Are you aware of this story? Many are not. The shooting of Lavoy Finicum in a FBI ambush near Burns Oregon and all the events leading up to that moment are complex, confusing and frightening. I don’t know what to believe, especially as most of my information comes from the media. Strangely, while the battle wears on between select ranchers and the US Bureau Of Land Management, and also the FBI, the mainstream media seems to largely ignore the issue. It is a sensational story, the very essence of American romanticism and courage. I am suspicious of why there is not more attention to this drama and of course, that leads toward conspiracy considerations.
Uncle Sam loves you, just do as you’re told!
My research on this story has left me with plenty of unanswered questions. All I’ll say is that if you’re messing with a bully who clearly has you outgunned, then it is best to back up and reload for another day. I’ve spent more time watching interviews with Shawna Cox, who was one of the people with Finicum when he was shot repeatedly. The story is chilling. Clearly we live in a police state where might is right and citizens had better tow the line. This is a country which imposes its military will wherever it chooses on the planet and it ain’t going to tolerate any non-conformity at home. Mr. Obama wants to impose stricter gun control. Rightly so! Perhaps he should start with his own goon squads. To hell with the Sheriff Of Nottingham!
Yes I live in Canada but as it has often been said, when Uncle Sam sneezes, Canada catches a cold. Check out infowars.com and also Libertys Champion on this story. I’ve also watched the last video of Lavoy Finicum before his death. He is being interviewed by The Oregonian. It is a poignant few minutes. I did notice that he is wearing a shoulder harness for a concealed weapon. It is all on You Tube. Watch these interviews and form your own opinions. The aerial footage of the event as released by the FBI was taken by a drone. That a drone was even present raises some obvious questions and why is the film’s quality is so low? This equipment is capable of very high resolution and so more riddles arise. Why was this film provided so expediently?
As the dust settles there will be books and movies and maybe the truth will become clear.
I am, of course, inclined to side with the ranchers and their declared determination to preserve their enshrined constitutional rights in the USA, the land of freedom. I am an old farm boy, I’ve also spent my time on and around ranches and I am a sailor. So this farmer/cowboy/sailor has a typically strong instinct to resist bureaucratic suppression. An impingement on my freedom as a human being and a citizen, so close to home, raises an urgent concern. It is amazing how any creature, when cornered, can become an irrational and extremely dangerous force. I think Finicum, with his wit and calm, rational intellect may have had old Sam feeling cornered. Finicum, true to his convictions, died with his cowboy hat firmly in place and quite possibly a copy of the US Constitution and a Mormon Bible in his pocket. He may even have been trying to draw fire away from the passengers in his vehicle when he was shot down. He has now become a far more formidable foe to Big Brother as a martyred legend. The Feds have pissed in their own cornflakes. I suspect that Mr. Finicum knew his value to his cause was far greater dead than alive and so deliberately put it all on the line.
To have a conviction that you are willing to speak out for is a rare and wonderful thing. To be willing to die for it is a facet of the human spirit which is a mysterious quality. Finicum did not have any bombs strapped to his chest, he was not out to hurt anyone. In fact he apparently advocated non-violence. Yet there were allegedly several loaded firearms in the vehicle that carried him and his passengers to his moment of execution. That’s what concerns me.
People often express dismay that I drive the back roads of Mexico and wonder why I’d do such a dangerous thing. I feel no less endangered there than I do driving on Vancouver Island. I do pucker up when travelling in the US where there is, on average, at least one handgun in every vehicle. I’ve spoken to so very many self-righteous gun-toting US citizens who feel carrying a weapon is as natural a right as having a navel. I’m not sure whether to avoid eye contact or to employ full facial contact. Do I smile or not? What triggers a personal indignation? What endears one person infuriates the next. I certainly don’t give anyone the finger nor express any indignation. You just never know what might set somebody off. I can still hear the granny in southern Arizona drawling on about how “I don’t go nowhere without a pistol in my purse!” “Even to church?” I asked. “Uh Huh!” she replied calmly. It seems to me that millions of US citizens are imprisoning themselves, and executing each other, with their own paranoia. This is in a country which embraced President Franklin Roosevelt as he famously declared, “There is nothing to fear but fear itself.” I guess we’re not in Kansas anymore Dorothy!
Turtle Valley Part of the ranch where I lived. I helped clear this field, tree by tree, stump by stump.The old ranch house that was once my home.My old ride. I bet she’ll still run. It was bloody cold on a winter morning.
