Sportsmen See Bad Precedent in Reopening Compromise to Protect Western Range Bird

VikingsGuy said:

I guess your passion for thoughtful discourse and thinking only lasted 27 minutes.

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onpoint said:

Show me where I said I have a passion for thoughtful discourse.
I've spent 30 years working in the resource conservation/mgmt arena and the same amount of time working behind the scenes with other dedicated hunter and anglers to better and preserve what this forum is suppose to be about - hunters who prefer to hunt on their own on PUBLIC LANDS.
I frame every post I put in here in that context - not about left, right, or don't give a shit either way.
I have no passion for thoughtful discourse, I'd rather argue with folks from Eden Prairie MN who don't live and experience smack dab everyday in the middle of all the threats which public lands recreation face. I'd rather argue and call you a lot of bad words and think I'm smarter than you. In fact I used to quite a bit.
I finally learned, that in today's ultra polarized America - it ain't worth it. I'll leave diplomacy to Ben, he does it for a living.
I and a bunch of dedicated others will continue to "do the heavy lifting" while you and some others wax philosophical (?) on the internet.
No I won't engage nice little diplomatic internet conversations with people who I believe are part of the threat against the things most important to me.
Actually, I invite you to prove me wrong - tell us about the boots on the ground - roll your sleeves up and get something done work you do to fight for hunters who prefer to hunt on public lands - and who actually live in the middle of these public lands we talk about on here all the time. I'll publicly thank you right here.
In the meantime and more importantly - it's hunting season.

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VikingsGuy said:

I can't argue the specifics of this negotiation because I wasn't there, but local interests could have easily supported a plan they privately didn't like if they feared endangered species listing even more (a threat that existed in pre-election that seems remote remote post-election). It's standard mediator technique -- scare the heck out of both sides and get them to support things they don't like under threat of something far worse. It drives settlement, but doesn't always correlate with true satisfaction and long term support.

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Ben Lamb said:

That's it: The Mule Deer Foundation, another supporter of the plans before they were hijacked, coined the phrase "What's good for the bird is good for the herd."

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Ben Lamb said:

That's how compromise works though: Everyone gets most of what they need, while not getting everything they want.

The people who have the most to lose in this effort: Individual states, wildlife management agencies, a big chunk of ag groups, sportsmen, conservation groups and some oil and gas companies are supporting the existing plans, with the desire to make fine-scale modifications.

The people who want to eliminate or make massive changes are the same ones we fight when it comes to transfer of public land, or removal of regulations to properly manage those lands in favor of only their vision. The people who actually spent years working on these plans are solidly in support of keeping them - and it's a wide array of locals who were able to put aside their partisan politics and ideologically driven positions and find common ground.

Opening these plans sets us up for the "something far worse" scenario you posit. By doing this, we are essentially telling courts that the protections put in place to avert a listing will be reduced, further strengthening the case that the bird should be listed in order to maximize protections as the gov't won't do it otherwise. It also sets up a string of listing decisions on over 100 other species who are candidates for listing due to either lack of data or data showing precipitous declines in populations and range.

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