00:00:08 Speaker 1: This is me eat your podcast coming at you shirtless, severely bug bitten and in my case, underwear listening. Don't eat podcast. You can't predict anything presented by first light. Go farther, stay longer, down to our main thing. Uh, what I have heard? I feel like I've even heard you say your last name differently on different occasions. That's probably not true, I hope not so, Fosberg, So you do do the Z. Most people probably stay Fosburgh, Yeah, because you know, there's sometimes you got the s and sometimes to see Yeah. So with Fosberg respond to both. You you don't, you don't correct, you just roll with it. Maybe that's why I feel like I hear different versions of UM. You've been with Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership for sometimes seven plus years two thousand, so from that perspective, and you had if you right now had to grade us, if you had to grade us as a nation at this very moment, not not the history and all that, but just like this very moment as a nation, how we're doing with UM wildlife and wild lands conservation. What would the grade be pretty good, really actually would be yeah, because you know, jeez, let's just let's just put these microphones down. Yeah, yeah, nothing to talk about. Think about where we are compared to any place else in the world. And it may not be as good as we wanted to be, and it may be sliding a little bit right now, but in the big scheme of things, you know, we managed wild life better than any other nation in the world. We got more public lands to hunt and fish and play on than any other nation in the world. Our water is cleaner or air is cleaner. So I mean, there's a lot to be thankful. I mean people always look at the dark excited and think that, you know, climate change, think you know, with the public land development, you know, whatever the issue is, that the sky is falling. But and we can serveainely, you know, drift back where we've been. But let's not lose the fact that, you know, we got something great here, you know. I in my better moments, I find myself telling people that, um, that you live in the good old days right now. I'll tell hunters a fisherman that, because I'm like, the thing you want to imagine is you may like look at your dad right and be like, oh, it's not as good as but nonsense, Yeah, it's way better. My dad came into My dad came into hunting coming out of World War two and the forties, and it is way better, way better. I mean, you think about backt the time when you know Theodore Roosevelt created the modern conservation system. You know, there were barely any white tail deer left. There were almost no black bears, you know, elk or a fraction of what they are today. Bison, We're basically being decimated. You know, I never saw a wild turkey growing up in up state in New York, and all was in my thirties and I'm fifty five now, so I mean, you know, we have things today that we've never had before. Now there are some big challenges, but yeah, we got a lot of good stuff. What I kind of want to what do I want to do mainly is sort of one. I want to imagine like a stroll around the country and hear from you what things you're looking at, what things you're concerned about, you know, from from from just sort of like I said, just imagine, like however you want to do it, like the east to west or a circular walk around the country. And then I want to ask you just about some specific issues that are big issues that are just things that seem to never go away. UMI, which is those which which those you want to first do, Well, why don't we do the you know, the stroll across the country and what do East west? You know? I think that there are you know, some you know, pretty significant issues and we're facing the east, and we talked about some of them at dinner. I mean things like, you know, on the Upper Delaware system, the invasive not weed that's coming in there. This, you know, just change that entire landscape. So we sort of take invasive species for granted. Sometimes, Yeah, you have things like you know, in my upstate New York. You know, there's a beach blights killing all the mature beach and pretty much all the mature beach are gone, but it doesn't kill him enough to get rid of you all together. Instead, you have these immature, young beach coming up every place, and the deer don't like them, and they outcompete all the other hardwoods. So you don't like them because they're not producing mass. Well, they don't produce mass, and they don't eat the buds. I mean they will if they're starving, but they like everything else better. So we're having as this sort of conversion of our forests in the Northeast to this beach diseased, immature beach monoculture. And the only way you're gonna deal with that is get in there and actively manage it. And we're not doing much of that. The outer ondecks where I you know hunt is, you know, much of that is forever wild, hasn't been cut since the eighteen eighties and uh, you know, which is beautiful and it makes for a really cool habitat and sort of the mosaic of private land and public land. But the downside is over time those four sort of convert, and when they do convert, you're gonna have this immature beach you know, nests that comes up that's not ecologically rich in anyway, and we're gonna have to deal with that. So you have these forest management long term, and they really relate to these invasive pests that have come in that are changing the ecosystem up there. We have more time talking about non natives and invasives. Oh yeah, it's just like it's everything's everything is undersult I think the only tree in the Northeast that does not have some sort of invasive parasite coming is a red maple and you know everything else see, and we're losing our an ash forest because the emerald ash borer. You know, there's a hemlock, you know, the woody a delpha or whatever it is. You have a white pine blister rust, you know. So you have these things which have come over