Readers Write: Mining near the Boundary Waters, Democrats’ losses, Logan Park debate

Opinion editor’s note: Strib Voices publishes letters from readers online and in print each day. To contribute, click here.

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In her recent commentary “Counterpoint: We aren’t doing the Earth any favors by saying ‘no’ to mining” (Dec. 4) Julie Lucas argues that instead of saying “no” to copper-sulfide mining near the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness, we should ask “how?” and “by whom?” and “why?”

Let’s start with the “who.”

Antofagasta, the Chilean mining conglomerate seeking to mine near the Boundary Waters, has an alarming history of environmental violations including toxic spills, water pollution and destruction of cultural heritage sites. The company has been sued by the Chilean State for allegedly contaminating groundwater and, more recently, not only pushed through a controversial pipeline project but also sued 27 local protesters who opposed the project due to environmental concerns. Given copper-sulfide mining’s inherent risks of acid mine drainage and heavy metal contamination, should we welcome a foreign corporation with its track record of both environmental destruction and legal intimidation to operate near the Boundary Waters?

Now, you can’t answer “how” they are going to mine without addressing the fact that this type of mining has a perfect track record of pollution. The claim that Minnesota has a “non-detect” standard, in which no amount of pollution is allowed from a mine, is simply false. Let’s remember that in 2018 Minnesota permitted another copper-sulfide mine, PolyMet, and that permit would have allowed the mine to discharge almost 16 million gallons of polluted water each year.

As for “why,” Lucas is right: Our modern world does need minerals such as copper and nickel. But is the small amount of copper and nickel that these mines would add to the global supply chain worth it? Should we risk the Boundary Waters and the clean waters that make Minnesota so famous and such a great place to live?

Do we really want this Chilean-owned mining company operating a polluting mine on the doorsteps of the Boundary Waters?

Chris Knopf, St. Paul

The writer is executive director of Friends of the Boundary Waters Wilderness.

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A pro-mining counterpoint by Lucas, executive director of MiningMinnesota, an organization created for this purpose, raises important questions such as “how?” and “by whom?” and “why?” that need to be addressed before actual mining should begin.

We know the answer to “why?” Since the beginning of mining, thousands of years ago, it has always been greed; any attempt to claim other motives is absurd. But OK, greed sometimes works out. “By whom?” and “how?” are almost as easy. Hopefully by folks with proven track records of protecting the environment, using proven methods for protecting the environment — i.e., not by multinational companies controlled by interests known for destroying the environment, using dangerous, destructive or experimental technologies.

Oddly, Lucas skips “when?” This is the easiest question of all. When all reasonable people are convinced that the “by whom?” and the “how?” have been satisfactorily addressed. It’s not like these reserves of copper, nickel, etc. are going to be less valuable in the future.

John K. Trepp, Minneapolis

Saturday’s juxtaposition of a political cartoon with a Democrat writing on a chalkboard “Those who don’t learn from history are doomed to repeat it” with the article about Rep. Ilhan Omar lecturing Democrats about why we lost (”Omar has feedback for Harris campaign,” front page, Nov. 30) — caught my attention. Her message that if Democrats had veered more progressive we’d have done better couldn’t be more wrong. It is her and her “defund the police” faction that turned off the voters we need to attract. Our party needs to look in the mirror and temper our obsession with lecturing people about race, gender, immigration, masks and pronouns so we can focus on things people care about like health care and the environment.

Our wokeness is not simply annoying, a segment of voters used it as justification to turn over the keys to a dangerous, despicable narcissist. A large group of voters were more disturbed by our excesses than the excesses of a vulgar, dishonest, unstable wannabe dictator. Blue-collar men no longer feel welcome in our increasingly white-collar, urban, feminized party. I’ll go to my grave baffled how people can be OK with someone like Donald Trump. I’ll still take my side’s values, policies and well-intentioned naivete to the anger, danger and fear of MAGA. But if we don’t listen, learn, adapt and moderate — we’re going to continue to lose elections, and possibly our democracy.

Ryan Pulkrabek, Minneapolis

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Rep. Omar’s assertion that Kamala Harris and Tim Walz lost because their message was not far enough to the left is clearly off base. Trump’s (unfortunate in my opinion) win was because the majority of voters were unhappy with the Biden/Harris administration’s actions (and inactions) on hot button issues including the surge at the southern border, inflation exacerbated by government overspending and transgender women in women’s sports competitions. Ukraine and Gaza will suffer the collateral damage of the Democratic Party’s loss of the election and failure to decisively address the voters’ priorities.

Les Everett, Falcon Heights

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As Ben Fox maintains, laughter is important in dark times (“We must reclaim joy by laughing to endure Trump,” Strib Voices, Nov. 30). But there’s a time to laugh and a time to cry, and I’m not quite finished crying.

Aristotle maintains we should feel pain in the presence of wrongdoing. Suffering and experiencing pain’s silent despair, then, are as essential to the human spirit as any laughter amid great moments of satire. Both laughter and tears maintain equanimity and sanity in trying times, and both mobilize ethical action to address wrongdoings.

As much as Fox tries to strike a balance between laughter and tears, he gives silence, sorrow and suffering short shrift. But he’s in the comedy business, and the comedy business gets paid by the laugh.

I’ll laugh again; I’m sure of it. But with the election of Trump, half the voters just suffered a painful blow that may soon court injustices against vulnerable and disenfranchised people worldwide for the foreseeable future. Which is why I can’t get out of my head a little dark humor from Søren Kierkegaard:

“In a theater, it happened that a fire started offstage. The clown came out to tell the audience. They thought it was a joke and applauded. He told them again, and they became still more hilarious. This is the way, I suppose, that the world will be destroyed — amid the universal hilarity of wits and wags who think it is all a joke.”

James Lorentzen, St. Paul

With regard to the debate between city planners and the working artists of the northeast Minneapolis Logan Park district, I have one word of advice: Listen. Listen, that is, to the artists. And make sure that their views are an integral factor in any development decision for that rare and unique area (” ‘There’s a vibe to the atmosphere,‘ “ Nov. 28).

Has Minneapolis learned nothing from generations of bulldozing unique buildings and neighborhoods, only to replace them with bland commercial kitsch? When money is the only real factor in planning, you are taking the easy way out — and you get what you pay for.

As someone born and raised here and who spent many years living in Providence, R.I., I say: Take a lesson from that city — which has honed its skills (literally for centuries) in cultural and historic preservation. In so doing, they have produced a tremendous renaissance — both economic and cultural — for that tough old industrial town.

Listen to the artists. Work with them. Merely to advance your own priorities, dismissing theirs, is a zero-sum game, which nobody wins. Don’t demolish a vibrant neighborhood for the sake of standardized banality! Bureaucrats, think like artists — that is, out of the box.

Henry Gould, Minneapolis