Like myself, my friend thinks that all the blame will be assigned to the forest ranger who authorized the Cierro Grande fire instead of those at the top of the decision-making chain. Before the Forest Service began suppressing fires, the areas now known as Forest System lands naturally burned over every seven years, on their own and completely. This was the natural state. While we focus on the tragedy of those who lost their homes, let s not forget the thousands of people who lost their jobs over the past decade because federal policies have led to hundreds of sawmills being closed. People who had been in the timber industry for generations were wiped out.
Wood is only one of many national resources that have been under attack.
Despite vast oil reserves, the federal government has created huge obstacles to explore for or to extract them. It will only be a matter of time when a lightning strike sets off a blaze that will sweep across several States where there will be no roads to access the fires. The mismanagement of our national parks and forests has created the tinder for the worst conflagration of the modern era. This is about the actions of people at the highest levels of our government who do not care the least for the lives and property of American citizens. I confess I sometimes rhetorically lump all federal employees together with the political appointees running their agencies.