Same Old Cheap Wine - Beware The Reformer


Things you learn as a "baby bureaucrat". You never question a "Chief" or
"Director".  Unless you are a Ph.D., you always agree with what a Ph. D.
says. No one except foresters ever question what emanates from the US Forest Service just as no one but wildlife biologists ever question US Fish and Wildlife Service emanations.  Finally; titles, awards, and medals indicate
wisdom, not as some would have it, pliability.  Alas, I am about to break
this code of the bureaucrat.

The top half of page A18 (the Commentary page) of the 14 July Washington
Times features an article titled "A future for forests and wildlife" by Jack
Ward Thomas.  "Jack Ward Thomas, Ph.D., holds degrees in wildlife biology
and forestry.  He served 27 years in Forest Service Research, three years as
chief of the Forest Service under President Clinton, and 10 years as the
Boone and Crockett Professor of Conservation at the University of Montana.
He has received numerous awards including the Aldo Leopold Medal from the Wildlife Society."


Essentially the good professor/chief/researcher bemoans the current
condition of public and private forests in America.  Lack of timber
production, declining biodiversity, and "forest health are "problems".
Endangered Species Act impacts are praised while pointing out that "total
preservation" "is not tenable in the long-term".  He instructs us that "A
return to totally economic-driven forestry is not viable" as he tells of
"the visual effects of clear-cutting".  (He ignores the decline in access
caused by Wilderness and Roadless declarations, the enormous costs of
fighting the increasingly uncontrollable fires, the loss of big game to
wolves and other predators and the loss of fishing opportunity to Invasive
Species and Native Species chicanery in "protected" woodlands.)  All this
while simultaneously saying we have become dependent on "places beyond our borders to provide our wood - places with far less resources and knowledge about how to manage forests responsibly. When we import wood products, we export not only environmental consequences but jobs and dollars."

But, once again, he has "the answer"!  He goes on, "It seems the perfect
time for a new forestry." He proclaims, "We have the know-how, technology,
and trained professionals to do the job."  His thesis, "This new forestry
must focus on the landscape and accept the need to provide myriad values
from our forests, including biodiversity, wood products, clean air and
water, and recreation. By doing so, and harvesting more trees from its
private forest-lands, our nation can enhance biodiversity and lessen the
effect of our consumption on forests around the world.  Were the most
fertile lands (usually in private ownership) intelligently managed more
intensely for wood production the pressure could be relieved on less
productive lands."  There is more but it is merely more of the same and
frankly it upsets me.  This is like seeing some Prohibition street preacher
in the Park ranting for contributions about twenty minutes after seeing him
drinking in a bar.

The good Doctor was the darling of the environmental extremists when
appointed out of nowhere to be Chief of the Forest Service.  He oversaw
radical changes from reducing timber harvest and eliminating access to
reducing hunting and fishing in favor of illusory biological contrivances
like native ecosystems and desertification.  He led the way as all the
federal conservation agencies erased education requirements and experience as hiring and promotion factors to both give themselves bonuses for race and sex preferences and to stack the bureaucracy with ecosystem "preservers" to replace natural resource "managers".  This was during the period when his appointee counterparts in the US Fish and Wildlife Service were stealing Millions of Excise Tax Dollars from State wildlife agencies to do thing Congress specifically rejected like introducing wolves into Yellowstone and opening political offices in area of environmental activism.

- So "total preservation" "is not tenable in the long run"?  Why didn't you
tell your political pals that when you were Chief?  Every knowledgeable
forester and wildlifer knew that but you had a career to consider.

- So depending for wood from "beyond our borders" is "morally bankrupt,
economically unfeasible, and wasteful."  Oh really!  When did this little
bit of common sense dawn on you?  Everyone that was marginalized in the
bureaucracy during those years said the same thing.

- So "The idea of letting nature take its course is seductive but has
significant downsides."  Weren't you the great harbinger of all the "stop
use and let nature take its course philosophy"?

- So now you are concerned about "exporting environmental consequences" and "jobs and dollars"?  Oh spare me.  Even college sophomores in Economics classes saw that consequence when you were touting the policies that took us so far down this road.

- So you want "a new forestry"?  You believe we have "trained personnel"?
What rock have you been hiding under?  The Universities have stopped
teaching, researching, or explaining forestry and wildlife management.  They
are reorganized into global warming and satellite telemetry centers to
monitor world climates and mine whatever topic federal grant money becomes available to explore.

- So you want "the most fertile lands (usually in private ownership)" to be
"intelligently managed more intensely for wood production".  What about all
those The Nature Conservancy Easements that preclude that and all the
environmental restrictions and requirements that you and all your fellow
appointees supported and encouraged?  Weren't the National Forests purchased and set aside for that, in spite of all your Forest Service policies to the contrary? Who are you to infer that "private ownership" is not
"intelligently managed"?  Quick, your socialist colors are showing, someone
is liable to think you aren't really the sort of guy that thinks Americans
are "owners" and not subject to the latest government controls.

- Lastly you state, "The old forestry is largely dead."  That is like saying
"the old chemistry is largely dead."  Only those engrossed in solipsism
believe or can make such a statement.  You and all your political and
environmental chums have perverted forestry just as you have perverted
biology to your own purpose.  You see it as a piece of clay that can mean
one thing today and another tomorrow depending on who is in power and what it means to YOU.  The truth is Doctor that forestry and biology are
collected facts, not opinions to be massaged.  They are information and
known consequences available for people to consult when making decisions
that you may or may not agree with. Your policies created the very
conditions you now bemoan as you offer your newest concoction as a remedy.
The only thing dying is all the environmental promises made in the last 35
years about an imaginary ideal ecosystem that never has existed and never
will exist.  Forestry, like biology, will eventually be recognized again,
the only question is will the policies you pushed destroy the forests and
the nation in the meantime.

Enough.  Whether this guy is looking for a job with the next Administration
or just trying to cleanse his "legacy", I for one am having no part of it.
His "new forestry" is as phony as his old policies.  Looking to these
disproved forestry and "new wave ideas" as solutions rivals the perfidy of
all this moaning about "becoming energy independent with windmills" while
leaving oil in the ground all over and off our shores and tying up all our
coal and natural gas resources and opposing refineries and nuclear power and hydroelectric dams and ranching and trapping and - come to think of it, all
those things were popular with these 1990's gurus too.

Jim Beers
14 July 2006

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