Welcome back Hedgehog, I mean Fishermanonabike.

yah i know.....

If the only factor you take into consideration is environmental policies when voting for presidents, please, do the country a favor and never vote again. While I'm not behind Bush's environmental plan, I wasn't behind Gore's either. However, I liked every other one of Bush's policies far more than Gore. Democrats have been in power in this state for years and haven't done a damn thing to improve fish and wildlife and in fact, have done many things to make things worse. If democrats can't fix things on a state level, what makes you think they'd be able to do anything on a national level? Clinton didn't do jacksh*t.

sure clinton might not have done as much as he could have ...ie. jacksh*t, but isnt doing nothing better than doing something that is bad for the enviroment?

The right man is in office! If Gore would have won, he would be sitting in a corner rocking back and forth while sucking his thumb over this terrorist crap that is going on.

Yup. Gore was a carbon copy of Clinton and under Clinton, bin Laden attacked the WTC towers in 93, bombed the U.S. embassies in Africa, bombed a U.S. barraks in Saudi Arabia, and attacked the U.S.S. Cole in Yemen. What was Clinton's response? We blew up a pharmacutical factory in Sudan. At one point, the government of Sudan offered us Bin Laden but Clinton turned them down. Also, during Clinton's last year in office, the CIA knew exactly where Bin Laden was and had a plan to take him out but Clinton wouldn't give them the go ahead. If Gore were president, we'd probably be sending bin Laden U.S. tax dollars to try to appease him.

Yeah baby, the #$&? is flying now. Blame Bush for 100 years of environmental mismanagement if if makes you feel better. At least Bush has been consisitant. He has been a strong supporter of STATES RIGHTS AND RESPONSIBILITIES since he was gov of Texas. Do you really want the Feds in control of WA fishing? Ohh.. just a minute... I'm rethinking this... maybe you're right... I'd rather have Bush making the decisions(never mind that he just signs or vetos what the Congress sends to him) than gov locke.

Jack and Jacob:

You are digressing. Osama bin Laden had NOTHING to do with our current environmental issues, so I will not take the time to point out that one of you is horribly misinformed and the other is completely baseless.

ET (liked your movie but refuse to play $25 to see it remastered with my family, sorry):

I don't recall anyone blaming the current administration for the mismanagement of the last 100 years as, obviously, that would be ridiculous. Instead, we are talking about his actions over the last 14 months that have obviously had a decidedly anti-environment bend to them. From pushing to open up that plot of land in Alaska for oil drilling (would take YEARS to develop and supply only 6 months of oil) to appointing a woman to the head of the EPA whose trying to limit the amount that a company can be charged to help clean a superfund site that THEY polluted. There's a larger list of his "accomplishments" that I have at home that I'd be happy to put up here for those who want to know.

In short, Bush has proven that he will completely disregard environmental concerns so that his corporate buddies that paid for his campaign will get paid back tenfold. Anyone who has so far tried to argue against this fact has not shown where this is incorrect and has, instead, mounted a failed effort to deflect it off to some other unrelated tangent.

Also, don't get me started with Clinton. That ******* was more right of center than some moderate Republicans, and otherwise would have BEEN a Republican except for some leftover beliefs from his college days somehow sticking around. Not that he DID anything with them.

