Feature Story- -The Wolf Tree
Articles- -Collectivism Vs Individualism: The Critical Wolf Issue
-The Dirty Clean Water Restoration Act of 2007
-More Anti-Hunting Lies
-NAIS and Property Rights, A Poll
Humor -Truckin’ Penguins
-Wireless History
Feature Organizations/Sites- -Americans for Responsible Recreational Access
-The Gardner Files
Welcome to the second edition of the Voices From the Rural American West monthly newsletter. I am pleased to be bringing a new writer to you as well as returning with a few familiar folks with new works I know you will enjoy and gain from as I have. We bring you wolves, politics, environmental issues, recreational access and hunting along with some humor- and in this edition- a feature organization and feature website we feel represent some of what we are about here at VFRAW. A thank you goes out from me to our contributing writers who make this possible and offer great insight and food for thought.
Erin Miller
Editor
The Wolf TreeBy Greg FarberEarly 2001: My father dropped me off with my pack at the Bear River inlet at the North Fork of the Boise River, and we agree to meet in three weeks at Ten-Mile Creek on the Payette River. My plan was to climb the Bear River drainage and cross Goat Mountain making my way to Johnson creek and slip into an unnamed lake for some rainbows and solitude. As I watched him drive off, the dust settled and all is quiet except for the breeze, singing birds, and the slow bubbling waters where these two rivers collide. I shouldered the 55 pound pack and stepped off the road onto the Bear River trail starting my hike up the canyon. Flies buzzed me, grasshoppers flitted about, and chipmunks zipped and twisted like lunatics in impossible escapes, making like the jaws of death are just behind them snapping at their tails.
I set my pace, using the walking poles to balance and move like a cat, wanting to take advantage of the coolness and make some miles. I should have seen the omen in the chipmunks hurried flights, but everything was so full of life that I looked up canyon eagerly at the curve ahead of me which I could not yet see around. I had no thoughts of the intricate web of the hunter and hunted, being used to the top of the food chain during my stay here. I confidently looked around at the beauty of this place and looked into those openings made by snow slides which were rich with greenery and thickened between the tall yellow pines, long wisps of moss hangs from them, the buck brush grows taller than me. It is the jungle.
The river talked louder as I moved a few miles into the canyon, having just turned south east as I made my way around the first curve of the canyon. The trail is a highway of fresh tracks and I read the story as I walked along following one after another, sometimes stopping to investigate where one went off to water, or to the mountain and their hide out. Another couple miles goes by, I was buzzing with things seen and heard. The air was heavy with spring and the scent of animals. Everywhere I looked, a branch bent or whipped skyward as birds came and went. The forest is incredible and looks like a sea of deep, deep green, I feel like I can dive into it, it is brilliant.
I did not see the Red Tailed Hawk until I was almost to my first camp site, seven miles behind me now I have used the morning to get here, I pull the 10×28 binocs’ off my chest and raise them to my eyes and watch the hawk, a snake is dangling from the talons and I lose sight of him at the tops of the trees across canyon from me. He had seemed excited, as if he had done something of great magnitude, and he cut the air with folded wing as he turned out of my vision. I stood staring at what I imagined was the mark of his flight which seemed no longer visible. I envied this hawk, and would exchange places with him if I could. It was a great day, a prize day.
The river branch dove left and then right, deep green pools amongst the ripples here, cutting an arrowhead of land at its bend. The tree stood a little inland, pushing out buds as if some force inside it demanded release. Four feet thick at its base, massive branches shading a circle around it- a natural skyscraper 140 feet tall- one massive spruce. A log bridge straddled the river where it narrowed to a stream along the north side of the arrowhead. Up the path beyond it are Trapper Flats and some old eighteenth-century Spanish diggings. Later I expected to go up that way for a look and maybe find myself a trinket or such, but first there was camp to set up for night and fish to catch and eat. I was glad to drop that pack and set about making the fire spit ready for evening, and set up my little home here. I was looking forward to enjoying the river and sight seeing before dark, and tomorrow’s getting to Goat Mountain and the waterfall where I would camp the next night.
After finding myself a forked stick to use as a spit for later, and collecting of firewood for the evening fire, I thought I would go and sit on the log and use my 10×28s again to see into the pools to spot a brook trout and watch my meal first before attempting to take him with fly. I wanted to know him before I put my hook in. I wished him to know that what I did I did not do out of malice but to live. I could see several trout in the deep pool below the natural log bridge, and spotted several two pounders darting about and playing below. Already knowing their colors and size, I also knew their taste- one would be my fish soon. I knew my food from the moment I saw them circling under the rushing water, watching the surface for their food of flies. One made a tight turn and then a short, powerful run before his leap out of the water taking his fly then returning to his friends. The slap and silver flash was quick and wonderful, I knew just where to place my fly later. That leap would make him my meal this day.
