Wetlands, mudders and atv's...





This week was this story from the Strib on a mudrun turned wetland violation. In any story, the most interesting and frightening addition is reading the comments. They range from the bizarre to the rational, but it often shows the scary part of our society. This one brought out the best; deranged mudheads, private property rights nutballs and absolutely ignorant fools. Two comments stand out, however. One writes on how rural or small town people often assume they know more about nature than city people. That I often find is true. Just because you have a bear in your garbage, live on a gravel road and deer hunt doesn't mean you know squat. Working in resource management, one sees this all the time. Horse people converting forest and wetlands into pasture, then years later you see nothing but a rocky, muddy, weedy mess. Small farmers growing corn on clay soils next to a stream and needing the evil gov'mint to come in a put up a deer fence at taxpayer expense. The local guy who decides he is going to "improve drainage" by ditching and damming. Most, frankly, have the biological knowledge of a treated fence post. What they really know is what they wish to know so they can justify what they want to do, an often universal human trait. But out of the mouths of lunatics often comes legitimate questions, and in this case the offender himself asks one:" Why do Atv's get to play and I don't?". I could get technical, for in this case wetlands law applied and the event was a frigging nightmare, but the question is legitimate. The DNR, bowing to political pressure, and so have other government units as the counties and feds, created an entire system for atv's and vehicles. Oh yes, it is regulated, and most of it follows existing road systems or other existing networks, but that begs the question on how the entire operation is justified, and why is the same agency obligated to protect resources not just allowing, but actively developing systems that are inherently ecologically destructive with no legitimate economic or social purpose. It is one thing to manage timber or minerals for economic reasons( though the giveaways are ridiculous and offensive), and another to say let's build a trail system for something we know is ecologically destructive and consists of nothing but people tearing up the woods and burning gas. The above pictures are not a bad example..that is normal for what is seen everywhere. At a resources meeting last week, there were the usual atv people present, and when faced with any evidence, the usual arguments popped up. They are just bad apples. They need more places to go or else they will go there illegally. Here is a thought experiment. Picking another illegal, inherently destructive activity, perhaps lets say illegally playing in wetlands with heavy equipment: "People get great enjoyment being in nature while playing with heavy equipment and altering wetlands; if we do not allow them to do it on public land of adequate size, they will just do it illegally. If we use part of the transportation tax to develop places where citizens can run excavators and enjoy the outdoors while moving hydric soils around and digging holes, they will just do it wherever they please and create problems". Pardon the absurdity, but that is what we have now.

From the local news...


This is a story about a drunken fight that ended in a killing and the lunacy that surrounds it. By lunacy, I mean the complete delusion most people react with. A tragedy it is, yes. but there have been other words used...cowardice and evil are two of them. There is one fundamental aspect no one seems to ask the story: Why was a drunk guy walking around with a gun? He had been booted from the casino for being too drunk. He goes to a house, tries to crash a party, gets booted out, starts a fight, gets beaten down not once but again, pulls a gun..I remind everyone, HE pulled the gun first, then gets shot by the guy dominating the fight. For a year now, I have listened to the word tragedy used in this young man's life, but no one in public has dared ask the question..what was he doing running around town drunk with a gun? My only explanations are two elements. The killer, another young man, is black, and therefore suspect. The other is mass delusion as people do not wish to state the obvious: He got himself shot by being drunk, obnoxious, having a gun and starting multiple fights.

posted at whitepine today

People who have not read that little thing called the Constitution...

In western Minnesota, three kids were suspended for not participating in the pledge of allegiance. That this policy existed despite the numerous court cases forbidding such forced exercises is only one frightening part of the story. It is the sheer muddied ignorance of the entire original basis of our government which should cause everyone to immediately return to the Declaration of Independence, the Federalist papers and the Constitution and begin reading. A telling statement is the mother having to justify her child not engaging in the pledge as " not being defiant against America". I am going to apply a thought experiment; replace the word America with another country's, for example, in an English colonial court in 1775 having to argue that " John Adams is not being defiant against England." It is telling that none of the participants can get past several assumptions. One is that worship of the state is a good thing, which it isn't ( read horrifying radicals like Jefferson or Madison), or that enforced rituals of patriotism ( at its very essence the true root of fascism) are legitimate. The argument then breaks down into a justification for behavior despite how bad it is. That is not the point; our entire system was founded on the principle that the state exists at our behest, not as an entity unto itself that does no wrong ( a truly fascist concept). The government we have, despite its many flaws, originated with the concept that the state was not a god, that the state derived its powers from its population, and was only a political system one participated in. It was not meant to be worshiped unto itself. That is what is happening now, however; the state and its symbols whether flags or recitations, are treated to be an object of worship. The sheer blindness of this false patriotism is best expressed in the story itself, where the community ed instructor proclaims the validity of the entire enterprise based on his serving in the military. I am sorry buddy, but you are not the only one who served, and that merely shows how blind and stupid you are. This was not meant to be a place where people blindly worshiped flags and treated the state as an arm of god, something so very against the very nature of our origins the moment it is mentioned in public the speaker should be humiliated for public stupidity. I will refer people to the original writings, as they are readily available. One very wonderful document is Washington's farewell address, really a public letter, where he warns against standing armies. Ultimately, this case is about whether the state or its people are most important. It is to be a state of its citizens, and not the the citizens of the state...

The war on science..and the war on Resource Management Anyone who works in Natural Resources may tell you now, if they actually know anything and are actually committed to the work ( rather than just working at a job), that it is probably the area truly under attack by the right wingers. Cuts have been abundant at a time when resources are being pressured the most, and they and their supporters not only dislike the rational inquiry of science, but the application of this to resource management, or anything that questions their grabbing a dollar at the public expense. The same is true in this region, where economic hopes are placed at more and more extraction and exploitation. This has happened before, and memories are short here. They do not seem to remember the difference between 1978 and 1984, and they are falling for the same again. Relying yet again on one industry is not going to solve the communities' problems...in essence, we are going to destroy more of the place so for another 20 years someone can drive a pickup and an ATV, just as the seventies were spent on oodles of snowmobiles and muscle cars, all to be sold off at cut price in the 1980's. So where does resources fall into this? Our objective is to make sure that use is sustainable, but whole divisions and departments counter that, and actively help and subsidize the very industries that destroy the most...and mining is one primary problem. The regulations do not acknowledge the reality that every time someone destroys just a little bit, it adds up. We, hopefully and eventually, will acknowledge this, that the strip malling of America must cease, and that we must eventually say no to developers and ourselves. It is always interesting to me how some express their love for nature, then they plow it, pour concrete and asphalt, build a 3000 sq foot "cabin", replete with sat dish and air conditioning, roam around the lake on a leviathan pontoon boat, then tell me how they " love nature". Loving someone is not destroying them..it is allowing them to exist. The state of course, as a politically driven beast, cannot challenge these precepts. It can only attempt to control and modify the lunatic behavior of our society...one that experiences nature by driving, taking a picture in front of a sign, sampling the local coffee shop, purchasing a t-shirt, then dumping the garbage in the local ditch. All species go extinct, and most likely we will as all do, or we'll split off into different species...and maybe much of this will be forgotten when the stars burn out...