national parks

From The Colorado Independent:
Interior Secretary Ken Salazar today issued a notice of withdrawal of nearly 1 million acres of BLM and U.S. Forest Service land around the Grand Canyon from new mining claims for the next two years to allow for more study and analysis.
The move drew the praise of conservation groups such as the [...]

Two separate votes. Two high-profile legislative reforms, wrapped together, are on their way to the White House for a signature.
The first installs sweeping consumer protections for credit card users, including a prohibition on rate hikes for existing balances (unless payments are more than 60 days late) and a minimum 45-day warning when rate hikes are [...]

A proposal allowing guns in national parks.
That’s right. Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) is pushing a provision to overturn the Obama administration’s dismissal of a controversial Bush administration rule allowing concealed weapons in national parks and refuges.

It was one of the final rule changes of the Bush administration: A controversial new regulation allowing gun owners to bring concealed weapons into national parks. But that change hit a major snag last month when a federal judge blocked it, finding that the rule resulted from “an astoundingly flawed process.” On Friday, the Obama [...]

In another of the Bush administration’s awesome midnight rule changes, the White House announced Friday that visitors to national parks may now carry concealed loaded weapons. For what purpose, we can’t be sure. But I suppose the threat of moose in Yellowstone and anemones in Acadia justifies the choice (not really).
A statement from the Brady [...]