Jacob F,

Maybe I went a little overboard. You know how it is with these threads. I suppose not everyone can be a Pro-Fish voter. ? However, I stand by my assertion that the republican party (as a whole) is anti-environment/anti-fish protection. Here in Oregon, the only reason we aren't having the same degree of wild fish problems that you're currently having in WA is Gov. Kitzhaber. The republican -led state legislature is not merely failing to come up with better fish protection, they're actively trying to roll fish protections backward. One fine example from this past leg. session was a republican-led initiative that tried to put an end to finclipping of anadromous fish in Oregon. Seems it costs money and if you cannot easily identify a wild fish, who's going to notice that they're disappearing? Their logic was shared by who?........The tribes! Tah Dah!!! If you can't identify wild fish, then who's going to mind them showing up in their nets? The tribes wanted more fish to net (inc. wild ones). The republicans wanted less fish protection for industry. The only reason they've not succeeded in these cases is the govorner's veto/threatened veto (and now, of course, ESA). Kitz has exercised more veto's than any gov. in state history and I've thanked him for it. He was the only governor or senator from the NW to call for Snake River Dam breaching. (He took a lot of political heat for that one, but got a standing ovation at the 2001 Trout Unlimited Nat. convention, which he spoke at). He also co-wrote Oregon's salmon recovery plan, which is aimed largely at protecting wild/native fish stocks. With Oregon's senators, Wyden(D) has not really taken a stand on fish (good or bad), but Smith(R) has sided with the anti-environment republicans in almost every case, including stating that removing Snake River dams should not even be considered, much less debated. Smith thinks that people who want the government to consider removing dams to help native fish are "extremists", his word, not mine.

I'm not saying that the dem's are policy genius's or environmental saviors, and I certainly don't think that about Nader either. Frankly, many Dem's (Gore and Locke included) have dropped the ball on environmental policy. What I'm saying is that, in my state and in the nation as well, the republican party as a whole has been a political enemy of wild fish and if republican voters who care about wild fish don't know this, they should and they should let their opinions be known.

Seems like you're having the same problem down there with Republicans that we're having here with Democrats. They don't finclip all hatchery fish here either because the tribes want to net more. Then, they ran Bern Shanks out of office, the first good director of fish and wildlife we've had in years and Locke appointed Koenings as the new director -- the former manager of commercial fishing in Alaska. Guess where his interests lie. Basically, when it comes to voting, I look at the big picture. Social issues, budget plans, defense policies, etc. Bush beat Gore in spades in every other aspect, IMO.

Estimates indicate that there is most likely near 10 years worth of oil up there, not 6 months.

Jacob F,

We know what we said, you don't need to repeat it. Just makes the screen take longer to pull up. The 6 months D. Jackson mentioned is if ANWR were the sole source of oil our country used (the oil reserves there are about the equivalent of 6 months of our current usage). It would take 10 years to get it online.

Regarding the democrats in WA, sounds like you all need to give 'em hell! I cannot speak for Washington (State) (At least now that Slade Gorton is gone...That Rebublican was one of the most anti-fish politicians the NW has ever seen! ). I can only speak currently on Oregon and the Fed. government, and I already have. Regarding the voting record of politicians in Washington State, do you have a state league of conservation voters? If you do, you could see a breakdown of how the different parties vote on different environment/nat. resources issues. Reading that report makes you a much more educated voter.

P.S. Not that it really makes any difference or that you should know.......I'm an independent.

Jacob:

Here's the facts: the USGS estimates that there are 10.4 billion barrels of oil harvestable in the ANWR. Sounds like a lot until you realize that during the 10 months ending October 2001 the US used an average of 19.6541 million barrels of oil per DAY. Thanks to my Windows calculator that tells me that there is roughly 528 days of oil available up there if we were to use ONLY Alaska oil. By conservative numbers the US imports 58% of its oil consumed, so let's use the Alaskan oil to replace imports. That takes us to just over two years worth of oil. Comparatively a short fix, but just long enough for Bush's oil buddies to make a killing.

Now, the other thing to consider is that in 1995 a ban on selling Alaska oil overseas was lifted. Current Alaskan delegates are against any future ban, so with that in mind are we sure that this oil will help the US situation? Oh, it'll help the oil companies who have been posting impressive profits gained from last years gas price inflation.

Also factor in the recent production increases from Russia. Their goal for the near future is to wean America from the OPEC teat, and with the low prices along with the instabilities in the Middle East, America appears to be very willing to accept Russian oil.

