SOS Forests

The Forest Incineration Conspiracy Continued

I presented the Forest Incineration Conspiracy last post. The bottom line is that multi-national forest landowners are engaged in territorial hegemony, taking over as much land as they can for reasons of money and power. That takeover will not serve our economy, will not create jobs, will not increase general community wealth, will nor benefit “nature”; in fact, just the opposite of those things are occurring.

Need more evidence? As Bear Bait pointed out [here]:

We are exporting the value added jobs. The profits are made offshore and not subject to US taxes. That is a real model in Seattle that Weyco and their ilk have to see with some pain. Look for it to happen to logs and lumber.

And then this just in over the insider wire:

2007 Softwood log exports from the West Coast increase [here]

PORTLAND, Ore. April 24, 2008. A total of 879.9 million board feet of softwood logs was exported from Washington, Oregon, northern California, and Alaska in 2007. The 2007 volume was up 11.6 percent from the 2006 total of 788.4 million board feet, according to Debra Warren, an economist at the Forest Service’s Pacific Northwest Research Station.

“ Some 546.8 million board feet or 62.1 percent of the west coast softwood log exports in 2007 went to Japan, 264.8 or 30.1 percent went to South Korea, 42.4 million board feet or 4.8 percent went to China, and 7.2 million board feet or 0.8 percent was exported to Taiwan,” says Warren. …

Other statistics included in the report are:

Log exports for 2007 from Washington and Oregon totaled 673.0 million board feet, up 26.0 percent from the 2006 volume of 534.3 million board feet.

A total of 457,000 board feet of logs was exported from northern California, up from
75, 000 board feet in 2006.

Alaska exported a total of 206.5 million board feet in 2007 compared with 254.1 in 2006.

Douglas-fir accounted for 53.7 percent of the 2007 log exports; western hemlock, 13.6 percent; Sitka spruce (out of Alaska), 17.3 percent; and other softwoods made up the remaining 15.4 percent.

The total value of 2007 log shipments was $544.1 million at port of exportation, and the average value was $618.40 per thousand board feet. Douglas-fir averaged $780.17 per thousand board feet; western hemlock, $521.92; and other softwoods, $460.77.

Those are NOT logs off USFS lands; they are from private lands, and from the Big Baron’s lands in particular. There is next to no cut from USFS lands. Roughly a quarter of the log harvest from the PNW got exported. No mill jobs for you! You will be allowed to purchase the imported wood products, however, if you can afford them!

That’s what happens when multi-nationals own the land base in the U.S.A., land of the slaves, home of the saps.

But don’t worry, the USFS is hot to take your property rights away on the land you are allowed to own. This little gem rolled in today too:

Forest Service Announces $54 Million to Conserve At-Risk Forests [here]

WASHINGTON, March 31, 2008—Forest Service Chief Abigail Kimbell today announced the award of $54 million in grants today to permanently protect thirty-five working forests across thirty-two states.

“The Forest Legacy Program conserves open space which allows us to respond to climate change, improves water quality and flows, and connects children to nature,” said Kimbell. “The strength of the Forest Legacy Program is the cooperation between States, partners, and private landowners—all working together to protect environmentally and economically important forests that are threatened by conversion.”

The Forest Legacy Program is the only Federal grant program focused on the permanent protection of important private forestland. The Forest Legacy Program promotes voluntary land conservation by operating on the principle of “willing buyer, willing seller.”

Examples of 2008 projects include: a forest vital for wildlife and cultural resources in Georgia; a rare pine barren ecosystem in New Hampshire; and a valley in Montana with abundant recreation opportunities, rare fish and wildlife, and local economic benefits.

Private forest landowners are facing increasing real estate prices, property taxes, and development pressure, resulting in conversion of forests to other land uses. The Forest Legacy Program focuses on conserving working forests – those that provide clean water, forest products, fish and wildlife habitat, and recreational opportunities. Most Forest Legacy Program projects are conserved through conservation easements, allowing landowners to keep their forestlands while protecting them from future development. …

In this context “future development” means homes. You will not be able to build a home on the “conserved” private properties. No home for you!

Open Space means no human habitation. No houses, no roads, no lawns. That’s right, no lawns, which are specifically banned. No defensible space. No human occupation. No residents. Can’t live there. Housing verboten by order of the USFS, even though it’s not government land.

The Big Baron doesn’t like neighbors. Humans are scum. Let the peasants live elsewhere. Last December Chief Gail declared her pet Open Space Plan [here]

Preserving open space is one of her top four goals, Kimbell said.

“If people have an incentive to hold on to wildlands (rather than develop them), we as a society benefit from that,” she said in an interview. “We all benefit from keeping wildlands wild.”

