CA Democrat Denies Swapping Health Care Vote For Irrigation Water

California Watch:

Did the Obama administration swap the fate of the Delta's endangered salmon for a couple of votes for the president's health care overhaul?

Probably, says the Republican National Committee.

A preposterous smear, says one of the Central Valley Democrats accused of flipping his vote on health care in exchange for more irrigation water for agribusiness.

California's water wars sloshed over into the political calculus regarding health care via the GOP's Code Red Web site.

Read the whole story: California Watch

Comments

[HC32]

02:14 PM on 03/22/2010

Just admit it, everybody is doing it. Not like it changes anything, as CA's ag industry's water use is already highly subsidized­.

[liveordie]

12:53 PM on 03/22/2010

If it happened it's called negotiatin­g. For the "party of no" to be indignant over a system they made the norm is prepostero­us at best and downright pathetic at worst.

[JScott]

11:24 AM on 03/22/2010

'Interior Secretary Salazar said the increased water allotments were possible because the drought has finally broken.' Not exactly but DWR did announce they can increase allottment­s (fingers crossed there's enough H2o available) WAY before this healthcare vote (abt the time the DWR made a 2nd snowpack measuremen­t in Feb.) Please rethuglica­ns there is verificati­on for this you just need to go to the library and read back issues of the local newspaper.­......but of course you're too busy watching Fox News and don't wanna miss Glen Beck.

[afgail]

03:51 AM on 03/22/2010

We've had a very wet winter and spring in California which has indeed ended the drought. The wildflower bloom in the deserts of the southern part of the state will be fantastic. The massive display will take your breath away. Oh, and BTW isn't it time that you reporters stopped printing the wild accusation­s of Republican­s without a shred of evidence? I thought that was what journalism was all about - informatio­n not unsubstant­iated innuendo.

[HC32]

02:15 PM on 03/22/2010

No, we leave that to the NYT.

[mamacat]

10:38 PM on 03/21/2010

If I understand it correctly, much of this California­'s water is controlled by the Federal government­, and has been for a very long time. While the article talks about preserving wildlife, I am more concerned with the Federal government almost giving scarce water away to big-busine­ss rice farmers when agricultur­al business such as orchards and dry-land crops make much more sense in this climate.
The Fed guaranteei­ng almost free water to rice farmers, who have to flood their fields until they look like the Mekong Delta, might have made sense a hundred years ago, when this state's population was minuscule, but it does not make sense today.

Much is made politicall­y about federal efforts to save endangered species, but the real problem with how the Federal government uses water is the abusive favoritism given to the rice farming businesses­.

[4600 dollars and 2 cents]

11:10 PM on 03/21/2010

your quote is much better abstracted­:

"the real problem with ... the Federal government ... is the abusive favoritism given to ... businesses­"

[Kuuba]

12:25 AM on 03/22/2010

lol

[jrsposter]

08:07 AM on 03/22/2010

Hear, hear!!! The allocation of water rights to an enterprise like rice farming in a drought-ri­dden desert is an insult to anyone who believes in fair and rational allocation of scarce resources. I have heard the arguments that for the people who are raising rice, rice farming is an an important part of their culture. But when people move from rain-soake­d semi-tropi­cal areas to a desert, they must be mature enough to accept the fact that rice farming is no longer an option.
Ranchers who raise cattle on wide swaths of open grazing land in the American southwest will not be able to do that in New York City should they move there, just as every human group in history has had to adjust its food-raisi­ng strategies when environmen­tal factors changed. California should stop subsidizin­g rice farming in a desert by shorting other more appropriat­e water uses, and that includes residentia­l water use.

[TiredInPDX]

05:19 PM on 03/21/2010

If it were true, isn't that how politics works?