PRAIRIE DOG PRAISE
Good news on the prairie dog front! WildEarth Guardians has released its anxiously awaited, sixth annual report card on how certain states and the feds are doing in protecting our official county mascot, and Colorado got the second-highest grade, a B-minus!
We haven’t been this happy since avoiding a C in high school pre-calculus. Colorado was lauded in the report for its “plague mitigation and research.”
Sexy.
Others weren’t so fortunate. WildEarth Guardians placed the EPA in detention for the second year in a row for approving the use of Kaput-D, “a dangerous anti-coagulant rodenticide,” according to an angry-sounding press release. And New Mexico nearly got expelled for its “proliferation of irresponsible anti-prairie dog ordinances on the city and county level and a prairie dog killing contest.”
Gadzooks! Where is the humanity?! Nebraska and North Dakota got Fs, naturally. Last time we were in Nebraska, prairie dog nuggets were a daily special on the menu.
We sure hope they don’t get wind of the way we have dealt with a certain stray elk and that unfortunate raccoon. We might get sent to the principal’s office.
POLIS HYPOCRISY
Is anybody else bothered by Rep. Jared Polis’ dogged devotion to the Trans- Pacific Partnership (TPP) and giving President Obama fast-track authority to approve such pacts?
Doesn’t his support of TPP and fast-tracking fly in the face of his opposition to fracking in Colorado? After all, as Boulder Weekly has reported, TPP would fling the door wide open to allowing oil and gas companies to sue cities like Longmont, Boulder and Lafayette, which have passed bans or moratoriums on fracking and other oil and gas operations.
After all, any oil and gas corporation wanting to challenge local fracking laws along the Front Range need only to own a mineral lease that it can no longer develop due to a fracking ban or moratorium, transfer all or part of the interest in that lease to a foreign subsidiary, and then file suit under one of the many international trade agreements to which the U.S. is a signatory.
U.S. Rep. Ed Perlmutter, D-Lakewood, has finally seen the light and declared his opposition to fast-tracking. What’s wrong with Jared? We’ll go ahead and print his phone number again, in case he hasn’t gotten the message from his constituents yet: 202-225-2161.
Respond: letters@boulderweekly.com
