Thursday, December 06, 2012

Dems Threaten Lawsuit If Assembly Mining Bill Passes

Curious.

There are strong indications the proposed mining bill could be next, joining collective bargaining, voter ID and a gubernatorial attempt to supersede the powers of the state superintendent as lawsuit fodder.

“From a litigation standpoint, they have a losing hand,” predicts state Sen. Tim Cullen, D-Janesville.

Protection of state waterways, Cullen and others say, will be the likely legal roadblock.


[...]

But what the Assembly bill fails to do, say opponents, is protect state waterways, including lakes, rivers, streams and wetlands, from the leftover soil, called “overburden,” that is dug out in any mining operation.

[...]

That means a lot of excess dirt will need to be put somewhere after it is removed to reach the iron ore deposits. Since the Assembly mining bill doesn’t say the excess soil can’t be deposited in wetlands and rivers, critics fear this is exactly what will happen.

If the company dumps the earth into these streams, says Meyer, it would be a violation of the state constitution’s “public trust doctrine,” which says that state waterways must remain the property of all citizens, not any one property owner or company.

Can you challenge a law for what it doesn’t say? I ask that in all seriousness. I don’t know. While it is clear that if a mining company dumps waste in a waterway that they can be sued and/or fined, that doesn’t mean that the mining law is unconstitutional. Come to think of it, if it is already pretty clear to everyone that such dumping of waste violates the law, then why does it need to be written into the mining law anyway?

(24) Comments
Posted by Owen at 1418 hrs
Law + Politics + Politics - Wisconsin

  1. A Democratic position that is anti-job, anti-middle class, and hurtful to the poor.

    Just awful.

    Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on December 06, 2012 at 1427 hrs


  2. I don’t get it either, from a legal or a common sense perspective.  I am curious to hear reasoning on your legal question, Owen, but from a practical standpoint I am also curious to hear why it was okay for big logging to clear cut back at the turn of the last century to the point where virgin forest areas were turned in to those wet lands.  I don’t know the percentage, but much of the land Gobegic Taconite had rights to mine were dry forests until logging destroyed the local habitat.  “Destroyed” actually means it became a wet lands.  One hundred years ago that was considered a disaster, now it is something to be preserved.  Hey libs, it’s easy, clear off the flora cover and let it go.  A few decades go by and BOOM, a new wetlands. 

    As owen points out, there are already regulations protecting waterways and the bill that was blocked earlier gave G-TAC no loopholes allowing them to destroy any waterways.  The only thing that concerned easing regs on water, was the proposed lifting of the regs requiring the flushing/cleaning of the water of chemicals used to mine even in cases (such as iron mining) where no chemicals are used.  There were, however, strict regs on what G-TAC had to leave when they were done and it was not a wasteland.  Lastly, face it libs, if tourism was even eking a living, much less booming in that area it would not be in as dire of economic straits as it is.

    What I would most like to hear is the opinion of every single person living on that land(are there any?) and on land that will certainly be directly affected by it.  Not maybe, the DNR can get an accurate study of what waterways will or will not be affected and how.

    Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on December 06, 2012 at 1538 hrs


  3. Why let people pollute the land???  You talk about jobs, but with so much automation not very many new jobs are going to be created. If the resources that are to be mined are valuable now, why not wait the value can only go up?

    Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on December 06, 2012 at 1834 hrs


  4. Who’s polluting?

    Even with the mining bill, the land is required to be restored to pristine condition.

    Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on December 06, 2012 at 1838 hrs


  5. Can you imagine what the chances of any law being passed are if you have to explicitly address everything that is already illegal but could possibly happen?

    Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on December 06, 2012 at 2310 hrs


  6. For Democrats, this is only about opposing any job creation under Walker’s administration.

    Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on December 07, 2012 at 0826 hrs


  7. Why let people pollute the land???  You talk about jobs, but with so much automation not very many new jobs are going to be created. If the resources that are to be mined are valuable now, why not wait the value can only go up?

    You libs are almost caricatures of human beings.  How do you stand with that whirling vortex of hypocrisy constantly swirling about you?  I wouldn’t be surprised to see some idiot put “UNION JOBS”, “Buy American” and “Save the Land, don’t mine here!” all on the same protest sign(in fact, there were ‘vote with vagina’ signs that did somethng very close). 

    Out of curiosity, Bret, how does one bring new union jobs on line, buy american, etc. if we are only allowed to buy China steel?  We can’t mine the iron.  Therefore, we have no iron to feed our iron/steel works as China will sell us steel for about the same price they will sell iron.  For a pittance more, they will shape it in to finished or finishing goods and sell it at walmart.  Oh yeah, I remember now, unionize Walmart!

    Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on December 07, 2012 at 0934 hrs


  8. I remember when you guys got the fully paid for train thrown out of the state and killed a bunch of jobs.  Hilarious.

    Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on December 07, 2012 at 1140 hrs


  9. Fully paid?  Yeah… That train went to Fantasyland.

    Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on December 07, 2012 at 1145 hrs


  10. Ah, so if you don’t like the project or have some reservations about its utility, safety, or impact on the community at large, then killing a bunch of jobs is just fine.  Got it. Dandy.

    Also, still hilarious.

    Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on December 07, 2012 at 1158 hrs


  11. Strawman aside….unless you live in a cave you are a liar and hypocrite.

    Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on December 07, 2012 at 1203 hrs


  12. Yes, my consistent position of being in favor of job development is very hypocritical.  Your hypocritical position of only being in favor of the environmentally destructive kind of job development is consistent.  And Oceania has always been at war with Eastasia.

    Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on December 07, 2012 at 1301 hrs


  13. Yet another strawman aside… there is nothing consistent about your position, except maybe putting partisan b.s. ahead of jobs.

    Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on December 07, 2012 at 1305 hrs


  14. Nonsense. I’m in favor of both projects and therefore in favor of the jobs, whereas you seem to be in favor of just the one project, ergo I’m in favor of more job creation than you are.  Only one of us is putting partisan BS ahead of jobs, and it ain’t me

    Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on December 07, 2012 at 1328 hrs


  15. “Fully paid for” is a lie.

    Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on December 07, 2012 at 1331 hrs


  16. Construction, not operation.  That was going to cost between 5-7.5 Mill. 

    It’s not like coal mining doesn’t impose costs on people, you job killer, you.

    Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on December 07, 2012 at 1507 hrs


  17. Bullshit.  Paid for with borrowed taxpayer money is not “fully paid”.

    Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on December 07, 2012 at 1513 hrs


  18. Well that’s nonsense since that money just went to other states to be spent less optimally.  Wisconsin didn’t stop that money from being spent, they merely ensured they would derive no benefit from it.  So we’re all still paying for it. Fully.

    Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on December 07, 2012 at 1523 hrs


  19. That dog won’t hunt.

    Radical thought:  Don’t borrow and spend the million$ in the first place.

    Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on December 07, 2012 at 1532 hrs


  20. I agree with that, but that’s not what happened, and at no point was it in Wisconsin’s power to make that happen.  Choosing the worst option when the best is no longer available is really stupid.  Cutting off your face to spite your nose.

    Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on December 07, 2012 at 1535 hrs


  21. Ah, so if you don’t like the project or have some reservations about its utility, safety, or impact on the community at large, then killing a bunch of jobs is just fine.  Got it. Dandy.

    Uh, yeah.  How stupid are you?  If someone proposed to build a dam right through the middle of Lake Michigan, I would be against it based upon reservations to its utility and impact to community at large.  Even though it created jobs!  PaulNoonan, your commentary here is moronic. 

    If someone offered to build me a theme park that studies showed would never pay for itself, I would decline the offer.  Especially if I was required to pay to keep it open and maintain the park in perpetuity with my own money.  In addition, I am required to use an international source for equipment without even bidding it to local sources(SuperSteel, for one) and the money I have coming in is finite while the project costs are a relatively loose estimate. 

    Heh, “that dog won’t hunt”.  You agree with not spending the money in the first place, but if it is coming, snap it up whether it is good for you or not.  What are you, a fish?  That lure is mighty pretty, ain’t it?

    Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on December 10, 2012 at 1011 hrs


  22. Jeez, sorry, just trying to determine when it’ OK to kill jobs and when it’s not.  I’m happy to refer to republicans as “the good kind of job killers.”  That better?

    Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on December 10, 2012 at 1302 hrs


  23. No, actually it isn’t.  From the perspective of ‘anything a Dem does is okay and anything a Rep does is reprehensibly evil and stupid’(and vice versa for Reps), I guess your words make a fair bit of sense.  The biggest problem is that both sides can get news that ‘proves’ the above all of the time.  There is very little non-partisan news these days.  Despite what your world-view and all the sources that feed it say, always accepting as much Fed money (of course dependent on which party sponsors it)as possible without any regard to conditions is not always the best policy for a state.

    Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on December 10, 2012 at 1508 hrs


  24. If there is no other option, then at least filter out the chemical compounds and waste. Nature must have priority.
    San Antonio Divorce Lawyer

    Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on December 17, 2012 at 1632 hrs


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