Feeding the Federal Behemoth 

Federal Lands or Royal Lands ? 

As a controversy brews in SE Colorado over the planned forced acquisition of
a half million acres of private property for the purpose of military
training it would be wise to take note of the 800 lb. gorilla unmentioned in
the corner.  I refer to OVER A HALF BILLION ACRES OF LAND CURRENTLY OWNED
(not "eased" or "partnered" or "cooperatively managed" with others) "OWNED"
by the Federal government.  This represents more than 25% of the entire
United States .

A thumbnail, and therefore understandable, sketch of this ownership is very
hard for average citizens to obtain.  It is avoided at meetings and in
reports and in speeches as we are shunted from one emergency ("save" this
"critter" or that "landmark" or that "ecosystem", etc.) to another.  The
reason it is so studiously avoided is that you may not feel the urgency or
start sweating until your politician or friendly bureaucrat explains that
more money and more private land placed in the Refuge, Park or Forest System
is your only hope if you realize how much land is already "owned" by Uncle
Sam.  So sit down and ladies no swooning, as I try to display the "Federal
Lands" ownership.

US Refuges                                                              96
Million Acres

US Parks                                                                  83
Million Acres

US Forests                                                             193
Million Acres

US Bureau of Land Management*                (Many Million of Acres)*

US Dept. of Defense                                               27,824,282
Acres

Total Federal Land Ownership                             563,128,072 Acres

(From General Services Administration)              (Over 25% of the Nation)

*These totals are hard, even for an old bureaucrat like me to find.  I never
did find the BLM totals so it was a question of growing older looking for
some hidden numbers or write something.  I opted for the latter.

Now Forest Service employees hardly ever transfer to the Park Service.  US
Fish and Wildlife managers are likely inserted employees (by politicians)
totally unfamiliar with the Refuges much less the Forests or Parks.  BLM
employees lose any hope for career advancement if the transfer to another
agency.  The Forest Service is in the Department of Agriculture and the Fish
and Wildlife and Park Services are in the Department of the Interior under a
different Assistant Secretary of the Interior than the Bureau of Land
Management.  They all have more contact and work with UN bureaucrats than
with the Department of Defense. They each have their own government
Solicitors (lawyers) working as much as any bureaucrat to advance their
narrow responsibilities.  They each compete fiercely for Federal dollars.
They each secretly draft legislation for "friendly" Congressional staffers
that then clip coupons from their boss (Congressman Snodgrass or Senator
Belch) who "introduces" it and get accolades (money and votes) from the rest
of us. Each agency has it's own fervid "supporters' ("Associations",
"Friends", "Societies", etc.) who whine when they aren't fed "more" and
lobby when anyone even suggests "less" or something "different".

I submit that they are exactly like Royal Lands and Lords under bygone Kings
and modern dictators like Mugabe of Zimbabwe.

"Our" Federal lands are under the "administration" of the President and
"funded" by the Congress for special interests just like an English King
"gives" Lord Norfolk those lands and Woolsey those lands over there and Lord
Cumberland the lands over there.  These lands are rewards to supporters, and
the ownerships and rights of others living there are secondary to the King's
wishes and the desires of his favored Lords.  So unless there is treason or
a new supporter to reward, each Lord keeps what HE has, fiercely defends HIS
"rights", and constantly seeks to add to "HIS" estate.  These Lords would no
more donate their holdings or parts of their holdings to the King or some
other Lord (without some scheme to wind up with more eventually) than they
would surrender their own fortunes or families unless there was an extreme
emergency that threatened THEM.  It is the same with these Federal agencies.

They each have their own " Mission " and "regulations" and "authorizing
legislation" and "operations".  They each differ such that any thought of
them having anything in common never crosses anyone's mind.  They are
however being blended by radicals implementing things like "Critical
Habitat" and "Wilderness" and "Roadless" and "Native Ecosystem" and
"Invasive Species" and "Entrance Fee" and other such legislation meant to
close the areas to human uses and resource management as originally
envisioned for setting them aside.  This "blending goes unmentioned though
as everything fro imaginary plant and animal communities and benign
predators are touted as "necessary".

