Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters Sale of public lands and drilling everywhere

Pruitt at EPA.

Zinke at Interior.

Please keep up.

Thanks?

If the public lands are to be sold, they need to be sold at market prices, not the below fair-market value the BLM and US forest Service have been leasing them for. As a taxpayer, i want fair market value.

I understand what you are getting at with Pruitt (though I think the fear of him at EPA will end up being overblown some), but what's the issue with Zinke? He's on the record as a supporter of public lands and that is what helped put him in as SecInt.

I don't have issues with either.

I was more just pointing out that we should have fewer Fed power grabs like the sage grouse issue with the incoming Trump Administration.

I could have been a bit clearer with that post.

Yeah, and I suppose that a 20 year old can be believed when she says her marriage to a 90 year old billionaire is for love.

I don't trust any of them.

Dave, APR now has pasture for lease. Ads all over the place.


Not sure what they charge but I bet it's more than the Feds.






John Burns, see above......grin

Gotcha, and quite clear now.

Big Fin for president..........

I've been following this thread with interest. I hunt and vacation "out west" - alot and have for the past 20 years. Interestingly I'm also a fed and work for DOI. I deal with multiple Fed agencies daily on ESA and permits on Fed lands. Here's my semi-related observations from a 20+ year career.

1. The Feds don't do anything better than private industry could - except have the bankroll to spend enormous amounts of money if/when needed, think purchase land, but more importantly are less influenced by big influence interests. Some will disagree with the last part but thats not been my experience. I've worked at all levels - industry, state, and federal. I've never gotten a call from the governors office telling me to issue ABC Co a permit regardless of the environmental impacts. I know many people that have. I have never received a call from any elected official or otherwise to issue ABC Co a permit while in federal employment - never and don't expect to.

2. The ESA is conceptually sound but abused and poorly implemented. I deal with the ESA daily. Implementation is governed by the biologist and associated management that implements it at the USFWS. A reasonable biologist, defined as one not interested in pristine preservation, can fulfill the intent of ESA while arriving at a reasonable solution for multiple land-use industries.

3. As Big Fin pointed out, once the land becomes part of a State 'trust' and I use the word trust generically, it is subject to a smaller pool of 'deciders'. If the deciders decide to implement some strategy, such as those pointed out by Randy, the rest of us are bound by those decisions - and screwed. As an analogy, I point to the state of WY law regarding non-resident access into wilderness areas. As I understand the most logical version of the story, and I've heard several from WY state officials ranging from grizzly bear protection to wilderness rescues, a lawsuit was decided in the 1980-90s that states can implement laws on NF as they see fit. I'm not sure who benefits from that law except the WY Outfitters Association. I can hike, fish, horse back ride in them but not hunt. I've somehow managed not to get lost in wilderness areas in every state surrounding WY. Suffice to say, I'm not keen on this smaller pool of decision makers when I see crap like that plus the issues Randy posted that restrict access.

I'm not in favor of private/local/state control of current public lands. The Feds don't do much well but I'd much rather fix the current system then gamble on private/local/state control. Thats a bridge too far IMHO.

As a Fed Govt worker myself, working in the oil and gas sector, I can say with quite honesty most of my fellow coworkers 100% believe in the usefulness of proper grazing, logging, drilling and mineral extraction in general. There are a few greenies in my office that hate drilling and grazing, but not too many. The wells on state lands around here look absolutely horrible, with constant hazmat spills, contaminated soils, trash everywhere, etc. WY state cares about the royalties off the oil and gas wells only...not the management of their lands. I deal with it every day.

It's the laws in Washington that need revamped...Every lawsuit that comes in gets millions of taxpayer money spent fighting it...while WildEarth Guardians, Western Watersheds, etc. don't pay a dime for their FOIAs, litigation demands, and whatever else...its frustrating to say the least to hear the greenies refer to the BLM as the Bureau of Livestock and Mining and the Forest Service other colorful names, cause they think that's all that happens out there.

The states simply wouldn't be able to fight the lawsuits, much like the fires, and I 100% believe the lawsuits would get substantially worse with state management. The greenies will just file in state court instead of district court. You can guess where the situation would go from there...

I missed that the first time around. Nothing funnier than a guy who writes for a living calling someone else a "desk driver." I'd pay to see ol Dave try to keep up with you on one of your public land elk hunts

Of course, I'm sure you wouldn't have to pack out any elk, since federal lands are so mismanaged and have such crappy habitat that the hunting's no good. But just in case you did get lucky, I'd pay to see Dave help you pack one out too.

