Our World and Everything in It

There was a reason Bush reluctantly put the polar bears on the endangered list but then curiously omitted protection for their habitat. Not so curious anymore. It seems in the latest round of attacks on the environment by the Bush administration and more than likely in support of oil, coal, and the natural gas industries, the president doesn’t find habitat protection necessary. To quote an article on NRDC’s website, the president will argue, “that studying and protecting the places that are essential to species survival is unnecessary. Specifically, the Department of Interior is planning to insert language into all future critical habitat designations that argues that these protections have no value in species protection.” Ah and Dirk Kempthorne, Secy. of Interior is at it again.

Protecting animals but allowing their habitat to go unprotected is so straight out of the dogma of big oil and other fossil fuel industries that we don’t even have to wonder why this underhanded push is happening. I say underhanded because the same article on Defender’s website stated that: “The first attack, contained in a rider on the House version of the Defense Department appropriations bill, would have arguably given the Secretary of the Interior sole discretion regarding where and when-and whether-to designate critical habitat for endangered species. Although the appropriations bill still contains a damaging ESA exemption for the Department of Defense, the more radical rider was defeated by the House on May 21.” Sneaky.

The Bush administration may not get their way the second time around either but there are other rotten ways of doing things.  The administration appears to be overly restricting funds for species protection by the USFWS. Bush only requested a measly $9 million dollars for it this year even though the agency knows it would take $153 million or more because there is a backlog. Congress even requested more money for the agency in the past to no avail. So no one is actually keeping track of or properly protecting our wildlife habitats because there is no money.

This is a “frightful” disregard for living things. If this administration can so ruthlessly overlook one natural resource for another, oil vs. animal habitat, than it’s not a stretch to think humanity is not being overlooked in the process either. We’re not suffering all that different a scenario from the animals on the endangered species list really. By continuing with the quest for oil and possibly more fossil fuels, our habitat won’t be around much longer either. What is it people don’t get? The earth is a closed system. If we put too much pollution into it, it will eventually break down. If we go on the way we are, we are no better than a cancer to our environment.  Yet this administration is destroying our habitat right under our noses while we go on believing someone is looking out for our best interests.

I hope that someone isn’t specifically Dick Cheney. Because when I watch what’s happening all I keep remembering is an article I read back in 2004 about Cheney. John Perry Barlow, a former Cheney supporter, said, “He has the least interest in human beings of anyone I have ever met.” That explains a lot.

http://www.nrdc.org/media/pressreleases/030528.asp.

http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/story/6450422/the_curse_of_dick_cheney/.

I just did a blog about our becoming accumstomed to violence, killing, and guns. Then I read my e-mail that STATE WILDLIFE AGENCY PERSONNEL in Alaska illegally staked out a breeding den/area for wolves, and aerial shot and killed 14 of them. The wolves were parents to 14 little pups. They shot all the pups in the head at close range.

View this video of 4 week old wolf pups and imagine plugging the cute little things in the head. It takes a heartless person to do this.

http://www.everythingwolf.com/sitewide/videolib/p1020310.wmv  

On the same website as the video, I read about people adopting wolf cubs, and even potty training wolf cubs. This is counter to the image of wolves as blood thirsty, indiscriminate killers.  

http://www.everythingwolf.com/forum/threadview.aspx?thread=1340p1.   

The big execution in Alaska was to boost caribou populations. There are approximately 950,000 caribou in Alaska. How many caribou do we need? What’s the target, a million?

 http://www.adfg.state.ak.us/pubs/notebook/biggame/caribou.php.

Alaskans are outraged over this aerial killing movement and are moving to “end the Board of Game’s barbaric aerial hunting of wolves through a ballot measure,” according to Defenders of Wildlife. Defenders website has a drive that ends today to help this ballot initiative with new ads. It also said that: “On August 26th voters can pass this ballot measure and band this awful practice before another deadly season begins.”

Defenders of Wildlife is “helping Alaskans for Wildlife, a coalition of local grassroots activists, hunters, and citizens who secured the 55,000 signatures to put this measure on the ballot. Already, they have reached thousands of voters across the state with their hard-hitting mailings.”

Collecting 55,000 signatures is a daunting task in the heart of hunting territory like Alaska, but everyone involved is close to meeting their goal of collecting $80,000 and running ads that will get voters out to vote for this ballot measure. The ads essentially say, “Real hunters don’t shoot wildlife from airplanes.”

I think aerial hunting is gutless. I also think shooting helpless pups is heartless. And I’m starting to think humans need to be kept in check more than animal populations. We’re starting to show our animalistic tendencies far too much, forgetting about empathy and compassion for all living things in our world.

http://www.defenders.org/newsroom/press_releases_folder/2008/07_23_2008 _statement_regarding_illegal_killing_of_14_wolf_pups_in_alaska.php

 I heard on ABC news this morning that the deer population has gone from 330 thousand to 30 million deer. The news had video coverage of deer walking right inside the door of a house and jumping through a picture window. There was video after video of deer in homes and businesses in different urban areas too. The question was to shoot or not to shoot?

The deer invading everything from homes to yards to downtown stores are usually young deer that don’t know any better and have no fear of humans. Consider also that one village with homeowners up in arms over deer munching on their landscapes has a population of only 20,000 that decided to live in an area with 2,000 deer. So who is invading whose territory? 

And why are we eradicating natural predators like wolves? Seems like we’re not going about this right. We have the wolf depicted as a ravenous carnivore that threatens a dwindling DEER and elk population, as well as, people, children, and pets. Except the deer are hardly dwindling. There are more than enough deer to go around for double the wolf population. Wait until the coyotes follow the deer. Wolves keep coyotes down too.

Simple solutions have been offered to use a speaker instead of a gun for both deer and wolves. Deer have a keen sense of hearing, and certain tones will repel them. Wolves honor another wolf’s call over territory. A strange wolf call will repel them.

A speaker system, instead of a gun to kill what we deem invaders, seems like the sanest solution for now, at least until we figure out who the real invaders are.

 http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/story?id=5478591&page=1

Alaska’s Ted Stevens, longest serving Republican in the senate, was indicted on seven charges for his connections with VECO, an oil services company, and the renovations done to his home.

Ted is pro-oil, and we see why. VECO CEO Bill Allen pleaded guilty to bribing Alaskan lawmakers. And Ted has been accused of influence peddling. So we have an admitted briber, and a guy who invites it. So now Ted’s been indicted for lying about his dealings with VECO.

Ted has consistently put ANWR (Arctic National Wildlife Refuge) drilling language in defense bills. Remember the recent Senate hearings with oil execs about high gas prices in relation to excessively high profits? We can thank Ted, the Chairman of that committee, for preventing them from having to speak under oath.

Senator Stevens is best remembered for financing two Alaska bridges to nowhere to a tune of over $220 million. A fiasco that had Ted threatening to quit the senate if congress took money away from those bridges. The money  for them would have been redirected for repairs desperately needed in New Orleans afer Katrina. Stevens got his way, but the bridge money was given to Alaska’s transportation fund instead.

But Ted’s mid 80’s age and this haven’t stopped him. He’s put in his bid to run for senate again. This is not the way to top off a long career.

Democrats want Mark Begich, the mayor of Anchorage, in the race. Begich is the favorite. Alaska could use someone environmentally friendly for a change. If they could just get rid of Governor Palin, Alaska might stand a chance at remaining a pristine wilderness.

After this, maybe Senator Waxman, who is investigating everyone, and doing a fine job of doing his job by the way, should direct more attention to the goings-on in Alaska and why so many are protesting.  

Read more of Stevens bio at: http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Ted_Stevens

Good news! A federal judge “has restored endangered species protections for wolves in Greater Yellowstone and the Northern Rockies,” according to Defenders of Wildlife.

This kinda throws a wrench in the proposed sport hunting of wolves by the likes of Butch Otter, Governor of Idaho, who vows to fight the decision. Ron Gillette, Idaho’s Anti-Wolf Coalition leader predicts a war.

Anti-Wolf Coalition sounds silly somehow, doesn’t it, like the “wolves-are-at-our-doors” campaign commercial? It’s just another generation that wants to eradicate wolves as a form of sport hunting.

For now the wolves are protected and Defenders says it plans to:

Make the case in court to restore full protections for these endangered wolves;

 

Pay for guard dogs, range riders, turbo fladry fencing and other non-lethal wolf management strategies to keep livestock and wolves safe; and

Combat distortions and misperceptions about wolves to build tolerance and understanding for the vital role that wolves play in healthy ecosystems.

It’s too bad this new protection came too late to save “Limpy,” the park’s icon.

Not long ago I wrote a blog about H.R. 5852 (The Great Ape Protection Act) to protect our closest DNA relative from both mental and physical pain of suffering. Well, an article in USA Today stated that in Europe, apes could receive some of the same rights as humans very soon.

The article stated, “A Spanish parliamentary committee adopted resolutions last month that would give great apes, such as chimpanzees and gorillas, the right to life, freedom from arbitrary captivity and protection from torture.” It’s expected to be approved next year.

A specific court case in Austria is poised to go further and declare a chimp a person so that it can have a legal guardian and funds for upkeep. The European Court of Human Rights is considering this appeal for Matthew Hiasl Pan, a 28-year old chimp.

The only major legal argument against this is that it may conflict with a human’s rights somewhere down the line.

Spain’s legislation, however, stresses that this is about the basic rights not to be arbitrarily mistreated and killed. It would also “outlaw using great apes in experiments, circuses, TV commercials or films. Apes could be kept in zoos, but conditions would be improved.”

The case in Austria hinges on Matthew, who has always been treated as a human. He has lived in a Vienna shelter for 25 years and it’s going bankrupt. If Matthew has no place to live, he could simply be killed even though donors have pledged money for him, not the bankruptcy. A British animal rights activist who has worked with Matthew for 10 years will be his guardian.

The case wants about 4 out of the 50 human rights enjoyed by Europeans bestowed upon the animal as follows: the right to life, limited freedom of movement, personal safety, the right to claim property, and to a legal guardian.

This issue is being blown out of proportion as if Matthew’s lawyers are trying to get all human rights for a non-human animal “so he can go to college. This is about basic rights not to be killed.”

“Not to be killed” was a consideration for all living things in Bonn, Germany this year where representatives of 191 nations discussed putting a cost on saving nature. They looked into trying to make a highly profitable business out of saving forests, whales and coral reefs and to stave off extinction of the many species that will follow.

German Environment Minister, Sigmar Gabriel stated: “This conference deals with economic interests. It is critical that we assign ‘a measurable cost to the loss (of environment),’ or else we run the risk ‘of deleting data from nature’s hard drive.’” According to an article on the Mathaba News website “the initial results of a study, initiated in collaboration with the European Union, on the global costs of species and habitat loss amounts to 6 percent loss of global gross domestic product. Poor countries are the hardest-hit. The annual cost of species and habitat loss amounts to as much as half of their already modest economic strength.” So preserving biodiversity pays much bigger than destroying it.

It’s sad we have to go through all of this, put a price tag on life to give it value, when a good dose of morality/ethics that insures we have reverence and a deep abiding respect for all life that was given to us should be the norm in civilized society.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/offbeat/2008-07-15-chimp_N.htm

http://www.mathaba.net/0_index.shtml?x=593303

I saw a segment on the news this morning about a dozen wild dolphins that made a wrong turn and ended up in a river in Seabrite, NJ. There are 3 calves with the pack that are mesmerizing residents. Evidently they were following food and didn’t pay attention. The dolphins know where they need to exit to get back to the open sea but are deterred by the noise and vibration of a bridge they must go under. So they keep turning back. The worry is that the Fourth of July approaches and hundreds of boats are set to go up the river to a bay in celebration of the holiday. As one boater said, “They [the dolphins] don’t stand a chance.”

What’s wrong with this picture? I see a ridiculously bad attitude toward nature here. Boaters are willing to mow down a group of stranded dolphins with babies in order to celebrate. American’s are trying to get Canada to quit seal hunting, Japan to quit dolphin and whale hunting, and what to we do but offer another of our hypocritical bad examples.

If I was a Seabrite resident with a boat, I’d simply stay home. Have we finally become an overall mindless, unempathetic, feel good society, because if we have, it’s a good indicator of our overall decline that has nothing to do with politics or economy. It seems we suffer a selfishly bad attitude toward life besides our own . What would you do in this circumstance, stay home or mow down the dolphins?

In the meantime marine specialists are going to try and add predatory type negative vibrations to the water to drive the dolphins out to sea where they can be away from real harm, humans.

Boy, am I slow. I just got around to putting a bunch of e-mail and newsletters together to figure out why wildlife, habitat, and our national parks have been under attack by the Bush administration. Well, at least the how. A group of wealthy hunters that comprise Safari Club International (SCI) are using their funds to permeate congress once again to allow hunting polar bears, and everything else on their exotic big game list of course, whether or not the animals are endangered, and to bring the carcasses back into the U.S. as trophies.

People all over the world are outraged about our treatment of polar bears already by not putting them on the endangered species list much sooner and continued threats to the bear’s environment by oil drills. And these guys want to hunt the bears. Is that not adding insult to injury that we civilized humans just dismiss a beautiful species and hundreds of other equally beautiful species already threatened by global warming as trophies? How utterly superficial. We fight the use of ivory, but condone canned hunts. Do we know what we’re doing half the time?

I read a little about SCI on Wikipedia, and Source Watch and how they direct their lobby money predominantly toward Republicans as their allies in congress. SCI also advertises that they donates money for the preservation of animal species and that they do not advocate canned hunts–except they do it. And they pretty much are interested in the preservation of species so they can hunt the animals they preserve. Got a crippled exotic, put it in a canned hunt. Got too many exotic offspring put them in a canned hunt. Nice, real sporting.

I just read my mail from the Humane Society Legislative Fund about canned hunts. I had no idea that 25 states still advocate them and the trend is growing via lobby money from SCI and others. America is hitting rock bottom on ethics/morals when it comes to money vs. our national parks, animals, and habitat lately. I couldn’t figure out how the wolf slaughter, the buffalo slaughter, the push to put guns in our National Parks and a lot of other abuse was happening with help from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service despite thousands of protests. It seems Dirk Kempthorne, as Secy. of the Interior isn’t the only hunting/gun advocate working too closely with wildlife and habitat.  Director of our U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Matt Hogan, is the former chief lobbyist for Safari Club International, and another Bush appointee. Figures. Talk about conflict of interest. I thought the EPA was bad!

Considering the plight of all of animals and humans due to global warming, there really should be a moratorium on big game hunting for trophy’s sake. The people in Gana Africa are eating exotics to just stay alive for Pete’s sake. Complain to you senators and reps about canned hunts and lobbyists like SCI.

I was looking for cures to get rid of all types of weeds in my lawn that have become prevalent in just the last couple of years like Creeping Charlie, Henbit,Violets, Wild Strawberries, etc. I’m not a fan of spraying if I don’t have to and figure I need to know why I’m getting so many of these weeds or I’ll just be dealing with it all over again year after year. Well, it seems I need to fertilize my lawn more to keep Creeping Charlie at bay. So I’ll go the natural fertilizer route or whip up a Jerry Baker concoction. But I was still curious where all these weeds are coming from. I had a pretty nice lawn not long ago.