I once travelled the US regularly on business. When old George Bush and the boys waded into Kuwait there was a massive display of patriotism. In a roadside rest area north of Seattle a small red car pulled in beside me. It was festooned with American flags and several bumper stickers saying things like “Support Our Troups” The car carried an elderly couple and as the driver emerged it was clear he was an ex-marine. There was no mistaking the crew cut, the tattoos and the steely glint in his eye. I was impressed with the patriotic overkill and frivolously remarked that I didn’t really believe it all. “Why not?” he demanded levelly, fixing a magnum glare on me. “Well sir, because you’re driving a Hyundai.” There was a pregnant silence.
“Of course” I added, grinning like an idiot, “I understand the Smith & Wesson under your seat was made in America.” The hard lines in his face relaxed a little as he replied, “Actually it’s a Colt .45.” Then he smiled.
What I didn’t know then! It’s hard to believe I was once this flat-bellied ranch hand. I did learn how ranchers think.
I always imagined that Oregon was one of the more laid-back states in the union. I’m on my way in a couple of weeks to read at the Fisher Poet’s Gathering In Astoria, Oregon.
Dang!
“It’s not a gun control problem, it’s a cultural control problem.”
Nature Organized A wintery walk for Jack. The snow lasted a day.
One of my dog Jack’s favourite places to ramble is in a piece of Parkland along the Nanaimo river. We meet nice dogs who come with nice people, the paths are gravelled and open. There’s no slogging along muddy trails under the dripping branches of dank woodlands. It is the place where the eagle dropped the duck at Jack’s feet. (see blog dated Nov. 11, 2015 ‘A Scent Of Apples…) There are rabbits and squirrels to harass and open forest for Jack to explore while I can keep him in sight. Once this was virgin fir forest before it was logged and turned into farmland. Now it has been planted with pine, in straight rows. It is called an “experimental forest”. Perhaps I’ve had my head in the bilge for too many years but I don’t understand the persistence that we can improve nature. If the climate and terrain have determined over millions of years that a specific species is best suited in a particular area, how the hell do we think we can improve on that simple wisdom? I’ve spent many years in and around the forest industry and am dumfounded by this practice. But then, there are many things which, to me, seem either blindly foolish or deliberately twisted, just like the movies.
Replanted Forest Pine and Fir. Spot the alien!The rest of the story. We insist on fiddling with nature. Can you hear Joni Mitchel’s lines about the tree museum?
I’ve acquired a term recently: CGI: Computer Generated Image. Well, it’s new to me. I’ve learned it from watching two recent films, ‘The Revenant’ and ‘The Finest Hours.’ These images are so good, so believable, perhaps it is inevitable that breathing actors will be replaced with computer generated characters. Extrapolate that thought to sports, we could have virtual athletes and hey, what about politicians? If characters like Arnold Schwarzenegger, Donald Trump, or Sarah Palin (I won’t touch on Canadian politicians) have caught serious attention on the political stage, then what is for real? Cartoon characters are just as credible and at least we know what we’re looking at. How about Wiley Coyote for president? On television old Arnie is picking up some extra pocket money advertising a new cyber war game so it all makes sense in an abstract sort of way. We can drink a lot of beer wading through this subject. Real beer that is, with lots of gluten. I just tapped out a typo, perhaps a Freudian slip, with the word ‘plotiticians’. We can have some fun with that one too.
I digress.
I am not beginning a film review in my blog but both of these current flics have a few glaringly obvious oops. ‘The Revenant’, filmed in four countries, has no continuity in its scenes. Set in the early 1800s it begins near the edge of a camp with men stalking elk through the waters of a spring flood plain in a coastal second-growth fir forest. You can hear bull elk bugling, although elk make their mating calls in the fall. The camp comes under attack by local natives. Eventually the survivors make for a raft moored on the banks of a high-country river. The same camp, now thousands of feet higher in altitude! How’d they do that? As they drift down the river, you can see clear-cut logging blocks in the background, several times. Those scene incongruities occur constantly throughout the entire bladder-bursting film. There’s a lot to be said for intermissions, and think of all that extra crap food the theatre could sell.
