Focus 580; The Battle Over Logging in Old-Growth Forests

Well in this part of focus 580 will be talking a bit about the environment about what we know about how the new Bush administration is thinking about environmental issues and one in particular that has logging in old growth forests. But we may well get into some other issues as well. Our guest for this hour is Martha Marx. She is president of an organization called Republicans for Environmental Protection. And I know that perhaps some people might be a little skeptical about a group of Republicans who say that they're environmentalists. She I think would be the first to admit that the record of the party recently on the environment hasn't been what she would like it to be. However she also reminds us that there is a long commitment in the GOP to environmental issues going all the way back to Theodore Roosevelt. When she says that something she'd like to see the party stay with and build on. Let me just tell you a little bit about her. Martha Marx was a Spanish teacher in high school for a number of years then she went back to school got a Ph.D. in Spanish literature and Linguistics at Northwestern. And then she taught college for 11 years after

that she left teaching to write textbooks and has published six of them and also to work as a freelance language proficiency tester and trainer for the American Council on the teaching of foreign languages in 1990. She got involved in politics because of some local land use issues in 92. She was elected to the Lake County Illinois board and forest preserve board on a pro environment platform the year after that she helped form the Lake County conservation Alliance which is an organization of grassroots groups interested in preserving the natural beauty and that area. She's since been re-elected two times as a county commissioner winning 70 percent of the vote on her 1998 Republican primary and then she was unopposed in the general election. That fall in 1995 she was one of a group of Republican environmentalists who were interested in. Establishing the importance reestablishing the importance of environmental issues in the GOP. And she created this organization Republicans for

Environmental Protection. She has been involved in that for a long time and continues to be the president of the organization and as I mentioned was one of a number of Republicans openly critical of President Bush's choice of Gale Norton to be secretary of the interior. And as we talk of course questions are welcome the number here in Champaign Urbana 3 3 3 9 4 5 5. We also have a toll free line going anywhere that you can hear us. That's 800 to 2 2 9 4 5 5 so at any point here people want a call that's welcome. All we ask of people as they try to be brief. We keep things moving along and getting as many people as we possibly can. Miss Marks. Yeah. Well good morning. Well thanks very much for talking with us. Yeah happy to be here. I'm not exactly sure where to start maybe you know in a general sense among the things that I read was that you had written and delivered with a speech from a few years back that had to

do with the Republicans and the environment this was a speech from one thousand ninety seven a speech you gave in Indianapolis. And what you talked about the the at that time the more recent environmental record of the GOP and saying that you know sometimes within the party say well if people somehow think that we're not committed to the environment it's either the Democrats fault because they're talking us down or it's the media because they're talking us down I think the thing that comes through very strongly in this speech is your feeling that no it's not the media it's not the Democrats it's it's your own party. It's us. Think I said in that speech it's not them making us look bad it's us making us look bad. It's the thing with that many times our Republican elected officials and party leaders. It's the things that they say about the environment. I gave a quote from that speech. It's the bill they proposed and it's the vote they take. And I would have to say that you know three and a half years later that's still very much the case.

We are our own worst enemy in the Republican Party on the environment where of course our organization is trying to make the party better we say we're trying to green up the GOP and we're having some success although it's of it's a long project it's a long term difficult uphill battle plan. We think the rank and file Republican voters are with us on that issue and the evidence is pretty clear that they are. Well I think you you certainly tried to remind people that there has been this commitment to conservation that as I said indeed goes back to to Theodore Roosevelt and I think that well you're quite right back that's one of the guys you think about is being right time conservation is right. And then also it was in deed under a Republican administration that of Richard Nixon that the EPA was created so it certainly one can point to examples of Republicans being concerned about the environment. However it seems that more recently. The commitment hasn't hasn't been there and

in fact I got a question from somebody off the air question raising this very making the points in raising this very question. How is it that not the preps not just for voters who would identify themselves as Republicans but for people who are active in the party who are elected officials. How is it that you think that you could wake them up and communicate to them. Just how important an issue this is. Well in fact the Republican pollsters are doing that for us. We really don't even have to do that I think a lot of elected officials in our party are aware that the the Republican Party has a big problem. Big image problem and a big big basic ground level problem when it comes to environmental protection issues. And what and how are you to find out whether it's clean air clean water or natural resources in our public lands or endangered species whatever the public is telling Republican pollsters the same thing that we are which is that they support strong environmental protection

