I see it as tantamount to complete submission, just one more highly paid fellow standing around scratching his head when the Silvery Horde pours through the locks …
The White House has tapped a former leader of the Indiana Department of Natural Resources and the Indiana Wildlife Federation as the Asian carp czar to oversee the federal response to keeping the invasive species out of the Great Lakes.
The reference to the former body politic for the Greater Russian Empire, whose family was dragged into the Siberian chill and shot, along with their doctors, maids, and servants, doesn’t breed thoughts of success, and may be partly to blame.
We’ve had security czars and drug czars but their job was easier. Dealing with human foibles or cravings is a sight more predictable than slowing the spread of a remorseless silver vacuum capable of eating half its weight each day.
“When it comes to the Asian carp threat, we are not in denial. We are not in a go-slow mode. We are in a full attack, full-speed-ahead mode. We want to stop this carp from advancing.”
I suppose like his predecessors, the Asian Carp czar will mobilize the military, carefully lining up phalanxes of mechanized infantry and their supporting cast, and unleashing holy hell on the Chicago River and its tributaries, until the environmentalists complain about the swans ingesting spent .223 – and calling a halt to the hostilities.
“Certainly there are some legal questions that are in process, but there has been a history already of good cooperation among the states,” Goss said. “I believe that will be one of my strengths, talking at the level of the department of natural resources in each of the states so that we can very carefully coordinate our efforts.”
It’s certain that I’m cynical and jaded and coloring this in the least favorable light, but this issue doesn’t have the years to construct some alternate system allowing commerce to flow from the Great Lakes downstream. Our sacrificial lamb and his meager 80 million budget are opposed by both people and fish, not merely the fish alone.
The extensive commerce and barge traffic of the region enjoys voting privileges, which can slow an aggressive solution just long enough to have the fish pour into the area with little or no opposition.
Once established and with free rein of the Great Lakes, everyone can throw up their hands and point fingers, then resume business-as-usual, free of the potential costs of portaging goods overland.
Attorneys for the defense countered that the DNA research has never been used in this manner and was unreliable. They argued that even scientists disagree about the likelihood that Asian carp are capable of sustaining a large and destructive population if allowed to enter the Great Lakes
It’s a repeat of the California Salmon debacle, where the interests of business are at loggerheads with the environment. Attorneys deny the most basic scientific tenets for fear of the financial implications to their clients, and despite plenty of consistent scientific opinion, the process drags on until ..
.. too late, all gone. Now we can all go home happy.
The Tsar was shot in July of a hot summer.
Damn, and here I figured nobody reads this stuff. You are correct sir.
We don’t need a czar, we need a chef. What 4-star Cajun, Paul Prudhomme, did to “Blackened Redfish,” surely some gifted entrepreneurial stovemeister can do to the Asian carp. The threatened gulf Redfish was soon removed from the menu, but (thankfully) there doesn’t appear there will be a shortage of this flavorful and robust new fish. Bon appetit !
As an expatriate Alaskan commercial fisheman, I can only ask “what’s the holdup?” I can think of any number of ways to commit genocide on the damn things with very little cost to the taxpayer. God knows we did it enough back home… In my not-so-humble opinion, further scientific study is not needed. The problem is clear and (to my mind) so is the solution.