The stand offs between ranchers and public land management agencies are a sign that climate change and craziness are both growing in the USA. The latest standoff is between ranchers in Otero County and the Forest Service who is trying to protect riparian areas. Incredibly, the ranchers are having a problem with 23 acres out of 28,000 being protected from grazing in order to make a natural system work and protect endangered species. The Forest Service is doing what they should be doing.
Those ranchers are hurting for sure. Grazing in an arid landscape is always hard and many times outrageously destructive to streams and rivers. The cattle trample the natural banks of the riparian areas and the water spreads out and evaporates. In other words, they lose even more water in the long run
One wonders what happens to the ranchers in the West as they continue to support rightwing corporate republicans who deny the science that says the planet is warming. It is nothing more than suicide for their so called 'way of life'.
One wonders what happens to the ranchers in the West as they continue to support rightwing corporate republicans who deny the science that says the planet is warming. It is nothing more than suicide for their so called 'way of life'.
2 comments:
As a species, humans have doomed themselves, and seem to be doing their best to bring everything down with them. That short-sightedness you mentioned in your May 7th post results not only in voting against our best interests, but in putting short-term profit above the long-term consequences of our actions. It's as if we're blind to the big picture.
Re: "...climate change and craziness are both growing in the USA."
This is going to be a real big deal, I think. Economic decline may be in the mix, too. Whether it's because the economy recovers but the good salaries don't come back, or through economic displacement caused by climate change, we're in for some interesting times.
Leaked documents reveal that the government is aware of the potential for social upheaval, as is the Pentagon. Some people think this is why local police forces all over the country are being militarized. A lot of military hardware has been handed over to local police agencies. We got our first glimpse of it here -- the armored vehicles and the cops dressed like the military -- during the recent protests downtown.
Militarized cops aren't yet stationed at city council meetings and as far as I know the mayor hasn't requested an armor plated car, but don't be surprised.
This isn't going to be pretty. It will manifest in aggression and violence. Watch for the appearance of certain behaviors. It starts in pockets. Say, at a certain business establishment they are more rude than usual. You just leave pissed off, but people who work at other businesses leave pissed off and start doing the same things where they work. Pretty soon it's being done that way everywhere. More people are pissed off more of the time, and there's no way for it to diffuse itself. It spreads to all the places and ways people have interactions.
Be on guard against it. Stay strong. Be humane.
And fight against its sources, greed and ignorance. The accumulation of wealth, and therefore power, at the top. To borrow a phrase Jim used in an earlier post, "Time for head knocking."
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