Prop 5 still leading 53.3-46.7
It's leading by about the same percentage in Westchester County, which is usually a good belwether in statewide elections. It will pass. Good jobs will stay in the Adirondacks!
Dude... gross.
Yes yes, how dare those conservative white trash country yokels actually get good job opportunities. Whenever these sorts of environmental issues crop up it's a nice reminder that many liberals and leftists don't actually care about working people.
Bull. Those "good job opportunities" are inevitably far fewer, and far worse, than promised, and then when the mining company leaves (as it inevitably will, eventually), the people there will be worse off than before.
Hitching your star to resource extraction* is one of the worst economic development strategies there is. I mean, I recognize that it is inevitably not seen that way (for various reasons) by most people living in those areas; and I do recognize that it's also not the sort of activity we can afford to eliminate entirely. But we do need to reserve the ability to proscribe it from areas where it's particularly inappropriate (of which the Adirondacks happen to be such an area), and to have regulations
with teeth that ensure proper mitigation.
And it is
definitely the case that, although rural development is a tricky thing, seeing through the false promise of "mining jobs" and understanding that there is a counterbalancing greater good to keep in mind should not and
cannot be misconstrued as "not caring about working people".
*Mining in particular. Forestry and fishery have their own sets of issues, but as a rule are much less destructive, or at least can be if done in a halfway-responsible manner.