This is really a shame.

Def. a shame. The thing is that this is REALLY going to cause severe environmental problems, IMHO.

All those logging companies thought it was great to pull all that timber out of there. Then all the home builders built all these houses, buildings, etc. with all that timber. But my guess is that ater all the great floods and hurricanes that all those houses made of all that timber will be washed away.

I still think that if there is/was a garden of Eden, that the Amazon was it. Looks like mankind just destroyed it again.

Reports like this are what add fuel to the idea (very popular here in Brazil) that the US is planning an invasion of the Amazon region in order to make it a protected international environmental zone.

People have little idea of how vast the Amazon region really is. I am not saying that there are not abuses happening there--but I am saying that the Amazon will be there long after all of us have passed on.