Valerie Jarrett, a senior advisor to President Obama, has declined to explain why the White House turned a deaf ear to the pleas of Gov. Deval Patrick for relief from what Patrick told her were “impending drastic cuts” in landings allowed the groundfishing fleet concentrated in his state. continued
NILS STOLPE: The New England groundfish debacle (Part IV): Is cutting back harvest really the answer?
While it’s a fact that’s hardly ever acknowledged, the assumption in fisheries management is that if the population of a stock of fish isn’t at some arbitrary level, it’s because of too much fishing. Hence the term “overfished.” Hence the mandated knee jerk reaction of the fisheries managers to not enough fish; cut back on fishing. What of other factors? They don’t count. It’s all about fishing, because fishing is all that the managers can control; it’s their Maslow’s Hammer. When it comes to the oceans it seems as if it’s about all that the industry connected mega-foundations that support the anti-fishing ENGOs with hundreds of millions of dollars a year in “donations” are interested in controlling. Read the article here
How can anyone here be shocked and surprised that the Wizard of ‘O’ in the White House, wouldn’t give Gov. ‘Cadillac’ sedan Deval the time of day on some ‘little’ fishery issue in New England? Shouldn’t Deval be politically astute enough to realize that the 2012 election is over, the campaign offices have been long shut down and the circus has left town, and the Obama administration now not worrying about ANY bad press or ‘insider’ favors to be paid back to friends due to the NOAA/NMFS created collapse of the New England groundfish industry? By the way, wasn’t the senior Senator from Massachusetts the ‘point man’ for bringing financial aid and relief to the New England fishing community and getting the head of NERO to ease off on devastating landings cuts coming in 2013? Oh that also is old news as he has moved on to much more important issues and has become quite the world traveler, out and about, racking up the frequent flyer miles. No-no, it has to be much, much bigger to get the attention of the most influential person in the White House who doesn’t play golf, and some low-level blip on the local news-wire about a few fishermen losing their livelihoods and a number of fishing businesses being permanently put out of business, just doesn’t have the daily Jay/Art Carney White House Press Briefing ‘juice’ like the Bengahzi scandal, or the genocide and mass atrocities going on in Syria, or even our own government using the IRS to specifically target conservative 501(c)4 political groups. Maybe a #tweet to the Wizard of ‘O’ using the Twitter handle @vj44 would be more effective in getting her attention….if just for a very brief moment.