It seems America is being inundated with imported invasive species of plants and trees that will have a terrible impact on our own native plants and trees in the near future. I had no idea that the nice maple trees in my yard are probably the invasive type called Norway Maple. As a matter of fact, one website that offered a guide to the imported/invasive plants and trees said: “Many of the plants in this guide are popular, even beloved, landscape plants, but it is now clear that they pose a threat to our environment.” It’s because these plants significantly reduce the number of plant and animal species on any site they invade. The fact that they are in our yards is a sign that over the past 100 years or more they have indeed spread.  http://www.mdflora.org/publications/invasives.htm.

I couldn’t believe all the new and different weeds popping that I have that are on that list. And the list is for the mid Atlantic region! That says something about climate change. Now I’m not about to cut down my maples and I have a sneaky suspicion they’re Norways because I have too many maples willy-nilly in my yard. But one of them shades the front of my house from the summer sun, and two are on the bank by the dock.

As for getting rid of these weeds, I found all types of natural ways to combat them on the Internet. For instance, I know enough to weed whip before weeds go to seed,  but it seems there is a magic time you can mow some weeds and they won’t come back. So, depending on the type of weed you are trying to control, you may not need any chemicals at all. Whack them at the right time in their lifecycle and kill them dead for good.

For my Creeping Charlie problem I could apply a herbicide when it flowers, but it seems this weed is sensitive to borax according to the blogsite Hobby Lawn Care. The website gives the formula to make your own borax concoction. It said: “…dissolve 8 ounces of borax in 4 ounces of water. Then dilute the solution in 2.5 gallons of water.” This is supposed to be sprayed on 1000 sq. ft. of lawn, “no more, no less.” That scares me a little. Too much borax prevents desirable plants–like grass?

http://www.hobbylawncare.com/browse/lawn-pests

And if all else fails, I can just eat my lawn. That’s right. I found a website with a recipe for Wild Weed Salad and Dressing. I have everything I need except nasturtium. I used to grow nasturtiums, but that was long ago. I think nasturtiums are just watercress. The lawn violets I have aplenty. They add a peppery taste to a salad. Dandelion greens I’ve already eaten before, but I don’t know about the lamb’s quarter. It’s a little too hairy for me. Everything else on the list of ingredients seems fine, but I just can’t imagine the taste of the added mint, with basil, with garlic. I’m thinking peppery/garlicky taste, which would be really good with the honey and apple cider vinegar dressing.

Read the recipe: http://gorhamgarden.blogspot.com/2007/06/weed-of-day-no-2-henbit.html

ve.

 I just got a letter from Earthjustice today about the polar bears. It seems that AGAIN the Bush/Cheney administration pulled a fast one with Dirk Kempthorne doing their bidding. They put the polar bears on the endangered list but didn’t provide any real protection for them or their habitat. How convenient for all the oil leaseholders.

There are holes in the judgment for the bears, so that big oil can still feasibly drill in polar bear habitat. You know, like most criminals, if this administration would just take the time to put as much effort in doing something good for our world and everything in it as they do to connive, cheat, steal, and mislead the public to do the exactly the opposite, they would go down in history as one of the better administrations in a time of great global need instead of hitting an all time low.

So according to Earthjustice, (who always catches up with their maneuverings), Representatives Jay Inslee and Maurice Hinchey introduced THE POLAR BEAR SEAS PROTECTION ACT last week to protect polar bear habitats until “essential environmental impact questions are answered and the Dept. of the Interior, [that would be Dirk] clearly designates critical, protected habitats.”

Let Congress know that you want this Act supported, and you want polar bears, their habitat, babies, grandbears, and great grandbears protected. I don’t know about anyone else but I am so sick and tired of chasing down this administration. It is like an evil child, like Damian of “The Omen” that pays little if any attention to ethics, and is manipulative and conniving to the point they just can’t be trusted. When they announce something good for the environment anymore, it looks like I’m not the only one looking around for the real angle.

This act covers some of the holes they’ve purposefully constructed. We’ve got polar bear allies in Congress that just need to hear from us—AGAIN.

Go to Earthjustice to send your message:

 http://action.earthjustice.org/campaign/polarbears_0508