initiative. They don't want. Protections for endangered species cut. They don't want public land given away or sold off as is often proposed an extreme right wing Republican circles. They don't want the protection of our air and our water. They don't want the standards lowered for those. The Republican pollsters almost 1095 quite honestly have been telling the Republican Party that their own voters if they don't trust the Republican Party to do the right thing on the environment or that they don't appreciate or don't approve of what is perceived as anti-environmental positions. And I think a lot of rank and file voters feel that they don't have a Republican voter so that they don't have any alternative if they are supportive of other things that the Republican Party stands for which is you know a smaller government an individual initiative a strong defense and good fiscal responsibility. They very often won't vote the environment at the very top of their agenda so they vote for the Republican Party

anyway which is given the GOP a certain leve to ignore the issue. And what we've done as an organization is to have what we are doing and continue to do is to pull together individuals who care about all those of the other things that the Republican Party stands for and cares about but also cares about environmental protection and is trying to raise the issue. Without our party speaking up as Republicans who care about these issues and saying you know you're great on other things but on this one issue we don't agree with what you're doing with your with your approach to our own protection. And we are we are growing and making some significant waves within the Republican Party they definitely are hearing from us and at certain areas they're hearing from a lot of us in certain areas we're not as strong but we are growing across the country. We have members in 48 states. Certain areas have quite a large membership base and so those elected officials are definitely hearing from us. But they will be hearing more and more in the future. We're trying to do is to create a grassroots

groundswell within the Republican Party for stronger environmental protection and this shit is within the GOP. Well given the fact that it is you would say that there is this with the within the Republican Party there is a strong conservation tradition and that we don't have to go back very far before we see as I said environmental legislation and Richard Nixon we have one of the one of the important leaders in the party in the post-war era Barry Goldwater. I think it was the right member by the way. He indeed was a member your organization had the reputation I guess my question is what is it do you think that has if if that if that is an important tradition in the in the party what is it that has led the party away from that. Why is it that that. That at least in some some people's minds. But other things like oh for example wanting to get rid of government regulations. Having very strong feelings about the idea of private property and what

people's rights are. Belief in the unfettered market all of those things seem to have have come to the front and have eclipsed the issue of conservation. Well I think you've actually done by quite a few there's been several strains running through the Republican Party for several decades. They all sort of came to the fore around 1980 with the election of Ronald Reagan and they've been growing in strength ever since. And if you can point to a few of them they will. Classic line of follow the money is certainly one. Environmental groups give and environmentalists individual people who who share conservation concerns are not noted for giving large numbers amounts of money to candidates for office whereas extractive industries developers of the various different special interests that depend on. Friendly government government and like to use public lands for example the extractive industries those those.

Industries contribute heavily to elected officials at all levels but especially at the federal level where take so much money to run and I think they have turned the heads of a lot of people who might otherwise have a little more of a conservation ethic. Other things that you mentioned certainly play a role. The desire to have fewer government regulations is one that runs deep and true in the Republican Party. And there's nothing exactly wrong with that. We are saying you know we don't want more and more and more regulation. But we do want there to be a minimum floor of protection for water in our air and that there should be you know those the standards should be good ones they should be clearly enforced and consistently enforced that there necessarily doesn't need to be a great rollback of protection. Let's just enforce them fairly. The the property rights movement is something of a Western phenomenon. People who live in the East are more

aware that you know we are all in this together and we all have a common stake in what happens. On our land around our our proper homes. And there's more of a sense of buy into the idea of community. I think I've told other viewers this I think that the idea of property rights is so strong in the West is a residual hange holdover of the old old west mentality where you know a man had a horse and a gun and he would end his property and he was like the lord of his everything he surveyed. And that strain of thinking is still very prevalent in the West where they view any attempt at protection of dangerous species which is the main issue out there as a threat to their personal property and of course the takings issues which are hotly debated within the Republican Party and elsewhere have mostly come out of the West. So I think if you combine the the the money that is now and involved in politics and the sort of libertarian strain of you know don't put the rules on me everybody should be able to do just as