Things were as they should be, the woods moved in complex rhythm, things mated, ate, and were eaten. The whole thing was sustained by the interlocking network of its parts. I liked this camping spot, I could see much of the canyon below me, and its sheer cliff walls to the southern sides and gentle but steep timbered slopes of the north sides with scattered shoots. It held openings with buck pastures- I thought it strange I had not seen the elk and deer it must hold now, not even a track of hoof had I seen yet, but this area is a big country and I thought not much of it. When I looked up the canyon towards Goat Mountain and could see the switch backs far above which would be my path tomorrow, the sun felt nice, I could feel my body drinking in its warmth. The air smelled of pine and cottonwoods and bitter sage; a chickadee whistled across the camp from branch to branch scolding me and my pack for our intrusion, I watched him flit off down the path I had come in on. I looked up into the blue sky and felt my world spinning around me, with the canyon rims just touching the edges and the snow capped peak of Goat Mountain behind me. The stars turning above the high blue of the sky could almost be felt, and for an instant, we spun together- the stars, the river, the fish and me.
When I next looked up, the wolves were hurrying down the near side of the opening into my clearing and camp. Instantly I sensed this would not be the usual howling session and testing on me, they had made up their minds I was their prey. It was only a short run to the log and across it. Had the first wolf had not bumped into the second and gone splashing into the water, they would have torn me down before I reached the lowest branch of the mighty spruce. I looked around while running and knew I had to make that spruce, it was the only one I could be sure of making, so I sprang towards it. The lead wolf swept around the point of the land yelping and struggling against the current. It occurred to me that he might not make it out, and I wished him into the fastest part of the current where his legs would tire and let him drown.
The other five hesitated on the far side of the log for a second, watching their leader shrieking downstream. His terror and anger seemed to disarm them for a moment and it gave me the time I needed.
The lowest branch was a good nine feet off the ground, I ran right up that massive trunk throwing myself back and up and wrapped my arms around that branch pulling myself up and swinging a leg over the branch then my other. I stopped a moment, caught my breath and my mind, and then pulled myself around to the top of the branch and slid over against the tree. Holding on, I stood up and grabbed another branch then steadied myself. One wolf had just nipped my vest as I rolled around the branch to safety, lucky for me he leaped after me too soon and fell short; otherwise he would have pulled me to the ground.
Whew, I laughed and cursed at the same time, I was cut up a bit on my arms from the bark of the branch, but fine. I was glad to be wearing marmot skins on my legs and a marmot shirt under my Kakadu vest, and then loose fitting camo khakis shorts, thus I was not fighting tight clothing at all in my rush to safety. The other four wolves tumbled into the tree base and they all were jumping and snarling but I was out of their reach and they knew it.
I was shaken a bit and moved up into the tree, my heart pounding. Those are the coldest eyes below I have ever looked into in my life, and I have faced a Wyoming grizz before. I moved to a wide huge branch on this monster spruce, another smaller branch forked out from it and close to the tree so I sat on this with my back to the spruce and tried to relax and focus on this situation. I could see across my fishing hole and camp, I could see my pack and my evening stack of fire wood and lying across my pack is my belt of cartridges and holstered pistol which I wished now was on my hip.
I just laughed out loud at the luck, and looked down and cursed them. Finally looked away from them and started watching the Alpha; he had made it out of the river and was approaching the tree. Tall and black with gold eyes, 150 pounds of sheer muscle and teeth- I shivered as I admired him. He looked up into my eyes and somehow let me know he was angry, as I had bested them for now.
No doubt, they thought of my skull cracking like a nut in the narrowing angle of their mighty jaws, opening the sweet delicacy of my brain to them like the meat of a walnut. I could see their hunger in the joyous frenzy of their leaps. They wanted me with a sadistic exuberance that made them keep leaping long after they had any chance of reaching me. I stood up and teased them, I spit on them. I cussed them; I imitated a chimp and drove them mad. I became mad and screamed out loud, I almost leaped into them to fight this prehistoric and savage battle with them as I felt my warrior savage anger rising. I felt the way I had made a few cougar feel, trapped in the tree, I hissed and spat at them. This was kinda’ fun, I had no idea at that moment just how zero on the fun meter this would become. I roared with laughter at their frustration. They circled the tree and began to howl. I sat back down and tried to ignore them. Maybe they would leave soon. I had things to do.
I decided to climb higher into this mighty spruce which had become my prison; I wanted to go high enough that they could not see me. I disappeared into the tree, and was getting tired. Reaching a spot where three massive branches grew out close together and then tangled a bit, I found I could almost lay on it. I scooted onto it with my back to the tree and took note of the day’s events mentally. I remembered the pouch in my vest full of hemp seeds, got it out and ate some as it appears my trout and wild plant meal was off. I had a knife and saw on my belt, some ten foot of twine in the vest pocket, and my lp-3 light with a bumble bee chocolate bar- but no water, I tried not to think of the water. I unleashed my belt and fastened it to the tree branch looping it thru my belt loop again and buckling it back up. Then attempting my afternoon nap, I remained silent looking around at my view outside the tree, the view alone was worth the climb, and I try to shut out that howling. Finally, sleep found me. I expected the wolves would get bored and leave soon, the best thing is to ignore them. I did.
