Commentary
The Chronicle
FRIDAY, OCTOBER 19, 2001 �PAGE 19
Protecting America’s wildlife After many years, the Endangered Species Act still serves important purpose This summer witnessed the latest chapter in the controversial 28-year history of the Endangered Species Act. When the headlines broke in May, they looked bad for ESA. The protected
attractive. They spend most of their lives grubbing in the mud, eating invertebrates. But for the sake of these uncharismatic creatures, the federal government stopped delivering irrigation water to the farmers of the Klamath Basin. A prolonged drought had reduced water levels until federal authorities were forced to choose between the fish species’ existence and the farmers’ crops. The farmers, of course, objected. Four times they stormed federal facilities in the area, vandalized equipment and opened the gates holding back “their” water. They and their local politicians staged photo-ops, appearing on CNN, on NPR and in The New York Times. Several of their activities and appearances were timed to coincide with symbolic events, including July 4. Some farmers sold their land and water rights to conservation groups, but these few were labeled as sellouts by their neighbors and as carpetbaggers by the conservationists. The demonstrations continue to this day, although protests stopped temporarily following the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11. So the ESA should be changed, right?
service. Both needs were answered with the Klamath. Onions rotted in their homesteads for many ofthe veterans in fields. Potato prices fell until they were the Klamath. “Don’t worry, we know it’s worth less than the cost of bringing dry,” said the Feds. “We’ll build dams, them to market; farmers ground them and an irrigation system, taxpayers’ into fertilizer rather than sell them. species were obscure, treat! You’ll be able to grow anything Many Klamath farmers turned to unattractive and supyou want! Least we can do for men who growing grains that benefited from posedly worthless. The fought the Axis powers!” federal price supports, so that competiopposition was a group Through the following decades, water tion does not affect their prices. And human beings trying to levels dropped and temperatures rose as the water levels got lower and lower make a traditional livirrigation turned the arid watershed and lower. ing, and the circuminto farmland. Water And so, we come Joshua stances forcing the conquality declined as full circle, with a Rose flict were apparently fertilizers and pestinew perspective on not br "tr'l jeyoiivd human contro. cides ran off from the the situation. The This time, ESA had to be changed. But farmers’ fields. The drought is not an species in the end, after looking past the attendams cut off cenunexpected event, tion-grabbing headlines and vote-seekturies-old migration protection, is but the natural cliing rhetoric, the picture was very differroutes between the mactic state in the ent, and the act was justified again. salmon’s ocean habito [the Klamath Basin. The The setting was the Klamath Basin tat and upstream farmers did not have in south-central Oregon. This location is breeding grounds. way their water cut off probably significant because of their The salmon fishery without warning; relative proximity to the old-growth crashed in the 19605, they had nearly a forests that were ground zero in the taking many jobs with it. Suckerfish decade of advance notice and did nothbiggest ESA controversy to date, the populations also crashed. ing. The federal government is not takSpotted Owl fracas. Many of the same In 1993, then-President Bill Clinton ing away the farmers’ livelihood; in fact, folks who engaged in demagoguery convinced Congress to pass the North the Feds are their livelihood, paying American Free Trade Agreement negothen, such as handing out “Save a logmillions of dollars in price supports, ger, eat an owl” bumper stickers resurtiated by his predecessor, George Bush. irrigation water and other subsidies. The two species of suckerfish were Free trade, not endangered species proWrong. faced. But this time, rather than loggers—stereotyped as burly, hairy men To get the whole story, look back sevdeclared endangered, and a recovery tection, is the real threat to their way of in flannel stomping around the forest, eral decades to the late 19405. The plan was filed with recommendations life. The suckerfish are not useless but bent on destroying trees —the humans Allies were defeating Germany and to protect and restore the remaining are signs ofimbalance in the ecosystem. involved were farmers: sympathetic Japan, and the Klamath River boasted populations. The Native American They are relics of days when suckers families who feed the world and grow not only abundant suckerfish of several tribes were restricted to taking one and salmon supported a fishing econoproducts that we have in our own species but also one of the west coast’s suckerfish per year, for ceremonial my more profitable than the present kitchens. Many of them were also war most productive Coho salmon fisheries. purposes only, until the populations farming one. The farmers who sell their veterans (more on that later). And The salmon supported both commercial recovered. 1994 land are not sellouts, nor are the conin However, instead of owls—warm, soft and feathfishermen and a large community of Republicans took control of Congress, servationists buying it carpetbaggers; ery symbols of wisdom or patience in Native Americans. The tribes also and the suckerfish recovery plan never they are agents of the free market, many cultures, valued for controlling fished for the suckers, for both food and received sufficient funding. Klamath turning the land and water to their rodent populations—the endangered ceremonial purposes. What the Basin farmers ignored the listing and most valuable uses. And the farmers species this time was suckers. Klamath Basin did not have was farms; continued irrigating, still at the taxwho refuse to sell out, and the politiTo be specific, the Shortnose Sucker, the region was predominantly arid, too payers’ expense. cians who use their protests as photoChasmistes brevirostris, and the Lost dry to grow crops profitably. Through the ’9os, NAFTA brought a ops? Well, let’s just say that fish aren’t River Sucker, Deltistes luxatus. Both The war ended, and the veterans flood of imported Mexican and the only suckers in the Klamath Basin. species are restricted to the Klamath came home. They wanted peaceful ways Canadian crops, many grown in natuBasin. Both are edible, but too rare to to make a living, and the federal gov- rally wetter, more fertile places and Joshua Rose is a graduate student in support a fishery. Neither is terribly ernment wanted to thank themfor their harvested with cheaper labor than in the Department of Biology. \
Free trade, endangered
threat
the real farmers’]
of life.
