In Response To Obama Actions, Senator Goes Seuss

Since President Barack Obama announced his plans to designate millions of acres of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge as wilderness, state legislators have taken to the House and Senate floors to rail against federal overreach. The speeches have ranged from incensed to righteously indignant.

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But one state senator has decided to voice his displeasure in a more poetic way. On Friday, Fairbanks Republican Click Bishop gave a Seussian speech on the federal government’s attitude toward Alaska, and read from a modified version of Green Eggs and Ham, titled “Click on Uncle Sam”:

I do not like your crazy rules
like those proposed by Sally Jewell.
I do not like them
here or there.
I do not like them
anywhere.
I do not want them near or far
not Sally Jewell nor Salazar.
Could you, would you.. let us drill?
We have the folks, they have the skill.
We have the oil, underground..
we’ll leave it nicer than we found
I do not like your EPA
they’ve run amuck – they’re in the way.
I do not like this Federal Plan, I do not like it Uncle Sam.

The inspiration for the speech came from U.S. Senator Ted Cruz of Texas, who once read Green Eggs and Ham as part of a filibuster. The copy of the book Bishop carried with him to the Senate floor was signed by Cruz last year.