they want. And the Western mentality of you know the man on the horse with a gun protecting his land. I think you can see where the Republican Party is has developed this attitude that it has right now. Yeah I was certainly struck by one of the things one of the points that you just made it was one of the points that you made in the speech there referred to going back. This was a 900. 87 soberly you've been felt this way for some time. I have it when you look at it when you list these points what could the Republican Party do to repair its anti-environmental image. The number one thing on your list. This was an as I say Guinness and 1997 was campaign finance reform. I agree and that goes to the to the money issue right there. And it's probably not a surprise that the champion of campaign finance reform within the Republican Party is John McCain. Well it's not that's not a surprise that that's an obvious fact. It's an it's not a surprise that last year in the Republican primaries after doing some fairly in-depth analyses of the various Republican candidates for the

presidency including George W. Bush who basically had nothing to say about the environment any at any stage of the campaign. But our our political organization Republicans for Environmental Protection did enjoy or endorse John McCain in the Republican primaries before the primaries. We were actively involved. Our members across the country in several key states were actively involved in working for Senator McCain. And it was in part because of his beliefs and campaign finance reform but also because he did have all the Republican candidates for president. He did have the strongest environmental record. Proven environmental record it wasn't that he was as I said in one interview he was not an environmental saint but he had worked very hard for some wilderness bills in the West the Arizona wilderness bills. He had worked hard to protect the Grand Canyon from the first plane overflights a number of things that were really demonstrably protective of the environment he had a good record on or as none of the other Republican candidates

did. And in fact most of what they even addressed the issues. So what if it's pleasing to us to see that the guy that we felt was the strongest Republican presidential candidate is also the one who's working the hardest and have for a long time worked the hardest on campaign finance reform. And even if you know it's not a direct environmental issue it certainly has ramifications for not only the environment but a lot of just good government issues. Well we've been talking for a bit here and I have a couple of callers I promise that we'll get right to them but I think perhaps for other bit of benefit of anyone who is just today and maybe I'd better introduce. Again our guest with this part of focus 580 We're speaking with Martha marks. She is the president. She's president of an organization called our E.P. America and that stands for Republicans for Environmental Protection. It's a group that she helped to create in 1995 she was elected president in 96 an office that she still holds. She has been an elected official she was served on the Lake County Illinois board and also forest preserve board. Her

academic background going back some ways is in Spanish literature in linguistics she is a graduate of Northwestern where she got a Ph.D. She taught college after that went into a college textbook writing and publishing and after that was when she got involved in local politics. She lives in river woods is that right. That's right river wins Illinois in Lake County which is a far north suburb of Chicago she's talking with us by telephone. And the question's welcome three three three. W I L L or 9 4 5 5 that's for Champaign-Urbana folks we do also have the toll free line no matter where you're listening around Illinois Indiana anywhere that signal travel you may use the toll free line that's 800 to 2 2 9 4 5 5. And we have a couple local folks here will start in Urbana with. Line 1. Hello it's my turn. Yes. OK well I agree with you about John McCain I thought he would make a really good president he'll fire in his belly. Right. Would like you to talk about saying no I saw last October.

And there are companies I want to get up there and get up to the coast and they don't even know how much I want to stand and it seems to me it's mostly Republicans that want to do that so can you discuss facts. It's I mean it's tough. I laugh like haven as easy as that and that would be destroyed. May I may I take that. Yes go ahead. Well I have to say ma'am I agree with you and the organization rep America Republicans for viral protection has for the last year been doing everything we could to argue against the oil drilling and exploration for good for oil and gas in the coastal plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and I can tell you some of the reasons that you will agree with that some of the other people out there in the audience may or may not know that is the last 5 percent of the Arctic coastal plain that has not already been explored for oil and gas. The other 95 percent is all gone.

So we have been arguing Afghani knowing Dad well and know that I mean that it is democratic or it is and it is been ruined as a ecological area and one of our arguments as recently as just a month ago during the Gale Norton appointment as interior secretary we have been arguing against her appointment in part because she so strongly supports the exploration of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. The arguments are always made well we have to have balance and the environmentalists don't want to balance. So we have to balance what we have been saying is the balance was lost long ago. We're talking about the last 5 percent of the Arctic coastal plain that's still a pristine wildlife area. Balance was lost. You know a decade ago two decades ago when they when they were exploring before and so we are strongly opposed to any further exploration of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge or any further exploration of the coast that would ruin the Arctic refuge. In fact we are and we have put out. Very nicely done action alert that

if you go onto our website you can read our positions opposing the exploration of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge there. They're pretty clear going back a whole year since we started working on this. This was in fact an issue that we tried to raise in the Republican primaries and it didn't resonate very well. And unfortunately right now we have. I've been saying that the stars have kind of come together for the oil and gas industry in that there is we now have a very oil friendly Republican administration. We have a supposed energy crisis which has done. Don't you think of it as the increase in the gas prices just putting pressure on the market to open at the last minute or fully agree with that. I think it I'm very suspicious of the timing too. I know that the whole thing is coming to a head in four in the next four months I expect that the Arctic Refuge will either be opened up in the next four months or it will be saved again until the next alleged crisis comes along. You

probably know maybe other people in the audience know that the Wellcome oil industry you have since three have been trying to get into the Arctic National Refuge for decades. They have repeatedly tried they have argued the same things before that we had to have this oil gas that there was this crisis that the American people just were being deprived of some great treasure that we had some right to have. They've been making those arguments for 20 30 40 years. I've not even sure when it began but for certainly 20 years and longer back before that and repeatedly the Congress or the president and sometimes both and sometimes one of the other has has said no that we weren't going to go in there. Some places are just so special that they need to be kept. And you know many people are in your pocket and say. A couple thousand little over that I'm not sure exactly what the numbers are. We're in 48 states where not enough not a force to run to rival the Sierra Club and we're not something that's going to make the extractive industries quake in their boots but the Republican Party is

very aware of. I said I would think that they're very aware of us and I would I would add ask you if you know anybody who might be a good candidate for membership to to tell him about us. And anybody who's listening if you want to find out more about if we do have a website it's actually very easy to find it. W w w dot our E.P. dot org dot org for Republicans for Environmental Protection. OK one more thing it seems to me that we need to be. Looking for alternative fuels such as FEMA That's right well alternative fuel alternative technologies. Yes tech not external pervasion. I've heard that they've already started conserving so much in California that they've conserved enough to provide power for a million homes. What worries me is that in the great push to to open up the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge the idea of conservation and alternative fuel development and alternative technologies are being

lost in the administration. Something else that people don't realize I don't think that even if we were to trash the Arctic National Wildlife for its oil and petroleum for the oil and gas and even if we went into all the other publicly protected federally protected public lands that we have we still have only about 3 percent of the world's oil in the United States. So we are still going to be dependent on foreign oil and gas suppliers. But oil gas oil suppliers we will still be dependent because we can't begin to supply our own needs. So the idea that we are somehow going to become energy efficient if we will just get into those publicly preserved lands is is nonsense. And also of the arguments about how much oil is actually available in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge a range from a very low to very high in the industry that wants to extract it is the one that's saying it's very high. All right but I and the the the fact of the matter is that it will take seven to 10 years even if

the oil is there it will take seven to 10 years to begin to get it out. That will do absolutely nothing to help our current energy crisis if in fact there is one. And I'm like you I'm highly suspicious of the timing of this. I doubt it. Increase in prices. Yeah yeah. Of the post crisis. OK. Thank you. All right thank you for the go. The According to some figures I've seen in the U.S. Geological Survey their estimate is something like three point two billion barrels of oil that it would make sense economically speaking to try to get which is about six months worth at the rate that we use it you think that's a creditor figure and I've heard I've seen and industry figures of anywhere from 11 billion barrels to 900 billion barrels. Nobody credible has ever said that. But they the industry dangles those numbers out there and it acts like there's you know there's some treasure trove there that will keep us you know energy. Energy independent

for for decades. It's just not so. It would take seven to 10 years to get at whatever is there and the best estimates are what you pointed to that's about a six month supply. And some of the arguing that there are some things that we could just conserve our way to six month supply would be a whole lot better for the country. We don't have to go in and trash some of our last remaining pristine areas. The last 5 percent of the Arctic coastline we're not talking about the whole area. And it should be preserved. There. This is this is come up in the past isn't the first time people have talked about drilling there. And I think that environmentalists have been able to rally some support for not doing that. It's it seems to be the kind of place that really can capture people's imagination. I guess though I wonder whether there are other places where where the issue is maybe as critical but there's not as much discussion. For example I have read some about the Jack morrow hills in

