New Posts Over on the “Not Without a Fight!” Blog

hummingbird

NCFP’s readers may be interested in some of the new posts at the “Not Without a Fight!” blog, e.g.:

1.  Nelson’s November 21, 2013 Testimony to the House Subcommittee on Public Lands and Environmental Regulation — Part 1

2.  Taking an Ax to Traditional Forest Management — The charter-school approach works for education, so why not apply it elsewhere?

3.  On Paradigm Change and Morris Sheppard’s Hummingbird

4.  Over-regulation as a Reason for the Timber Harvest Decline: Recalling Jack Ward Thomas’s Lament

— Ron Roizen

25 thoughts on “New Posts Over on the “Not Without a Fight!” Blog”

  1. Ron, might I suggest that you simply post each of these items here, as new posts? (perhaps with some text like “originally posted at… etc etc.”) That way, I think you would be less likely to generate concern that you might be using this place to spam your own blog. You can imagine the chaos if everyone here started posting similar “new posts here…” links to whatever their favorite personal blog happens to be. It also puts a burden on the moderators, who do an admirable job of keeping this place cleaned up, but might feel obliged to follow all those links to see if NCFP standards of civil discourse are being followed (not that yours doesn’t, but it should be obvious where this could go). As another advantage of posting here, NCFP specifically avoids embracing any particular ideological viewpoint, so that folks from all perspectives can feel comfortable joining the discussion, i.e. your posts would get more readership. As it is, some people may be unenthusiastic about visiting your blog when it’s advertised in this way, since it is founded around a single (and somewhat combative) point of view, is moderated by a single individual (you), and of course every visit results in publicity (hits) for your blog. Hopefully the opportunity to spark a diversity of discussion (which would happen here) would be seen as an advantage. Best, -Guy

    Reply
    • Guy, thanks for giving your point of view. I agree that I would like to see more of the posts here. I invited him to post them because I thought they were interesting. I agree that having each one separate, and either posting the whole thing or an excerpt, is more likely to get discussion going. Anyway, I didn’t want you to think Ron had untoward motives other than responding graciously to my invitation.

      Reply
    • Guy, Thanks for your comment. I suppose if what you mean by “spamming” is simply “advertising,” then I was spamming this list with my post — mea culpa! NWAF! is just a month old and still looking to expand its readership. Your point about everybody taking the liberty of spamming is well taken however. I think, from now on, I’ll leave it to others to re-post articles on NWAF! to this blog if they see fit — and thus avoid the problem you raise. As regards NWAF!’s “ideological viewpoint,” the purpose of the NWAF! blog is to advance the interests and perspectives of counties with national forests. My hope is that it will provide a forum for enlarging the discussion of future policy ideas and options — say, for example, the way my post on applying D.C.’s structural deficit concept was intended to do. Large readership, per se, is not a goal. As for the blog being “combative,” I guess that disposition is suggested right from the start with its name, “Not Without a Fight!” Circumstances in many forested counties are not looking promising and a combative disposition about dire prospects may not be inappropriate. NWAF! is intended to be combative, however, in the arena of ideas and policy options, and certainly not otherwise — e.g., by airing ad hominem arguments. As regards the issue of a “single individual” moderating the list, what can I say? The blog is just getting started and I’ve been trying to expand its list of contributing editors and participation more generally in its discussions. It is, for now, too much of a one horse operation, but I hope that changes before too long.

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      • That means I’m back to where I started.. reposting Ron’s posts here myself. But after looking at them I would repost them all..so couldn’t Ron just post them here in the first place?

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      • Ron, I hope you’ll post them here, maybe as individual posts. Realizing it’s kind of a grey zone, since folks do post links to longer articles, court decisions, etc. (but often those have excerpts, as Sharon notes, enough to get some discussion going “in-house”). But since yours are already in the form of posts, and are relevant to NCFP subject matter, it would be nice to have them posted here in toto so discussion could occur w/o jumping back and forth between websites. And maybe a link to your own blog so people could go there for other perspectives, or a different community, whatever. Just a thought, and only one opinion…

        Reply
        • Ron: I’m in agreement with Guy and Sharon. It makes far more sense for you to just post your entire essay here — and including a high profile link to the parent document — than expect people to follow blind links or to hop back-and-forth between locations. What better way to get your ideas discussed than to disperse them over as wide an audience as possible? What better advertising for your writings than to provide samplings to potential readers? Personally, I’d like to hear what other have to say about “charter forests”, but that is mostly because of what I’ve read in my emails, rather than what I’ve read here.