Mid-afternoon I awoke from this sleep, now quite sore. The cuts on my arms stung and thirst was another physical problem I tried to ignore as I rubbed my head with my hands to push the cobwebs out. It was now silent except for the river and the slightly enhanced breeze. Unhooking from the branch, I moved down to have a look-see. The wolves are moving back and forth along my scent trail at the camp, to the log and across to the tree where I reside at the moment. Thinking I might be able to reach the river unnoticed and drink, I edged down, then I stop and watch them. Timing this thing that must be perfect- get a drink and get back to the tree. I figured I would attempt it, but I have only seen five wolves at my camp… where is that lobo Alpha, I could not see him as I moved around the tree to hide my drop to the ground from view from camp. A low growl… there he was… waiting about twenty feet out from this backside of the tree. He charged the tree growling and snarling, bringing the other five across the log and back under the tree. Then a rage built within me as I climbed up again and sat. Then I decided to cut up a branch and make short chunks which I could throw down at them. Once done, I then moved down a bit getting set. I throw one of my chunks of wood at the Alpha, smacking him a good blow on his rib cage. He sort of shrieked and howled as he lunged at the tree, the other wolves started leaping again and I pelted them with sticks until I ran out.
I moved back up into the tree from their line of sight, to my perch, and re-hooked in to sit and ponder this out in my mind. I decided to ignore my adversaries longer this time, while observing a squirrel sitting out on a branch of a nearby tree watching the spectacle from his own perch. As if to tease me, he jumped across to my tree, through it, then leaped out to another tree before turning to scolds me. I shook my grinning head; everybody was on my case this day. I sat and stared out at the birds as they flew about amongst the tall pines and brush of the north slopes behind me. The howling had stopped again and I decided to visit the top of this tree, nothing else to do right now. Climbing up thru this incredible tree, I never imagined in all the years walking past here that I would spend and entire afternoon in this tree. Perhaps I should have, the view from up there was magnificent. I perched myself upon a very thick group of branches where I could see all the way around me. I found that I could put my arms around the trunk up here. I watched some goats up in the rocks above me, looking after little Billie-unbothered by the events taking place below them.
A ruckus began below me with growling and snarling, so I climbed back down to a safer position in the tree and looked out and below. The wolves were tearing apart my backpack pulling on my belongings and throwing things about. My sack of collard green leaves and onions was trashed- they chomped on the cans of sardines from Portugal, splitting them open and licking out the contents. My sack of apples and oranges was strewn about along with two pounds of hemp seeds, walnuts, and almonds along with clothing, my thermorest and sleeping bag. I just laughed, what else could I do, I had seen chewed open cans before but never got to watch it happen before, I just watched and enjoyed the show; hoping one would slice off his tongue for his efforts. I counted five wolves, then I looked around below me and sure enough just to the north the Alpha had climbed a knoll and was just sitting there, looking right at me, those cold eyes met mine and I knew then his determination. The others might have left me, but not him. This wolf was all business. I longed for my pistol which was lying over in the dirt right now, I would show the Alpha determination, but I was unfanged… de-toothed if you will.
The shadows were getting long, signaling that soon the sun would go down, so I moved back to the spot of my nap in the tree from early in the afternoon, I tied in and leaned back. I realized they weren’t going to leave anytime soon. I was stuck in the tree until they got bored and went away.
The ants were making their highway along the trunk of the spruce, and I put my face up against the tree to see them walking the tiny ravine in the bark, full of dedication and purpose. I wondered if there was one ant in the column going steadily by that would let its curiosity distract it from its job and set it wandering down some curling road in the formic acid, hot on the trail of some mystery. But I never saw one that didn’t stay within the lane laid down by some functionary between the nest and food. One or two got lost and did an erratic circle as big as my hand, like some hunter from the city trying to find the jeep trail he had wandered off. The rest never went far from wrong before they stopped and circled, looking for the trail. They did not seem comfortable until they found it again. The ones I took into my hand explored this new world looking for their old; I doubt that they saw much. When I put them back down on the trunk of the tree, they blended right back into the flow of commuters. When I put some down in a new part of the tree, they searched with ferocious diligence until they found the highway again, the road to home, job, and duty. I decided that they were depressingly like people in the end, but I admired them for the way they tracked, even if I didn’t like their purpose.
I was getting angry again, for my purpose of freedom had been taken from me and my goal of the next days was shattered as I still sat in this huge spruce tree, scratched, bleeding, and thirsty. I wondered if there were ants like me, were they shunned as well, or did they seek others of their kind to share in new mysteries?
