Frauds in Waders

By Michael Furtman

It's an election year. Fish don't vote.

The first statement might seem too obvious to anyone who's not been asleep the last few months. The second probably appears equally inane. Even so, based on what's been going on in Congress, fly anglers in the Midwest ought to read both statements again.

Consider what happened in the Republican revolution of two years ago. Appearing to proffer the answers to complex problems and a desire to make America a better place, a group of ideologues were swept into office - politicians, who, among other failings, turned out to believe that natural resources are green only when transformed into dollar bills. Not only were these men and women out of touch with Americans when it came to matters of the environment, they were out of touch with the majority of their own party members.

Their Contract With America turned out to be a Giveaway For Industry, and in the months following, moderates from both sides of the aisle fought to protect the bipartisan-crafted environmental gains of the last three decades, and to halt the giveaway of federal lands and waters. Fortunately they were largely successful in curbing this assault, although some extremely bad bills are still winding their way through Congress.

Lest you think this is simply the ranting of a liberal Minnesota Democrat, consider the words of conservative Republican outdoor writer Tony Dean as they appeared in Outdoor News, a Minnesota-based weekly:

Certainly, not all the despoilers are Republicans, though they are leading the effort. They are extremists and we can't let them get by with controlling America's destiny. They have stolen the Republican Party, transforming the Grand Old Party into one of greed and privatization.

Dean was in part referring to efforts in Congress to virtually turn over all Bureau of Land Management and Forest Service rangelands to livestock interests, a bill that has passed the Senate and is, at the time of this writing, stinking up the House like week-old fish. If passed, resource managers will have their hands tied when trying to maintain forage and water for wildlife. In addition, the water now caressing and nurturing your trout will end up in the gullets of, and as bathtubs for, cattle (the bill turns water rights over to ranchers). To add insult to injury, you will be denied any means of objecting, since no one but grazing permit-holders will be allowed input on how the land is managed.

I have previously written (in Midwest Fly Fishing) about how hunters and anglers were duped into voting for these politicians thanks largely to the wise-use movement. When these ideologues were running for office, apparently no one asked them how they felt about fish, wildlife, and public lands. At least no one who actually wanted to protect these things. Many of these politicians gained office with the direct support of wise-use groups and the financial backing of huge resource extracting industries. Given that support, it is no wonder their voting record is so dismal, or not surprising they hold your interests in such contempt.

The problem is, how can we separate the charlatans from the stewards when all we usually hear from our politicians is delivered in TV sound bites?

For one thing, don't be fooled by politicians who claim to be sportsmen and sportswomen. In Hollywood East (aka Washington, D.C.), image is everything. Or so believes the Congressional Sportsman's Caucus (CSC), one of the most blatant ruses in a city known for telling fibs. The CSC is supposed to be made up of members of Congress concerned about conservation and other issues of importance to hunters and anglers. While not everyone in the CSC is an impostor (Michigan's John Dingell, South Dakota's Tom Daschle, and a few others stand out as conservation heroes) it may be home to the single largest concentration of mountebanks in Washingtion - which is saying a lot. And except for the few heroes, these frauds think you and I are idiots since they figure that if they prance around once a year in waders or camouflage we'll be convinced that they're one of us.

But the record speaks dismally to the fact that most of them routinely vote against our interests.

The League of Conservation Voters annually compiles the voting records of members of Congress as they relate to conservation issues, as directed by their advisory group that includes the Izaak Walton League of America and Trout Unlimited. I pulled out the scores of CSC members that represent states within Midwest Fly Fishing's core circulation area. If one of your senators or representatives isn't found on this list, it only means that he or she isn't a member of CSC. In fact, given the voting record of the CSC, you might just hope that he or she isn't a member, since the voting record of those not in the CSC, is often much better. (For example, Minnesota Senator Paul Wellstone, not a CSC member, received a perfect score, while his CSC counterpart, Senator Rod Grams, is ranked as a conservation zero. In effect, Minnesota's two senators canceled out each others votes. )

The following information is based on how CSC members voted during the 1994-95 session on bills affecting the environment. A score of 100 percent means he or she voted in favor of conservation all the time. You can guess what a score of zero means:

If, like me, you're embarrassed by the number of zeros and other low scores from your state's politicians, you ought to let them know you'll be thinking of their scores when it comes time to cast your vote. And for goodness sake, we ought to write thank you notes to those who scored well. One might be able to understand how conflicting issues could keep someone from attaining a 100 percent score - but how can the charlatans explain ratings of 30, or 20 or zero?

We probably shouldn't be surprised that we've got the worst Congress money can buy when we look at the CSC's top financial contributors, which include the NRA Political Victory Fund (single largest buyer at $29,581), Exxon Corp. PAC, Realtors PAC, National Cattlemen's Association PAC, National Right to Life PAC, Association of American Trial Lawyers, and Coal PAC.

It's an election year. Fish don't vote.

Inane? Hardly. RWOL

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