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The Pacific Legal Foundation responds: The Constitution is (fortunately) a stubborn document

Posted by: Maven on January 26, 2010 at 8:18 am

From Brandon Middleton at Pacific Legal Foundation, this rebuttal to Barry Nelson’s post:

“The Natural Resource Defense Council’s Barry Nelson doesn’t like what Pacific Legal Foundation is doing when it comes to California’s water. (See his NRDC Switchboard blog post, “Facts are stubborn things” [above]). According to Nelson, PLF and others have been “particularly careful to ignore facts that undermine their point.” Nelson asks that the public to

pay attention to news stories and statements to see who’s addressing (and who’s ignoring) the following stubborn facts:

o According to state and federal agencies, fully three quarters of the water supply reductions in 2009 were the result of a third consecutive dry year. (The Pacific Legal Foundation virtually ignores the dry weather and refers to this as a “government drought” on a video on Delta water issues.)

So, according to Nelson, if there is a natural drought, then there cannot be a government drought.

This, of course, is absurd and is belied by Nelson’s own statistical concession — our government and the Endangered Species Act were responsible for 1/4 of California water supply reductions in 2009. And the 1/4 share is not insignificant: at more than 160 billions gallons of water, the amount of H2O devoted solely to the delta smelt in 2009 could have supplied the entire city of Los Angeles for more than eight months.

Continue reading this post at the Pacific Legal Foundation by clicking here.

January 26, 2010 · Filed Under General Water Issues

Comments

One Response to “The Pacific Legal Foundation responds: The Constitution is (fortunately) a stubborn document”

  1. John Bass on January 26th, 2010 8:48 am

    Funny how the same group that emphasizes that the farmers of the SJV are the breadbasket of the world, invoke national security issues and the like can also claim that the fish they despise so much has no relation to interstate commerce. Does the smelt need to be a truck driver now?

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