[IPSM] Protect the Sacred Land Where Life Begins: The Gwich'in Nation needs your help now!

[Macdonald Stainsby]

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Macdonald

Protect the Sacred Land Where Life Begins
The Gwich'in Nation needs your help now!

http://www.alaska.net/~gwichin/

The Arctic National Wildlife Refuge is the Sacred Place Where Life
Begins, the calving and nursery grounds of the Porcupine Caribou Herd.
Desecration of the Arctic Refuge would cause serious detriment to
caribou and the people of the Gwich’in Nation who have depended on the
caribou since time immemorial. The Arctic National Wildlife Refuge must
remain off limits to any oil or gas development and must be put in
permanent protection status as Wilderness.

No matter how many times the administration tries to advance this plan,
the facts haven't changed: drilling in the coastal plain of the Arctic
Refuge would ruin one of America’s last wild places for what the U.S.
Geological Survey and oil company executives concede is only a few
months’ worth of oil, oil that would not be available for a decade. The
American people don’t want that, and they’ve made that clear. But
proponents of drilling in the Arctic Refuge have a much broader agenda.
Just last year, Rep. Tom DeLay (R-TX) told a group of high-ranking
Republicans that the controversy over drilling in the Arctic National
Wildlife Refuge is a “symbolic” debate about whether or not oil and gas
drilling should be allowed in pristine wild areas across the country.

The coastal plain of the Arctic Refuge is one of America’s last wild
places. Caribou, musk oxen, wolves, polar, brown and black bears, and
hundreds of thousands of migratory birds rely on the wilderness habitat
that the Refuge provides. The Gwich'in people, Alaska natives who live
near the Refuge, depend on the caribou. For 20,000 years, their culture
and way of life have been intimately bound up with the Porcupine River
Caribou Herd.

All this with the chance of finding little or no oil. At current rates
of consumption, there is at best 6 months worth of oil in the Refuge. An
analysis by the U.S. PIRG Education Fund - False Profits: The Business
Case Against Drilling in the Arctic Refuge,
http://savethearctic.com/PDFs/arcticwhitepaper_2_4_02.PDF- makes the

Sneaking Arctic Refuge drilling into the federal budget would allow
drilling supporters to sidestep the normal Senate process. Budgets
cannot be filibustered, so a simple majority of 51 votes could pass an
Arctic Refuge provision. The budget process also limits time allowed for
debate; controversial proposals attached to the budget do not receive
the full examination they deserve. The federal budget bill is exactly
the wrong place for Congress to decide the fate of the Arctic Refuge.
Including Arctic Refuge drilling in the budget would be a bad fiscal
decision as well. Since the amount of oil and the level of oil industry
interest in drilling the Refuge are still unknown, any figures
describing revenues derived from the sale of the oil are entirely
speculative. Especially in these economic times, it is risky business to
have such assumptions included in the national budget.

Take action! Write or call your Senator and Representative today. The
Capitol switchboard number is 202-224-3121. And, if you want to do more,
write a letter to the editor. Let them know that drilling in the Arctic
National Wildlife Refuge is a bad idea, it is not the way to solve
America's need for energy, and controversial policy decisions are not
supposed to be made in the budget bills. To drill in the Refuge will
destroy forever another. Native peoples' ''right to a way of life.'' For
more information, contact the Gwich'in Steering Committee at (907)
458-8264 or visit our web site: www.alaska.net/~gwichin .

Girl at River

The Gwich'in Nation of Northeast Alaska and Northwest Canada have a
unified longstanding position to seek permanent protection of “Iizhik
Gwats’an Gwandaii Goodlit” The Sacred Place Where Life Begins, the
coastal plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. The coastal plain
is the primary birthplace and nursery for over 120,000-member Porcupine
Caribou Herd. Our Gwich’in villages are located along the migratory
paths of the caribou. The area where we live is virtually the same as
the range of the caribou and our villages are strategically set along
the migratory routes of the caribou.

more info:
http://www.alaska.net/~gwichin/index3.html


-- 

Macdonald Stainsby
http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/rad-green
In the contradiction lies the hope
	--Bertholt Brecht.