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Show ee gt eee ee ee re eee STILL MORE FROM GORDON SWENSON OF THE SIERRA CLUB Dear Mr. Stiles: In your "Brief Understated Reply", editorializing around my previous letter, you said: "Gordon, you accuse me of being a shameless liar and then you fail to mention a SINGLE factual inaccuracy in the "Sierra Clubbed" article". (Emphasis in original) GOODBYE MOAB... Editor: It is with sadness that these words are born. It is not a sadness as at the parting of friends, but a sadness at the belated discovery of having found none. In the endless splendor of this gift around us, it is, strikingly, bone dry here in Moab. In place of a heart is the rhythmic kachinging of the money till. I have been to many masquerades of friends, but never quite like the one here. Unmasked, they have all sold out to someone. Unasked, they have all lined up at the corporate money vendor. And this... in the name of being friends to the Earth. - But they are not my friends. They are friends to the peculiar American illusion that is not nearly enough. That even love is not enough but needs the endless lubrication of expansive self-interest. - They are not my friends. They are hustlers for the big roll. They are smug promoters of smog, noise, speed, intoxicants and, of course, the rhythmic kachinging of the money till. In their personal pursuit of happiness, they are managing to turn a fragrant haven into a vagrant hell. They will have you forget that progress is the increasingly futile attempt to erect the most current illusion in the place of another failing one. Of course, we could blame it on outsiders: those restless deep-pocketed thrill-seekers who make their pilgrimage to our Moab. But... they are us: urban vagabonds slashing-and-burning the deep peace around them in their desperate attempts to escape themselves. No matter that our Earth suffers, no matter that our sweet innocents suffer, no matter that our conscience suffers, we are desperados to the very end! We need more than enough; we need everything. Thus we ironically gather our plunders before us, preventing ourselves from ever getting out. And, of course, we could portray ourselves as victims of unintended consequences— quick-cornering the short curves of progress. After all, we are just trying to make a decent living in this stress-driven world—a world of doing unto others before they do unto us. But we are not victims of greed; we are its towering promoters, basking shamelessly in our own fermenting avarice. Oh yes, all this in the name of love of God or love of family or love of the Earth--as if these were all different and not one and the same thing. So let us not be hypocritical. Let us not be caught up in lacquered pretense that differs little from an aborted lie. We are not "doing good.” We are "making a killing" by "making a living." We are the menacing mercenaries in the killing of the vulnerable. We are the covetous soldiers-of-fortune in the extinction of the Earth’s innocents. So, go ahead and indulge yourself in the commerce of lies and tears. Steal from the Earth, profit from your own children. On the entrance to you city, put up this sign: "Give _ me your wired and bored, and we will give them strife, vanity and the endless pursuit of © emptiness.” And all of you who have been there, done that, got the t-shirt, you need not apply for my friendship. Your chamber of commerce is my chamber of horrors! Goodbye to Moab, goodbye to your sadness. Your lifts will never take you high enough; your off-road chariots will never take you far enough; you speed demons will never take you fast enough; your motels will never accommodate your peace enough: Not high nor far nor fast nor deep enough to ever tough the face of God. Goodbuy Moab; kaching, my spandex friends. Is this your final answer? BOARD'S DRAINING RESOLUTION The national Sierra Club board’s resolution with respect to the Glen Canyon draining, quoted directly from the minutes of the meeting at which it was passed, is as follows: "The Sierra Club supports the draining of the reservoir behind Glen Canyon Dam." The Sierra Club’s policy guide-at least in the versions I’ve seen--says that "support" is a "position" and that: "The adoption of conservation policies, guidelines, and position(s) should not be confused with setting priorities for action or deciding how to allocate limited Club resources. The adoption of policies, guidelines, or positions may focus attention on issues, but it does not confer any priority status nor does it guarantee any Club action on the issues.” In your article "Sierra Clubbed", you changed the wording of the national board’s Glen Canyon resolution by replacing the word "supports" with "advocate". You put the word "advocate" inside the quotation marks, so as to give the false impression that the wording you have was the actual wording of the national board’s resolution, and to give the false impression that the national Sierra Club board has formally called for a media campaign. By making the change in the wording, you were able to provide a basis for your false portrayal that the Utah Chapter opposes the national board’s resolution--a basic theme of your article, and indeed of your entire editorial position. Since the chapter's first resolution stated a policy of neutrality ("cannot support... and will not defend, "as distinguished from oppose") and the chapter's second resolution was not directed toward the merits of the draining itself but solely toward the timing of the proposed media campaign, the only way that you could fabricate a conflict between the chapter’s resolutions and the national board’s resolution was by falsely changing the national board’s resolution to one which called for a media campaign. . Hence your substitution of the word "advocate". I’ve seen other instances of newspapers misstating the facts as badly as you did, but few if any were the misstatement was so essential to the main thesis of the article. There are plenty of good reasons to drain Glen Canyon. The best way to support the draining will be to fund research which will help provide evidence to prove that there are plenty of good reasons. To falsify the story by misquoting a resolution which can be easily double-checked implies that the case for the draining must be so weak that publications which support the draining don’t think that they can make their cases if they have to rely . |. only on the truth. By falsifying the story and thereby supporting such an implication, the Zephyr undermines the Glen Canyon draining effort and hurts the cause rather than helping it. Feel free not to publish this letter at all, but if you do print it, or even quote it or refer to it, then please print it in full. Sincerely, Gordon J. Swenson (writing on my own behalf, as before) Salt Lake City, Utah Here in part is the reply I sent Mr. Swenson... Dear Gordon, You accuse me of deliberately changing a word in a quote to "provide a basis for (The Zephyr’s) false portrayal that the Utah Chapter opposes the national board's resolution.” Mr. Swenson, the quote is from the then Sierra Club president Adam Werbach who said: “The Sierra Club advocates the draining of the reservoir behind Glen Canyon Dam." He made the ¢ Plant Now! ¢ GLEN CANYON INSTITUTE Now on-line Undamming Glen Canyon: www.stanford.edu/group/EL]/ “WE'RE THE NATIVE PLANT EXPERTS." GLEN CANYON CUM a oe the way it could be again. Plant Now! « Plant Now! Lunacy, Rationality or Prophesy? By Scott Miller A comprehensive 88 page analysis of the Sierra Club's 1996 resolution to support the restoration of Glen Canyon. With a Forward by Richard Ingebretsen President of GCI 435-259 400d _ & Agaves...Consulting/Site Design « Plant Now! ¢Plant Now! P.O. Box 1925 Flagstaff. AZ 86002 www.glencanyon.org HIGH DESERT GARDENS Native & Water-wise Plants, Cacti, Succulents Orem nie Fionn comment about a month after the resolution was passed. PATO PoP The October/November issue of The Zephyr will be on newsstands September 29th Like the publisher of The Zephyr, Don't water your plants more often than you oughfer. 2971 S. Hwy 191+(Next to the Branding Iron)*Open Mon-Sat 10:00 - 5:00 * Native Grasses For Large Areas ® e {MON JUDId ¢ jMON JUDide jMON TTS Daniel.Oleszko Moab ¢ Plant Now! enough OK, you insisted: . MISQUOTING OF NATIONAL |
