The Other McCain

"One should either write ruthlessly what one believes to be the truth, or else shut up." — Arthur Koestler

House Republicans Head Off Obama Administration’s Threat to Hunting

Posted on | April 18, 2012 | 31 Comments

Audrey Hudson at Human Events reports:

The House on Tuesday passed legislation giving hunters and fishing enthusiasts access to certain public lands to pursue their sport and also blocked the Environmental Protection Agency from banning lead for use in ammunition and fishing tackle.

This is one of those laws that people with common sense might think would be unnecessary. Why would anyone want to prohibit hunters from having access to public land? After all, hunting is an essential (and cheap) method of wildlife managment, to prevent herds from breeding out of control, as has happened with whitetail deer in many parts of the country. But the Obama administration isn’t staffed by people with common sense:

[Sponsors of the House bill] cited an article in U.S. News and World Report stating the proposal to ban hunting on BLM land was in response to urbanites that “freak out” when they hear gunfire, and that the decision was an effort to reduce “social conflict.”

This is not a joke, as Paul Bedard reported in November:

Gun owners who have historically been able to use public lands for target practice would be barred from potentially millions of acres under new rules drafted by the Interior Department, the first major move by the Obama administration to impose limits on firearms.
Officials say the administration is concerned about the potential clash between gun owners and encroaching urban populations who like to use same land for hiking and dog walking.
“It’s not so much a safety issue. It’s a social conflict issue,” said Frank Jenks, a natural resource specialist with Interior’s Bureau of Land Management, which oversees 245 million acres. He adds that urbanites “freak out” when they hear shooting on public lands.

If the Interior Department would consider prohibiting firearms from public land for such absurd reasons, what could be next?

Federal law already bans the EPA from regulating lead ammunition, however, more than 100 environmental groups petitioned the agency last month to ban it claiming the lead can poison those who eat wild game shot with the ammunition, or other animals that accidentally ingest the metal in dead carcasses.
“There is no scientific evidence for their position,” [Republican Rep. Doc] Hastings said. “So this (bill) makes it crystal clear Congress has primacy on this issue and it should be respected.”

Read the whole thing. Ask yourself: What economically feasible alternative is there to lead ammunition? Answer: There is none.

Category: Congress, Environmentalism

Comments

31 Responses to “House Republicans Head Off Obama Administration’s Threat to Hunting”

  1. Bob Belvedere
    April 18th, 2012 @ 1:31 pm

    Unleash me in a certain capital city and I could make silver bullets cost effective.

  2. Bob Belvedere
    April 18th, 2012 @ 1:31 pm

    I hereby denounce myself as a HATER.

  3. PAcon12
    April 18th, 2012 @ 1:42 pm

    “Ask yourself: What economically feasible alternative is there to lead ammunition? Answer: There is none.”

    Well, sure there’s no alternative right now, but if you put the incentives in place I’m sure our top scientists will be out there inventing new elements to put in our ammunition in no time. Or perhaps the current administration already has their alternative in mind: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unobtainium

  4. ThePaganTemple
    April 18th, 2012 @ 1:50 pm

    Overheard at a White House Staff Meeting-

    An Aide-President Obama, hunters are complaining about your EPA’s attempts to end hunting on public lands.

    Obama-Let them eat dog.

     

  5. Adobe_Walls
    April 18th, 2012 @ 2:28 pm

    What is needed is a much broader definition for “game animals” and “Public lands”.

  6. Adobe_Walls
    April 18th, 2012 @ 2:29 pm

    Count me in.

  7. Charles
    April 18th, 2012 @ 2:33 pm

    “What economically feasible alternative is there to lead ammunition?”

    Algae.

  8. Adobe_Walls
    April 18th, 2012 @ 2:34 pm

    Just about any other material used in ammo has a greater potential to penetrate body armor.
    Well it isn’t as if we didn’t already know that we needed to abolish the EPA, the Dept. of Interior and particularly bureau of Land Management, and while we’re at it we need to do something about those environmental groups.

  9. Finrod Felagund
    April 18th, 2012 @ 2:37 pm

    If urbanites freak out at the sound of gunfire, then maybe they should stay in their cocooned suburbs.

  10. Pathfinder's wife
    April 18th, 2012 @ 2:37 pm

    Thank you House Republicans…about 6 months of our annual meat/fish requirement is met by hunting and fishing (sometimes more).  I’d hate to see what the expenditure would be for us if we didn’t have that resource.
    Guess the EPA has something against poor people eating; why does the EPA hate poor people and want them to starve?Lead poisoning?  The idiots do realize that nobody eats the shot, right? You cut around it.  Also haven’t seen any indications that the local wildlife and fish are suffering much from lead  poisoning either — what does seem to clock them is destruction of habitat, which the EPA and the hippies really don’t do a great job of protecting at all.

  11. JeffWeimer
    April 18th, 2012 @ 2:44 pm

     

    ….to prevent herds from breeding out of control, as has happened with whitetail deer in many parts of the country.

    So Stacy, that reminds me: how’s the car coming along?

  12. DewyK
    April 18th, 2012 @ 3:32 pm

    Depleted Uranium could be used, of course. The enviro-weenies can’t complain about that, now can they?

  13. AnonymousDrivel
    April 18th, 2012 @ 4:00 pm

    My grandparents lived to a hundred. Grandad started hunting/fishing when he was first able to walk. I figure any lead his family ingested from the organic game and fowl he collected actually helped them live longer. That and all the Duck Stamps he licked over a lifetime.