The story is built around the protagonist being severely mauled by an angry sow grizzly bear. That long scene is amazingly believable. I wonder how they can dub-in a very realistic rampaging bear, yet not dub-out modern scars in other scenes. I thought that film makers employed people to keep a tab on continuity and realism. I’d love that job! I did not see any jet contrails and I did very much like how the first nations characters and their mistreatment were portrayed in this story.
‘The Finest Hours’ is a Disney effort made by landlubbers for landlubbers. Actually, the CGIs in this film are also incredible but I was left jaded with some simple oversights. Lifeboats can run fully submersed for brief periods, they must be able to do that, but they are not submarines. Once fully afloat again, with the wheelhouse torn away, the crew is soaking wet. The North Atlantic is freaking cold anytime of the year and especially in a raging winter storm. No one seemed even near hypothermia, despite hours of exposure to extreme conditions that would kill the average person within a short time. Hell, you couldn’t even see their breath! In reality their hair and clothing would be frozen instantly. I was born a few months after the events of this true 1952 story and I’m not so sure that folks were that much tougher back then. Even casual conversation was possible despite the supposed raging elements. Having experienced the actual conditions being represented in this film I can tell you that the simple act of breathing is a challenge. Speech is reduced to single screamed words. At the end of the film, the returning lifeboat is conned into harbour to the six-volt headlights of those old cars. Apparently nobody thought to run and start the generator in the lighthouse. Hmmm! I know, picky, picky, picky. All those missed details, I think, detract from the credibility of the story.
Well, I can give each of these movies an IDFA award. (I Didn’t Fall Asleep) And anyway not many folks give a toss about reality these days from what I can see. In fact, we all seem determined to find some sort of distraction from it; after all that’s why we go to the movies. No I didn’t buy any of that trans-fat-sodden popcorn or sugary drinks and yes, I returned my 3D glasses at the end of the show.
Just as I was about to post this blog I learned of a third movie now being released. ‘The Lady In The Van’ stars the venerable and wonderful Maggie Smith. It depends solely on good acting and a good story. I’ve seen the trailer, it looks promising. This was first written as a play based on a true story. Interestingly, I saw this on stage in London in January 2000. It starred, yep, Maggie Smith. I think she knows her lines. So there, I’ve said something positive about a new movie.
Hope Grows.
It’s mid-winter and the blahs are upon many people although there is noticeably longer daylight in the evenings, when it is not overcast and bucketing rain. The buds are beginning to swell. Patches of early flowers show their colours in the sheltered spots and this morning I saw some shoots of skunk cabbage in the swamp. Hope is in the air. We’ll make it through.
Crocus time
Speaking of parks, and hope, an agreement has finally been reached to put eighty-five percent of the woodlands of the Great Bear Rain Forest into permanent conservation. I think that’s truly great but would like to point out that there is a reason why much of that timber has never been logged. It is just not commercially viable. A lot of that timber is of low quality and has been left on the stump throughout our province’s rapacious history because it wasn’t of sufficient quality to be of commercial interest. So wahoo!
The Great Bear Rainforest There are endless miles of untouched forest. It’s lovely to see.The Seaweed Camp Thick, tangled, inpenetrable. Much of the Great Bear Rain forest is covered with decadent jungle. A wonderful eco-system fortunately of insufficient commercial quality to harvest and haul away.Look the other way. No-one however notices the loads of high-value timber being hauled southward from other regions through the Great Bear Rainforest. The aroma of this load of red cedar was wonderful, even this far from the barge.Subterfuge! Hidden behind the harbour-front clutter in Nanaimo, another forest-load of raw logs, and jobs, is ready to head out of the country. Two or three loads regularly leave the harbour every week, right under our noses. There are many other points of export.
While the media bandstands the Provincial Government and the First Nations Peoples for this wonderful accord, nobody notices anymore how many shiploads of raw logs will leave this province this week and every week. I can show you foreign ships loading raw logs while moored to the former docks of sawmills now closed, allegedly, because there were not enough logs available. The questions are obvious…and so are the answers. It’s all smoke and mirrors.
A load of beautiful second-growth fir at the new timber export facility in Astoria Oregon
If our provincial government wants to do something meaningful, stop the export of our raw resources and all the related jobs! Eco-tourism is touted as the economic future of the Great Bear Rainforest, yet sport fishing continues there at an unsustainable rate and all along the British Columbia coastline. What I saw last summer while working in that region disgusted me. I can’t return to be part, in any way, of the ongoing rape. A typical conversation I repeatedly heard went like this. “How was the fishing today?” “Great! We really slayed them!”
