Alliance for the Wild Rockies, Defenders of Wildlife, the Center for Biological Diversity and their brand of environmental activism have found a better way to monetize our public lands, which is far more profitable than logging. They use excellent marketing tactics to convince well-intentioned, but uninformed, people to give them money. Rather than use this money for actually keeping the Rockies wild, helping the wildlife they defend or adding to biological diversity, they instead leverage it by filing lawsuit after lawsuit using the courts to line their pockets with even more money. The best part? The costs of their actions go to others, they reap all the profit. Give them some credit, they are really effective at what they do. Their business plan would not work very well, if they called themselves wood ticks or leeches, parasites that best represent what they really are. Like good capitalists anywhere, they are maximizing their profit potential. They have a powerful offense. Wall Street cankers, corporatists, other environmental groups duped? Who would not be against that? The problem is it has always been about the money. There is no substance. It is true: The emperor has no clothes!
How can you tell? These are groups still fighting to relist wolves, a species that by any measure of the best available science has been fully recovered for 13 years and still thriving. Why do they do it? Because it is profitable. Any reasonable person observing their actions over the years can clearly see they could not care less about the land, flora and fauna. If it wasn’t about the money, they would recognize that the states are perfectly capable of managing the wolves. If they really cared, they would let the wolf go and move on to the next valid animal, wolverines. Unfortunately for the wolverines, they are reclusive, rarely seen and don’t stir the imagination like a wolf does. They don’t have the marketing potential these groups need to reap in the profits. If more evidence is needed, look what is happening with the grizzly bear, another charismatic poster child. They already stopped the first delisting attempt over white bark pine. Never mind the fact the bears eat just about everything and are now hanging out on the edges of our towns. There is another fortune to be made there. The science says they are recovered, but they do not care. The grizzly, like the wolf, has enormous marketing potential. The damage they are doing to the Endangered Species Act in order to line their own pockets is immeasurable and unforgivable.
How can they be stopped? Shut off their funds through education. Unfortunately the task is a difficult one; trying to counter slick marketing, playing on emotion, with logic and reason. If you find one of their supporters, deal with them with honest debate. Can we log sustainably, protecting bull trout, lynx and wolverines, species truly threatened, and at the same time provide jobs and quality products the market needs? Are there National Forest lands suitable for logging? Are logged lands beneficial to certain species? Will collaboration among the varied forest user groups protect what needs protecting? Are there conservation groups working to truly protect the land, flora and fauna? Yes, to all of the above. Find one and support it and cut off the parasites.
Mark Brust
Whitefish