OK ET, I'm not talking about individuals here, I'm talking about private sector entities, specifically the ones that profit from development or natural resources. Ever heard of one of those voluntarily curtailing their profits by volunteering to protect the environment over and above the minimum required by law? And do you really think that since few if any government regulators are going to be around to watch them, after the budget cuts mandated by all of your favorite initiatives kick in, that they will continue to curtail their profits?

And folks, I sure hear a lot of talk about fraud in government, but has there ever been a fraud to equal what the freindly Enron folks did with energy once the stupid decision was made to privatize it? Oh, but if we didn't let the private sector bilk us for 150 times the true value of energy we would be communists - so sorry

And I do know something about why prisons cost more in Washington, specifically Staford Creek Prison, as I was involved in that one, it's those ******* environmental regulations, little things like requiring the sewer, water, and gas lines to be put under the highway shoulder rather than filling 14 acres of salmon-bearing wetlands to put them in, and directionally drilling these lines under 8 streams rather than digging them up and doing it the cheap way. Oh, but wait a minute, we all like to catch salmon and ***** like hell when the fishing isn't any good. Well, if you want to put a prison in a relatively pristine and undeveloped portion of the watershed it's going to cost more to build it and not kill salmon. I personally lobbied hard to get the damn thing sited in some dryland wheat field, but when that didn't happen I lobbied even harder to get the thing built without environmental impacts. Damn communist thing to do though, it made it cost more.

Face it, luch isn't free, and even if you could convince me that it doesn't cost even more if prepared by a private, for profit company than it does when prepared by the government, you sure as hell aren't going to convince me it costs less. <img border="0" alt="[eat]" title="" src="graemlins/eat.gif" />