The Up-Hill battle to keep OUR PUBLIC Lands PUBLIC

It’s possible that in the Nevada trials, the Bundys will once again evade the law and win acquittal. But in the end, theirs is a lost cause. We regular peace-loving, rule-abiding citizens will not give up our public lands to anyone: not to armed desperadoes, not to contemporary robber barons, and not to the states, which can’t afford their upkeep.

These lands are our outdoor churches, our cathedrals — and keeping them that way is the real economic foundation of the West. Open spaces attract new, high-paying industries and yield billions of dollars in tourism and recreation. When we are young, we hunt, hike, fish, camp, backpack, paddle, horseback ride, walk, run, raft and bicycle on our shared lands, and when we are old we stare out at their undiminished beauty.

The great Wallace Stegner wrote in 1960 that it is the American wilderness that forms our national character, separate and distinct from that of other nations. That character, like the wilderness, is under pressure, weakening at the seams, as news reports tell us every day. In heated times like these I find myself much in need of going for a walk — a long walk, on my American land.