Monthly Archives: November 2013

Bill Maher: Republicans ‘Shouldn’t Be Pandering To Hunters, They Should Be Pandering To Stoners’

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Bill Maher concluded Friday night’s episode of “Real Time” with a bold suggestion for the Republican party: “Why not embrace pot?”

About 3:00 into the “New Rules” clip above, Maher asks why politicians such as Ted Cruz are still using highly publicized hunting trips to show voters how relatable and down to earth they are, when only 6% of Americans actually hunt.

“Like many Americans, this picture [of Cruz hunting] makes me less likely to vote for you, and more likely to wish your hunting partner was Dick Cheney,” Maher joked.

If the goal of the GOP is to appeal to women, hispanics and millenials (or as Maher describes the new American voter, “a young latino lesbian who smokes a boatload of dope”) Maher suggests that the GOP start pandering to stoners instead of hunters.

“If they want to pass the torch to the next generation, they need to ‘pass the torch’ to the next generation,” he joked.

Watch the full clip above to hear the rest of Maher’s reasons why Republicans should support marijuana legalization, including how in the age of Molly and flesh-eating drugs, pot really IS conservative.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/11/02/bill-maher-republicans-embrace-pot-not-hunters-video_n_4202427.html

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An Upside to Just About Everything

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The rain was pounding so hard off my roof last night that I went to sleep with the satisfied feeling that the storm forecast to continue on into today would surely put a damper on the opening day of elk season (a more sacred day than Thanksgiving, Christmas and Easter combined to folks around here). But like a scene out of the cartoon “How the Grinch Stole Christmas,” it seems nothing can put a damper on the local revelers murderous merriment.

Except for a lack of elk, that is.

Dawn broke to the rapid hammering of gunfire, in spite of the driving rain and near gale-force winds. It sounded like boys and girls of all ages were out playing with their new semi-automatics, sending lead sailing through the air for the sheer joy of it. If each round spelled a dead elk, every herd in the region would be felled by now. Don’t ask me how they get that “good clean shot” at that rate.

But with all the privately owned forest and farm land in these parts, this isn’t a popular destination for the suburban hunting faction. I knew the noise was all the result of just one overeager local resident, and that most of his shots hit only alders, salmonberry bushes or possibly another neighbor’s sheep or llama.

So what is the upside of all that insanity? Another neighbor out trolling around for elk in his $40,000.00 pickup (clad in full Cabella’s camo coveralls and an orange vest that made him look like some kind of demented, oversized crossing guard) inadvertently provided the answer when he pulled over to make small talk, bemoaning the fact that at the first sound of gunfire this time of year the elk for miles around make themselves scarce. He went to add, “…and they know the difference between deer and elk season too. I’ve been out every day of deer season and saw over a hundred head of elk, but now they’re nowhere to be found.”

Can’t say I feel sorry for the guy; it’s not like he was starving. Hunting is just a hobby for him—something to do. You know, like a tradition; just something to bullshit about with his buddies about at the local tavern or mini mart.

Meanwhile, for the elk hunting season is a matter of life and death.

Text and Wildlife Photography ©Jim Robertson, 2013. All Rights Reserved

Text and Wildlife Photography ©Jim Robertson, 2013. All Rights Reserved

Woman wounded in apparent hunting accident

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By Associated Press                Nov 2, 2013

SCAPPOOSE, Ore. (AP) — A northwest Oregon sheriff says a 24-year-old St. Helens woman out hunting with a friend suffered a severe leg wound in an apparently accidental shooting.

Sheriff Jeff Dickerson said Lindsay Roub was wounded Friday afternoon when the rifle she had been carrying discharged as she was handing it to her hunting partner.

The sheriff says Roub and 39-year-old Raymond Ozias of St. Helens had been hunting in a rural area a few miles west of Scappoose.

They reportedly were walking down a steep hill in pursuit of a buck. The sheriff says the rifle discharged as Roub asked her friend to take her weapon so she could climb down.

Ozias called for help. Deputies found Roub barely conscious. After treatment by medics, she was carried out of the woods and taken to a Portland hospital.

[Sarah Palin–poster girl for a women’s right to be just as psychotic as any man–is shown here wearing a T-shirt reminding her adoring fans simply that “Women Hunt” (don’t ask me what the accompanying drawing is supposed to be). I guess it’s only fair women hunters have their share of hunting accidents too.]74490788

Identifying and Dealing with the Anti-wolf Forces

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“Cartoon” from Save Western Wildlife’s Facebook page

