1 Boring Old Man

Interior Dept. Changes Rule to Remove Congress Veto

In another regulatory action in the waning days of the Bush administration, the Interior Department on Thursday unveiled a new rule that challenges Congress’s authority to prevent mining planned on public lands. Congress has emergency power to stop mineral development, and has used it six times in the last 32 years. The most recent was in June, when it put a three-year moratorium on uranium mining on one million acres near the Grand Canyon. Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne has ignored that Congressional directive, saying it was procedurally flawed.

The new rule issued by the Interior Department’s Bureau of Land Management comes as environmental groups are suing the bureau in federal court for failing to obey Congress’s directive, which under a 1976 law can be invoked when “an emergency situation exists and extraordinary measures must be taken to preserve values that would otherwise be lost.” The revision of the rule eliminates all references to Congressional authority. The revision moved through the often-cumbersome rule-making process with lightning speed; it was proposed in October, and the public was given just 15 days to comment.

The rule seems intended to speed a judicial confrontation on the constitutionality of the 1976 law, and to underscore the Interior Department’s determination to leave public land near Grand Canyon National Park in northern Arizona open for mineral development. Tina Kreisher, a spokeswoman for the department, said that revising the rule did not relieve the department of its legal obligation to obey Congress. “We are obliged to follow the law,” Ms. Kreisher said…

They just can’t stop, can they? Yesterday it was relief for the strip miners from having to haul away their waste. Today, it’s mineral mining at the Grand Canyon. In 2002, Cheney and Rove were killing off thousands of Salmon on the Klamath River. In 2003, they started killing off American Soldiers and the people in Iraq. Global warming? Not true. Recession? Who said there’s a recession? Vice President? Not part of the Executive Branch.