storage and the use of unlined pits. In New Mexico, Governor Richardson issued a moratorium on drilling in the Galisteo Basin after hundreds of cases of water contamination from unlined pits were reported. In Utah, a pit with 150,000 barrels of fracking fluids leaked and the toxic wastewater ended up on a nearby farm. A well in Bulette County, Wyoming was found to have levels of benzene 1,500 times what are considered safe.

James F. Gennaro, Chair of the City Council’s Environmental Protection Committee said in February that, “Natural gas drilling in the city’s upstate watershed will not only contaminate our drinking water supply, but it will force the building of a filtration plant costing New York City taxpayers upwards of 20 billion…As a geologist and an activist onSuch a picture of accomplishment is appropriate for a novel like Ayn Rand’s since Rand was all about the glorious nature of human achievement. Born during the days of upheaval in early 20th century Russia, she never embraced the tenets of communism. Later emmigrating to the United States, she developed a philosophy of her own called “objectivism.” At the center of her vision is an heroic image of the individual who can accomplish anything he or she sets her mind to achieve. In that sentence, the key word is “mind.” For many pages toward the end of the novel, Ayn Rand becomes Ayn Rant as she excoriates those who have neglected the mind to favor either the body or the soul, observing: “Man has a single basic choice: