When people start doin' what they oughta be doin',
Then they won't be booin' no more.
When a President goes through the White House door,
An' does what he says he'll do.
We'll all be drinkin' that free Bubble-Up,
And eatin' that rainbow stew.
- Merle Haggard
   In a wide-ranging press conference interview Thursday morning, Wyoming Governor Dave Freudenthal said Wyoming has been enjoying much more attention in this election cycle, thanks to the Republicans holding their caucus early and the Democratic Party holding their caucus late.

   “I don’t know whether I’ll attend my county caucus on March 8,” he said. When he’s attended political caucuses in the past, it is because “it’s fun to watch.”

 

   The governor said watching democracy in action reminds him of the old Merle Haggard song, where “We’ll all be drinkin’ that free Bubble-Up, and eatin’ that rainbow stew.”

 

   Freudenthal said he’s being lobbied pretty heavily by the Clinton and Obama campaigns, since he’s a super-delegate for the national Democratic convention in Denver. Although some of his fellow Democratic governors have lined up in support for either Sen. Hillary Clinton or Sen. Barack Obama for president, Freudenthal declined to say who he will support.

 

   Asked if he thought Wyoming might go Democratic (the last time was 1964, when the state voted for Lyndon B. Johnson), Freudenthal laughed as said, “I said there’s a lot of excitement – I didn’t say people were delirious.”

 

   He’d just come back from a governor’s conference in Washington, D.C., where governors held discussions about a variety of issues, including energy development. Some governors were extolling biofuels, others wind and solar. With some satisfaction, Freudenthal said Wyoming has opportunities throughout the energy spectrum.

Governor Freudenthal testifies before a Senate subcommittee about protecting the Wyoming Range.
(Photo by Fleur de Fry)

Wyoming Range

   Freudenthal commended the efforts of Senators John Barrasso and Michael Enzi, to protect the 1.2 million acres of the Wyoming Range from further oil and gas development. Thanks to Barrasso’s help, the governor testified his support for that concept before the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee earlier this week and was able to speak privately with Committee Chairman Jeff Bingaman, D-NM.

 

   It all depends on whether Congress is willing to act this year, or wait and see what the November elections bring, he said.

 

  “It comes through at the same time that Oregon and Colorado have similar bills that they would like to see promoted, so there may be an opportunity. To some degree, we’re hung up on whether or not the U.S. Senate plans on doing anything between now and the election. If they do decide to do something, I think we’ve got a shot at moving this bill,” he said.

Budget session

 

   Freudenthal said the budget process in the Legislature has been going fairly well, with the conference committee agreeing more often than not and a conference report expected Monday.

 

   “We have a good idea of what’s in the budget,” said the governor.

 

   The Legislature is eager to get done and leave town, he said, and that’s fine by him.

 

   He’s had a few disappointments, notably the coal-bed methane water management bill (SF 46) which died in the Senate.

 

   “I was disappointed that the CBM discharge bill got so loaded with amendments th

at it died on a 15-15 vote and a fairly tense discussion in the Senate. I had hoped that we would actually not end up with a lot of amendments, but I think it reached the stage where people said, ‘If I can’t get 100 percent of what I want, I don’t want anything,’ and as a consequence, it died,” he said.

 

   Freudenthal said he’d hoped that the bill would give the State Engineer some new authorities and tools.

 

   Overall, the governor credits the budget process itself for smoothing out controversies over most bills.

Critters

 

   Freudenthal downplayed conservationist fears that two-thirds of the wolves will be wiped out, once the states of Wyoming, Montana and Idaho take over their management, after the wolves are delisted by the feds. He called such talk “inflammatory fund-raising” rhetoric by conservationists and bravado by wolf haters. “It’s not going to happen,” he said flatly.

 

   Freudenthal joked that his attorney general said he’d need to get a new set of pajamas, “because he’ll be getting into bed with the feds” to fight the anticipated green lawsuits to block the delisting of wolves.

 

   Freudenthal said he’d heard the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is taking another look at an Endangered Species Act listing for the sage grouse and white-tailed prairie dog.

 

   “We’re in much better shape than we were with the Prebel’s jumping mouse,” he said, with new money and resources to study and protect sensitive species in Wyoming.

 

   “I think we can provide a more accurate picture of what’s happening with species,” he said. Nevada, for example, has lost hundreds of thousands of sage grouse habitat to wildfires. “We’re in much better shape than that,” he said.
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