February 2005     

Blue Counties

By Jim Beers

As someone who writes about managing the environment, animal use and ownership, Constitutional rights, government, and associated matters, I find myself fascinated by that red/blue map.

I do not see parties or political machines so much as I see an accurate depiction of American attitudes about the things I write about. Those blue counties are the centers of animal rights activism. They are the hotbeds of environmental extremism. They are the places that want to gut the 2^nd Amendment, and close down public land grazing and logging.

They tend to be the California spots that vote to protect mountain lions, the Massachusetts spots that ban trapping, and the Oregon spots that outlaw bear and mountain lion management by precluding harvest methods. They are the spots that want the federal government to buy more land, and for the state and federal government to regulate land use, animal ownership, and animal use.

They are, pretty much, the places that generate the money for national and local campaigns to ban hunting, fishing, and trapping. They are the places that want more species "listed," and new federal authority to restore "native ecosystems" by declaring war on invasive species. I do not make these observations to be disparaging, but rather, to mention a fact that seems to go unnoticed.

Reputedly, the blue counties are the harbingers of progressive changes and innovations. Looking back over the years, many government programs and ballot initiatives that harm residents of red counties originate in the blue counties. Circus bans, pet breeder licensing, and "NEPA/EIS requirements" intended to be used in lawsuits to stop everything from roads to energy development, bear-hunting bans, and Wilderness proposals are but a few examples of the things concocted in the urban offices of environmental and animal rights organizations - headquartered in the blue counties.

How all this might relate to the hostility that has emerged lately in election campaigns, I do not purport to know. Like the chicken and the egg, it is hard to say which came first, or which caused the other. The fact remains, however, that there is very probably a strong relationship between the political hostility of recent years, and the upsurge in animal rights and environmental activism.

This all came to mind recently, while reading a newspaper article titled, Elephants' captivity questioned. Activists want to close all of nation's zoos. San Francisco's zoo wants to improve "its facilities for pachyderms." However, "That plan is not enough for Dr. Elliott Katz. President of In Defense of Animals, which is lobbying San Francisco's Board of Supervisors for what would be the first ban on zoo elephants in the country."

Further in the article it says, "It is highly questionable whether politicians who know absolutely nothing about animal management ought to be the ones who are making decisions about complex animals, about elephants, or other animals in zoos," said Michael Hutchins, the American Zoo and Aquarium Association's director of conservation. In conclusion, it says, "The debate in San Francisco is part of a wider campaign among animal activists against keeping wild animals in captivity, particularly elephants, which are not only the largest, but also considered among the more intelligent and social animals."

Well, there it is for all of you red-county folks. The radical agenda. The elite snobbery. The hokey science. The claim that our government is inadequate. The inference that only experts should be in charge of things. The claim that animals and humans are equal. (The great G.K. Chesterton once observed, "You never have to dig very deep to find the record of a man drawing a picture of a monkey, but no one has yet dug deep enough to find the record of a monkey drawing the picture of a man.")

The domino plan is to protect elephants and then, just like the gun registration that morphs into a handgun ban, and then a rifle/shotgun ban, or the English law against foxhunting, that is immediately followed by proposals to ban pheasant shooting. As the immortal Dr. Berra might observe, for all of you who read my writings, it is deja vu, all over again.

Elephants, like whales, mice, and monkeys are wild creatures. They are not human, no matter "how like us" or "how smart" they are reputed to be. It is a credit to us all, that we provide them wild places to exist in our midst, and they deserve the best we can provide when we manage, capture, or display them.

The fact that whales or elephants are "big" or "smart" does not provide them any more consideration than a deer or a jackrabbit. Being "big" and "smart" does mean they are harder to manage, that they have a larger impact on their (our) environment, and that they are harder to display.

There is no difference in reducing whale populations, because they depress desirable fish populations, or reducing elephants, because they destroy forests, than there is in reducing deer herds on National Parks, because they are destroying desirable plants. Why are these things so difficult to accept?

Likewise, displaying an elephant is, except for the size of the pen, no different from displaying a fish, or a turtle. While I would guess that red-county readers are nodding in agreement, I'll bet more than a few blue-county readers are hyperventilating, if they have not already used a naughty word or two.

So anyhow, that is the latest innovation from the blue counties. As a red-county fellow, whose body is maintained in a blue-county much of the time, I can only promise to keep you posted, as other such progressive proposals come to light.

By the way, in case your zoo starts its shutdown by getting rid of the elephant exhibit, think about bidding on the elephant. I have a recipe for elephant soup in my recipe box, and it goes something like this. Cut up one elephant in a pot. Add 100 gallons of beef stock, 4 bushels of carrots, 150 onions, salt and pepper to taste, and add a jackrabbit for flavor. The cook is cautioned to check first with the dinner guests about the jackrabbit though, since some people don't like a hare in their soup.

Like the dinner guests, I don't like the recipe the blue-counties want to serve me. It seems to be passe to discuss the matter logically in the open, or to suggest that those who object to elephants in captivity (or hunting, logging, dog breeding, or whatever) simply go to a symphony or basket brawl game, and leave others to their pursuits.

Somehow all this is a reflection of "values," but even discussing that seems to only evoke strategies and approaches to somehow mask such differences in the next election cycle. Whatever happens, I pledge to keep working on how to resolve these differences, while maintaining friendships and our nation. I hope you will, too.

Jim Beers is a retired Refuge Manager, Special Agent, & Wildlife Biologist U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service.