The sun went down, and I lost the ants in the changing contour of the tree. The darkness came in like a tide, shade by shade, deepening the water into space and throwing stars back with the unveiling of the dark curtain. The cold came with it. I watched the river dim, darken and then become slowly bright again as my eyes adjusted to the dark. In fits and starts I fell asleep and woke to changes, cursing myself for missing them. Sometimes when I awoke, I got hungry, but that passed, then I got thirsty and that didn’t. So I put it aside until I could do something about it and watched the sun come up. The wolves below me jerked and twitched in their dreams. I wondered if they were dreaming of eating me, tearing my soft human flesh to shreds and ripping my muscles from the bones, or would they just kill and waste me like they do so often to other creatures of the forest- like they did to that kid in Canada, or to those other North Americans whom died from brutal wolf attacks in history. I didn’t figure they thought they had anything more powerful than perhaps a bobcat up this tree, and I grew angry. I decided I was going to fight, I hated to be taken for granted like this. There were those stupid wolves lying down there, and I trapped in this tree like some greenhorn city hunter whining and crying over a little discomfort. Besides, I couldn’t go another day and night with out water, if I did, I would have died and I knew it. I was dehydrating bad and had to stop it.
As if the Alpha new my thoughts, he went to the river and drank, then turned and looked at me and almost grinned. This made me so angry, I started cutting up another branch into chunks and stocking up on ammo, I wanted to beat them back from this tree. I would bean that Alpha if it were the last thing I’d do. I could tell by watching him he was one of those rare wolves with super intelligence and cunning, and he was determined to have me. I got the impression I was not their first human and I wondered about a missing young man over towards home- gone missing from his church camp a while back. I contemplated this must go on yet the actions are either hidden from public view or out right denied.
I furiously cut up all the dead branches I could find in my tree kingdom, and stacked them high on a wedge of branches near the lower part of the tree. I made myself a nice club from a heavy branch and tied it with twine to a living branch so as not to lose it. I stopped and ate some hemp seeds; I noticed clouds moving in to the canyon and hoped for some rain. I had an Idea how to get out of this and started formulating my escape in my mind spending the rest of the second afternoon driving that Alpha crazy and getting to know his reflex movements and such. I could see the absolute anger and determination in his eyes to kill me, I swear those eyes penetrated my inner being like cold steel. I raised my arm again to throw a stick and watched him jump back out of range, I kept the stick in my hand and when he charged forward I threw it hard and nailed him on the head. He leaped up then dropped and ran by the tree to get behind me, and then circled back. I realized then that he was playing me too, trying to tire me and wear me down, hoping I would misstep and fall.
Sitting down again, starting to rain ever so slightly, I caught what I could in my mouth. The wolves sitting below me now with a forlorn, less excited howling. A couple of sparrows had an aerial battle I could see through an opening in the branches which I sat on. I could see the river swirling down through the trees and valley I had hiked the day before. A nice rainbow darted out of the water twisting and turning, then slapped back under after he came out and caught a fly.
I could feel the dehydration headache coming on and knew I was in trouble as I licked rain drops off the pine needles and branches, catching rain drops more in my mouth as they fell from above. I sat silent, watching the wolves and watching it get dark again. I hooked into my spruce camp and sat wet and shivering in the cold darkness, I had to be careful now as the branches were slick. At some point I fell asleep, I woke to pain and cold so got up and flexed and moved, doing some pull ups from a branch, locking my hands together until I was hot and tired again. I slept until the gray dawn woke me, I watched below me for the wolves but they were gone.
Elated and feeling like the fool green horn city hunter, I climbed down to the lower branches of my kingdom- the wolf tree. I looked about and could not see them, and felt sorta’ humiliated that I had not defeated them. I wished they were back so I could even the score on them. I looked around myself, raised my eyes to my camp and, and caught movement on the rise dropping into my camp- five wolves were sitting on the rise where I had first seen them two days ago yet I could not locate the big black Alpha, he was missing. I swung myself around my tree and looked for him hiding in the brush or tall grass but he wasn’t there. I lowered myself some more and studied the tracks on the ground, but in the confusion of all the tracks, I could not figure out which way he had gone. I got down onto the ground, I crept towards the water. Halfway between the water and the tree I spotted the black wolf coming for me, I was caught, fell for his trick. He had been hiding behind the log jam and then jumped onto the log bridge and was running full steam at me. I lunged for the river, my only hope, I knew I could not jump back into the safety of the spruce. I dived into the deep green pool of the Bear River and swam under water with the current.
I could feel the river carrying me down stream in the rapids, the cold of spring run off was shocking and I thought I would drown. I fought to stay under and to get distance between the Alpha and me. I stuck my face up and grabbed some air, went down again floating along, smacking rocks, then finally I looked up from the cold- I knew I was done, I could not even move my limbs, then I saw it- a small sand bar next to the bank. I hit it and somehow pulled myself out and lay on it for some time until the numbing cold left me, and I could crawl off into the brush and hide. I went under a small cotton wood in tall grass and with my back to it watched upstream. I had washed down stream two-hundred yards and could see my wolf tree, yet I could not see the wolves. I got up and headed down the valley, watching all around me and finally made the road after two hours- muddy, bloody, beaten, and alive. I walked to the North Fork of the Boise River Bridge and sat down there until some campers saw me. After hearing this story, they gave me a ride to my father’s home some 40 miles away.
