Concession to the Environmentalists' Premise Killed the ANWR Drilling Program

The Senate has just voted against opening up the Alaska ANWR site for drilling. Technically, what happened is that the Republicans were unable to vote to end the Democrats' filibuster against the drilling, but the news services agree that since the Republicans were able to get only 46 votes, this means the possibility of drilling in ANWR is dead, at least for this year.

I'm not going to concede the environmentalist premise by pointing out how small a percentage of ANWR was to be opened up. The truth is that the very existence of ANWR--and of any square foot of governmental "preserves" anywhere--is a disgraceful upending of individual rights and a betrayal of government's actual function.

Government exists to establish "the conditions required by man's nature for his proper survival"--not to "preserve" things from man.

To hold land off from development is as perverse as it would be if government declared an "anarchy preserve"--an area in which arson, rape, and murder would be legal--to "preserve" human wildness against the growth of civilization. ANWR and the other millions of "preserved" acres, uses governmental force to prevent the exercise of property rights, just as an "anarchy preserve" would use governmental force to prevent the exercise of man's rights to life and liberty.

But, of course, the villain here is not the government--it is only enacting public opinion. The villain here is the intellectual leadership and followership which has sold suicide to the American people since the late 1960s.

As an example of the guilt of our "opinion leaders," look at how our supposed friends at FoxNews report the event on their website:

"Those who support drilling in ANWR say it could significantly reduce the nation's dependence on foreign oil. But most independent experts who have done the mathematic calculations suggest that is not the case and that environmental protection is more important."

Did you get that? FoxNews is telling us, as *news reporting* that "independent experts" have decided what is "important," and it just turns out, as a matter of *fact*, available to experts, that "protecting" barren waste is more important than you and your needs are. After all, that's what makes them "independent"--that in considering the claims of ice and dirt, they are not "biased" in favor of human life.

How low have we sunk that this is the "reporting" on the supposedly non-leftist network?

(The real issue is not "energy independence," a very dubious goal, but energy--i.e., the ability to further man's life on earth by using nature-given resources.)

Consider another betrayal by FoxNews today, from another aspect of the energy issue. Were it not for the environmentalists over the last 30 years, a large proportion of our energy needs would now be fulfilled by nuclear power. Today, FoxNews ran a segment on the "danger" of possible terrorist attacks on nuclear power plants. They even had a phone-in poll asking whether listeners were worried about this danger.

Now there is no danger of terrorist attacks on nuclear power stations--it's far too difficult to pull off and it would have no real payoff: there's very little that terrorists could do to harm anyone even if they were given free access to nuclear power reactors. But the public doesn't know this. The facts of the nature and safety of nuclear power have been systematically withheld from the public for three decades. Most people probably don't even know that nuclear power generating plants physically cannot produce a nuclear explosion.

But FoxNews had no hesitation in playing on people's ignorant fears concerning nuclear power by running the segment and polling those same ignorant people. (I didn't have the stomach to wait to see the poll's results.)

It's a black day for America. How are we supposed to maintain our resolve to fight anti-civilization forces in the Arab lands when our own homegrown Taliban wants to throttle civilization for being civilization, right here? What is the difference whether progress is to be stopped, and turned back, in the name of the Koran or in the name of "preserving wilderness"--a wilderness on that barren Arctic tract that not one American has any intention of ever visiting, seeing, or in any way "enjoying"?

The only dim ray of hope is that in the fall elections, Americans will give the Republicans a majority in the Senate. But I find it hard to believe that such a victory, if it comes, would have anything to do with Americans turning against the suicidal, anti-civilization ideas that just killed the ANWR drilling program. For Objectivists are the only ones who oppose environmentalism on principle and uphold man's sacred right to exploit nature.

-- The above was an email from Harry Binswanger's List, and is reprinted here by permission. The Harry Binswanger List (HBL) is an email list for Objectivists, moderated by Dr. Binswanger, for discussing philosophic and cultural issues. The HBL is $10 per month or $100 per year; a free one-month trial is available at: http://www.hblist.com/

Dr. Binswanger, a longtime associate of Ayn Rand, is a professor of philosophy at the Objectivist Academic Center of the Ayn Rand Institute.

Special Offer: Dr. Binswanger moderates Harry Binswanger's List (HBL)--an email list for Objectivists for discussing philosophic and cultural issues. The HBL is $14 per month or $145 per year; a free one-month trial is available at: www.hblist.com.