Tag Archives: President Franklin D. Roosevelt

Flawed rescue? – Franklin D. Roosevelt asked for plans for a low dam. Joe Biden wants windmills

“The federal role in damming the Columbia tied in well with the New Deal belief that the government should stimulate economic recovery by putting people to work and encouraging the creation of public utilities,” records a National Park Service history of the river’s Grand Coulee dam. “Franklin D. Roosevelt, elected president of the United States in 1932, asked for plans for a low dam with foundations strong enough to support a higher dam  later, one that would back water up to the Canadian border.” (President Joe Biden’s efforts to grow offshore wind) No thought was given to the river’s salmon. “Of all the impacts that caused extinctions of Columbia River Basin salmon and steelhead, dams were the most significant. “The dam wiped out runs that spawned in tributaries that drained into the Columbia from that point, river mile 596, to the headwaters, a distance of 645 river miles. Adding the tributary miles where salmon spawned nearly doubled the distance.  >click to read< 14:36

Remembering Pearl Harbor – December 7, 1941, ‘a day that will live in infamy’

Seventy-nine years ago this Dec. 7, the Empire of Japan carried out a sneak attack on American military forces at Pearl Harbor in Hawaii. More than 2,400 people — including 68 civilians — died and almost 1,200 more were injured. The next day President Franklin D. Roosevelt asked Congress for a declaration of war. The speech has become one of the most famous in American history, and reminds us of the service and sacrifices made by our countrymen during World War II. Here is Roosevelt’s address: Mr. Vice President, Mr. Speaker, members of the Senate and the House of Representatives: Yesterday, December 7th, 1941 >click to read< 06:50:

Hydroelectric dams and fish are possible if we’re willing to talk it out

We are now almost 30 years into federal court battles over the management of the Columbia and Snake rivers, both of national concern. Federal judges are making decisions over the “right” management of the river systems. None of them is a dam operator. This is probably the most complex natural resource issue in the Western U.S., if not the entire country. Environmental groups have teamed up to tie it all up repeatedly in the slow federal court system to force a decision that moves only in their direction. They don’t care about the rest of us — the folks who love the working river system FDR started and we use today in so many ways. by Jeff Sayre >click to read< 10:26