Two days later, I went back to my camp and retrieved what was left of my pack, pistol, walking poles, clothes and bedding. I brought a 12 gage shotgun with me this time, no wolves were around. I looked at the wolf tree and the log jam. I smiled, and knew I had learned another lesson while playing in the great outdoors. I’ve wanted that black since then, I wanted to kill him. He was a demon disguised as a wolf, I think. I will never forget him, and the wolf tree that saved me.
Greg Farber is a lifelong Idaho/Wyoming mountain man, hunter, fisherman, backpacker, and horse packer who grew up 30 miles from the Idaho Sawtooth Wilderness near Lowman. He learned the art of tracking and survival from Native Americans. Preferring to hike across the Sawtooths from the West going East using no trails made by men, Greg has taken three 200 class mule deer bucks all with over 30 inch spreads and is determined to get his 40 inch buck before leaving this place. He was born in 1959, and his mother cooked for his family in a little log cabin on a Monarch stove, he says, “sure do miss those days…”Collectivism Vs Individualism: The Critical Wolf IssueBy Bruce Hemming Researching and talking with people about the wolf issue I noticed a trend with the pro-wolf side. "Wolves are needed for a healthy eco-system," or "it can't be that bad, wolves are good and people just have to learn to live with them." Often, people that make these statements are hundreds if not thousands of miles away from those living with wolves. Yet there are those who live near wolves that say the same thing, but again, the majority and often most vocal and powerful are located in big cities. How many people living with wolves 365 days a year support them? Well, the number is a low 25%. Then Ask the ranchers and rural families that have had their dogs horses or livestock attacked if they support the wolves, and you may see 10%. Clearly 90% will tell you there must be sound management. Use the US Constitution guarantees the right to bear arms, the right to private property and the protection thereof, the right to protect themselves and their children, the right to protect their pets and livestock, and also the right to peace and life without undue harassment.
Follow this
great web link to better understand what is going on with this vital issue, which is imperative:
“Socialists or Communists or Fascists are collectivist and sees government as the solution. The collectivist believes that the group is more important than the individual and, if necessary, the individual must be sacrificed for the group. Sometimes that is expressed in terms of ‘the greater good for the greater number.’ It’s a very appealing concept.”
This statement applies especially to the wolf issue.
The pro-wolf side essentially says individual rights are unimportant, as is the fact that ranchers and outfitters are being forced out of business. They don't seem to care that people have been stalked, children terrorize, livestock and pets slaughtered- all by wolves. The concept seems to be that the individual must be sacrificed for the cause. Those of us who believe in freedom and human rights say- hey, wait a minute... Many if not most of those who oppose the wolf situation in ‘recovery’ areas don't wish to ‘wipe out’ the wolves, they want is reasonable control and that is the least they could ask for given the reality of the situation.
“Collectivists are often critics of religious and family values, because collectivism demands unquestioning obedience to the state. Since loyalty to family or religious codes often conflict with the concept of group supremacy, they cannot be tolerated in a collectivist system.”
You see, people who believe the wolf –an animal- deserves the same or more rights than people, children no less, being terrorized by them are falling in line with the Socialist, Communist, and/or Fascist way of thinking. Have they forgotten they are Americans?
“The view of individualism was expressed clearly in the United States Declaration of Independence, which said: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among men." Nothing could be clearer than that. "Unalienable Rights" means they are the natural possession of each of us upon birth, not granted by the state. The purpose of government is, not to grant rights, but to secure them and protect them.”
Those who believe in Freedom, our Rights, and The Declaration of Independence have no problem with their fellow Americans protecting themselves and their property from damages from wolves.
Simple concept: our forefathers ensured our 2nd amendment guaranteeing our right to protect ourselves and our property. What happened was the Socialist, Communist, and/or Fascist way of thinking seems to have taken control in this issue and resulted in others being convinced, especially those living in cities or away from wolf country that what has happened with the wolf populations is for the greater good- therefore it is fine for people’s livelihoods and family businesses to be sacrificed for the wolves.
“By contrast, all collectivist political systems embrace the view that rights are granted by the state. That includes the Nazis, Fascists, and Communists. It is also a tenet of the United Nations. Article Four of the UN Covenant on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights says: "The States Parties to the present Covenant recognize that, in the enjoyment of those rights provided by the State … the State may subject such rights only to such limitations as are determined by law."
Why do we need so many wolves? Are they really worth stripping peoples of their rights? Are they really worth bringing the full force of the Federal government down on Americans and forcing them to accept wolves at their doors? “…Those rights provided by the State … The State may subject such rights only to such limitations as are determined by law." So people that believe in Socialist, Communists or Fascist ways in regards to the wolf issue say, “of course the collective good is more important than individual rights. Run these people over, toss them in jail, force them out of business, let their animals be slaughtered- who cares about people? The wolf is more important.
“The collectivist says you have to force people. That’s why he has an affinity to government. Government is the embodiment of legalized force. You can always spot a collectivist because, when he confronts a problem, his first reaction is to say, "There ought to be a law." His attitude is that we must force people to do what we think they should do, because they are not as smart as we are - we collectivists.
