I watched the pres give a speech this am on his new forest initiative. (Gawd, it is painful to watch him speak).<br /><br />Now here is an issue close to my heart.<br /><br />I guess it is impossible for him to give a speech with any sort of detail and explaination in it. What would be so difficult in just saying here is what we are going to do, and this is how it is going to be funded, I wonder? <br /><br />We found out that he is against forest fires, and against firefighters getting killed. I am glad. I was worried about that.<br /><br />However, as always, the devil is in the details. Every private landowner, especially out west, knows that thinning and managing forests is important for the forest health and timber production. They have spent a lot of money on this and rarely have very significant fires. So far, so good.<br />The US Forest Service, on the other hand, has had both a completely different mandate over the last couple of decades, and a completely different funding model than have private forests. First, the forest service manages not just for timber production, but rather ecosystem management, in that not only are economic goals important, non economic goals are also important, including bio-diversity and the like.<br />Additionally, congress has never appropriated the money for proper forest management in the US Forest Service. Is that going to change now?<br /><br />From what I understand, this is going to be funded by large timber companies. Large timber companies will only spend money for harvesting merchantible timber, and the fire problem comes from unmerchantible undergrowth, which they don't care about, and won't spend money on their own to fix, unless, of course, it is their own timberlands.<br /><br />And, surprise, surprise, the large timber companies were big campaign contributors. Call me skeptical, but my guess is that this is more about increasing harvest of merchantible timber on federal lands than it is about fire suppression, which is of course why the pres did not include any details regarding his plan.<br /><br />This president and administration does understand salesmanship--you have to give him that.
No offence intended.
