WASHINGTON—In what is being hailed as a landmark preservation effort, federal officials announced plans Monday to set aside a 600,000-acre tract of pristine wilderness so that future generations of Americans can pollute it. “We have a responsibility to ensure that this country continues to have beautiful woodlands, fresh streams, and breathtaking vistas where one day our children and grandchildren can toss their refuse and dump their industrial waste,” said Secretary of the Interior Sally Jewell, who noted that despoiling the environment is the birthright of every American citizen. “They too should know what it feels like to clear-cut an idyllic forest, poison a crystal-clear lake with chemical runoff, and permanently devastate a fragile ecosystem—not to mention what it feels like to level a majestic mountaintop with dynamite to access the coal beneath. If we don’t act soon, the experiences so many of us take for granted will become little more than a memory.” Jewell expressed her disappointment, however, that tomorrow’s children would never know the joy of driving the Tacoma pocket gopher and ivory-billed woodpecker to extinction.

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