美国国家公共电台 NPR Montana Monument May Expand Under Trump Administration

 

LINDA WERTHEIMER, HOST:

Secretary of the interior Ryan Zinke follows the Trump¹ administration's playbook. He's pushing to shrink national monuments across the country. But Zinke makes an exception in his own home state. He's recommending a new national monument in a park in Montana.

Yellowstone Public Radio's Nate Hegyi reports.

NATE HEGYI, BYLINE²: Huddled³ behind his white pickup⁴ truck in northwestern Montana, Roland Kennerly stuffs his hands into his coat pockets.

ROLAND KENNERLY: Oh, this wind. (Laughter) It's starting to snow now.

HEGYI: The road has turned into a muddy slop. And beyond us is a pocket of socked-in mountains and roadless grassland⁵ known as the Badger-Two Medicine area.

KENNERLY: You can only get in there by walking or by horseback. And so it keeps it in its natural state. And I hope it stays that way for my kids and my kids' kids.

HEGYI: Badger-Two Medicine is sacred to Kennerly's tribe, the Blackfeet Nation. It's part of their creation story. And this summer, Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke recommended it become a new national monument. That designation would protect more than 200 square miles of federal land from any future oil and gas development. But President Trump has called these large monuments massive federal land grabs by his Democratic predecessors⁶.

And Zinke has recommended the president reduce the size of some of those monuments, including Bear's Ears in Utah and Gold Butte in Nevada. Now, Zinke hasn't commented publicly on the newly proposed monument, and his spokesperson says interior has nothing new to say about it. So the recommendation has a lot of people scratching their heads, including Blackfeet tribal⁷ chairman Harry⁸ Barnes.

HARRY BARNES: I'm falling back on - I think it's because of his kinship that's been developed with the Blackfeet tribe.

HEGYI: Zinke is a former Montana congressman⁹ who grew up in Whitefish, Mont. - a couple of hours west of the reservation. He even played high school basketball against the Blackfeet Nation. Barnes points to Roland Kennerly, the man who took me to see the newly proposed monument.

BARNES: This guy played basketball against them, although now he had to change his story. He was telling me before, oh, yeah. We used to whip Whitefish's [expletive] all the time.

HEGYI: Now Barnes says Kennerly puts it more diplomatically and just says he used to play against Zinke.

BARNES: So we've had a connection for a long time. We've lobbied him in the state legislature. We've lobbied him in Washington, D.C.

HEGYI: And when the congressman became interior secretary, the first place he visited was Glacier¹⁰ National Park, inviting¹¹ the Blackfeet to join him for a prayer. But Land Tawney, president of the Montana-based sportsmen's group Backcountry Hunters and Anglers, says it feels like Zinke is proposing a new national monument for more ambitious reasons.

LAND TAWNEY: You know, I think the secretary has talked about, you know, wanting to come back to Montana after he's done being secretary and potentially run for governor.

HEGYI: Tawney says protecting public lands here is a huge issue. And since becoming secretary, Zinke has encouraged mining, drilling and reducing the size of national monuments elsewhere in the country while leaving existing national monuments in Montana alone and urging mining bans near Yellowstone National Park. Tawney says these proposals imply Zinke is protecting public lands in his home state.

TAWNEY: I think that the people of Montana hold our special places very near and dear. And if you do not protect those places, I think that's a political nightmare for you in this state.

HEGYI: David Parker, a political scientist at Montana State University, says Zinke may even want to run for president someday.

DAVID PARKER: Whatever his ambitions are, Montana's important to that. I think moving forward he can't say you're going to be on the national stage and be a serious candidate if you don't have strong support from your home state.

HEGYI: Blackfeet tribal chairman Harry Barnes says Zinke's political ambitions don't really matter to him. In fact, just having a Montanan in Trump's cabinet is good enough.

BARNES: If we can get a friend in there that'll do us a solid now and again, great - because it's something we don't normally see.

HEGYI: For NPR News, I'm Nate Hegyi in Browning, Montana.

1 trump   

n.王牌，法宝；v.打出王牌，吹喇叭

参考例句：

• He was never able to trump up the courage to have a showdown.他始终鼓不起勇气摊牌。
• The coach saved his star player for a trump card.教练保留他的明星选手，作为他的王牌。

2 byline   

n.署名；v.署名

参考例句：

• His byline was absent as well.他的署名也不见了。
• We wish to thank the author of this article which carries no byline.我们要感谢这篇文章的那位没有署名的作者。

3 huddled   

挤在一起（huddle的过去式与过去分词形式）

参考例句：

• We huddled together for warmth. 我们挤在一块取暖。
• We huddled together to keep warm. 我们挤在一起来保暖。

4 pickup   

n.拾起，获得

参考例句：

• I would love to trade this car for a pickup truck.我愿意用这辆汽车换一辆小型轻便卡车。||The luck guy is a choice pickup for the girls.那位幸运的男孩是女孩子们想勾搭上的人。

5 grassland   

n.牧场，草地，草原

参考例句：

• There is a reach of grassland in the distance.远处是连绵一片的草原。
• The snowstorm swept the vast expanse of grassland.暴风雪袭击了辽阔的草原。

6 predecessors   

n.前任( predecessor的名词复数 )；前辈；（被取代的）原有事物；前身

参考例句：

• The new government set about dismantling their predecessors' legislation. 新政府正着手废除其前任所制定的法律。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Will new plan be any more acceptable than its predecessors? 新计划比原先的计划更能令人满意吗？ 来自《简明英汉词典》

7 tribal   

adj.部族的，种族的

参考例句：

• He became skilled in several tribal lingoes.他精通几种部族的语言。
• The country was torn apart by fierce tribal hostilities.那个国家被部落间的激烈冲突弄得四分五裂。

8 harry   

vt.掠夺，蹂躏，使苦恼

参考例句：

• Today,people feel more hurried and harried.今天，人们感到更加忙碌和苦恼。
• Obama harried business by Healthcare Reform plan.奥巴马用医改掠夺了商界。

9 Congressman   

n.（美）国会议员

参考例句：

• He related several anecdotes about his first years as a congressman.他讲述自己初任议员那几年的几则轶事。
• The congressman is meditating a reply to his critics.这位国会议员正在考虑给他的批评者一个答复。

10 glacier   

n.冰川，冰河

参考例句：

• The glacier calved a large iceberg.冰河崩解而形成一个大冰山。
• The upper surface of glacier is riven by crevasses.冰川的上表面已裂成冰隙。

11 inviting   

adj.诱人的，引人注目的

参考例句：

• An inviting smell of coffee wafted into the room.一股诱人的咖啡香味飘进了房间。
• The kitchen smelled warm and inviting and blessedly familiar.这间厨房的味道温暖诱人，使人感到亲切温馨。