Summit pointers for Bush WASHINGTON Here are a few do’s and don’ts that will help coalition-wary realists measure President George W. Bush’s success or failure at this week’s Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum in Shanghai.
William Safire Commentary Don't get hung up in a free-trade love feast. Bush is not leaving his command post in terrorist wartime primarily to save the world from recession. Interminable blather about opening up markets is what China’s Jiang Zemin wants most. The Chinese leader’s diplomatic legions, drawn up in vast cumbrous array, will issue reams of plans for a “Shanghai round” of negotiations, but what makes this Bush trip necessary is getting, face to face, a promise of intelligence sharing about terror groups, to be followed by arrests and extradition. Do focus on the central issue of the new era: All nations must choose sides in the terror war. Muslim Indonesia, with the world’s fourth-largest population, is becoming a breeding ground for fanaticism. Bush needs to get commitments from nations like Japan, the Philippines, Australia, Taiwan and South Korea to help Indonesia —as well as dictator-ridden Malaysia—resist and root out al-Qaida and its underworld brethren. Do not let China and Russia gang up on us in a trilateral meeting; stick to “hi-lats” only. Jiang wants to use this crisis to justify crackdowns on Taiwan, Tibet
and its Muslim Uighurs, while Russia’s Vladimir Putin accept the newly reinforced American resolve. It’s sees a chance to brutalize Chechnya again and snatch worth a shot. Don’t let our new warmth toward Pakistan allow independence back from Georgia. Bush should hold fast to his unequivocal position: Not all local autonomy China to get away with selling missile know-how to need be separatist, and not every separatist movement that nervous nuclear power. In November 2000, is a terrorist organization. China agreed not to transfer ballistic missile techDo seize the moment to advance missile defense. nology to its longtime ally Pakistan. Then it did. Bush shows no sign of wobbling on this issue. Next When we objected, China stonewalled; we countered month is decision time to continue or to delay devel- by denying U.S. companies the license to launch opment, and that deadline coincides with his satellites on Chinese rockets. In Shanghai, Jiang will “friend” Putin’s visit to the Crawford, Texas, ranch. try to get a pass for its duplicity by saying we all love Now is the moment to nail down his agreement to Pakistan’s dictator now. Bush should not allow himthe principles of a “new framework” to replace the self to be so rolled. Do make clear to China that future relations with outmoded ABM treaty that now renders both nations defenseless. Then both presidents can instruct aides the United States hinge on sharing the intelligence to complete the deal for signing at the November gathered by its worldwide network of spies. “As you might imagine,” a high official traveling with the “Crawford summit.” Do not pay for the freedom to build a space shield (or president understates, “our intelligence relationship for permission to hit the Taliban out of the formerly with the Chinese is not all that well developed.” But Soviet country of Uzbekistan) with an offer to bring even as we continue to steal each other’s secrets, it unready Russia into the World Trade Organization or should not be beyond the wit of spooks, when nationinto NATO. No quid pro quo is required when all al interests coincide, to exchange secrets about a comnations benefit from a planet-wide defense against termon enemy. rorist missiles containing nuclear or germ warheads. This above all: Freedom of world trade, so devoutBush could offer Putin some face-saving wiggle room ly to be wished, cannot blossom without freedom from fear. Those who want to participate in prosperby promising to consult him before deploying the antimissile shield. ity are obliged to join America in crushing the fanatDo follow up such a preliminary Russian- ical fearmongers and the nations nurturing them. American missile handshake with a face-to-face pitch That should be the message Bush drives home in to Jiang to relieve the mind of his military. Bush’s Shanghai. earnestness and charm are unlikely to stop China’s inexorable missile buildup, but Jiang, as he nears William Safire’s column is syndicated through the New retirement, may be looking for a graceful way to York Times News Service.