WASHINGTON – Governmental Affairs Committee Ranking Member Joe Lieberman, D-Conn., Wednesday issued the following statement regarding the Bush Administration’s proposal to open Utah’s Book Cliffs to oil and gas leases, even though the Bureau of Land Management recently said the area qualified as wilderness.
“We are now beginning to see the fallout from the closed-door deals that the Bush Administration negotiated this spring. If it spent as much time and energy developing renewable energy resources as it has spent in devising ways to destroy pristine environments – just so its supporters could pump a few weeks’ supply of oil and gas – the country would be much better off. By the time this Administration gets around to doing as it said it would – which is to protect areas identified as having wilderness characteristics – those pristine areas will be gone.”