Wyoming which is a place that for a lot for a long time they have said no you can't go explore for energy there some people apparently think there are significant natural gas there. And this is one of the things that that what I reads is one of those that people say look watch here what the administration does and this is going to tell you something about what their attitude is going to be. Another area that you're talking about is the eastern front of the Rockies up to Montana which may be the same area you're talking about. I have heard about that more hills I'm not sure exactly where they are. But what what President Bush said in his campaign and what Gale Norton has repeated with enthusiasm is that. They want to open up the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and other currently protected areas. And what we have we have asked in an open letter to President Bush which is in our latest newsletter which we call the green elephant. It's also available right on the front of our website. You can find it very easily. What we have asked is What exactly do you mean

by other currently protected areas. How far does that go. Do you mean our national parks. Do you mean all of our other national wildlife refuges. You know what what are these other currently protected areas that you two want opened up. And you know we've been raising these questions and I think a local local community is will put the pressure on their own elected officials to protect them the problem for the Arctic is that Alaska is almost totally dependent on oil revenue. What Alaska residents pay no. No income taxes they in fact get I think a $2000 rebate per person from the oil and oil and gas revenues they'd have. They are almost almost dependent on those revenues. There are senators two senators and there one representative are rabidly in support of opening up the wildlife refuges the Wildlife Refuge for oil and gas exploration. And you now have a president vice president or secretary and others in the in the straiten who are also support of the same thing.

And the problem for the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge is that it is remote. Not many people live there not many people go there. Some of us believe that just because something is not readily accessible my man that doesn't necessarily mean that we have a right to go in and trash it. Well that's I guess that's what makes it makes this more difficult is that at least in some places there will be local people local government officials who will argue that it's to their economic benefit for these places to be developed. Just for example here going back to this one of this this place in Wyoming here is an article that I read quotes the president of the Rock Springs Wyoming National Bank who also happens to be the local Cattlemen's Association had a fellow named John Hay who says that he says to lock up the land and have it for the sake of saying it's out there doesn't make a lot of sense to me. He goes on and says we have a change there when administrations and my guess is that we'll have some rational

people who see that there is room for multiple use. So here I guess if you're running up against local people here who are going to say well you know look I mean it's well to have this have pristine land but here we are and it's our local resource and. It's we want to use it because it'll create job little being bring money into the economy and you know I mean how do you argue with that. Well you argue very well that that's not their land that is our land. We here in Illinois people on the East Coast and people in the south in the Northeast we are the owners of that federal land. It is not the local property or the special property of the local people. It is our land. We are paying to to protect that we are paying to manage it. It belongs to all of us we are the stakeholders. We have a right to say what happens on that federal land not just the local people. And I'd also point out to you I did see that quote that you just read. He was a banker and also the head of the local Cattlemen's Association. Well anybody who knows

what happened in in the ranching industry the cattlemen are some of the biggest users of the public lands in the West. And frankly some of the greatest corporate welfare that takes place in this country is done by the by the cattle industry we. We have millions of acres that are owned by the by the American public and some of us you know preserve the national parks and wildlife refuges that a lot of it is Pure Land Management lands which are basically in lands that have no special characteristics other than they are useful to some industry or somebody. The cattle industry is a major user of our public lands and they are subsidized on those lands. One things that I've learned in recent years is that I don't know anything about ranching but I know that there's something called an animal unit which consists of a cow and a calf. The ranchers who need land to graze their cattle pay a certain amount of money

which is around $9. As I understand $9 a month I believe for an animal unit I count a calf on privately owned land. If they go into someone else's land to graze. But when it's on publicly own land on federal land that we own. There's a subsidy of about 50 percent so the American people are subsidizing the cattle grazing the lands that we own and the cattle industry of which this gentleman is is a part is already being benefiting greatly by the fact that there are public lands there available to them and half the price. And what people don't always realize is that there is great environmental damage done by the cattle that Graves in many cases along the river of the riparian corridors that used to be fine bird habitat that used to be high quality wetlands and protection for water quality. Those lands are all trampled down by the cattle that use them. They turned into nothing but mud puddles. They're totally