So, in 2007, the US Army wants to condemn and acquire a half million acres
of private property in SE Colorado for training under circumstances similar
to the Middle East and central Asia .  When I attended Utah State University
years ago (they no longer claim me since I am a global warming and Federal
power doubter) I was told we had more Iranian students than any other
University because Utah was the closest state to Iranian weather, soils, and
agricultural practices in the US .  It is therefore reasonable for the US
Army to train somewhere in the West if they want to duplicate the Middle
East .  But, they already OWN 40-45% of the Western states (over 80% in one)!

How foolish of me though.  Those aren't DEFENSE lands, those lands BELONG to
Lord Parks and Lord Forests and Lord Refuges and Lord BLM.  I apologize my
Lords for suggesting that YOUR? Lands be made available for training
necessary to defend the Nation.  "'WE' (all the refuge, park, forest
supporters) didn't get' these (refuges, parks, forests) for artillery
ranges" (as though the ranchers of Colorado ranched for generations to hold
the land until the DoD "needed it"?)

Think carefully about how absurd this Federal estate has become.  I know the
hunters are thinking they could "lose" all the marshes (before the radicals
shift them all to "native" uplands) and the historians are all swooning
about their "viewsheds" and "roads that must be closed" and the 'foresters?"
(are there any "foresters" left?) are all atwitter about loggers "denuding
the forests and causing extinctions while ranchers graze the land down to
nothing and erosion completes the job of desertification and global warming
to destroy our 'ecosystem'".  We can't manage any National; Park for any
wildlife use or sustainable resource use.  We are closing more and more of
the Forests and Refuges to access and use and management.  We can't touch
the energy resources under any of these lands.  We are squeezing out
ranchers and loggers and strangling rural communities with deadly and
harmful predators in areas that we then propose buying up for a song to
close down more areas.  But I digress.

The Federal government could find and use at least 20 appropriate Army
training grounds in the Federal or Royal Estate that would be as good or
better than seizing any more private property in Colorado or elsewhere.  If
the President (or King) is loathe to tell HIS Secretaries (or Lords) or the
Secretaries (or Lords) are afraid to anger "THEIR" specific SUPPORTERS then
we need a new King and American Lords that understand that THOSE ARE NOT
THEIR LANDS BUT OURS!  When "WE the People" "need" a place to train our Army
and they can't come up with locations while owning a half Billion Acres or
25 % of the US and half of the West then we are being served by dumber (like
a fox) bureaucrats and politicians than even an old bureaucrat like me sees.

We have come a long way from the Constitutional authorization (and by
limiting it, admonition) for the Congress to have limited authority to
establish  "Post Offices and post Roads"; "a Navy" and "make Rules for the
Government and Regulation of the land and naval Forces"; and "exercise like
Authority over all Places purchased by the Consent of the Legislature of the
State in which the Same shall be, for the Erection of Forts, Magazines,
Arsenals, dock-Yards, and other needful Buildings".  And the thing is you
really don't have to be a Supreme Court Justice or Ivy League lawyer to see
just how far we have come.

Jim Beers
2 May 2007

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- Jim Beers is a retired US Fish & Wildlife Service Wildlife Biologist,
Special Agent, Refuge Manager, Wetlands Biologist, and Congressional Fellow.
He was stationed in North Dakota , Minnesota , Nebraska , New York City , and
Washington DC .  He also served as a US Navy Line Officer in the western
Pacific and on Adak , Alaska in the Aleutian Islands .  He has worked for the
Utah Fish & Game, Minneapolis Police Department, and as a Security
Supervisor in Washington , DC .  He testified three times before Congress;
twice regarding the theft by the US Fish & Wildlife Service of $45 to 60
Million from State fish and wildlife funds and once in opposition to
expanding Federal Invasive Species authority.  He resides in Centreville ,
Virginia with his wife of many decades.