RIDING HERD by Lee Pitts
Bring Back The Blobs
E
ighteen states have sued the feds over some new twists to the Endangered Species Act. A species no longer has to be few in number to be listed, only its habitat has to be “endangered”. There might be trillions of some long-eared bat but if its habitat is “threatened” as deemed by the feds, the bat could be considered endangered. And it gets worse. According to the lawsuit, “The final rules allow the services to declare areas occupied critical habitat that are not occupied by the species and could not support the species were it moved there.” In other words, a species can be listed as threatened or endangered in areas where there aren’t any, and never were. They can also be considered endangered in places where they could not possibly survive. Under the new rules the Atlantic Ocean could be considered endangered habitat for tigers, even though tigers can’t hold their breath underwater all that long. Sadly, I’m not making this up. The rules are based on the supposition that some day the land, or water, might change and a species could theoretically live there. Think polar bears in the Amazon Rainforest. When I first heard about this my head exploded but after much thought I see it presents a great opportunity to right a wrong. Currently there is a great imbalance in the number of endangered species each state must harbor. Hawaii has less than .2 percent of America’s land mass but 25 percent of endangered species. Four hundred live in Hawaii while Maine only has 12. California has over 300 endangered species while New Hampshire has nine. The Northeastern quadrant of this country, which has the highest concentration of liberal greenies, has the lowest number of endangered species. New York has 22, Rhode island has 8, Connecticut and Delaware both are home to ten, and Vermont has only five. I’m sure easterners want to do their part in saving species instead of just passing crazy laws, so here’s my plan. Idaho has done more than their fair share in bringing
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