I read with great interest an article by Republican Rep. Devin Nunes about the real cause of the water shortages in California. In the summer of 2002, shortly before I was elected to Congress, I sat through an eye-opening meeting with representatives from the Natural Resources Defense Council... they told me something astonishing: Their goal was to remove 1.3 million acres of farmland from production. They showed me maps that laid out their whole plan: From Merced all the way down to Bakersfield, and on the entire west side of the Valley as well as part of the east side, productive agriculture would end and the land would return to some ideal state of nature. ... large Democratic majorities in Congress passed [a water restriction act] in 1992... [Bush #1 was President in 1992] The act stipulated that 800,000 acre-feet of water — or 260 billion gallons — on the Valley's west side had to be diverted annually to environmental causes, with an additional 400,000...(Read Full Post)