Aw gee, I'm gonna have to do direct replies here.
Randy, I understand your perspective because you sell it. Fine, but even in Montana you're only around five weeks a year out of a 52 week economy.
As for the selloffs, since statehood, AZ has sold what, ten percent? Montana, ten percent since statehood? And Nevada, sure, they've sold like 80 percent, but this is in a state where it's 85 percent federal already and has Vegas. Each state is laid out different, and therefore responds to needs differently.
As for the trust land restrictions, those COULD be changed in the state constitutions and/or legislatively by a vote of the people, and yes, I support a fee structure for that which services the actual costs of recreation upon these lands. Everyone has an impact and maybe its time to look at the hidden cross-subsidies.
And yeah, Randy, I've got my NRA "endowment" too.

Not a copy, Forger. Wrote that directly.

I'm just going to hit on oil and gas.

How do you guys get to the hunting grounds? How do you run the rest of your lives? Fossil fuels, and they have to come from someplace. We'd prefer they be far away, but on the other hand, it's okay to have it nearby where we can see the consequences of our actions, mmmm?

Never mind that some of my most productive hunting days came in the oil patch around Strangely and Bleeker in NW Colorado. As long as you have ethical oil patch people who don't get stupid with the wildlife, the animals don't care. Sure, it's not the "same" as, say, those scenes from the Deer Hunter, or one of Randy's productions, but for the vast majority of hunters, it's good enough and keeps us in the game.

America is a modern country because we have access to modern and plentiful energy sources. Remember that.

Sam,
APR can only hit its billionaire backers for so much, and even they need some cash flow to keep things in the air, or semi-black until the package can be sold to "the public."
Never mind that grass needs grazed.
And because the surrounding ranchers don't have trust funds, they need the graze. I bet the price is still pretty good, and I have to wonder what kind of practices are contingent.

Winters,
You come west to escape, right?

1. I wasn't defending private industry, in fact, the REITs have created a situation that I find indefensible...I'm not going to go into that here, but REITs are going to be a long-term downer for the sporting life.

2. The ESA was written by four guys in the House cafeteria, two animal-rights types and FWS's chief of law enforcement, plus the son or grandson of FWS's first director. It was a low-key yet massive power grab and is poor law at its core. The cost of preservation is not balanced against benefits, leading to utterly irrational allocations of resources. Two million in land for one mouse? Look at what wolves eat! How much does each wolf cost in blown hunter opportunity, never mind livestock losses?
One part I loathe is the restriction against captive breeding by private parties, the only exception I know of being peregrines. And guess what, the peregrines are good for the foreseeable future. Why, for God's sake, is it PROHIBITED for "Friends of the OUter Saruvian Snotwort" to breed and release all the snotworts they can?"
3. So what if it's a smaller pool of deciders if the deciders have the right motives -- motives shaped by exposure to the costs and benefits of an action?

LOL, that's a great strawman you set up and knocked down there Dave, you really knocked it outta the park.

Now show me where I said anything negative about oil and gas extraction from public lands. The only reason I mentioned oil & gas extraction was to refute your ridiculous assertion that the NF is "no longer multiple use."

You're dang straight that the federal governing laws need to be revamped. But that ain't gonna happen unless there's a crisis that drives Congress off its dead butt. And much of Congress represents places where dysfunctional laws have no impact, but lots of gullible Green supporters.

And here's something cute. Backcountry Hunters and Anglers? Well, they get money from the Wyss foundation, which pretty much replaced Terrible Ted Turner as a Western eco-funder. Wyss is a Swiss billionare who got his billions representing Swiss medical implants in America. But Mr. Hansjorg Wyss NEVER ever threw down to become an American citizen, he stayed a resident alien in America for over 50 years.
Why? Because now he gets to take 6 billion back to Switzerland where there's no inheritance tax.
Wyss is a major funder of Center for American Progress (John Podesta, remember him) with a board seat.
He has also contributed over 10 million to Center for Biological Diversity, the folks who tried to ban all lead bullets last year.
So why is Hansie funding BHA?

You griped about the Pawnee. Case closed.

Guilt by association, another old chestnut. Pulling out all the stops eh Dave?

It seems Mr. Wyss legally avoided paying taxes. Do you have a problem with that?