Recent comments

I personally don't think the Forest Service should be building lavish Visitor Centers. If it's worthy of a Visitor Center, it's worthy of National Park status. Either close the thing permanently and let people enjoy it without all the fuss of National Park status, or make it a NM and fund the thing. I was there a few years ago with my son. We had fun without the VC experience.

Volcanoes are skittish things. We're not really preserving anything -- we're temporarily permitted to place a few buildings on its slopes until the next time it goes kablooey. Then Mother Nature reinvents the park all over again and we're back to building more roads and Visitor Centers and parking lots. But then again, it may be a thousand years before the next big one, so who knows...?

-- Jon

Thanks everyone for the comments. Without getting into the details, we had run into a situation where we were refused some park information because we were "just bloggers". As you all have found with the new website, and backed up with Kurt's statement in this article, we are really trying to build something beyond "just" a blog. The community participation in the new site has been extraordinary so far, and Kurt and I both feel an obligation to bring quality stories to the site and feed the dialog about park issues.

Andrea, thanks for the video comment! I've got more in the works, including an interview tomorrow, and another request sent in email.

Kurt, you and Jeremy have created a important and informative appendage to understanding the critical issues facing our National Parks today (through your website). I have learned alot about the intricate aspects in how our National Parks are administratively run, ruined, raved and ranted over your website. Some of this stuff you would never find even in the back pages of your local newspaper. I know that I'm free to put my two cents in worth of blog but within respectable bounds, and I thank you for that. Remember, "the pen is mightier then the sword"! Keep up the good work!!

These kinds of events raise questions of compatibility and appropriateness. National parks are our national treasures, deserving respect and treatment as such.

Interesting reading through this, I live in Jackson and yes I saw the Blue Angels do a flyby around 2:50pm Mountain time. We have a few flybys a year by the military mainly because the VP has a house here. The main concern of these flyby's is the safety of the people in the mountains, because the "sound of freedom" can cause rock debris and slides. Luckily and thankfully because of forewarning of the Blue Angels nobody was hurt. That I have heard.

As to Tom
"It is quite obvious that you were never issued a service number.
And you never served.........You have no voice!!"

I have a 4-dig MOS number and your comment is grossly out of place.

The SOG units where a great help in forming the special forces of today, thank you.

"If he get impeached"...lol...you libs are so funni....
O.K., so then we have Dick Cheney as president! Yee-haw!...drop some bombs, babyyyyy!!!

I've had the displeasure of seeing military jets fly through the gorge of Grand Canyon, fly under the Chesapeake Bay bridge, and through Misty Fjords National Monument in Alaska. It's disgraceful -- the same attitudes that brought us the military academy mistreatment of women over the years... there's no honour in such behaviour. It just demonstrates that these people can't be fully trusted. When they sign on the dotted line and swear to uphold and protect the constitution and laws of this great land, there's no wiggle room -- no "yuk yuk lookie what I did" -- no "I was just following orders" excuses.

Yes I served, so wipe that nasty thought off your frontal lobe. Drop and gimme 20 while you're at it.

-- Jon

I guess the terrorists have won. We have to spoil our national parks just to keep up the recruitment effort. Very sad.

To: Chair, California Desert District Advisory Council
C/O Bureau of Land Management
6221 Box Springs Blvd
Riverside, CA 92505

From: Packrat

Subject: Panamint Valley, Surprise Canyon

Date: January 29, 2003

I am absolutely disgusted that the BLM, out of Ridgecrest no less, has installed a barrier at the mouth of Surprise Canyon to prevent vehicles from driving beyond the Chris Wicht Camp and on up to Panamint City.

All of this because The Center for Biological Diversity has filled a law suite against the BLM for failure to implement a environmental protection measurement?

What this equates to me is that the BLM has stopped all vehicular traffic from using this
RS 2477 designated road. A Court injunction should be filled immediately against the Center for Biological Diversity, to allow vehicular traffic to use this road to Panamint City, whilst the Environmental Impact Report is being established.

Its like saying the people, with their vehicles, that use this RS 2477 road are GUILTY of using a one hundred year old road and will not be allowed to access Panamint City. The people and vehicles should be allowed to use this road whilst the BLM is preparing the EIR.

Furthermore, for the two sections of the, so-called “stream”, are being considered for designation as a “Wild and Scenic River” are completely ridiculous. Anyone with any notion of common sense would not even think this way. Do you think the general public really believes this? If that were the case then would the California Department of Fish and Game require boat permits to use this so called river. I don’t think so!

Being that The Center for Biological Diversity has filed a lawsuit against the BLM, and the BLM has, in turn, closed off this road to Panamint City, is another classic case of big government closing areas to the general public, let alone the private landowners up in
Panamint City, CA.

In summary I would like to say the following as a matter of public record:

1. I am against the closure of this RS 2477 road going up to Panamint City, which is in the Death Valley National Park system.

2. I am against the BLM for even considering that this “Rivulet” of water would
be even be considered as a wild and scenic river.

3. I am against the Center of Biological Diversity for filling the lawsuit for the
BLM’s failure to produce a EIR, in an efficient manner. This is just another
waste of taxpayer money!

Respectfully,

Packrat

Epilogue: I still stand to this day on what I sent the BLM in the year of 2003
Been up to Panamint City many times, but not after the summer of
1984. The Government, Environmental people, etc., have way too
much to say and keep on locking all of us Desert folk out of the area,
with the exception of walking and enough is enough...

"I never said the government is the best steward of land, but yes I am dead set against privatization." Leave it to Professor Macdonald to be as clear as mud.

Oh, and I do know the difference between an anarchist and a socialist, since I didn't just fall of the back of the turnip truck yesterday, and I would definitely categorize myself as leaning much more towards the former rather than the latter. I subscribe wholeheartedly to the classical meaning of the word anarchy which is defined in the dictionary as " a theory that regards the absence of all direct or coercive government as a political ideal and that proposes the cooperative and voluntary association of individuals and groups as the principal mode of organized society."

Snowbird the NPS and the military-industrial complex are inextricalbly linked by virtue of their common Decider-In-Chief in Washington, DC. If he and his minions deem the Grand Teton range to be a suitable backdrop to promote the cause of militarism that is totally his perogative. He is after all the Decider and those mountains belong to the gov-mint he runs. So just settle down and enjoy the roar. There ain't nuthin' you can do to stop him. NUTHIN'!

Beamis, one of these days you'll learn the difference between an anarchist and a socialist. I never said the government is the best steward of land, but yes I am dead set against privatization. Actually, I have trouble seeing much difference between the two choices in your false dichotomy. That's in fact why I raised a disgraceful public use of land, but I was also a little clever to mention the public/private partnership that is the military. It was a way of signaling that the discussion isn't being framed correctly by either pro-government control or pro-privatization forces.

Anyhow, c'est la vie

*sticking my head back in the sand*

Jim Macdonald
The Magic of Yellowstone
Yellowstone Newspaper
Jim's Eclectic World