Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Green Decoys

Anybody see this site?

He's claiming many of the hunting and fishing organizations are disguised liberal/environmental groups. After Quail Unlimited and SFW I'm leery of any "sportsman's groups".

Yep, that's been around a while. It's all true.

Basically, if it's a "hunter and angler" group, it's probably Astroturf, funded by the same people who fund Sierra Club, Earthjustice, Audubon and other pure-Green groups.

The intent is to split off a faction of hook and bullet people in order to advance environmentalism -- that's distinct from conservation.

The real issue is, there's no "Hunters R Us" umbrella group out there, except maybe Safari Club. Most groups are either regional or species-focused and aren't on the big picture of how the green Left plays their multi-billion-dollar political game.

Well said.

Sounds right to me.
I gave up my Trout Unlimited membership when they got too green for my liking.

This is utter propaganda. I support TRCP whole heartedly.

This is a right wing jab. These orgs support public land hunting. I don't care about NRA (for this topic) or a republican from Montana (especially since the (R) NM state land commissioner is charging %500 more for hunters to use the land next year.) Lets face it, some conservation organizations not necessarily support everything with the same ideals.

I'll be interested in what folks like Mudhen and others, quite a bit more eloquent than I have to say about this. I would pay $$ to see what Bigfin has to say here.

This one of the reasons I've been not so active on the fire lately. Instead of us discussing the Land and Water Conservation Act, we're talking about Islamophobia and political extremism.

-Jon

And the Land and Water Conservation Fund is an epic ripoff. It's been completely hijacked into a slush fund for TNC and other land trusts to buy and flip private lands into federal ownership with no risk to the proponents, while the responsibility for managing these lands --- AS TNC WANTS, NOT THE PUBLIC ---- falls on the taxpayer at large.
I have several document strings of transactions set up precisely with the intent of buying and flipping them. Montana Legacy Project is the worst and biggest robbery, just an outrage, paying ten times what land is objectively worth as timber and turning it into more restricted federal land instead of state trust lands. A string of ranches on the John Day is another, secretly funded by a Swiss billionaire.
It is classic robbing Peter to feather Paul's nest -- precisely what that guy on the Chicago trading floor was talking about when he mentioned "moral hazard."
Amazing what happens when government programs allow concentrated benefits while pushing the costs AND risk onto others.
Jon, you want to argue this, bring it on.

"paying ten times what land is objectively worth as timber and turning it into more restricted federal land instead of state trust lands."

Those are federal lands that we can ALL hunt on. I dont see the problem here? All I want to do is hunt, plain and simple. You can't always hunt state trust land.

Federal lands can be tough to access sometimes too.

Jon,
The thing about state trust lands is, within the constitutional mission of these lands, you have a heck of a lot more influence over the policies governing those lands at the state level than you could ever hope to have on a national stage dominated by multi-billion-dollar "philanthropic" foundations that are, at bottom, tax dodges for rich people with pet causes.
All you want is to hunt? Well, great, I'd sure like to be left alone to hunt as I see fit within the law and biology, but that's not how it works in this complicated political world.
Everything in that video is documented fully, available on the internet if you are interested in some REALLY challenging hunting, tracking and trailing.
Right now I happen to be working on testimony for the House NR committee on their LWCF reform hearing. Hmmm. Time to hit the sack.

Same bullschit, different year.

http://www.24hourcampfire.com/ubbthreads/ubbthreads.php/ubb/showflat/Number/9062894

That "green decoys" BS has been discussed ad nauseum before, but here we go again.

Of course, the "green decoys" site doesn't discuss any of the work being done by those "environmental groups", simply because it cannot critique over a century of conservation and training done by the Izaak Walton League (firearms ranges across the country, among other venues), the half-century of work on stream restoration and cold-water fisheries by TU (how many lawsuits AGAINST EPA has TU won in favor of sportsmen?), or any of the rest.
Trying to align at least one of those groups (BHA) with anti-gun groups is ludicrous. BHA gives away firearms with life membership and has two firearms execs on its Board, as well as the Editor-in-Chief of Peterson's Hunting. Really... does anyone with a brain think those guys are "anti-hunting" or "anti-gun"? That site comes down to nothing more than a smear campaign.

Why? Well, funny that that site wants to lambaste 501c3s for revealing their funding publicly, which they have to do by law - and even goes as far as critiquing organizations for funding THE ORGANIZATION never received or applied for (hint: BHA), yet hides their own. Will Coggins, the person behind that site, receives 100% of his funding for it through Berman & Company, a D.C. lobbying firm. That firm represents oil and gas interests only. In fact, Coggins likes his little site so much that he pays himself twice for his "work"; once as director of that group, then again as the 100% retained outside consultant for them. Nice gig if you can get it.

Dave, who has been challenged time and again to check out any of those groups personally and backed off fast when such happens, brought up LWCF. Great. LWCF has been fantastic for sportsmen across the country; it ranks up there with Pittman-Roberts and Dingel-Johnson as far as being beneficial for hunters and anglers. Like the national forest you hunt, fish, camp, etc., on and in? It was probably bought or has certainly been expanded by LWCF funding. Hell, even Rob Bishop tapped into LWCF funding when it suited him to have funds to expand a wildlife refuge in UT (one that is open to hunting, btw).

That "green decoys" site has been around for quite some time and discussed before. It's a smear campaign with no substance attacking groups that are actually made up of and working for sportsmen. These groups have worked to clean up, restore and/or restock thousands of miles of streams, hundreds of thousands of acres of public land, and represent sporting interests in local, state, and national government meetings every day. Some are relatively new, others quite old (IWLA for example), but all do good work - if you check them out.

