Sustainable Ecosystems Institute?

December 18th, 2007

What is this group?

Are they a front group for industry? Or are they committed to truly sustainable ecosystems?

I tend to suspect the former when I read that Bush has decided that they should review the catastrophic and politically motivated plan to increase logging of old growth forests in the NW.

And check this out from their Web site:

Silviculture is the art and science of controlling forest establishment, composition, stocking rate, and growth, and silvicultural practices include a tremendous array of techniques that go far beyond simply removing trees.

Can you really trust folks that refer to logging (”silvaculture”) as an “art” that, in their phrasing, is primarily about “controlling” the forest, its growth, and establishment… oh, and secondarily, “removing trees”?

In today’s politicized climate, it is useless to try to use “science” to back-up any argument. Or, for that matter, courts or “law”. All of these things are totally and completely subject to human and political intervention. Nowadays we have “science” telling us that abstinence and creationism are viable, that global warming doesn’t exist, and, on the law front, that federal rights trump state’s rights when it comes to voting (but not anything else). Come on…

These guys may be just great. But strike one is that Bush is pushing them… that I don’t trust. Strike two is that nowadays I do not trust any organization that has no mission statement besides talking about sound “science” and the like. Science, like law, can be bended and argued in any way in today’s stupid media environment.

We need complete transparency for all non-profits. What if we find out that Weyerhauser gives $1 million a year to Sustainable Ecosystems Institute?

Update:

Well, lookee lookee, Weyerhauser IS funding them… as is Willamette Industries (are they still around?), Rayonier Timberlands, Potlatch, Pacific Lumber Company, Oregon State University, BLM, Big Creek Lumber Company. Then again, something called “Audubon” is also funding them… not sure what THAT is as Audubon is non-trademarkable and may refer to any number of groups trading on that name.

If BLM is funding them, how can they be expected to honestly appraise and assess BLM’s NW Forest Plan alternatives?!

Isn’t that sorta like a judge who goes duck-hunting with a defendant not recusing himself in court….

Oh, wait a second….