In late December an “event page” on facebook was attacked.  The page was celebrating a prayer vigil for wolves that was to be held in Salem, Oregon.  And the attackers swooped down electronically the day after the event and filled the page with bloody pictures of wolf kills and fetal deer purported to have been “aborted” by wolves.  The action was disturbing and eerily like the protests held by the Westboro Baptist Church, where they show up where they are not wanted and act in the most offensive and inappropriate manner possible.
The Westboro mob is classified as a hate group and rightfully so.  They—like the anti-wolf folks—are generally overflowing with unbridled faith, strongly held opinions and self-righteousness and somewhat bereft of relevant education, understanding, or any form of tolerance or compassion.  Both groups are classic bigots in that they hold unfounded and yet deep beliefs and will not let facts or reason dissuade them from dishing out broadsides of vitriol towards the object of their scorn whether it be homosexuals, people of color, members of other religions or wolves.
Is Wolf Hatred Gateway Bigotry?
Do I go too far in linking bigotry against wolves with the same attitudes against individuals and sectors of the human population?  I don’t think so.  Studies have conclusively linked animal abuse to child abuse, domestic violence and even serial killing.  The experts assert that these acts are all parts of the same dangerous syndrome.  I strongly suspect that bigotry is a related syndrome and behaves the same way.  And I have seen enough human-directed bigotry—mainly racial, anti-Semitic and life-style directed—on the facebook pages of these anti-wolf actors and their compatriots to think that, once started, predator bigotry translates quite easily across the wildlife-to-human spectrum.

– See more at: http://www.cascwild.org/identifying-and-dealing-with-the-anti-wolf-forces-pg-13/#sthash.fhfrhp9Z.dpuf

Also see: http://ireport.cnn.com/docs/DOC-1052941

Wisconsin’s Wolf Kill Tally Now 181

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In Wisconsin, more wolves have been killed in 16 days than during the entire 2012 hunting and trapping season.

Yes, you read that correctly.

In just over two weeks, hunters and trappers in Wisconsin have killed off more than 181 wolves. This represents a horrible and disturbing trend of accelerated anti-wolf attitudes and killing.

How did this happen?

Reports suggest that the state Wolf Advisory Committee is now overrun by livestock and hunting and trapping interests – and the deck is now completely stacked against wolves.

We have to stop this before it’s too late. Please take action today and demand that balance be restored to the Wisconsin Wolf Advisory Committee!

This committee makes recommendations on quotas, policies and even population goals. But several scientific experts have been removed from the committee, and livestock and hunting and trapping interests have been added on in their place!

No outside scientists are on the committee, and only one pro-wolf group is represented. There are, however, seven livestock, hunting and trapping groups represented!

Demand that the Secretary of the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources stop this blatant anti-wolf bias!

We’ve come so far in our efforts to restore wolves to their historic range in the Great Lakes region. But with anti-wolf forces more aggressive than ever, we’re at a crossroads…

copyrighted Hayden wolf in lodgepoles

Cages built to protect kids from wolves at New Mexico bus stops under fire for ‘demonizing’ the endangered animals

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snl-106_4[If folks in New Mexico are this afraid of wolves, they must  really be paranoid of land sharks.]

Cages designed to protect children from  Mexican gray wolves at New Mexico’s bus stops have come under fire for demonizing the endangered animals, which have never attacked anyone in the  state.

Environmentalists argue the  wooden and mesh cages erected in the town of Reserve a decade ago are only furthering the misunderstanding of the animals, their behaviors and the dangers they pose [not to mention making the people of Reserve look really silly.]

But supporters of the cages – including residents and conservative anti-government organizations – insist that the animals, which were reintroduced to the area in 1998, pose a very real threat.

The  debate has resurfaced because the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service proposes to  extend Endangered Species Act protections for around 75 wolves left in New  Mexico and Arizona.

The approximately 20 cages in Reserve were  installed on the orders of Reserve Independent Schools, Catron County Sheriff  Shawn Menge said.

The FWS is also seeking to make it illegal to  kill wolves in most situations and would greatly expand the area where wolves  can exist without interference, FoxNews.com reported.

To many conservatives in the area, the  proposals are simply examples of meddling government officials who do not know  what it is like to live with wild wolves.

But Eva Sargent, director of Southwest  programs for Defenders of Wildlife, said that keeping the cages was politically  motivated, rather than based on safety concerns.

While there are some – albeit few – reports  of animals attacking livestock, they rarely attack humans. Even with the livestock, domestic dogs kill 20 times as many sheep as wolves do, data  shows.

‘There’s been absolutely zero, nada, zilch attacks on humans by wolves in the Southwest, so I think these cages are a reaction to a non-problem,’ Sargent told Fox.

‘For some people, it’s a political ploy to bring attention to other things. A lot of the fear stirred up by these kid cages, at the base of it, is an anti-government fear and the wolves are standing in for that.’

Yet, still residents in the West say the decision should be up to them, not Washington. ‘The wolf is symbolic of a larger fact,’ David Spady, the producer of an anti-wolf documentary told the LA Times. ‘The federal government is running roughshod over private property rights.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2479999/Cages-built-protect-kids-wolves-New-Mexico-bus-stops-demonizing-endangered-animals.html#ixzz2jExLvkAG
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