    I’ll trust Grandad over a billion pin-headed enviroweenies any day.

  14. AnonymousDrivel
    April 18th, 2012 @ 4:07 pm

    Perhaps the urbanites should worry more about the shots fired in their neighborhood. Or check out “How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bullet.”

  15. Wombat_socho
    April 18th, 2012 @ 4:44 pm

     I like that steel-core ammo with the Berdan primers, myself. 🙂

  16. Wombat_socho
    April 18th, 2012 @ 4:46 pm

     You ever tried to get a GAU-8 off base? Also, have you seen what those Gatlings do to anything smaller than a main battle tank? Ain’t pretty.

  17. Evi L. Bloggerlady
    April 18th, 2012 @ 6:00 pm

    I call BS on the administration.  There are hardly any east coast suburbanites who live near BLM land.  Almost all of it is in the west and most of it is remote.  And the people who live near it (even in California) are not (generally) your anti hunting shooting crowd.  

    And state and national forests and the BLM have all sorts of non shooting zones around frequently used recreation areas, etc.  They deal with competing needs all the time.  

    This is the EPA on a power hungry quest and they could slapped back before they could cause any serious mischief.  

  18. Evi L. Bloggerlady
    April 18th, 2012 @ 6:02 pm

    When the Secret Service asks to interview you both, propose that Ted Nugent also be there, and that you do the interview in Columbia!  

  19. JeffS
    April 18th, 2012 @ 7:37 pm

     Eh, most of the complaints come from areas where yuppies and ancient hippies like to commune with nature.  They don’t necessarily LIVE there, they just recreate there.    I went shooting with a friend in a National Forest once, and a couple of hikers walked by us, quite dismayed.  No worries — we had a hill as the backstop, and their trail was at right angles.  Still we got “ZOMG!  Guns!!?!!?!?!!!111!!!!”

    (But we waited for a while, as a courtesy, before resuming fire.  Still, the M1 Garand is quite a noisy weapon, especially in valleys, so I imagine they jumped a bit.)

    Now, the areas where the Smelly Ones do live (e.g., Jackson Hole, WY), they petition the Forest Service and BLM to shut down certain areas for hunting, and then stack the public meetings with gaggles of trust babies who work only when they must to shout down the natives who DO use the land. 

    But the former is more common than the latter. 

  20. JeffS
    April 18th, 2012 @ 7:44 pm

     Sir, do you know what a pain it is to reload brass using Berdan primers?  How is that being “earth sensitive”, not recycling your brass? 

    Not to mention, steel core ammo isn’t popular in some parts of the country; sparks can result, causing fires. 

    Are you one of those brutish oafs who lives for steel case ammo? 

    ;-p

    Seriously, that sort of ammo is dirt cheap, especially if you aren’t a re-loader.   Used to be a lot of Greek surplus M1 ammo, all jacketed steel core.  I used a lot of it, while it was around.  Good stuff. 

  21. Adjoran
    April 18th, 2012 @ 10:52 pm

     And for crying out loud, don’t forget to bring some cash!

  22. Adjoran
    April 18th, 2012 @ 11:00 pm

    The EPA is the worst offender, but hardly the only one.  This Regime has misused regulatory authority to contradict statutes or exceed their authority under them in the EPA, FCC, FTC, DOJ, DHS, and NLRB at least.  It is not rule by law, it is rule by decree:  dictatorship.

    And this is the stuff he’s done when he still has to face reelection – and even in the election year!  What would he NOT dare to do when he no longer has an election to worry about?

  23. Adobe_Walls
    April 18th, 2012 @ 11:10 pm

    Well it isn’t as if we didn’t already know that we needed to abolish the EPA, FCC, FTC, DOJ, DHS and the Labor Dpartment.

  24. Bob Belvedere
    April 19th, 2012 @ 8:00 am

    First, we kill all the Hippies.

  25. Bob Belvedere
    April 19th, 2012 @ 8:03 am

    Guess the EPA has something against poor people eating; why does the EPA hate poor people and want them to starve?….

    They don’t, but they want to force you to eat Government Cheese™.

  26. Bob Belvedere
    April 19th, 2012 @ 8:03 am

    I want to know the answer, too, but, man…ouch.

  27. OverhearedSkeptic
    April 19th, 2012 @ 10:38 am

     Overhead near your keyboard-

    ThePaganTemple- I’m going to make up some silliness and post it on the Internet.

    TheOtherMcCain Readers- I’m gonna eat it up.

  28. ThePaganTemple
    April 19th, 2012 @ 11:59 am

     Ah looky here its a stupid little leftist, awwwwww.

  29. ThePaganTemple
    April 19th, 2012 @ 12:01 pm

     Exactly! If he were reelected, he would feel no shame or constraints. Of course, the joke could be on him if we increase our numbers in the House and retake the Senate as well.

  30. Tennwriter
    April 19th, 2012 @ 1:57 pm

    PT, you’re famous dude! You got your very own troll.  Next step on the Road to Greatness is to get a denunciation by Jennifer Rubin, followed by a fatwa from some bloodcrazed imam.

  31. ThePaganTemple
    April 19th, 2012 @ 5:33 pm

     Yeah, that’s just what I need, and don’t forget Amanda Marcotte. I guess its too late to be named the “Worst Person In The World” unfortunately.