lost as any other use which is you know clean water clean and providing habitat for species that might not have any of the wear to any other place to go and we are subsidizing the cattle industry is subsidized it's being subsidized by the American taxpayer not only for their use of the environmental destruction that comes along with it. So people like that who say well we gotta have public use of all of our lands we have to have it all opened up for multiple use. In a sense they're saying we'd like to have the right to destroy all of the land that the American people are not just the parts that we already have access to. We have another caller here to talk with let's do that in Clinton Indiana. Line number four. Hello hello I want to do nor just a word or heard anything about this. Gas and natural gas and oil off the coast I'm in the Gulf of Mexico. And they said hers you know as multiple supplies are. Excuse me. And that was about it. You know year

to go I heard that and it would only nobody's done anything about it. You know dirty specially with this energy crisis I just wonder if she knows anything about it. Well I do know that when I think of the listener I think OK thanks I mean we've been we've been drilling for years off the Gulf Coast. If you go along the Florida Texas coast you see massive oil derricks. So I'm not sure if you're talking about that area or if you're talking a lot along the Florida coast. Very interesting because the governor of Florida who just happens to be the brother of the president recently wrote a letter to the energy secretary the Energy Department saying keep your hands off the Florida coast if you go exploring for oil. And of course they will. But I'm not sure exactly which. Oil areas he's talking about along the Gulf Coast. The I mentioned and you mentioned that you were among. But Republicans that I had a problem with the selection of Gale

Norton to be secretary of the interior and I'm interested in maybe what you think about also the the other posts that have him have important environmental responsibilities. Interestingly enough all three of these are have no occupied by women agriculture and EPA. What do you think about Secretary Vandeman and Governor Whitman. Well be very honest I've never heard of them venom until she was nominated for agriculture secretary and I don't know much about her. I do know that she comes out of the Farm Bureau background which makes sense for agriculture. So from an environmental perspective that does send up some red flags because the American Farm Bureau is one of the most openly anti-environmental organizations anywhere. And so naturally that is something that makes me concerned. But as far as of her Personally I don't know anything about her. I haven't heard about her before she was

appointed. Christie Whitman Governor Whitman is. We have. We have. We're guardedly optimistic about that appointment. We think that she has done some things very well in New Jersey. She's known in New Cross the country in fact for having aggressively promoted open space protection in New Jersey while she was the governor there which is a good thing. We are stronger as a for that. Unfortunately that's not what the head of the EPA does. EPA is not involved in open space protection that's the Interior Department. And Gale Norton of course is not supportive of the public open space and has had made her career on that. But. Ms Whitman has Have a good record on that very aggressively attempted to acquire open space and protect farm farm areas and in New Jersey. Her record on environmental protection there is not quite is. Confidence inspiring but

she's in a different role now. When she took over as the governor of New Jersey she did slice the state's environmental port Protection Department radically. And in fact it was much noted in the news at the time that she was cutting the budget by I mean half or more. And I think she has had some successes in the in the areas along the coastal coastal areas of New Jersey and restoring water quality in some of the estuaries and these are the fisheries areas. From what I've heard is that the rivers in the streams in New Jersey have not done as well under her term. And of course New Jersey there is notoriously not good and I don't believe it's made any improvements under either Governor Whitman. So we would say that's a mixed bag. But compared to the appointment of Gale Norton Christie Whitman was a bright light. We have about 10 minutes left in this part of focus 580 maybe a little bit more. Our guest

for this hour of the show is Martha marks. She is president of Rep America that stands for Republicans for Environmental protection this was an organization that she helped to start in 1995. She's also a Republican elected official back in the early 90s she got involved in local gun. Because of the land use battle in northern Illinois where she lives she was elected to the Lake County Board this is Lake County Illinois and also the forest preserve board. The year after that she helped form the Lake County conservation Alliance and has been active on these issues and as we mentioned she was one of a a a group of Republicans who publicly came forward said they weren't real happy with President Bush's choice of Gale Norton to be secretary of the interior. Did did the part of the White House take any notice of you when you did that. Did that that register on their radar screen. Well I believe it did. And we we've had well even in the hearings are

