DescentBB

Lothar wrote:A semi-autonomous region which also functions as a sovereign nation. It's complicated, but don't undersell it as merely a region; it's a region with its own unique government, legal system, judiciary, etc. and with a complicated relationship with the Federal government. I would absolutely expect someone fairly high up from this side to contact someone fairly high up from that side over an incident as significant as contaminating one of their primary water sources.

Don't you think the state of Colorado, who does have quite a bit of control over what the feds can or can't do within it's borders, bears most of the responsibility for this disaster. After all, THEY were the ones who thought that they knew best on how to clean up the mine mess in the first place. They also thought that Superfund status was too politically loaded of a designation to even consider requesting, or allowing. I'm guessing Colorado didn't want to label all those popular tourist areas as hazardous waste zones needing a massive cleanup effort and thus putting a kink in all that tourist revenue by having those areas closed to the public for cleanup. Well, now a much bigger area is a hazardous waste zone and tourism has tanked and people for miles downstream can't drink the water without ingesting arsenic and lead whenever the sediment gets stirred up. They were dead wrong I see.

TC, the EPA took control of it. End of story.

tunnelcat wrote:Don't you think the state of Colorado, who does have quite a bit of control over what the feds can or can't do within it's borders, bears most of the responsibility for this disaster

Very likely. Perhaps our governor should be on the phone with President Begaye. But he should probably get someone reasonably high up in the Obama administration in a conference call. Treat Navajo Nation like it matters that we just caused huge amounts of damage to one of their most important natural resources.