Midwestern environmentalists worried about Asian carp were dealt another setback yesterday in their legal effort to force the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to sever the connection between Lake Michigan and the Mississippi River basin. But all is not lost. The Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel's Dan Egan, who has provided first-rate coverage of the Asian carp debate over the past year, reminds readers today that the Corps is already planning to study the viability of ecological separation and will release the results in two years. Meanwhile, a strong contingent of lawmakers and activists still support more comprehensive measures than Illinois officials or the Obama administration have proposed:

[T]he pressure to explore a permanent separation on the canal system isn't likely going away. It has the backing of a coalition of Great Lakes states attorneys general, a broad bipartisan coalition of federal lawmakers and state legislators from across the region.

"This does not mean that the dispute over Asian carp is over," said Wisconsin Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen. "We will review our options and work with the other Great Lake states concerned about this problem. We will do what we believe is necessary to protect the Great Lakes."