begins.” But in the past few years, the fate of the refuge’s roughly 19.5 million acres has become rather bleak: Its permafrost is melting rapidly, along with the rest of the Arctic region. The refuge’s coastal plain also remains at risk to oil and gas development, which companies have long had their eye on but have been barred from doing — until now. Drilling in the US Arctic is what President Trump has longed to do, in hopes of making the US the No. 1 energy producer in the world. And in early December, the administration made a stunning, last-ditch announcement that it will auction off drilling rights in the refuge on January 6 — two weeks before President-elect Joe Biden takes office. It’s the administration’s final attempt to turn a profit on Indigenous lands with little regard for the environmental or cultural ramifications.

Trump’s window to sell drilling rights in the refuge is closing fast — and climate activists are not making it easy. In the past few years, they have successfully put pressure on corporations that typically finance the fossil fuel industry not to fund drilling in the Arctic. Last week, Bank of America became the latest major bank to join the growing list of financial institutions — including JPMorgan Chase, Wells Fargo, Citibank, and Goldman Sachs — that pledged not to fund any fossil fuel operations in the Arctic refuge, putting a roadblock in Big Oil’s finances to bid in the auction. Drilling in the Arctic isn’t what voters want, either. A new poll from the progressive think tank Data for Progress released this week shows that 53 percent of national voters oppose the administration’s proposal to rush approval of oil and gas leases in the Arctic, while 37 percent support the plan. “Trump isn’t even pretending to care what the public thinks about giving the Arctic refuge to Big Oil,” Kristen Monsell, senior attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity, told Vox. “Rushing through these leases is incredibly reckless and violates federal law. We’re counting on the Biden administration and the courts to protect polar bears and our climate where Trump wouldn’t.”


Trump is trying to sell off our Alaskan wildlife refuge heritage to Big Oil.

Thankfully, this scheme to help out his fossil-fuel donor friends is running into numerous problems including financing. Trump will grift anywhere and everywhere he can.
 




Trump is trying to sell off our Alaskan wildlife refuge heritage to Big Oil.

Thankfully, this scheme to help out his fossil-fuel donor friends is running into numerous problems including financing. Trump will grift anywhere and everywhere he can.

ANWR is such a wonderful thing to throw away for a couple of years more of cheaper oil. It's like burning the art in the Louvre to generate energy to make tourist tchotchkes.
 
I'm really glad Trump is leaving office, but I'm also glad he got this done at the last minute.

Is there anything in nature worth saving for nature's sake in your estimation? Or is everything up for grabs so you can have $3.00/gal gas prices for a couple more years?

Is there any place on earth you would like to see preserved for its own sake?
 
Is there anything in nature worth saving for nature's sake in your estimation? Or is everything up for grabs so you can have $3.00/gal gas prices for a couple more years?

Is there any place on earth you would like to see preserved for its own sake?
I don't think the proposed oil leases pose the slightest risk to nature.
 
I don't think the proposed oil leases pose the slightest risk to nature.

Of course you don't. Because you had a rocks-for-jocks geology class back in undergrad! I'm sure you're insight into how damaging petroleum exploration in fragile ecosystems is on a par with your vast knowledge of statistical inference and data processing.
 
Of course you don't. Because you had a rocks-for-jocks geology class back in undergrad! I'm sure you're insight into how damaging petroleum exploration in fragile ecosystems is on a par with your vast knowledge of statistical inference and data processing.
Or perhaps I'm not swept up in a pseudo-religious experience.
Eschatology and Global Warming
 




Trump is trying to sell off our Alaskan wildlife refuge heritage to Big Oil.

Thankfully, this scheme to help out his fossil-fuel donor friends is running into numerous problems including financing. Trump will grift anywhere and everywhere he can.

Are you so deluded as to think that Trump gains anything from this personally?
 
It always comes back to the insults. Thanks for playing.

So calling my position "pseudo-religion" isn't insulting? Hmmm. I see a bit of a blind spot there.
 
I made no reference to your position.

You did in Post #9. In which you suggested I (as opposed to your position) was "swept up" in this pseudo-religion.
 
You're imagining things. My #9 made no mention of, or reference to, you.

You were responding to my post which outlined a part of my position and you suggested that YOU were not caught up in this pseudo-religious position. The implication is clear that my position was "pseudo-religious".

If that wasn't the implication you are easily the most distracted and random poster on the internet. Why would you write what you did? Is your posting style just to randomly post things that have no bearing on the conversation?
 
You were responding to my post which outlined a part of my position and you suggested that YOU were not caught up in this pseudo-religious position. The implication is clear that my position was "pseudo-religious".

If that wasn't the implication you are easily the most distracted and random poster on the internet. Why would you write what you did? Is your posting style just to randomly post things that have no bearing on the conversation?
I'm not responsible for your flights of fancy.
 
ANWR is such a wonderful thing to throw away for a couple of years more of cheaper oil. It's like burning the art in the Louvre to generate energy to make tourist tchotchkes.
Why would we be throwing away ANWR?

What is your logic behind that silly claim?

Do you realize how small the area wanted for oil exploration and drilling is compared to the size of ANWR?
 
Why would we be throwing away ANWR?

What is your logic behind that silly claim?

I take it you are unfamiliar with petroleum exploration and exploitation or perhaps you are unaware of the fragility of high latitude ecosystems.

Do you realize how small the area wanted for oil exploration and drilling is compared to the size of ANWR?

LOL. Hey, I want to store just a small bottle of extremely toxic crap in your linen closet at your home. Your home is what, a couple thousand square feet? This bottle is just really small. No prob, right?

The point is: we open up ANWR and it buys us a couple years more of "cheaper" oil to drive our big-ass SUV's around to the store because we can't possibly live with higher CAFE standards for our transportation. And in return we possibly irreparably damage at least SOME of a fragile ecosystem.

That's not a rational deal to make. I mean I get it that some folks are so addicted to oil and their giant SUV's that they'd gladly allow drilling on their grandma's head if it got them a couple more gallons of oil, but it isn't the way we should be going. It's poor payoff for bigger damage.

Even if it is just a "small" part of ANWR. Is there NO PLACE on earth you think should be protected? Because once you open a little bit up, well, you know the adage: "just the tip".
 
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