New Congress tees it up for selling off federal lands

[TGK]

1st order of business by the new GOP controlled congress, greasing the skids to sell off public lands. While I will agree that too many politicians on both sides of the aisle are held too captive by corporate interests, on this subject, I take issue with the author’s both siderism. I challenge him for an example of when the other side of the aisle pushed this agenda.

From the linkat Ride Apart:

"The latest salvo against public lands, however, comes from the Republicans in control of the U.S. House of Representatives who, in a bold move ahead of this year's session, passed a new rules package that allows the federal government to sell off said public lands easier than it used to be. Those public lands include all federally-held BLM, Forest Service, and National Park/Monument lands, in a move which echoes”

"The new rules, which passed 215 to 209 largely along party lines, states, "In the One Hundred Nineteenth Congress, for all purposes in the House, a provision in a bill or joint resolution, or in an amendment thereto or a conference report thereon, requiring or authorizing a conveyance of Federal land to a State, local government, or tribal entity shall not be considered as providing new budget authority, decreasing revenues, increasing mandatory spending, or increasing outlays.”"

"What all that means is that politiicans wouldn't be able to fight land transfers, sales, or whatever using budgetary means, i.e. if the federal government decides to sell land, it doesn't have to consider how much revenue its losing from the sale. That's revenue from tourism, recreation (hunting, fishing, dirt biking, camping, UTVing, etc), and other means. In short, they can plug their ears to the long-term downsides of a sale—i.e. they'll actually lose revenue, which is a provable fact—for incredibly short-term gains from said sale."


New House of Representatives Rules Just Made it Way Easier to Sell Public Lands

 

[AWG_Pics]

I do think there is a threat to public lands, but really for a hundred and fifty years the federal land managers have been forced to tilt toward private interests. There are literally dozens of stories of large scale federal preemption of private and tribal lands, and when the dust settles corporations and private interests end up controlling that land. Up until the 1990's the US Forest Service facilitated private logging on public land, and in the process became the largest road building entity in the U.S., for many decades. The phrase was "Get the cut!" above all else. And if you want to read horror stories, just read up on the administration of Ulysses Grant. Being a war hero did not exempt him from surrounding himself with scallywags, swindlers, thieves and pliable decision-makers. This is not a new story, just the latest chapter. His head of Interior was a real peach.

Don't get me started, I could write out more details for pages & pages & pages. It can be depressing.

 

[pods8]

Don't forget that Utah is also suing the government challenging whether the Federal government even has the right to hold land in perpetuity.

 

[TGK]

I have no doubt they pushed this through as one of their 1st orders of business because they do not believe the federal government has any business owning these vast swatches of land. End game is to privatize as much as they can, as fast as they can. Pretty much spelled right out in Project 2025. It’s been on the wish list for decades and they finally have the trifecta of all 3 branches of government and are going for broke.

 

[dennis 221]

they are going after OLD GROWTH FOREST

 

[rando]

This is pretty terrifying. While there is potential for damage on many fronts, much of it can be recovered from. However, the disposal of public lands is permanent - once sold these are never coming back.