March 27, 2008

Candidates: Ignite a ‘Greenfire’ to
Rebuild Our Great Nation

By Nina Leopold Bradley

Almost one hundred years ago, as a young forester, my father had an encounter with a she-wolf on a mountain in New Mexico that was to shape the course of his conservation ethic and, in turn, that of millions of others.

My father was Aldo Leopold, known mainly for A Sand County Almanac and his land ethic philosophy. One of the best known of his almanac essays was entitled "Thinking Like a Mountain," in which he told of shooting this wolf and reaching her just in time to see a "fierce green fire" dying in her eyes. He realized many years later that he had not fully understood the ecology of the mountain, and that the mountain needed its top predators to maintain a healthy ecosystem. He had not "thought like a mountain" when he pulled the trigger.

Sadly, a lot of metaphorical triggers have been pulled since that day in the early 1900s, and our planet is much the worse for it. Our nation should be a global leader in conservation ethics, in applied environmental science, and in the conservation of biodiversity and ecosystem services.

We have not been thinking like a great nation, at least as far as our natural resources, especially land and water, are concerned. Insidiously, and almost unnoticed, we are destroying the health of our land, and therefore human health.

My father believed that the real solution to conservation resided in the individual and with private landowners; he knew that governments alone could not conserve the biosphere. He would shudder to learn that new car buyers in America place fuel consumption 18th on their list of desirable attributes, after color. This tells me most don't have any idea of their carbon footprint, despite all the press this concept has received lately.

Our failure to pass comprehensive energy legislation, our incredibly bad decision to subsidize corn ethanol, our reluctance to increase CAFE standards, our weakening of EPA regulations, our foot-dragging on climate change remedies such as cap & trade or a carbon tax...these are but a few of the ways in which we fail to think like a great nation environmentally. It is a mystery to me how this has come about, as 70 percent of blue state voters and 64 percent of red state voters have said that we should "do whatever it takes to protect the environment."

Like most everyone in America, I have been watching on TV the most thrilling demonstration of democracy in action I've been privileged to witness in my ninety years. Appearances may be misleading, but do I detect, from both blue states and the red ones, a reawakening of citizens to the wonderful things that could occur in a united United States?

This election will be decided by moderates and independents, by those like you and me who are sandwiched between the radical extremes. Many of these voters, whether they realize it or not, possess an incipient land ethic. They don't want our nation, or this planet, further trashed by greed and exploitation. They want our nation to once again be great, and to lead the way to a safer, healthier, more sustainable planet.

So, in the name of my father, Aldo Leopold, and of my 300 million fellow Americans, I ask that the remaining primary candidates pledge to us that they will think like a mountain, that they will help ignite a greenfire movement not only in their campaign pronouncements but through their actions upon election. Why not form an Earth Corps, ten times larger that the Peace Corps, through which the best and brightest of our youth and environmental experts could spread out across the developing world and our country as well to help bring cleaner water and air, more productive soil, and a far healthier and more sustainable lifestyle to billions.

We ask each of our primary candidates to pursue legislation and administrative policies and actions to conserve and restore our planet’s remaining natural heritage—ultimately, to help a new relationship of people to land unfold.

Nina Leopold Bradley
Baraboo, Wisconsin

The author is the eldest daughter of Aldo Leopold (1887-1948). Leopold’s A Sand County Almanac (1949) has served to catalyze our growing ecological awareness—and the growing conviction that stewardship of the planet’s natural systems is vital to humankind’s future health and prosperity. Bradley writes from the Aldo Leopold Memorial Reserve in southern Wisconsin’s “sand county” region, where 2,000 acres are protected for ecological integrity, wildlife habitat and research.