opposition to Gale Norton was noted and people thought one of the senators who were. Questioning her asked what she thought of the fact that we had a post we were opposing her nomination and her response was basically say well that they didn't support hadn't supported George W. Bush in the primaries either so it didn't really matter. And that's true. We did not support him but we would like very much to see our Republican president and of Republican administration do the right thing on the environment and we have can repeatedly reached out to the Bush administration before the during the primaries we reached out after the primaries we reached out before he was elected. We said we can help you find good Republican reasons to support conservation initiatives we can help you address these issues in ways that that Republicans can support because we are Republicans and we have we have researched these issues and we do believe that there are good

conservative Republican reasons why why the United States should should continue to put progress on in the conservation environment protection concerns. We never received a response. We do believe that they know about us. We have had some. Behind the scenes information coming back to us that you know they really wish we would sit down and shut up. And of course our whole purpose is to try to make our party better on the environment we will. We do not seek to harm a Republican president we just want to encourage him to do better and we have had some successes at some local and state levels a number of our members are getting elected. We are in the pipeline. One of our members in Connecticut was just elected to Congress last fall the first member elected the Congress and he is. So I think the first of several that are coming through we have state senators and representatives around the country who are members. And we've had

some of our members elected to city councils and county boards around the country. So we're in the pipeline but we're still a very young and a very small organization we will be here for a long time. If people want to find out about us I'd love to tell them again to make sure we have a website which can give you about as much information as anything you would ask. It's w w w dot our E.P. dot org R G R E P dot org. You're welcome to give me a call. Our office is 8 4 7 9 4 0 0 3 2 0. We publish a newsletter that called the green elephant a quarterly. It quite well quite well regarded. It goes out to about 10000 addresses every month every quarter rather and we get fantastic feedback. People say oh my gosh I never heard of a group like this. This is wonderful and I'd be very happy to send a copy of that in our brochure to anybody who is interested in print 7 9 4 0 0 3

2 0. We have a couple callers here want to get in next to someone in Champaign. And one. Hello hello there. Yes Mrs. Marx. Yes hi how are you this is I'm just fine. How big would you say you work your constituency for rep America is. Well we don't know that. We think it's certainly somewhere between where it currently is and the Sierra Club which is much larger than what we will ever be. Are you are you represented in all 50 states. We are in 48 states 48 states are 48 states. We have no current members. And let me see if I can remember. We have no current members in Vermont and North Dakota and Ramada is a strange one because it is actually quite a green state. It's an incredibly green state very small state too. And it's also I think a fairly democratic state but interest groups go. Everybody has an interest group that ever set foot inside Congress that their congressman. They're all interest groups in the National Association of Manufacturers right down to the Sierra Club.

But I'm in the process of of of trying to find densify Republican candidates that have a consciousness towards you know being green and being green and not faking it. Right. Do you suggest sometimes to your constituency then that in the case of two year elections four year elections to be as pragmatic as possible if if the Republican candidate does not have the ability to regard the environment as something worth saving whereas for you know protecting. The you allow them or do you suggest to them to be as pragmatic as possible in the election process because sometimes it takes coalition building alliances with others that may not share all your beliefs. Well we are. I'll tell you what we do we do have. Let me just explain rep America the America is our membership organization Republicans for Environmental protection because of what we call a political committee and Republican for environmental protection does do endorsements. As for the last two election cycles we've

had some successes there. I will I will mention one example up in my my congressional district which was Congressman Porter John Porter who was a good moderate centrist. Pragmatist got top top ratings from the Concord Coalition which is for tax. For tax of utilisation a very very conservative on that also got very good ratings from the environmental organizations when he retired last year. There was a massive 11 candidate race up here in the primary. Very expensive primary. We stepped into that and did the survey all the candidates got responses from about half of them and from the ones that responded we decided to endorse Mark Kirk who just happen to be the one who actually won the primary and he won it because he was able to pull together a fairly large coalition of different interests that supported him. But he won it with very little money compared to some of the other candidates appear we have done things like that

