Sen. Heinrich shows the way forward in SD

Regarding Sen. Martin Heinrich’s letter to President Obama requesting that he rescind Monday’s eviction at Standing Rock: This is a very welcome breakthrough.

With Heinrich’s leadership, other senators and Congress members will step forward. I also predict that the “arbitrary” date of Dec. 5 will be overturned by the president. In due course, as Heinrich and Sen. Harry Reid have asked, the pipeline may be rerouted or scrubbed altogether.

To me, Dec. 5 was never anything but a contrived date conveniently determined after the announcement that 5,000 veterans and Hawaii congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard would converge at Standing Rock on Dec. 4.

Perhaps the Army Corps of Engineers indulged in wishful thinking that they thus could get rid of everybody on Dec. 5?

True participatory democracy doesn’t work that way.

Sen. Tom Udall, Rep. Ben Ray Luján and Rep. Michelle Lujan Grisham could send similar letters to the current president and the president-elect; thus, we could win this without resorting to fighting back at bestial weapons, rubber bullets, water cannons, tear gas, pepper spray, attack dogs and huge amounts of overtime subsidizing even more police brutality.

One 21-year-old’s arm may still be amputated; her name is Sophia Wilansky.

The Dakota Access Pipeline was as ill-conceived as was the MX Missile Project in Utah, which was never commenced because of eventual strong opposition from the Mormons. I had a small hand in that through my correspondence with Spencer Kimball, president of Latter-day Saints in the late ’70s. His intervention quietly, permanently squelched that deranged Rube Goldberg plan, with its 800 miles of underground railroads and missiles mounted on train cars, despite Sen. Orrin Hatch’s and Sen. Jake Garn’s coddling.

This pipeline is, however, 80 percent complete and would carry North Dakota oil that is so inferior it can be sold only to China. How horrific is this Dallas billionaire’s clout to precipitate the “inexcusable brutality,” as Heinrich put it in his Facebook Thanksgiving post, of unarmed people!

Heinrich and Wisconsin’s Sen. Tammy Baldwin were the only senators to cosponsor Sen. Bernie Sanders’ Save Oak Flat Act to prevent the privatization of the Tonto National Forest and Oak Flat land sacred to the San Carlos Apaches. This is Sen. John McCain’s mega-plan to dig North America’s largest copper mine in a national forest with a corporation that has a shocking environmental degradation records, Rio Tinto Mining of Australia.

This wreckage of Oak Flat is becoming 20 times more likely with the incoming administration, despite the historic Republican support that created national forests led by presidents Teddy Roosevelt and Dwight Eisenhower.

Will President Trump abandon Teddy’s and Ike’s land stewardship principles? Stay tuned, there is really a lot at stake: our Western pristine environment, our Native Americans, and the sanctity of our public lands and national forests. I am not holding out for a miracle during the next four years.

This may become the next decade’s defining issue, like Vietnam shaped the consciousness 50 years ago. As a longtime supporter of Native American causes, Heinrich deserves our accolades for long overdue progress.

In a larger sense, Heinrich is showing us by example how to get through the next four years, through dialogue and undeniable reason, rather than weapons, bluster and confrontation – all of which is even more applicable in the international context.

Hopefully, others in the Senate will also see this and I thank him profoundly for his unparalleled leadership.