Our federal Department of Fisheries shows a minimal presence during this annual orgy. Few folks seem inclined toward personal responsibility for what they take. There is still an archaic notion that everyone can take as much as they want because there is an unlimited stock. That abundance is dwindling, as we know it is around the planet at an alarming rate. If trophy-hunting bears is now a moral transgression, especially in the Great Bear Rainforest, what about fish? An eco-system is a sum of all its parts and you cannot exploit one component without affecting everything. We’re repeatedly told how salmon are the bio-foundation of the entire rain forest. The sport fishing industry is a multi-billion dollar machine but until there are no fish and so no whales or bears or wolves, folks will not learn from the sad examples already set so many other places. There is a clear line between need and greed. We refuse to acknowledge how we personally trespass over that boundary. It’s always the other guy. Sadly, legislation and strick enforcement is the only answer.
Done for the day! One salmon…. enough to for me to gorge on for several meals. The head was used as crab bait.
I’ve raised my objections, here are some possible solutions.
The sport of fishing should again become a sport,and stop being a meat harvest. All those electronic gadgets should be gone from boats so that skill and knowledge are the sole means of catching a fish. If I, one of the world’s most hopeless fishermen, can bring home some tasty protein that way, so can anybody else. If spending obscene amounts of money to have photos taken with a really big fish is a measure of manliness…well, I’m perfectly happy with who I am and no, I don’t have plastic testicles hanging from the rear of my vehicle.
Change the catch limits. Once you land a fish of any size of a specific species in its season you are done for the day. So one salmon, one halibut, one ling cod, one snapper, etc. If that is not enough for one day for each person, nothing will be. Once you’ve caught a fish and released it, regardless of size, chances are good that it will not survive the trauma of the catch so take it home and eat it.
The commercial herring roe fishery should come to an end or at least be put in moratorium for a few years. Herring are the prime datum of the marine food chain and unless we all acquire a taste for them ourselves; leave them alone. Hell, everyone complains that they are not making any money anyway. Let’s call their bluff.
The concept of the by-catch must come to an end. Fish of the commercially wrong size and species are routinely discarded from a catch and thrown away dead or dying. If those tons of wasted seafood were retained as the fresh healthy edible product they are maybe we’d need fewer fish farms. It seems incredibly stupid that we do this. Perhaps we should put all aspects of our Westcoast fishery into moratorium for three to five years. I am confident we would soon demonstrate what the factor of imbalance really is. Howl all you want about these ideas, but you are either part of the solution or part of the problem. The way things are going now is not a path toward sustainability. We love to talk about what we should have done when it’s too late. Let’s do something now. At least ask a few questions.
Of all the food items we can produce here in BC, we now import most of those from somewhere else; so why not seafood from somewhere over the horizon? Just think of all the diesel that gets burned solely in the importation of fresh food we should be growing right here. Is this thinking green?
A Thriller Photo! Well it is to me. After years of intent I’ve finally got around to installing a new fuel filtration system in Seafire. The filter bases are all used ones . I can now switch from a clogged filter, primary or secondary, just with the turn of a valve. This means that I can change filters on the go without missing a beat. This is still no substitute for clean fuel,
On that note, I’ve one final rumination. It is about the breaking up of HMCS Protecteur and HMCS Algonquin. These are both vessels retired from our Pacific Naval fleet. They will be towed, via Panama, all the way to Halifax! A ship-breaker there won the contract with a bid of $39,000,000. I can’t discover if that bid includes the cost of towing each ship half-way around the continent. I understand the issues of safely removing environmentally nasty materials but can’t we resurrect a shipyard here in BC to do the work? Why not simply sell the ships as scrap to the highest bidder and take the cash instead of paying for the dismantling? Vancouver-based Seaspan International, part of the enormously successful Washington Group, takes its retired vessels to China and brings back new ones. Hmmm!
I don’t have all of the information and I certainly don’t have any answers but I raise my weary question once again about the chicken farmer who goes to town to buy eggs. Computer Generated Images? I’m not sure what’s real and what is common sense in daily life. Is anyone? Have we become too stupid to know how stupid we’ve become?
See ya in the movies.
Dogpatch Dawn
“ Every creature is better alive than dead, men and moose and pine trees, and he who understands it aright will rather preserve its life than destroy it.”