in several races around the country where we try to help the voters in this case the voters up in Lake County in northern Cook County are very Republican voters are pretty much like I am they're pretty much like John Porter was. They want somebody who is fiscally responsible. They want somebody who is a good moderate on social issues and that includes the environment. So what we were able to do was to help people like that the voters like that cut through the gobbledygook of the primary which was very strange. On all on all sides I mean there were more there more. Candidates and you can imagine every kind of issuing of 11 people running we help them cut cut through that and got help to get Mark Kirk nominated. And then of course in the general election the Sierra Club came out and endorsed the Democrat in the race and we were there with our endorsement of Mark Kirk and even the Republicans for Environmental protection when there was a Democrat. Just the fact that we had endorsed him. The people around here we have a fairly large membership and in his district

people know that we're credible. People know me by reputation from my local government office. And so we believe that we were able to make a difference and help elect a good Republican in everyway who is also good on the environment. And then he of course went on to win the election and is now in Congress. We only endorse the. I believe there were the 435 congressmen up every year. And there are about thirty five thirty three senators of that. That adds up to about 400 in 70 election. Races that were run last fall. We only endorsed 23 people. But the people that we endorsed were people like Mark Kirk who are credible Republicans with credible positions on the environment and we believe that that is where the future is for us. That in Republican primaries we will help people pick a

Republican who also shares the strong conservation ethic. And we are not going to get involved in telling them to vote you know in any way but we do get involved in Republican primaries. We don't take positions telling them to vote for or against this Democrat or that Republican. But in the Republican primaries we believe we can make a difference. We're getting short on time. You know there's one thing that I that I said in talking about the program we were in. Do and I actually haven't gotten to ask you about and I think that we ought at least devote a couple of minutes to this and that is the logging issue just before President Clinton left office he signed an executive order that would ban logging and new roads running road building and National Forest. Here we're talking about 58 and a half million acres so it's a lot of territory and what it means is the order bans commercial logging mining road building oil and gas development and that then when the Bush administration came in a lot of these things

these things that the president or the former president had done before he left they put a hold on the. And the question is now what's going to happen to this. What do you think will happen to this. Well just let me tell you that we supported the roadless initiative. They're working very hard for it last year all through the year and I'd like to just make a few points about that. The areas that that were declared road less for new roads could not be built were places where there are no roads. So they are de facto wilderness areas. So in a sense what Clinton was trying to do was to protect the areas that are currently and have always been wilderness as wilderness. The American that the National Forests are riddled with roads already. There's something like a half a million miles of roads in our national forests already more than our national interstate highway system. And the backlog of of money that it would take to keep them and give repair is is astounding. And the fact is that they're not in good repair they are falling apart. They are creating erosion problems. They are

creating watershed problems. We don't even have the money to protect to to keep up the road that we currently have in our national forests that are used by the logging trucks. So why should we go in and build new ones when we can't even keep the ones that that we have. And I we did support that both from an environmental position and from an economic position. This is another form of subsidy I talked about the cattlemen's ranching subsidy. This is another subsidy that people are aware of the American people own the land we own the forest we pay. We buy or we build the roads. We the taxpayers build the roads that the logging companies use to go into our national forests and cut down our trees at a highly subsidized rate and we don't get anything back into the treasury for for a line and into our forests for building the roads for them for maintaining the roads for them. But that is a corporate subsidy that the industry the logging industry has have lived on for such a long time and insists on it. And unfortunately

President Bush is quite closely allied with them. Is that an hour with I think about a dozen executives from the. From the timber companies last year this was reported in the Oregon in The Oregonian newspaper he spent an hour with them came out with a million and a half dollars and has been very strongly supportive of logging in our national forests. All President Clinton was trying to do in that case was just protect what is in fact already wilderness. Well the public's asset you know I'm sorry to say we've come to the end of the time and we're going to have to stop. I do appreciate you taking some time to talk with us. Thank you have enjoyed it. And again tell people if you're interested in finding out more about this organization Republicans for Environmental protection they do have that website w w w dot R or G. Our guest Martha MARKS THE PRESIDENT Thank you very much. Thank you I enjoyed it.