Lawyering up bait and switch

From the aptly named RangeFire blog, Tim Findley has an articulate version of the right’s take on the reasons for the collapse of the Delta ecosystem and the economy of the San Joaquin Valley.

It’s the bully lawyers at the Environmental Defense Fund:

The next political move is up to Feinstein, not facing re-election this year and thus arguably the most powerful politician in the state. That is, if you don’t count the unelected, and unaccountable environmentalist bullies who know better than anybody.

The DNP is satisfied that bully lawyers representing dead bird embryos poisoned by selenium-rich agricultural drainage in the San Joaquin Valley’s west side and two-inch fish in the Delta is a noble and just work.

It’s unfortunate, too, Mr. Findley’s reactionary position, because some things he writes make sense. But typical of the right, he calls a foul when the bullying being done by their bullies doesn’t win the day.

What about those economist bullies at the University of the Pacific who did an unemployment analysis of the San Joaquin Valley? You know, the one that doesn’t correspond to the myth that lack of irrigation water is the primary culprit for the Valley’s unemployment problems?

But the DNP does agree with Mr. Findley on one thing: farmers in the SJV are not entirely to blame for the collapse of the Delta ecosystem. On the Public Record elaborates.

Agreed that the wastewater treatment facilities of Tracy, Stockton, Sacramento, and Lodi, primarily, need to be significantly upgraded so that this doesn’t happen. Pollution entering the Delta via the region’s urban wastewater treatment centers does beg the question, however - what about upstream communities of Modesto, Fresno, etc.? What are they dumping into the San Joaquin?

The problems of the San Joaquin Valley’s economy, like the Delta’s ecosystem, are caused by many things. They are systemic problems, tied to population growth, scarcity, greed, indifference, and unknown factors.

Finally, extending to Mr. Findley an olive branch, the DNP points out that Sacramento isn’t above lawyering up when it comes to its own culpability regarding ammonia discharges into the Delta . Won’t Mr. Findley just admit that no interest group is above lawyering up?

So don’t get the DNP started on Westlands and selenium, the gift that keeps on giving. Those folks have lawyers, too - don’t they?