Bury our Souls at ANWR

The Great Tundra Fight

It never stops. The racketeers
attack the Narragansett, rub
their essence off all land maps, then
parade to further real estate.
The west is won; their steam converts
to petrochemical commotions.
Now in Washington, they fix
the White House, paint it slippery
and black, and plan their next invasion
on the final plot of western
wilderness in long Alaskan
winter night, while nightmares heat
the earth with tales of arctic melting.

~Son Rivers 2005

Today's bunch of footnotes:

Narragansett; NATIVE AMERICAN WAYS: Narragansett Chief Canonchet;"The English, however, considered this a violation of their treaty with the Narragansett, and in December, a 1,000-man colonial army with 150 Mohegan scouts arrived and laid siege to the Narragansett fort. After Canonchet refused demands to surrender the Wampanoag in his village and join the English against Philip, they attacked. Remembered as the Great Swamp Fight, the Narragansett were literally destroyed in this battle losing more than 600 warriors and 20 sachems."

fix; deSmogBlog: Raging Against the U.S. Abdication on Climate Change; "In the U.S., the White House has become the east coast branch office of ExxonMobil and Peabody coal -- and climate change has become the pre-eminent case study of the contamination of politics by money."

Alaskan; Gristmill: Stevens and the defense bill; "As forecast last week, Sen. Ted Stevens (R-Alaska) managed to get Arctic Refuge drilling attached to the defense spending bill. He couldn't wrangle it into the budget reconciliation bill, so this is his last-ditch effort. He has said: 'Katrina will be on this [defense] bill. That's what makes the defense bill a little bit attractive because Katrina will be there. It is going to be awful hard to vote against Katrina.'"