{"id":26055,"date":"2007-06-27T01:01:01","date_gmt":"2011-05-19T05:20:16","guid":{"rendered":""},"modified":"2011-05-19T05:20:16","modified_gmt":"2011-05-19T05:20:16","slug":"the_tahoe_fire_the_spotted_owl","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/admin.rushlimbaugh.com\/daily\/2007\/06\/27\/the_tahoe_fire_the_spotted_owl\/","title":{"rendered":"The Tahoe Fire & the Spotted Owl"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

RUSH: I want to talk about this fire out at Lake Tahoe, because it\u2019s fascinating. There are two schools of thought on who\u2019s to blame. One school of thought is global warming. The other school of thought is environmentalists. Now, we can\u2019t have it both ways. I got this from my buddy Noel Sheppard at NewsBusters.com. ‘Depending on which newspaper you read Tuesday morning, the wildfires in the Lake Tahoe region of California and Nevada were either caused by global warming or environmentalists. In Northern California, just a few hours from the devastation, the number one paper in the region, the San Francisco Chronicle, chose to blame the fires on overdevelopment in Tahoe, and, of course, global warming.\u2019 And here\u2019s an excerpt. ‘From Gold Rush clear-cutters to modern home-builders, people have brought changes to the Tahoe basin that have fueled the intensity of this fire.\u2019 It\u2019s 2,500 acres. And, by the way, it\u2019s flared back up again. ‘Just letting nature handle the recovery isn\u2019t an option after 150 years of human activity and mismanagement. And, of course, this: The Forest Service\u2019s Safford noted that even the climate has come under human influence, as evidenced by global warming and increased forest fires.\u2019<\/p>\n

However, the people that live out there say it\u2019s the environmentalists. ‘They won\u2019t let us thin out these forests. They make this stuff remain as it is. It\u2019s a fireplace, it\u2019s a tinderbox.\u2019 The Tahoe Regional Planning Agency said that they were angry at bureaucrats and environmentalists who made cutting trees and clearing of land difficult. There was always too much red tape, they say. Now it was too late. ‘I hate to get political…\u2019 This is the guy from the Tahoe Regional Planning Agency. ‘…but environmentalists wouldn\u2019t let us cut down the dead trees.\u2019 People in the Bay Area, however, were led to believe the fires are all due to overdevelopment in Tahoe. The media\u2019s favorite culprit for every problem on the planet of course is global warming. It\u2019s a disgrace, this kind of disparity in reporting. But of course in the San Francisco Chronicle you have agenda reporting, and in the case of the people charged with preserving the Tahoe area, how in the world does development out there start fires? So global warming is responsible for everything, but the truth of the matter is, the environmentalist wackos in this country are the instigators of more of these kinds of problems than people want to admit, and they\u2019re afraid, people are afraid to fight \u2019em. <\/p>\n

BREAK TRANSCRIPT<\/p>\n

RUSH: We start with the phones in Redding, California. James, you\u2019re up first today. It\u2019s great to have you on the EIB Network.<\/p>\n

CALLER: Hey, mega dittos, Rush, from the People\u2019s Republic of California.<\/p>\n

RUSH: Thank you, sir.<\/p>\n

CALLER: I just wanted to call and comment about the Lake Tahoe fires. One thing I\u2019m not really hearing — I keep hearing about global warming — I have not been hearing about the poor forestry management over there. One of the reasons everything\u2019s burning is, with all the environmentalists living there, they don\u2019t allow any removal of deadwood or undergrowth.<\/p>\n

RUSH: Yeah, I know, I just did a story about this. The problem with it is you\u2019ve got the environmentalists who have got the local outfit that manages this stuff totally intimidated.<\/p>\n

CALLER: Okay.<\/p>\n

RUSH: Deadwood, they\u2019re not allowed to cut down. They\u2019re not allowed to thin these forests at all and take away some of the fuel that a fire would feed off of. Then you\u2019ve got the San Francisco Chronicle, and other liberal newspapers, saying, (summarized), ‘No, this is not the problem of environmentalism! This is global warming and development. There are too many people live there who shouldn\u2019t be living there. We\u2019re destroying pristine nature.\u2019 It\u2019s, frankly, ridiculous, the idea that human beings are the only ones that are unable to alter our environment. We\u2019re part of nature as much as everybody else is, and every element of nature alters the environment in order to thrive, and we do, too. The idea that we are not allowed to interact with nature because we destroy it and we disturb it and so forth is another one of these bleeding heart, left-wing belief systems that has its roots in, ‘(sigh) It\u2019d be so nice if we didn\u2019t cut down that tree. It\u2019d just be so nice if people didn\u2019t live that close to the lake. It\u2019d just be so nice,\u2019 and, of course, that\u2019s the emotional appeal that gets everybody: ‘Oh, how can we harm these poor people? We are a nice people,\u2019 we want to be, and we end up not being nice to ourselves. (interruption) What? We just had a question asked by one of my obedient staff, ladies and gentlemen: ‘How does a fire start because of global warming?\u2019 The fire doesn\u2019t start because of global warming. But the inability to put it out and to keep it from spreading, high winds, unusually high temperatures, lack of rainmaking the timber dry and just lethal, that is because of global warming. (interruption) Well, of course, because those forest fires started by lightning, and lightning is nature. But a forest fire where human beings live is not nature; it is destruction. I can\u2019t believe you still haven\u2019t figured this stuff out after 19 years of listening.<\/p>\n

