Wind Turbines Are More Important Than Eagles

According to the StarTribune, a $179 million wind power development near Red Wing may be blocked because the blades could kill some bald eagles. I like eagles as much as the next guy, but this is going too far.

It's the latest example of how, in the man vs. nature battle, nature is winning to the point that it's stagnating the nation's economy. We need energy and therefore, we must produce energy. We need to move people and goods from one place to another. We need to grow food. We need to make things that other countries want to buy. All of these activities require that humans harm "nature" to some degree.

I'm all for trying to minimize environmental damage, but we can't say no to everything. If you want your air conditioning to work or to charge up your new Chevy Volt, then you have to allow someone to produce electricity. That means mining and burning coal, drilling for oil or natural gas, creating nuclear reactions, damming up rivers, putting up power lines and wind turbines—and in the process, harming the environment in some way.

Unless you're willing to accept a permanent deterioration of our country's standard of living, we must start saying "yes" to new bridges, roads, power plants, oil fields, wind farms, hog farms, train tracks and factories. For the past 30 years, we've said no too often and simply purchased our energy and goods from other countries.  That can't last and it's simply transferred the environmental damage to somewhere else.

It's time to get real. Wind turbines are more important than eagles.