Special Interests Spar with Condors and Kangaroos in California: Two Bills on Governor Schwarzenegger's Desk and the Resignation of a Fish and Game Commissioner

THE REPUBLICAN PARTY EATS ITS YOUNG

Governor Schwarzenegger should refuse to accept Commissioner Hanna's resignation, and reinstate him immediately. Failing that, I would suggest that the Fish & Game Commission resign en masse on principle to protest this outrage.

The NRA and their cronies, along with the 34 ethically-challenged Republicans who signed that deplorable letter, should be tarred and feathered (perhaps with the feathers of those dead condors they seem to care so little about). There should be a NATIONAL ban on the use of lead shot for ALL hunting. The scientific evidence is irrefutable, notwithstanding the absurd denials of some of the hook 'n' bullet fraternity. Shame on all concerned.

This entire episode is a disgrace and a betrayal of the public trust. The environment and our beleaguered wildlife will suffer accordingly, if this is allowed to stand. Dollars to donuts none of the legislators who signed that despicable letter even know Judd Hanna or the good work he's been doing. (Interesting timing, too, at the very end of the legislative session, disallowing any repudiation of this underhanded deed by other, more conscientious lawmakers.) Hanna is a good man, knowledgeable and committed to protecting California resources, and a proponent of hunting ethics and sound science, and is being punished accordingly for political reason. NOT ACCEPTABLE! And the public needs to speak up.

CONTACT INFO:
The Governor, tel. 916/445-2841; fax 445-4633; email - governor@governor.ca.gov.

Dept. of Fish & Game (John McCammon, Acting Director), tel. 916/445-653-7667; fax 653-7387; email - ltoof@dfg.ca.gov

Fish & Game Commission (John Carlson, Exec. Director), tel. 916/653-4899; email - jcarlson@dfg.ca.gov

Resources Agency (Mike Chrisman, Secty.), tel. 916/653-5656; fax 653-8102; email - secretary@resources.ca.gov

RAISE HELL!

Condor lifespans may actually have *increased* due to eating gut-piles that supposedly have lead in them.

There must be a need by condors for this supposedly-tainted food that condors eat, otherwise it'd be left alone for other food. So if we want more condors to live, maybe we should assure more of these hunter gut piles are left out for their dining convenience?

Data accumulated (Hopper Mtn Nat'l Wildlife Reserve, USFS, Audobon)
http://www.fws.gov/hoppermountain/cacondor/Pophistory.html
http://www.headsuptrading.com/ar/condorchart.jpg
http://www.headsuptrading.com/ar/condorchart.jpg

shows that prospective lead poisoning is way down the list ("lost in the noise") of causes of condor loss, with ~20% condors just 'gone missing', another 17% killed in power lines, 17% killed due to predation, 11% due to 'unknown', 8% due to forest fire and another 8% due to illegal poaching (those are the condors that *really* died from lead poisoning).

We've actually had a net steady *increase* of condor populations, with over 300 birds now - so we have a negative correlation.

However, many things in legislation are not as they seem. These 'environmental issues' are really not about condors or wildlife at all but are a supposedly 'stealth' antigun strategy thru ammunition control devised by Brady Campaign. If you take away places where people do long-range shooting or hunting, their thinking goes, you'll somehow dry up the active shooter/politically-active gunowner population.

Legislation based on bad data accompanied by hidden agendas should be avoided.

Bill Wiese
San Jose CA

shows that prospective

I attended the F&G meeting where this topic received quite a bit of attention. While there were some voices of reason, hunters outnumbered them by about 100 to 1 and complained about the new shot and what a headache it would be. That's not a valid excuse and further, I am sure that the manufacturers of non lead ammunition would be falling allover themselves to make a killing (pardon the pun) in California.

Time to get with the 21st century = lead shot is not good for any being, human or otherwise.

Susan,

The reason so many people attended the F&G meeting is that they're worried, rightly, that this is an attack on hunting and shooting in general.

Since the underlying basis for this law is a stealth Brady anti-gun action merely using the condor for cover, we're circling the wagons.