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  2. Greenies will do all that they can to keep Charter Forests from happening. Just as surely as teachers unions have tried to eliminate Charter Schools.

    The reductions in oversight and contradictory laws referred to in one of the other articles would eliminate the need for Charter Forests as long as the national forests were subject to annual audits by independent third parties to validate and identify shortfalls in terms of compliance with State Best Management Practices and all environmental laws of the land.

    Reply
    • Gil, I’m not sure that most Greenies are even aware of this concept, much less wanting to put much effort in opposing the idea. I haven’t had time to follow the link to the original post, but I’ve noticed this topic being discussed positively in a few email groups I correspond with, so am in agreement with both you and Guy that this is a discussion that should probably be posted separately, rather than merely included in a list of links to another blog. Ron, would you be willing to post these separately, include a link to your original blog post at the beginning, and maybe including a few sentences of introduction to the topic or to your blog?

      And I’m in full support of the independent third party review, but even more in support of turning over management of forests and grasslands to county, state, and tribal resource managers. With annual third party review.

      Reply
  3. Bob

    Unfortunately, having “the national forests” “subject to annual audits by independent third parties to validate and identify shortfalls in terms of compliance with State Best Management Practices and all environmental laws of the land” isn’t going to fly with the greenies because it would limit their ability to veto management plans and micromanage by fear of lawsuit and actual lawsuit.

    Reply
    • Gil

      I’m not sure I’ve ever met an actual Greenie, but they certainly seem to be a powerful and irrational political force of massive negative consequences from the way you keep generalizing about their implied unpatriotic intent and well-oiled and incredibly successful legal and political strategies.

      Who are these people? And how did they become such a fearsome adversary if they are all so godawful dense? That’s what I’d like to know. Seriously Gil, without some additional details or examples, just calling something you think distasteful “the greenies” sounds overly combative and makes your actual ideas — rather than your social judgments, which apparently you think need to be shared — more difficult to take seriously. In my opinion.

      Reply
  4. As an environmentalist tiring of the commonly used pejorative here (“Greenie”), I beg to differ — I have been quite aware of the “charter forest” angle of the Tea Party/neoliberal/libertarian/free market fundamentalists’ agendas. Regarding the striking double standard going on here, Wikipedia defines “Greenie” as, “A common or derogatory term for an environmentalist, a person who supports the goals of the environmental movement.”

    (excerpt from http://countieswithnationalforests.wordpress.com/2014/01/04/taking-an-ax-to-traditional-forest-management-the-charter-school-approach-works-for-education-so-why-not-apply-it-elsewhere/ ):

    “The charter forest also would be exempt from current requirements for public land-use planning and the writing of environmental impact statements. These requirements long ago ceased to perform their ostensible function of improving public land decision making. They have instead become open invitations for litigation—effectively transferring much of the management control over national forests to litigants and federal judges.”

    Wow. “Not Without a Fight!” indeed.

    Besides the above quote possessing an unmistakable resemblance to talking points in opposition to NEPA and other environmental laws in NCFP posts, it bears mentioning the incredible amounts of libertarian and neoliberal dark money which have been central to the imposition of both, charter schools and many failed and successful “collaborative” attempts to privatize large portions of publicly owned national forests.

    You don’t have to be an environmentalist to understand this agenda. There are many collaborators who claim to be environmentalists even approving such agendas. They often do it for what is commonly referred to as the “Wrong Kind of Green.”

    Reply
    • This is EXACTLY why I use the two terms of “preservationist” and “conservationist”, to recognize the split between those who consider timber sales to be “forest destruction” and those who think we need to do whatever it takes to “restore” forests. I think it IS important that people see that most National Forests are not a product of “nature”, or some fictional entity. The forests where I live are products of man’s impacts, either beneficial or destructive. I think that once people realize that, we can address what man’s next impact SHOULD BE. Doing nothing, in the face of these realities, is the least “natural” option, and has been shown to be destructive, in most long term examples.

      Although some people seem to consider the “preservationist” term to be insulting, I intend no insult when I use it. It DOES correctly describe many people who want “nature to take its course”. They want a “pre-man” forest, in a world dominated by humans, and their inescapable impacts.