BREAK TRANSCRIPT<\/p>\n

RUSH: Now, remember two weeks ago we told you that the northern spotted owl was back in the news, back in trouble, and the numbers of pairs of northern spotted owls is continuing to dwindle out there? Despite all of the preservation of pristine, old-growth forests, where we were told for years in the eighties and nineties, that only there could the spotted owl thrive. If it didn\u2019t have pristine, old-growth forest, why, it would die out — despite the fact that pictures of them living in the red K in the Kmart sign were all over the place. <\/p>\n

So this story is in the Christian Science Monitor: ‘Northern Spotted Owl\u2019s Decline Revives Old Concerns — [M]ost agree, could reignite the ‘timber wars\u2019 of the 1980s and \u201990s, with lawsuits flying and activists tree-sitting to stymie loggers whose livelihoods depend on access to national forests,\u2019 and that\u2019s what the spotted owl controversy was about in the first place. However, this story does mention one thing and leaves out something else that\u2019s crucial. Get this. Folks, this is a great illustration of how you should be skeptical of everything you read and see in the Drive-By Media, because when the spotted owl controversy was up, we were telling you that this argument that they will only live in ‘old-growth forests\u2019 was wrong. It couldn\u2019t possibly be true because they were spotted living elsewhere. In fact, Weyerhaeuser or somebody was replanting. You know, they replant trees when they cut \u2019em down. The people in the wood business, the timber business need product. The tree is just a crop. It takes a little bit longer than a stalk of corn to grow, but they plant these things constantly. They spotted northern spotted owls living in young trees, certainly not old growth. What\u2019s ‘old growth\u2019 anyway? <\/p>\n

‘Old growth, Mr. Limbaugh, is trees that have been here since the creation of time!\u2019 <\/p>\n

‘Oh, give me a break!\u2019 <\/p>\n

‘Yes, those beautiful redwoods, Mr. Limbaugh, they\u2019re hundreds and hundreds of years old.\u2019<\/p>\n

‘Yeah, well, we\u2019re all here thousands and thousands of years. If those things are as old as the planet, we could climb to the moon on them. Idiot!\u2019<\/p>\n

I remember these people calling, talking to me about this. Now, listen to this: ‘The latest recovery proposal tries to incorporate new information about where spotted owls prefer to live (which is not always old-growth forests)…\u2019 Really? Yes. ”We\u2019ve had years of intensive scientific study on the northern spotted owl, so we\u2019ve learned a lot more about it, a lot more about the habitat it needs,\u2019 says Phil Carroll, spokesman for the FWS\u2019s Oregon field office in Portland. For example, he says, in some parts of its range, it\u2019s not quite as dependent on big blocks of old growth as we had thought before.” So all of this in the eighties, about the spotted owl and putting the timber business out of business, was a hoax! They knew then it was a hoax, and now they\u2019ve got the guts to report it. What this story doesn\u2019t mention, ladies and gentlemen, about the dwindling numbers of spotted owls? You guys remember the story on this two weeks ago? You know what\u2019s happening out there. There\u2019s a predator owl out there called the barred owl, and pardon my French, but the barred owl is kicking the ass out of the northern spotted owl. And they\u2019re intermingling and mating with them. So you\u2019ve got the north sparred bowel — or owl, or whatever. So these big barred owls are coming in there. They\u2019re taking over. They\u2019re wiping out some of the spotted owls, but this story doesn\u2019t mention that as one of the reasons why there are dwindling numbers of northern spotted owls. (interruption) They\u2019re raping female spotted owls, exactly. If you\u2019re going to need an abuse billboard anywhere, put it out there in the Great Northwest forests to get these barred owls to stop picking on the northern spotted owl.<\/p>\n

BREAK TRANSCRIPT<\/p>\n

RUSH: Speaking of this Tahoe fire, I forgot to mention this. They have a restriction out there that you can only cut timber, I think it\u2019s ten or 12 feet from your house. I\u2019m not sure about the number. But, this guy broke the law. He said to hell with it, and he cut it 50 to 70 feet away from his house. His house is the one standing. His house is standing! A lot of his neighbors who followed these regulations houses have burned to the ground. Fire department people out there, fire experts have been warning not just in Tahoe, but in the El Dorado Forest, ‘You guys are sitting on a powder keg out here.\u2019 But, you know, Dianne Feinstein and some other people introduced legislation to thin out some of these forests. The Sierra Club\u2019s been appealing it for ten years and holding it up. There are countless illustrations. It\u2019s just another illustration of all this do-gooderism, and, ‘(sigh) It\u2019s just so nice to look at those trees. It\u2019d be so mean to cut them down. They have feelings, too, and of course what about nature and what about tourism? We love watching those trees. They\u2019re so nice to look at. They\u2019re so pretty.\u2019 Yeah, and now we\u2019re talking about the dead ones. Every one of these do-gooder, nice — or motivated by nice — ideas that the left have, every one of them is wrong. Every one of them ends up causing destruction, either to families or to property or the overall culture. It is not even arguable. Liberalism, among all these other things, is just destructive, under the guise of ‘being nice.\u2019 Yes, being nice and compassionate and thoughtful and feeling good about yourself — while everything goes to hell around you.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

RUSH: I want to talk about this fire out at Lake Tahoe, because it\u2019s fascinating. There are two schools of thought on who\u2019s to blame. One school of thought is global warming. The other school of thought is environmentalists. Now, we can\u2019t have it both ways. 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