Well this seems to be a hot topic and very timely.
First off I believe salmon do bite when in the stream. How else can you explain a baited kwikfish out fishing an unbaited kwikfish.
Or the fact that I catch salmon in low water conditions using a corky with eggs PLUNKED. OR the fact I have deep hooked chinook with spinners so far down I can't even see the dam thing.
Or the fact I have seen salmon come across the pool to attack a spinner. They weren't getting backed out of the pool at all or even close.
There seems to be a gray area in our regs that allows the use of a lining techinque that appears to be legitimate setup. Sure fish will also miss the lure and get hooked outside of the mouth as they turn on it. But it really is the intent of how the rigging is fished that determines whether it was snagged or not. We are not mind readers so we don't really know for sure all the time.
Fish can be snagged or lined with virtually every set up we fish with including fly gear. The ones that are out of the ordinary fishing setups can be regulated against (6 ft leaders on drift gear). So the only real way to stop the snagging is to enforce the area of the fish where the hook is located. The head region including the gill plates seems to be a realistic answer.

In B.A.S.S. tournaments fish hooked outside the mouth must be released even if you saw it bite!! So the next step to stiffer regulations is to make it legal to keep only fish hooked on the inside of the mouth. This would make us release fish that were legitimately caught. But I don't think it would stop the snaggers and just hurt the honest fishermen with good intentions.

Thats my rant
Tight Lines

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Marty
Steelheader.net marty@steelheader.net