Arctic Refuge - Akaka bill connections

Thanks to Sens. Inouye and Akaka shamefully being two of only three Democratic senators voting today to approve oil drilling in the Alaska National Wildlife Refuge, the connection between this and the Akaka bill has finally been noticed in progressive parts of the blogosphere.

I posted it in comments on a DailyKos diary, but a commenter on The Left Coaster made the connection separately with a link to the recent Hawaii Island Journal article, and it was then picked up by MyDD and others that link to The Left Coaster post, including here at Bird's Eye View.

The Left Coaster and MyDD are both major progressive blogs with substantial readerships (including me), and a whole bunch of highly networked people are now aware of the bill who had never heard of it before.

UPDATE (3/18): In this AP article at the Star-Bulletin, Inouye denies that he made a bargain to support drilling to gain Republican support for the Akaka-Stevens bill for federal recognition of native Hawaiians. Funny that is the one bargain he feels it necessary to deny explicitly. The Advertiser also covers the vote.

A liberal libertarian take on it here says "How Native Hawaiians Destroyed the Alaska Wildlife Refuge," quoting the Journal article.

UPDATE 2 (3/19): The Reid Report has a pretty thorough review of the situation with excepts from the article, and Poinography also makes the connection (both with links back to my earlier post on the subject).

UPDATE 3 (3/19): Mary at The Left Coaster went back through the comments in the original post there and has now made a new front page post that does a good job summarizing the issue. She says "...it's clear that Senator Akaka's goal to obtain federal recognition for Native Hawaiians isn't something that Native Hawaiians want and that the recognition for which Akaka is searching comes with a very high price for Native Hawaiians." She notes correctly that Keala Kelly is due credit for originally breaking this story, and she links to my blog here and my diary I posted before the Indian Affairs committee hearing summarizing the issue at DailyKos. Very cool. Mahalo!

Here' s the original article from Keala Kelly in the Hawaii Island Journal: "Natives, Senators and Oil The connection between drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and the Akaka Bill."

Posted: Thu - March 17, 2005 at 01:46 AM

getBlogName(); > getCategoryName("C608676235"); >

Arctic Refuge - Akaka bill connections

> >