The collectivist believes in coercion. The individualist believes in freedom.
Last year Defenders of Wildlife collected over 35 million dollars. How was public opinion manipulated? A process called mass media propaganda. To get a greater understanding watch the film, “The Corporation," an outstanding documentary on how we become good consumers, yet the important part of the film is how public opinion and thoughts are manipulated. Physiologists are hired in developing these ads and commercials. How has this manipulation of public opinion in regards to wolf issues been accomplished? The value of presenting a single image or slogan, and repeating it over and over again until it becomes ingrained in the public's consciousness. “Wolves are needed for a healthy eco-system” has almost become a chant as a result of this. Then the thinking is reinforced with the "independent expert" and the "guy on the street" being interviewed in such a way that the only logical conclusion is to support the wolf. Propaganda can be used in very clever ways based entirely on emotional appeals. Emotional appeals are very powerful tools used to manipulate the public. The wolf turns into a heartstring-tugging animal that is almost heroic. A lot of pro-wolf people, when spoken with, seem to think the wolf is a deity of sorts. How could anyone ever wish to harm one, they wonder? What they are saying is a product of buying into the propaganda of the ‘collective good.’ Individual rights and freedoms are forgone, as is American greatness based on individual freedoms.
--The title of my film is “Undue Burden,” the term defined as being when some are forced to pay and sacrifice for what a particular majority wants. Do you believe in freedom? The only way you will truly be able to understand the wolf issue and see what has been missing from showing the issue is to watch this ground-breaking documentary www.prosts.com/Documentary-Undue-Burden.htm then you will finally be able to see what these people are living with. Do you believe in the “collective good” or individual American Rights?
http://www.lewrockwell.com/englund/englund46.html “The Green Recession: Today, thanks to Al Gore, greenies are riding high. For it is they who are the anointed ones who have the answers to prevent hurricanes, tornadoes, typhoons, soil erosion, flooding, osteoporosis, indigestion, migraine headaches, and shark attacks. (Of course, their real objective is to eradicate humanity, but that is an issue I have covered previously). And, true to Stephen Schneider’s "vision," the green movement’s success has been built upon a pack of lies.” -Eric Englund
The Dirty Clean Water Restoration Act of 2007By C. J. Williams The Clean Water Act of 1972, officially the Federal Water Pollution Control Act, was designed to govern pollution in the “navigable waters of the United States”. Responsibility for the law was placed under the jurisdiction of the Corps of Engineers. Navigable waters were defined to mean water on which a canoe could float and the legislative mandate was quite broad: “to restore and maintain the chemical, physical and biological integrity of the nation’s waters.”
The legislative bill’s primary designer was Sen. Ed Muskie (D-Maine) who some consider the father of the modern day environmental movement. Muskie was Maine’s governor from 1955-1959 and then a senator from 1959-1980 before serving the Carter administration as Sec. of State from May 1980 to Jan. 1981.
In a glowing tribute on the “founders” page of the Edmund S. Muskie Foundation Website, Leon G. Billings wrote that “before Ed Muskie, there was no national environmental policy. There was no national environmental movement. There was no national environmental consciousness.”
None could say there’s no “national environmental consciousness” anymore, that’s for sure, as environmentalism has become almost rabid in intensity, particularly with more than sufficient nudging by Gang Green’s partnering “tax-exempt” stakeholder groups who pass around a peace pipe with the taxpayers’ resource management agencies one minute and then sue them the next.
The lofty goal of Muskie’s 1972 Clean Water Act was to make the nation’s lakes, rivers, and shoreline clean enough for swimming and fishing by 1983. The immediate task to be undertaken, however, was to stop municipal sewage plants and other government facilities (such as military bases) and industries, including manufacturing, mining, oil and gas extraction entities, and also certain agricultural businesses (i.e. animal feedlots) from dumping untreated or poorly treated wastes into the public’s navigable waters. (Surface water for drinking purposes is governed by separate legislation, the Safe Drinking Water Act of 1974)
The 1972 Clean Water Act was amended in 1977 and is now primarily administered by the Environmental Protection Agency, which helps state and local governments set up their own pollution control plans. The Clean Water Act of 1977 provided for billions of dollars in grants that helped local communities build sewage treatment plants. Unfortunately, now that many of those treatment plants have become obsolete and in need of updating and repairs, the broke and badly bent communities are hard put to foot the bill on their own.
While the federal government could continue to kick in with money for upgrades, as it’s done in the past, it seems there’s no longer enough money in the nation’s coffer. One might wonder how that can be since presidential hopeful Barack Hussein Obama had no qualms about recently introducing legislation that would use $845 billion in taxpayer money to augment what America already doles out to reduce poverty everywhere else but in the USA.
Though the goal of the Clean Water Act of 1972 wasn’t reached by 1983, at least 60% of the nation’s intrastate (within a state) waterways were considered clean enough for recreational purposes by 1998. Chances are much of the 60% was safe long before 1972, but figures regarding that notion aren’t readily available. The good Lord knows I swam and fished in one heck of a lot of Michigan water from 1950 until today and am no worse the wear for it.