Wild Gail hates homes, hates people in general, and serves her master the Big Baron like a good toady. She does, however, love wildfire. Burn Baby Burn. Wildlands need wildfire, for resource benefits, don’t you know. That’s why Wild Gail is busy throwing Fire Management Plans in the shredder. She don’t need no stinking Fire Plans, because she don’t want no fire manager-ment. Let it be wildlands, and Let It Burn, says Wild Gail.

The Queen of Holocaust wants your home burned to the ground, because “we all benefit.” Better yet, no home for you in the first place! But not everywhere; just on 400 million acres of private land. That’s 625,000 square miles, or roughly all the private forestland in the continental U.S.

That land is for the Big Baron. Clearcutting allowed, homes no way. And the logs will be shipped overseas, thank you very much.

It’s “for the children.” Jamming children into urban slums and denying them the opportunity to live where it’s clean and green, on their own family property, is how Wild Gail is going to “connect children with nature.”

For the last 30 years I have been working with rural families who live on their land, and I can assure you that human presence and residence are the very essence and source of stewardship. What Wild Gail proses is so objectionable, so anti-human, so anti-stewardship, so destructive of nature and culture that I cannot find the words to describe my disgust. It is despicable, horrendously hypocritical, a Big Lie, Orwellian double-speak, anti-American, pure evil.

Someone I don’t know named Ester B. wrote to the Casper Tribune a comment to the above news article. She said it better than I can:

The US Forest Service cannot manage the millions of acres already in their hands. It may be called “public lands”, but it is the King’s Land. You may tread only with their permission. The notions of “renewable resource” and “multiple use” are gone. Change the definition and even treason becomes palatable. Environmentalist to Conservationist? Not. Farmers, ranchers and loggers are conservationists. They have to be or their livelihood disappears.

The Forest Service has gated roads, obliterated roads, closed roads, ripped roads and changed the definition of roads. They do not log anymore. They want the taxpayer to pay for their inability to sustainably harvest timber or grass. Endangered Species? What about rural communities and their inhabitants. The Forest Service does nothing but enhance and preserve their bureaucracy.

Now they want to lock up and manage [private] land. I don’t see anyone looking to the Forest Service for their land management expertise. If you want to fence it off, let the weeds take over, watch the forest collapse then burn, and then have a professional presentation (plus your tax dollars are used to pay for the privilege) as to why they can’t do anything then I recommend the Forest Service.

If you want sustainable production of merchantable raw commodities to be turned into products that have value to the people of the United States, if you want healthy sustainable ecosystems that support all life and not just the elite, legislated recipients or species, if you want something besides a charred aftermath for your kids to look at, you may want to look to someone else for management assistance. I would recommend the farmer, rancher or logger.

Chief Kimball better fix her own backyard and learn to manage her own lands before she thinks about sinking her hooks into the private land. Her other 3 goals are handled. Invasive species? It seems humans fit that criteria given the gates and laws to keep us out, Oh, you meant weeds? Yes, you have a very good crop of weeds and laws to keep you from treating them. Study them for 5 years and let us know. Too Late! Managing outdoor recreation? You have done that. Close all roads and do not maintain any trails, then set fire to it. You have managed to kill off any recreation.

Improve Forest Health because of wildfire potential? What about rural communities? What about raw fiber and to provide raw materials for our country? What about doing the job you have been hired to do?

I would your goals are met. The goal to do nothing with land you currently manage and now you look over the fence at private land so you can do nothing with that too! And we get to pay for it.

Thanks a bunch.

Treason is a good word for it. When Americans are driven off not only our public lands but our private lands, too, in favor of multi-national monopolies, that is treason.

The big, international non-governmental organizations control the Wildland Fire Leadership Council, and they have promulgated Let It Burn across the U.S.A. And when the people protest, Wild Gail in her haughty and arrogant way throws the Fire Plans away. Congress rolls over like lap dogs. The President is drunk and hiding in the White House basement. The Candidates are pocketing hundreds of millions in bribes before the race is even decided. The Big Baron has all the exits covered.

The convicted arsonists are dancing in their jail cells. America is going down, baby. Up the Revolution. All hail Karl Marx, or whatever Big Brother is called these days. It is all a charade anyway. Nobody really knows who is pulling the levers behind the curtain.

These are not arcane or abstract issues, but the General Public is oblivious and sadly uniformed. The average schmuck nods his head and says of course, no one should be allowed to own a home on their own property. That’s what he’s been told, and he accepts it, like a Good German.

So that’s my pet Conspiracy Theory. Laugh it off if you want to. Until the day the holocaust visits your favorite forest, watershed, neighborhood, home. Then you will wonder, what happened? How did my life turn to ashes? Must have been global warming…