What, exactly, has Mr. Coggins and his PR firm done for hunters, anglers, and sportsmen? What is it that they propose to do?

I'm sure Dave will be along to come up with something as to why Will Coggins is "right" and how facts are all "wrong", but do yourself a favor and look into all this stuff more than just a poorly done hack job by a D.C.-based PR firm.

Would you care to discuss the TNC purchases of millions of acres of old timber company properties across the Northeast that were otherwise to be sold in small private parcels and public access locked out, and instead were - through LWCF funding - purchased and added to the huge inventories of public lands in the Adirondacks and various national forests throughout NY, VT, NH, and ME? Likely not, of course.

LWCF exists from a hugely bipartisan bill passed in fifty years ago that is funded entirely by excise taxes on OFFSHORE oil and natural gas drilling and has exactly one purpose: to acquire and maintain public lands for recreation. Private oil and gas companies pay royalties to the U.S. Government for their drilling on governmental lands on the Continental shelf ,and those funds are to be used - by law - for the benefit of the American people through acquisition and maintenance of public lands in the U.S. Damned hard to "hijack" something to do exactly what it was intended to do. LWCF provides matching grants to state and local governments for the purchase and maintenance of public lands. It hasn't been fully funded - thank you Congress - for decades and that lack of full funding directly impacts maintenance and access for sportsmen. Over the last 50 years, millions of acres of land has been made available to the public through LWCF purchases and maintenance, and if you're a sportsman that actually hunts or fishes public lands then there is really no way you haven't have benefited substantially from the LWCF program.

Then again, the OP has absolutely nothing to do with TNC, or some alleged Swiss billionaire, or any of the rest of that horseschit.

Again, folks, do your own research. If you're a hunter or an angler, the concept that somehow the LWCF is "hijacked" against you or any other horsechit claim that it's "bad" for you/us is just that: horsechit.

To the OP; you'll notice a general difference of opinion here compared to the other forum you posted this on.

I sure as hell don't mind business having an upfront battle for capitalist reasons, but when a dude financed by a law firm that lobbies for oil and gas is making hack pieces on environmental firms, it's time to take a step back and determine the validity of the schit being slung...

Please clarify this statement. Are you saying that as federal land it is more restricted than it was in its previous ownership or that as federal land it is more restricted than it would be as state school trust land? If the latter, please expound how it's more restricted as federal land than it would be as state school trust land from a recreational use perspective. I already know it's more restrictive as federal land than trust land from a rape and pillage standpoint so no reason to argue that.

And thinking that just because it's trust land instead of federal land automatically gives carte blanche for the state to do as it sees fit is false as evidenced below.

HELENA — A federal judge has blocked a plan that would have led to more roads and increased logging on state trust land in western Montana that is designated secure habitat for threatened grizzly bears.

The 36,700 acres in the Stillwater State Forest is managed as secure core habitat for grizzlies, with restrictions such as a ban on roads closer than a third of a mile away.

The state Department of Natural Resources and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service sought to re-designate the area to help the state department generate more revenue from the lands.

U.S. District Judge Donald Molloy ruled Thursday the analysis on the effects on grizzly habitat fell short of what is required in the U.S. Endangered Species Act.

Three environmental groups sued to block the plan.

Damn it, I was gonna say something but forgot the password to my secret account....

Had to do something, nobody liked me as Lee24.

It makes the conversation more interesting.

I heard about "green decoys" on Steven Rinella's last podcast but it was so one-sided that I wanted to find out the other side.

I'll have to pull up that podcast. Rinella is generally good for a few laughs and some entertainment. As for finding out the "other side", or facts, just do some research yourself and see what you find. Coggin's group is a front for a PR firm; one that pays him twice, and he hides that like Hitlery hides e-mails. The track record of IWLA, TU, and many others is out there in the open and has been for a very long time. Not everyone is going to agree with every position taken by an organization (example: I don't agree with every position taken by the NRA, or TU, or the GOP), but to not support groups that are supporting what you hold dear (as those do for me) because of a smear campaign severely lacking in fact or merit is just not, IMHO, a wise move.

YMMV, but you (speaking in general terms as "you" and not specifically to the OP) owe it to yourself to do some actual research for yourself before deciding what is and is not the case.

Hell, there are some that I'm sure blame RMEF for "wolves"; yet how much elk hunting has improved, along with access and public lands to hunt them has increased because of RMEF? How much shooter and hunter education has been done, and how much on-the-ground conservation work accomplished, by IWLA? How many miles of streams protected from pollution or cleaned up by TU efforts? That list can go on and on, as can the list for acres put into the public realm, acres maintained, and access granted, via the LWCF.

If all that is "bad" and simply a "front for enviros", what then is the alternative presented by Mr. Coggins and his ilk? What, exactly, have they done for conservation, for hunting, for fishing, and for sportsmen and women? Let's see their track record and do a little comparison shopping.

4ager has done a good job, so I am not going to say much else, except that:

I represented TRCP in New Mexico for four years and got to know the outfit from top to bottom and had the opportunity to interact with many of their funders, as well. I guarantee you that they are primarily about preserving opportunities for hunting, fishing and related outdoor pursuits. To the extent that they receive funding from organizations that are "liberal", I applaud them for going after that funding and using it in ways that contributes to rather than compromises their primary mission.

I have known Land Tawney for several years and have worked with him on several campaigns, both with Back Country Hunters and Anglers and earlier with the Montana Wildlife Federation. He is an avid hunter and angler and his whole purpose in his professional life is preserving opportunities for hunting and fishing on public lands.

Both are being targeted because they are effectively championing the rights of those who use public lands for recreation, to the consternation of those who would like to privatize public lands for their own uses and lock everyone else out.