Regardless, only a fool would argue that ensuring that water isn’t safe to swim or fish isn’t a good thing.
What isn’t a good thing, however, is that the Act has been and continues to be manipulated by environmentalists who yank lawmakers around by the ring in their nose, just as has happened with the Endangered Species Act, so that, as time passes, people lose more and more of their private property rights without really knowing what hit them, let alone the how and why of it.
The latest manipulation is in the form of the Clean Water Restoration Act of 2007, which eliminates the term “navigable waters of the United Sates” and replaces it with “waters of the United States”. As such, the new term means “all waters subject to the ebb and flow of the tide, the territorial seas, and all interstate and intrastate waters and their tributaries, including lakes, rivers, streams (including intermittent streams), mudflats, sandflats, wetlands, sloughs, prairie potholes, wet meadows, playa lakes, natural ponds, and all impoundments of the foregoing, to the fullest extent that these waters, or activities affecting these waters, are subject to the legislative power of Congress under the Constitution.”
To encapsulate that new definition for “waters of the United States”, it means all water, every last drop of it, even on your very private, do not trespass, land that the government lets you own in name only, provided you pay property taxes to do so.
In essence, if it rains hard enough on your land to cause a run-off into a roadside ditch, or gives rise to wet meadowland on the back forty, or a water filled pothole in your driveway, the feds believe the Constitution empowers them to apply their cockamamie law to your private property.
Technically, according to Article I, Sect. 8, the US Constitution allows the federal government to “regulate commerce…among the several states…”. Being the devious bunch they’ve been long before being “transparent” about globalism and sustainability came into vogue, the ruling majority of our elected who serve in D.C. have interpreted their constitutional empowerment to mean they have the right to regulate the “navigable waters” of the United States because some goods are transported by boat.
Now they’re interpreting their empowerment to include striking the term “navigable waters” in favor of regulating mud puddles on anyone’s private property. And, if you don’t think Gang Green hasn’t helped in this endeavor, think again, as countless lawsuits have been filed against more than a few other than the U.P.’s Richard Delene and downstate Michigan farmer John Rapanos, who fought a long, hard, and very expensive battle regarding dubious wetlands on his private property 20 miles from the nearest navigable waterway.
In fact, the Rapanos v. United States case and another, Carabell v. United States, decided in 2006 by the Supreme Court in favor of the private property owners, may have provided the catalyst for the federal legislature’s decision to revamp the Clean Water Act so as to strike the term “navigable water” and replace it with “waters of the United States”. Not only that, but the feds also had their Constitution tampering legislation questioned in 2001 when a Supreme Court ruling limited the government’s reach to some extent by exempting isolated wetlands that didn’t cross state lines and didn’t have a hydrological connection to navigable waters.
Not having to fight city hall because they are city hall, a contingent of 174 U.S. Representatives, mostly Democrats, have decided to make an end run around the Supreme Court and bellied up to co-sponsor the newly contrived Clean Water Restoration Act of 2007, a.k.a. HR-2412. The bill was proposed by Rep. James Oberstar, a Democrat who, since 1975, has represented several counties in northeastern Minnesota that include the cities of Duluth, Brainerd, Grand Rapids, Hibbing, and International Falls.
Michigan legislators who don’t mind interpreting the Constitution in a very liberal manner so as to regulate the use of any water in any amount by We, the People and who have signed on as co-sponsors of HR-2421 are Republican Rep. Vern Ehlers and Democrat Reps. Conyers, Dingell, Kildee, Kilpatrick, Levin, and Stupak.
Russ Feingold (D-WI) introduced similar companion legislation, S-1870, in the Senate. Michigan Senators who co-sponsored Feingold’s bill are Carl Levin and Deborah Stabenow.
Clearly, our legislators need to get reacquainted with the 10th Amendment to the Constitution of the United States of America, which is part of We, the People’s Bill of Rights: “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”
To quote respected property rights activist Henry Lamb who wrote in his Feb. 4, 2008 article, ‘The Feds Are Trying to Steal Your Water’: “All limitations of freedom should arise from the government that is closest to the people and should be authorized by the consent of the people whose freedom is limited. In the case of water regulations, these regulations should arise from the government that is closest to the water source and water users, and these regulations should be approved by the people whose freedom is limited by them…
“…The regulation of non-navigable waters should remain in the hands of the state and local governments, where the people whose freedom is threatened can express their concerns and approve, or reject, specific regulatory proposals…
“…When Bill Clinton moved into the White House, every resource agency of the federal government was populated with recruits from politically powerful environmental organizations. The agenda that drives these organizations is not the U.S. Constitution, not the rights of the people. Their agenda is to force the people to behave in ways they think is best for society…
“…The people, and their local and state representatives, should rise up in outrage against this congressional effort to steal their water.”
