I'll begin with a
quote:
This is the best thing the Bush administration has done over the last six years for the oceans and for the environment.
-Ellen Athas, director of ecosystems protection for the Ocean Conservancy and a former Clinton administration official.
Follow me below the flip to find out what Our Dear Leader did to deserve such praise from the environmental community...
I found
this story via
Gristmill:
President Bush established the largest protected ocean area in the world today, creating a national monument over a vast, biologically rich chain of coral reefs and islands from north of Hawaii to Midway Atoll.
In the monument -- an aquatic Eden of tropical fish, sea turtles, monk seals and more than 7,000 other marine species -- commercial fishing will be phased out over the next five years, administration officials said, speaking anonymously prior to the announcement.
The area, known now as Northwestern Hawaiian Islands Coral Reef Ecosystem Reserve, is more than 1,200 miles long -- longer than the coast of California -- and encompasses roughly 135,000 square miles of the Pacific Ocean, an area larger than all of America's national parks combined.
This is great development for the the environment, and I give President Bush some credit for taking the time to do it, but it certainly wasn't a hard political decision. The area was first protected as a marine reserve by Clinton in 2000, but any future president could erase that on a whim. Also, there aren't any large industries with any interest in the area, so there wasn't any pushback. The cynical money quote is below:
"This appears to be a solidly and well-reasoned environmental decision," said Carl Pope, national executive director of the Sierra Club, in San Francisco. "I hope it is the first of many. Because it is the first."
Basically, we learned Bush will do the right thing if none of his friends are getting paid for him to do the wrong thing.
Posted to Daily Kos Environmentalists.
UPDATE: smokeymonkey has a great take on it over at his blog.