LMD August 2011

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Livestock “The greatest homage we can pay to truth is to use it.”

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AUGUST 15, 2011 • www. aaalivestock . com

Volume 53 • No. 8

A Greenie’s Manifesto by Lee Pitts

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NEWSPAPER PRIORITY HANDLING

by LEE PITTS

Dating Myself

– JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL

irst we had the “service economy” where we were all supposed to make a living providing services to each other. So we exported our good jobs overseas and imported our cars, toys, food, manufactured goods and the laborers who would actually do the changing of the motel bed sheets. And this our great leaders called “globalization.” Anyone with half a brain could see how well that idea worked out. (Admittedly, that would still leave our “leaders” in the dark.) The economists plotting our globalized future forgot one thing: that the people needing to be waited on would need jobs to make enough money to require those services. So, it’s back to the drawing board. Now we are told that we’ll all prosper and create jobs by transitioning from a service economy to a tourist economy. The Department of Interior (DOI) will create jobs providing meals, lodging and entertainment to all the tourists who will flock to the wild west to see roaming bands of wild horses, packs of wolves and redheaded salamanders. Or whatever. That’s the plan anyway, as outlined in a report released this summer called The Department of Interior’s Economic Contribu-

Riding Herd

“Timing has a lot to do with the outcome of a rain dance.” tions. Personally I don’t think the “tourist economy” is going to work out any better than the “service economy” did, and for the same reason. Unless you think our salvation is going to be the importation of more Japanese tourists with cameras hanging around their necks. The rest of us are going to have to earn a living before we can take vacations, and that’s getting harder everyday with the

government getting in our way. If the feds follow through you can expect fewer cows and more tour buses in our future.

Something’s Missing This report reads like a Greenie’s dream, an Environmentalist’s Manifesto, if you will. It will provide powerful ammunition for the greenies to get rid of the public lands rancher once and for all. The only problem is that

the bullets the folks at DOI are shooting at rural folks are all blanks. It’s a contrived report designed to do one thing and that is to increase the power and scope of the federal government. According to the Interior Department, they produce the oil and gas, the beef and lamb and the timber harvested on public lands. And we thought they only got in our way! Here’s a sampling lifted directly from the executive summary of the report: “The Department of the Interior plays a substantial role in the U.S. economy, supporting over two million jobs and $363 billion in economic activity for 2010.” Geez, I thought Exxon, cowboys and rugged guys and gals with chainsaws produced the oil, gas, beef and timber, little did I know that it was actually produced by the professional bureaucrats in Washington in continued on page two

by KAREN BUDD-FALEN

The $206,098,920 Endangered Species Act Settlement Agreements — Is all that paperwork worth it? The headlines question whether Congress and the President can make an agreement on raising the debt ceiling or will America stop paying military servicemen and social security recipients. I have a solution to the dilemma . . . n July 12, 2011, the Justice Department and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (“FWS”) announced “an historic agreement” which will require the American taxpayers to pay $206,098,920 to just process the paperwork deciding whether to include over 1,000 plants, bugs, worms, and other assorted creatures on the Endangered Species list. None of this money goes to on-the-ground conservation; this taxpayer funding is just to process petitions filed by only two, out of dozens, of radical environmental groups who think newts and moths are more important than the elderly or our children. The average social security beneficiary makes $21,600 a year and a basic military recruit makes a little over $15,000 per year. Our elected officials contemplated not paying these Americans while the Justice Department is readily agreeing to spend an average of

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$100,690 per individual species listing and $345,000 per individual proposed critical habitat designation for over 1,053 creatures. And to add insult to injury, the Justice Department has agreed that these two groups “prevailed” in the litigation and will pay their attorney fees in an amount that has not been disclosed. Has America lost its collective mind? These two settlement agreements are the culmination of what is known as the Endangered Species Act (“ESA”) multi-district litigation. This case was formed in 2010 by combining 13 federal court cases filed by either the WildEarth Guardians (“WEG”) or the Center for Biological Diversity (“CBD”) regarding 113 species. On May 10, 2011, the FWS announced its settlement agreement with the WEG with the promise that the agreement would help the continued on page four

he world is changing so fast these days that it’s leaving many old coots like me in the past, and I seem to be having problems communicating with the younger generation. I am ONLY 59 years old but I have to write carefully because I continually date myself by using references that young people can’t relate to. This was pointed out to me by a class of third graders recently who wrote me wonderful individual letters after their teacher had read to them one of my essays. Besides their kind words the little nippers asked questions like, “What’s a beatnik?” And “What is carbon paper?” They also reminded me that kids today play video games, not marbles. Now I know what my grandparents felt like when, as a child, I asked them why they went outside to the outhouse when a bathroom would have been much closer? It’s like I speak a different language than younger folks today whose reading consists primarily of text messages. I realize I’m either going to have to enter the 21st century and acquaint myself with today’s culture, or find another line of work. But there’s nothing I’m still qualified to do, as the oil patch now runs on computers instead of roustabouts, and cowboys ride four wheelers instead of horses. But just like Hopalong, Tonto, Hoss, and the Lone Ranger, I’ve never even been on an ATV. They’ve taken the word “farmer” out of the FFA and the Colonel out of Kentucky Fried Chicken. Now it’s just “KFC” to anyone under the age of 30. I feel like I am outliving my audience as young readers today may know who Darth Vader is but they’ve never heard of Deputy Dawg, Dick Tracy, Elliot Ness, The Duke of Earl, Broadway Joe, Bosley, Buckwheat, Bozo, Bogart, Bullwinkle or Bo Diddley. In their frame of reference Cher never had Sonny, Dale didn’t have to compete for continued on page six

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