      Reply
  5. Thanks bob, you said it much better than me.

    I can rap down the greens myself since I am one but we are a very diverse, and sometimes thoughtful bunch. Except for a few I will not name here.

    I consider Matthew Koehler well stated and well read, I don;t always agree but I like the way he presents things. Please do not cause him any distress or we might lose his voice and then what would we do for fun.

    You could call me a greenie over a beer sometime but on a blog, it is not quite as amusing as it could be. In person I think you would be great to talk with and I do not think you intend to be rude, but easier to make a greenie joke in person.

    Much obliged for hearing me on this lest we slip onto bad habits I thought we put behind us.

    You might note that I was whacking at one of the greenies last week for obnoxious talk so I can throw it both ways. And he was pretty bad, worse than you I think.

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  6. To all

    I am sorry to offend the sensitivities of some by my use of the word Greenies.

    As a forester with a great love for our forests and our somewhat fragile world, I am a trained and experienced environmentalist, conservationist and I am all about sustainability where not frustrated by evolution (global change and superior species supplanting less adaptable species).

    For lack of a better name, I use Greenies to describe those who claim to be environmentalist/conservationists/preservationist yet their proposals reveal their lack of knowledge which reveals that they are not enough of an environmentalist to spend the time and effort to garner the wide scope and depth of professional knowledge and experience necessary to better deal with the extremely complex subject of forest ecosystems and their impact on the world. To discuss this group of people, I need a label for them just as they need to use labels to describe the general group of people that I often agree with.

    What am I supposed to call those who proclaim to be environmentalists but advocate policies that are contrary to the established fundamentals of science and are self defeating in the long term for their stated goals for the world and forest ecosystems in particular?

    Until someone comes up with a name that offends no one yet still conveys my meaning, it’s greenies for me. Greenies even works for greenies. Ever hear of the the various national green political parties? Whoa, there is even a Green Peace NGO. Greenies is a natural choice as a collective name for those who are proud to be green without any clear cut definition of what green they are for and what green they are against (maybe they are against invasive species or maybe they are against organisms without chloroplasts).

    Me thinks that we all protest too much. Me thinks bluster is much easier than dealing with facts.

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  7. When I was a forestry undergrad many years ago, some other students (mostly wildlifers) liked to call us “stumpies”. I didn’t mind too much, figured it was because they didn’t understand forestry all that well, and so resorted to a simplistic stereotype. Before that, in the Navy, I used to call all USMC folks “jarheads” (sorry guys) and they called me a “squid”. Same underlying reasons, I think. Nowadays, I don’t really mind being called a “greenie”, just more of the same 😉

    Reply
    • Guy

      I loved being called a squid because that’s what part of the team I was and I was proud of it. The Grunts/Jarines/Jarheads loved their labels because they new that they could whip our derrieres any time that they wanted to. Fortunately, most squids knew enough not to call them names when they were looking for a fight.

      Labels were ok because we had the same goals and they knew that they needed us and we knew that we needed them because we had different training, tools and skill sets. The mutual dependence created something called respect and the name calling was just a weird way of showing that respect. In some ways it was almost like saying, ‘I may not like your bravado and swagger but I am proud of your skill set and proud of being on the same team with you and I’m going to do everything to insure your success because that is also my success. Or, at least, that was the way it was some of the time 🙂 I had it easy in the navy and my contribution wasn’t much but I knew why I was there standing by in a state of preparedness.

      Obviously, my idealized military example above is meant to draw a contrast and suggest why we have some of the shortcomings on this blog that we all dislike. Unfortunately this isn’t an idealized world and no matter how hard we try, we are going to have our falling outs because we are no better emotionally or morally than our close ancestors.

      Reply
      • Gil, you continue to surprise me. Agree with all you said here. Only combat I ever saw was in Portsmouth, Norfolk, and Naples bars, sailors vs marines, but out at sea we were glad to have them on board. My little bro’ was a Navy hospital corpsman (there’s another name for that but can’t say it here) attached to the Marines, they treated him like he was the Dalai Lama or something because they knew he was their lifeline. Have to ask, were you an officer or did you work for a living? If the latter, we have something else in common. If the former, no problem at all, I knew some good ones. -Guy

