While many eyes are watching escalation of Indian-Pakistani tensions and the papal conclave, Congress has quietly inserted plans to sell off public lands in the tax bill before the House. To pay for tax cuts for the rich (not you or me), Big Oil is salivating at the thought of acquiring more land to pollute.
As reported, in addition to selling out public lands to the oil industry, the bill mandates at least 30 massive offshore lease sales in the Gulf of Mexico, with 80 million acres offered each time, plus more leasing in Alaska’s Cook Inlet. It also includes provisions to bail out the coal industry by mandating coal leasing, at rock-bottom prices, on at least 4 million acres of public lands.
And our three New Jersey Republican Congressmen (yes, they are men) are voting for this abomination. The Arctic National Wildlife Preserve will be destroyed to fund $2 billion in tax cuts. It’s time to flood their offices with calls demanding that they refuse to destroy our public lands and environment, and, if they do, to find alternatives to their so-called “service.”
Prayer for the Day
Like the Psalmist, we cry to you, O God, for help,
For we are beleaguered by plans to destroy your Creation;
Like the Psalmist, O Lord, we cry to you for courage,
For we know how hard it will be to take on wealth and power.
Be with us in this time, O Holy One, so we do not falter,
For our world is really at stake as a result of our actions.
In the name o the One who gives us hope and courage,
Even Christ Jesus our Lord, Amen.
Thoughts for the Day
The tax bill would adopt arbitrary mandates for increasing the amount of timber harvested from most national forests and forested BLM lands, harvesting 25 percent above fiscal year 2024 levels year after year.
Jenny Rowland Sea, Center for American Progress
This is just some truly odious sausage at 11:20 p.m. at the end of a long markup. Any member of Congress that votes for this is just surrendering any semblance of good process, the integrity of the legislative process is dead if you do this.
Jared Huffman, U.S. Congress (D-CA)
Let God rise up, and God’s enemies be scattered;
Let those who hate God flee from God’s wrath.
As smoke is driven away, so drive them away, as wax melts before the fire,
Let the wicked perish before God.
Psalm 68: 1-2