As a side note, I went to the Alaska National Wildlife Refuge website several months ago to study this stuff and it talked about how there wasn't enough oil up there to make the expense of exploration worth it, and boasted pictures of mountains, wetlands, and prairies to show that the image spoonfed to us of a vast wasteland was incorrect. Today I went back to the site and those pictures are all but gone. The front page is this red, white, and blue patriotic thing urging voters to write Tom Daschle to encourage him to open the ANWR to "responsible development". The pictures section is now largely a group of shots of the Alaska Pipeline, refineries, and great expanses of nothing. Nice changeover. If you read the pdf file available on the site about how much oil is available up there, by the time they're done bloating the numbers the end up with over 40 billion barrels. Funny how a website representing a wildlife refuge can change so quickly and so drastically. I even like how they added "oil" to the meta keywords.

So there's the numbers. Hardly seems worth tearing that place apart just for 2 years worth of oil.

Getting back to the original post --

A lot of times when broad brush one-size-fits-all federal legislation is implemented in the real world at the local level, there is a lot of stupid BS that does nothing to furthur the intent of the original law - it only causes needless misery.

When I have looked beyond the surface and past the knee-jerk reactions, I usually see that the Bush Administration's main goal is to minimize the stupid BS - accomplish the environmental goal without screwing the economy any more than necessary....

SlabQuest,

Do you read the papers? Before 9/11, the editorial pages of papers across the nation were full of info blasting the Bush admin. and surprised at the magnitude of the rollbacks to environmental protections on the Bush agenda. The one issue I know details of best (because I'm in an organization that's fighting the administration) is water flows and dam removal. Bush isn't trying to cut out the BS, he's FULL of BS. How about his saying "We need fish friendly turbines" on the Snake River? There's no such thing! The engineers and biologists say it cannot be done (they ought to know, they've been trying to come up with them for decades). When discussing removing the dams, Bush won't even discuss it. When the alternative NMFS/Corpes plan came up in his budget, he appropriated $1. ONE DOLLAR!

That's not BS? Give me a break!

Dammit Dave,

After all the crapola I gave you over on the F4 thread, and then you deliver gems like that. Makes me feel bad.

Gore is bad, bud Bush is worse.
Locke is bad, but Carlson would've been worse.
And I'm through talking about simple Eyman and his simpler followers.

Man, and I thought I had until November to get all wound up.

Wow, this topic certainly "shook the behive". I am against all the liberal handouts the democrats want to give everyone. I believe that a person should get what they earn, not what they are handed because of their gender or race. That being said, could not vote for Bush because he made it very clear from the beginning that he cared very little for the health of our planet.

We are now in a place where many of our salmonid populations are at or near extinction, how much longer can we wait? For those against more Federal regulation, please take a look at where "local control" has gotten us. People are for the most part greedy, don't expect them to "voluntarily" implement actions that will benefit the environement at their own expense, thus the need for intervention. Our farm programs are a perfect example, CRP and CREP, WRP, etc. Although there are landowners that voluntarily take the steps to protect stream corridors, water quality, etc., the vast majority did (and have done) nothing until being paid a fee to do so.

Bush is a good "war president" I believe but sincerely doubt you will find many "salmon" voting for him. Thanks!

RM

How can you say Carlson would have been worse than Do-Absolutely-Nothing-About-Anything Locke? Carlson would have removed commercial and tribal netting from the state as well as fix numerous transportation problems. Locke will be remembered as the governer who chased a bat around in the Governer's Mansion.

Jacob:

Never NEVER use the campaign promise of a losing candidate in a "so and so would have done this if they would have won" scenerio. We all are painfully aware of the value of campaign promises once the person gets into office. They often seem to disappear right before our eyes, don't they?

Stew, go back to your corner and wimper yourself to sleep little boy. Had no intent of bringing that stewpid flotilla 4 crap over here. If you noticed there fella, it is all light hearted fun. Do you know what fun is Stew? And Stew, don't need you to agree with me at all. I can hold my own without charity support.

Fishermanonabike. Gore never won Florida. All the recounts showed that. Give it a rest. Be glad we have a little backbone in office.

Just don't blame Bush for the distruction of the environment yet. He will need 4 MORE YEARS at least.