        Reply
        • Guy

          I was a short timer from the beginning – wanted to get to practicing forestry. They wanted me to go to OCS but twenty months in when Nam was winding down they asked for volunteers to leave as part of the force reduction. My hand went up so fast that I broke the jaw of the guy next to me and had to spend as much time in the brig as he had to in the hospital. 🙂 And they all said BS, Gil 🙂

          Got a letter from my Uncle Sam saying that he wanted me to take a free trip from grad school in Athens to Atlanta for an Army pre-induction physical. While I was in Atlanta they served us Hominy for lunch. I suddenly remembered that I’d heard that the Navy ate the best of all of the services so, when I got back to Athens, I signed up for the USNR which gave me a year to finish my degree while serving once a week at the Navy OCS school in Athens. Then after graduating and having been married for only 3 months, they sent me to Charleston where I got to pick up cigarette buts for a month while they figured out what to do with me. They finally sent me to Gitmo where I started out in the boat shed, playing a lot of pool while waiting for a boat run, scrapping barnacles off of the bottom of a small craft and worked my way up to coxswain of 40 and 50 foot motor launches. Then I got moved to the admiral’s staff as the backup to the Jarine who was the Admiral’s driver and a V.I.P. pool driver for when important people and their families came to make sure that Cuba wasn’t drifting away from the states. We were really busy in the winter. Of course, I had to take the kids snorkeling and take their yacht captain to the NCO club where the Aussie had to put down the whole club because they were up in arms that an e-3 was in their club. I learned from him that I had power even over officers because all that I had to say was “the Admiral wants it”. It was kind of like being Radar on Mash 🙂 So I had my own car and the rest of the VIP pool and I could go snorkeling any time we off duty. And then there were the endless luaus where we escorted the visitors, helped the Philippine cooks and served as cup bearer and food taster to make sure that nothing was poisoned. But in spite of all of the fun, and not being in combat, I nearly got killed a couple of times when the Lord was trying to make His presence known to a young agnostic.

          After about 9 months in Cuba I had made DP3 (Data Processor) and while in Norfolk on leave getting ready to go to Athens, I hit the phone book in a pay phone booth and called the head statistician at the Commander of the Operational Test and Evaluation Force and a month later back in Cuba, I had orders for Norfolk where half of my $300 gross monthly pay went for a duplex for my bride and I which was 3 blocks from the beach right next to the Chesapeake Bay Bridge. We never did figure out how, after $150 rent, we bought groceries and payed for gas for the daily commute to the base for 9 months.

          So, I guess that you are now sorry that you asked and triggered an old man’s memory. 🙂 I am glad to know that you too served and I thank you for that. I think that this country would be better off if all had to serve and grow up quick.

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  8. Laughing here, starts off about spamming then becomes an etiquette lesson?
    Devolution of management oversight is a concept way overdue. And Gil is right about the “faction that will not be spoken of” fighting such a thing with all means possible. They’d rather have it all burn than give up de-facto power over policy through the courts.
    Or maybe, the FTWNBSO don’t really want it all to burn flat, but having built power on the premise that it would be perfect if we just locked up and left it alone to wise Momma Nature, they can’t go — oops, we were wrong and the outcome really stinks.
    So, because this is political in natural, and political operatives NEVER admit they are wrong — expect a fight over devolution. So the website name is fine with me.

    Reply
    • Gil: Thanks for the Acronym Alert. Those of us over at SOYAP! (Spell Out Your Acronym(s) — Please!) appreciate this kind of diligence. The serious side to this is that acronyms — and maybe particularly those coming from the federal government the past few decades — are just a more recent form of insider arrogance, all LOL’s aside. Purposefully designed so that the Chosen Few can speak in code above and beyond the rest of us. Very much like Latin priests in the Middle Ages, or statistics in the 1950s — real barriers to education, communication, and understanding. Unless Dave is just pulling our chain . . .

      Reply
      • Bob

        I just want to know if FTWNBSO is more insulting than “Greenie”? If it is, then I’ll probably start using it instead of “Greenie” 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂 – 😉

        Reply
  9. Dave hid the answer in plain sight: “Faction That Will Not Be Spoken Of”. Fooled me for a while, I thought it was maybe something to do with Spotted Owl… But a nice rhetorical move, as it links the greenies with such social unsavories as Harry Potter’s Voldemort (“he who must not be named”) and Oscar Wilde (twice: “the love that dare not speak its name”, and “Better to be spoken of badly rather than not to be spoken of at all”). Nicely played, Dave.

    Reply

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