Last week we cited Admiral James Watkins' fears that the 200 or so recommendations of his U.S. Oceans Commission report would be largely ignored by the Bush administration using the excuse of, "we're pretty much already doing all these things," which is a matter of opinion. Now they are getting ready to do exactly this by rolling back 90% ...um, did you hear that correctly -- NINETY PERCENT of the established protections for salmon critical habitat, offering up the same excuse (that they are already doing enough to protect salmon).
From the front page article in yesterday's LA Times by our buddy Ken Weiss, one of the best ocean journalists around:
The Bush administration on Tuesday proposed dramatically rolling back protections for salmon and steelhead trout streams from Southern California to the Canadian border, saying the rare and endangered fish are sufficiently protected in other ways.
Posted by Randy Olson at December 2, 2004 06:23 AM