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by randycupertino·7mo ago·view on hn ↗
Apparently one fake mineral was flagged and removed but these two made it through to the law:

> The fake minerals are friezium and stralium, apparent references to Christopher Friez and David Straley, attorneys for North American Coal who were closely involved in drafting the bill and its amendments.

> Bjornson said a Legislative Council attorney flagged and removed a fictional mineral, “docterium,” earlier in the session from an unofficial draft of the same bill before it became part of the legislative record.

> Anderson recalls joking about finding docterium, a reference to Rep. Jason Dockter, during a committee hearing. The lawmaker said he noticed the term in an unofficial draft afterward and immediately asked Legislative Council to remove it.

2 comments
This is a good example of “not fixing the whole problem”. Once a “fake” mineral was discovered, a good idea would have been to demand an expert reviews the entire list.
Remove it!?

But that's the only evidence of something fishy!

You shouldn't just silence an error without knowing how it came to be there.

Someone against the lobbying may have intentionally left the names in, or added them.