The "manufacturers of non-lead ammunition" do not exist (with the exception of steel & bismuth shot for shotguns). There is some tungsten-core ammo available to military but not to civilian marketplace and it's prohibitively expensive given key supplies of tungsten are in China. Steel core ammo does not have the density and depending on design can fall under 'armor piercing' category.

Jacketed ammunition has been demonstrably shown not to be an envirohazard: insoluble lead salts encrust the exposed lead areas and effectively seal off further exposure; the unexposed areas are covered by copper jackets.

This bill has NOTHING TO DO ABOUT CONDORS. It is merely an umbrella for antihunting - and more importantly, anti-gun - organizations to try to reduce the population of California shooters.

I'm not a hunter but I (and people similar to me) shoot thousands or even tens of thousands of rounds of ammo per year. (Competetive shooters shoot even more).

We also have the "Law of Unintended Consequences". You're just gonna cause zillions of california shooters to stockpile millions of rounds of ammunition. Remember how when the Democrats banned asssault weapons it caused everyone to go out and buy a half dozen or so? I know I did.

Bill Wiese
San Jose CA

Bill - If lead shot disappeared I guarantee some smart company would fix the problem. Buying assault weapons has everyone storehousing them...how troubling is that? Exactly why the Demos had a right to be worried. I am a shooter not a hunter and I think you and the Republicans (by the way I am registered as a Republican) have your heads up your butts on this issue. People actually care about the environment and do not all hate hunting despite what you think. Susan

The bill to repeal the ban on kangaroo interests is special interest legislation at its best.

Adidas finally got smart and hired a high-powered law firm to both lobby for the bill (SB 880 Calderon) and throw around some campaign contribution just before legislators voted, and that did the trick.

This sort of bill has been defeated for decades, and nothing has changed to make the repeal OK today and not 30 years ago, except for Adidas money.

Adidas discovered that buying votes isn't so costly, a good business investment which will reap greater profits.

Too bad for the kangaroos, though.

Remember when Schwarzenegger said in the recall election that the special interest favors will stop when he's elected? Now he can prove he meant it by vetoing SB 880.

Susan,

Are you the PR agency for propoonents like HSUS for this bill? Susan Tellem from Tellem in LA - sure sounds like it. Kinda doing some cross-balancing to restore your enviro credentials after representing Chevron and Union 76? (Hey, I don't have a problem with those, I drive a V8.)

I don't care about your party affiliation. I hang out with a lot of rabidly pro-gun Democrats as well as Republicans. We vote "guns first" anyway (as well as "taxes second").

Your "some smart company will come up with..." argument is moot and reveals a lack of knowledge of the shooting sports. Many shooters shoot mil surplus ammunition for reasons of cost and availablity (and by the way, which are fully jacketed and thus any prospective lead issues from spent bullets are vastly reduced).

"Buying assault weapons and storehousing them - how troubling is that?" ... Um, it shouldn't be troubling at all since the original concept of 'assault weapon' was a fully automatic one, and California just decided to rewrite a couple definition to include common semiauto sporting rifles. The only difference between an semiauto sporting rifle like a Mini-14, M1A or Remington 7600 and a California assault weapon is the lack of a 99-cent pistol grip or a folding stock. We've rendered these laws mostly moot in CA due to good engineering and careful reading of the laws.

I strongly doubt you are much of a shooter or associate with any real shooters, or you'd realize that these ammo control laws are really driven by the Bradyites as 'alternate gun control' stealth methods, including their stealth work with the Environmental Working Group.

And whether or not you care about the environment is moot when there's just plain bad science involved. Bottom line, it appears condors have reached an evolutionary nadir decades ago and their recent population *increases* may actually be because they're getting adequate food sources from gut piles! When 30%-50% of condors are dying from predation, power lines, and poaching, and the population is so small, all other low-incidence stats are unquantifiable 'noise' in the data.

Bill Wiese
San Jose CA

Oh -BTW - I'm going to Reno for a new pair Lucchese kangaroo leather boots. They're really quite comfortable and stylish.

so what?!

animals were created for us!!!
for our USE!

Post a comment

Commenters: You must preview your comment before posting. And please only hit "Post" once; it may take a while, but your comment is being processed. Thanks.