Sagebrush Redux

Groundhog Day! The alarm clock rings and we keep waking up to the same wretched farce day after day after year after year after decade after decade ad nauseum. Instead of Reagan and Watt we have Trump and Zinke and Cliven Bundy. Who will no doubt soon have his own line of survival gear and western wear. Grazing rights, States rights, Sagebrush rebellion, blah blah on and on.Cliven is now on the lecture circuit and just gave a talk in Big Sky Country. Our local Patriot Representative Theresa Manzella was there, reassuring the crowd that she was "not a politician, I am one of you." Except of course she holds political office and does politics. Luckily the crowd is not overly burdened with discernment or coherent thinking.

The crux of the matter is private property and the individual vs the collective. The classic Left/ Right antagonism, though rarely articulated, because it is so contentious and divisive. Bundy, who just visited Sanders County Montana, came at the behest of a group calling itself the Coalition of Western Property Owners. Other sponsors are the American Lands Council and Freedom Works and Western Tradition Partnership (there are dozens of these)whose guiding philosophy is: "strongly protected property rights are the key to any free society." It is also the key to capitalism itself.

In Latin America social movements still talk about latifundia, or land reform in terms of redistribution. Every once in a while you might hear about workers occupying a factory and taking over production. In the USA private ownership of productive property is sacred and supported by every class. We can talk about socialized medicine or public utilities, Obama can even take control of a car company for a while, but no one talks about nationalization or collectivization. No one.

Because the individual and their individual rights are the supreme law of the land. Their is no "collective" subject, except when it comes to public land, where "We the People" are owners. Which is why Bundy & Co. have their eye on it. Bundy, not unlike ISIS or the Taliban, sees his mandate coming from God (manifested in the US Constitution) How can he lose?

Goodbye Tuna

Flyfishing magazines are not known for their radical critique but I stumbled across an article on salt water fishing that surprised me. Bemoaning declining sport fishing opportunities, the author takes on the environmental movement in general, writing: "the environmental movement hasn't even managed to slow down the rate of destruction, never mind halt it...as with regulatory bodies everywhere, the pressure from politicians and industry ensured it (the ICCAT) never followed the recommendations made by environmentalists."

From here it would only be a short leap for this liberal writer to condemn "democratic capitalism" as a contradiction and the profit system as a failure. Maybe next issue he'll write that the state is subservient to capital, is not just "captured" by lobbyists but ideologically integrated at every level. So wild fish don't stand a chance in the race for economic growth.

Trout fishing magazines, their "conservation" writers and the organizations still cling to the belief they are "winning" the fight to save habitat and fish stocks but they choose not to mention climate change. Since they are not struggling against industry profits in a direct sense ( no commercial trout fishing) they can pretend their regulatory efforts and volunteer stream restoration projects will preserve the resource.

Shitholes

Does Trump really imagine there is some big line of Norwegians waiting to get into this shithole country? People tired of good healthcare and education and public transportation and clean energy? People looking for a place with no vacation pay or retirement or maternity leave. Just not enough gun crime in Oslo, I'm headed for Philly.

As for all the outrage, if you elect Rodney Dangerfield to be your President you should expect some embarrassingly candid moments. Since he has no filters, he's going to say out loud what everyone thinks. It's all about ratings. Like when Rodney claimed Mexico is going to pay for the wall, you get a big bump, and then you move on to other topics, a little shape shifting, some sleight of hand.

I just finished a book about the early tribes that inhabited the San Francisco Bay Area. Talk about blessed- abundant game, fisheries, acorns, grass seeds, you name it- the perfect climate and relative peace among neighbors. They had the technologies they needed but no more. And then came the Spanish with all their "civilization" and religion and the psychosis that went with it. Turned Paradise into a shithole in a little over two hundred years. You're welcome.

Optimists and Conservationists

Time magazine is the pop music of journalism. It gives you a predictable,simplified,uncontroversial picture of the world and the latest issue on Optimism, edited by Bill and Melinda Gates is a perfect sedative. It was the first time a civilian got to edit the magazine but Bill is special, as we all know. Special wealth, special altruism/philanthropy, special insight into the state of the planet. And according to Bill, things are on the up and up! There is no crisis,in fact, we've never had it so good! The crisis is a matter of perception, fostered by naysaying media that only reports on the bad. But according to Bill and Melinda democratic capitalism is saving the planet one child at a time and we should be checking our bad attitudes at the door.

I also picked up a copy of the magazine put out by Trout Unlimited where they describe all the great conservation work done by these great conservationists. They are conserving the shit out of trout streams. In one piece they interviewed a big donor named Charlie Johnson, a retired corporate whore who likes to fish. Charlie recalled how he called the CEO of TU and said: "Chris, Charlie Johnson here. I want you to know I will be watching you, I don't want to see TU become one of those commie-pinko organizations." Because Charlie is a millionaire conservationist who won't mention climate change and won't give money to TU if they mention it. So they plant willows in creeks that will soon be dry. Using Charlie's money (tax deductible)


I also saw that the son of Wallace Stegner just died and the obit talked about what a great conservationist (and probably optimist) he was, dedicating his life to conserving landscapes and species that are rapidly disappearing. No commie-pinko, thank God. Then there is National Geographic magazine's latest, with all the articles about all the bird species that are disappearing despite all the conservation work they have done and the articles they have written and the legislation passed and conservation yeah. Because they have conserved the shit out of it and still the ice is melting.