Link 1 Link 2 Link 3 Link 4“I wouldn't call it fascism exactly, but [an American] political system nominally controlled by an irresponsible, dumbed down electorate who are manipulated by dishonest, cynical, controlled mass media that dispense the propaganda of a corrupt political establishment can hardly be described as democracy either.” -Edward Zehr
More Anti-Hunting Lies
By Tom RemingtonThe Committee to Abolish Sport Hunting is continuing their campaign of spreading lies to the people. In
an editorial in the Adirondack Daily Enterprise by Joe Miele, president of CASH, says that young people are against “killing”.
“The average age of these “sportsmen” is increasing because hunting and fishing no longer appeal to the younger generation, which has shown for the most part to be uninterested in killing animals for recreation.
According to data supplied by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, since 1996 the number of anglers and hunters in New York has decreased by more than 25 percent and 5 percent, respectively. This has been occurring because sportsmen who choose to interact with wildlife in violent ways are dying or otherwise dropping out of the sport faster than new hunters and anglers can be recruited. Despite the waning interest in the blood sports, nonviolent forms of outdoor recreation are becoming more popular every year; hunting and fishing have been declining in popularity as wildlife watching in the state has been showing encouraging growth.”
It is despicable that CASH has taken some data from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service that shows the interest in hunting and fishing has declined of late and wrongfully concluded that the reason is because young people aren’t interested in killing animals. Miele offers no data to support his claim because there is none available.
Certainly, the
information that USFWS puts out that Miele refers to, does not include any conclusions as to what is affecting any of the trends referred to in this editorial. His assumptions and conclusions are absurd, unfounded and this is nothing more than a cheap trick to influence public opinion.
"The three great rights are so bound together as to be essentially one right. To give a man his life, but deny him his liberty, is to take from him all that makes his life worth living. To give him his liberty, but take from him the property which is the fruit and badge of his liberty, is to still leave him a slave." - George Sutherland, Associate Justice of the United States Supreme Court, 1921. The National Animal Identification chipping program has caused Western Horseman Magazine to hold an
online poll on the issue. Beleif in Private Property Rights says support "little guy" farmers, 4-H programs, and anyone who has a horse, cow, pig, sheep, goat, chicken, turkey, etc., on their property and take a moment to visit this poll and vote "no." NAIS requires that these folks register their property where animals are located, as well as every one of their critters, in a national data base so Big Brother can keep its beady eye on them, and it's not just the "barnyard" animals.
The
survey is on the bottom left of the
Western Horseman page.
NAISThere was a blond truck driver who had to deliver 500 penguins to the state zoo. As she was driving through the desert, she broke down. After about 3 hours she waved down a brunette trucker and offered her $500 to take the penguins to the state zoo for her. The next day the blond trucker arrived in town and saw the brunette trucker crossing the road with 500 penguins walking in single file line behind her. She jumped out of her truck and yelled, "WHATS GOIN ON? I GAVE YOU $500 TO TAKE THESE PENGUINS TO THE ZOO!" The brunette driver responded, "I did take them to the zoo. But I had some money left over so now we're going to the movies."
After having dug to a depth of 10 yards last year, New York scientists found traces of copper wire dating back 100 years and came to the conclusion that their ancestors already had a telephone network more than 100 years ago. Not to be outdone by the New Yorkers, in the weeks that followed, California scientists dug to a depth of 20 yards, and shortly after, headlines in the LA Times newspaper read: 'California archaeologists have found traces of 200 year old copper wire and have concluded that their ancestors already had an advanced high-tech communications network a hundred years earlier than the New Yorkers.' One week later, "The Post Dispatch," a local newspaper in Missouri reported the following: 'After digging as deep as 30 yards in corn fields near St Louis , Ole Johnson, a self-taught archaeologist, reported that he found absolutely nothing. Ole has therefore concluded that 300 years ago, Missouri had already gone wireless.
Americans for Responsible Recreational Access (AARA)
Their Statement of Purpose says it all: ARRA was formed to ensure that Americans are not arbitrarily denied the right to responsibly experience and enjoy the public lands that belong to the citizens of the United States. The members of ARRA, which include horseback riders, personal watercraft users, off-highway vehicle and snowmobile riders, and vacationing families, have joined together to provide input on decisions regarding land use designation, recreation opportunities, and preservation. Its members seek responsible consideration of competing activities, which are based on sound environmental principles. No alliance member believes that recreation enthusiasts have the right to exclusive, unregulated use of our national heritage, but all oppose land closure or extreme regulation, which denies responsible citizens access to public lands for multifaceted recreational pursuits.
New Site Loaded With Nevada & the Northwest’s Oral History on hunting, ranching, property rights-
It’s now on line by Cliff Gardner, a lifelong Nevadan who has spent many years of his life documenting game management atrocities throughout Nevada and the western states and its affects on hunters, cattlemen, grazing rights and private property owners.
You'll be amazed at what Mr. Gardner has compiled for our use to benefit each of us in our fields of expertise.
Look it over and appreciate its professionalism and use it in your future research and understanding of our American history.
“The Gardner Files-They Drove Us from the Land” www.gardnerfiles.com
