Governor Palin is a tsunami of environmental destruction, a direct consequence of her warped religious view of the world. Palin subscribes to the notion that God put resources here on Earth for man's exploitation, as described in Genesis. She believes God is not only on her side, but supports her specific environmental and energy policies. Concerning a proposed $30 billion gas pipeline in Alaska, she actually said, "I think God's will has to be done in unifying people and companies to get that gas line built, so pray for that." God takes time out from Darfur, terrorism, disease, hunger and suffering to make sure Palin gets her pipeline.
Her answer to our energy needs, with God's approval: drill baby drill. Her version of energy independence is to drill for more oil. She wants to "drill here, drill now." She opposed her own running mate, and wants to drill in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR), one of the world's last pristine ecosystems. The most optimistic estimates put peak production at 780,000 barrels per day from ANWR; the U.S. consumes 21 million barrels per day. So even at maximum output, ANWR would supply less than 4% of our daily consumption. And that peak would quickly fall to under 700,000 barrels per day. For that she wants to destroy millions of unspoiled acres. Drilling in ANWR solves no problems. We can no more drill our way out of this mess than an alcoholic can drink his way to sobriety. The idea is pure nonsense, and delays critical actions necessary to secure our future.
Renaissance scholar Lynn White famously wrote in 1967, "We shall continue to have a worsening ecologic crisis until we reject the Christian axiom that nature has no reason for existence save to serve man." Now 40 years later, Palin proves him right again.
Palin dismisses climate change as a left-wing conspiracy, again in opposition to her running mate. She denies that the dramatic melting of arctic ice has anything to do with global warming caused by human activity. "The jury is still out," according to Palin.
Palin is a danger to endangered species. She argued strenuously against listing the polar bears, stating that the decision was based on "unproven long-term impact of any future climate change on the species."
Palin was concerned that listing the polar bear would be "do serious long-term damage to the vibrant economy of the Cook Inlet area."
All biologists know that shrinking polar ice threatens the survival of polar bears, yet Palin dismisses the entire problem -- both the shrinking ice itself and the cause of that shrinking. Speaking of Cook Inlet, Palin also opposes any listing of the beluga whales found there, even though the whale's numbers have declined dramatically over the past 20 years.
She opposed restrictions on mining operations that could impact salmon in streams and rivers. She is accused of abusing her power as governor by improperly weighing in on a ballot initiative to oppose the clean water initiative. A legal complaint has been filed against her.
She has promoted initiatives to let citizens shoot wolves from airplanes and helicopters; she promotes weakening bear hunting laws in order to reduce bear populations. Why? So there will be more moose and caribou to draw big-game hunters to the state.
She specifically opposed any efforts to stop the Pebble Mine, which if approved would be the largest open-pit gold and copper mine in North America. Palin is unconcerned that the mine would pollute Bristol Bay's headwaters. She actively opposed efforts that were aimed specifically at preventing the mine from dumping waste materials directly into salmon watersheds.
So Palin is for Big Oil, and nothing else. She denies that climate change is caused by human activity; she is against polar bears, wolves, clean water, salmon, and renewable energy.
She is blatantly anti-science, which partly explains her sad denials about global warming, her ignorance of ecosystems management and her blind indifference to endangered species. Her extremism is no virtue in the realm of environment or religion.
Palin is plain scary.