from Asia or Europe or you know, the species have evolved with it, but over here we haven't. And so it's gonna have big impacts. And so I think that's one of the challenges we're seeing in the northeast. If you move a little bit further south, well, let's let's back up to that government just because, uh is it known? Like is there a thing we could do if we had the motivation and money to do it? I mean, any one is you know a lot of it you don't have to deal with right now because it's when the four start to convert, you know, that's when we're gonna have the problem. But like, you know, we have a property there are we hunt we've had been in the families to eight hundreds and it's about five thousand acres and you know a bunch of the families own it together. But yeah, we're you know, any when we do a lot of timber harvests there, but we are basically, you know, anytime we're cutting beach, and we're cutting a lot of beach, you know, we're hitting it with you know, herbicides afterwards to try to knock it down and give the other hardwoods there are softwoods a chance to come up and and and we're having some pretty good success with that. And there's a lot of research going on at you know, Syracuse and Cornell and some of the other institutions in New York about how to deal with us. But in everyone hopes it over time you'll have sort of the beach will figure out how to deal with us themselves, but that hasn't happened yet. You know, the same thing with you know, chestnut, which was once the dominant hardwood in the eastern United States, and they're gone and you know we're probably never gonna get them back. Yeah, there's been a lot of research done. There's a chestnut foundation that's developed a what appears to be a resistant strain, but you're just never gonna have it the way it was in the old days. So I think that you know, the forest management the in devasive species issues is a huge one in the Northeast, and you have obviously have a sprawl equation there. There's so many people and it's just tougher and tougher to get outside and find places to hunt and fish. I mean, one of the exciting things is in the Farm Bill there's a program called the Volunteer Voluntary Public Access Habitat Improvement Program and it's also known as open Fields, and it essentially pays landowners, private landowners to open up their properties for public hunting and fishing. And a lot of that was sort of started in place like Kansas, in the Midwest, Montana or they have pretty aggressive walk in programs the same thing. But since the Farm Bill programs started, is encouraged states like Connecticut, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania to create those programs and uh, you know, just great because now those are all stay areas that have you know, it's a real struggle to find you have public lands in those places. It does it pay them in the form of tax incentives or is it payment the form of cash cash, So it's a competitive grant to go to the states and stays negotiated with landowners and it gives them cash, and it gives them a wave of liability if somebody steps in a ditch and breaks their leg or something like that, so the state assumes that liability. And it's been uh, you know, it's I mean, I think in the first farm bill, the two thousand and eight farm Bill where we was put in, it opened about three million additional acres to public hunting and fishing. It's gonna be a lot more in this one because it's expanded in the two thousand and fourteen Farm bill. And so I mean there's some positive stuff that is happening to but access in the Northeast is a huge deal. Yeah. Can I can I interrupt your your walk around the country again to ask about the farm bill because I know that and looking at materials at t RC, TRCP puts out and here and you talk in various ways. You spent a lot of time, like like conservation is very tied to the farm build You spent a lot of time talking about what's in the farm bill, what needs to be in the farm bill? How did how is it that the farm bill has such wide reaching implications for people to hunt and fish. Yes, of the land in the US is privately owned and the majority of that is an agricultural production, and so that is a huge swath of land. And the Farm Bill is the nation's single largest conservation program. Is five or six billion dollars annual or in the over the course of the Farm Bill that goes to private landowners to do the right thing for conservation. And uh, you know, it's been tremendously successful. I mean, originally, a lot of these programs are created, you know, when farm prices are really bad back in the nineteen eighties and they you know, you needed farmers, they needed some money in order not to farm, and so that things like the Conservation Reserve Program were created at that time as a way basically a price support program. Well since then it's really become an incredibly important conservation program. So it wasn't known the effects of CRP fields like, it wasn't no one was pushing that aspect of that bill for what it would do for wildlife. They were looking at some people are pushing at sure does this forever Folks like that. They knew that, they knew it would be good, even though the main goals taking land out of production to stabilize exactly. And but the Qal the benefits that have had addition to producing a ton of pheasant and you know upland birds and waterfowl and things like that, is you know, it is an incredibly important water quality program too, because a lot of these you know, CRP strips are along you know, streams and ravines in these areas that are just not as productive to farm. So it has ancillary benefits for that too. And the problem is that in the you know, the last farm bill, the last farm bill was done in two thousand and fourteen, and when farm prices really high, you're talking about seven dollar corn, and it was just very hard for conservation programs to compete. And you were we were seeing millions of acres being moved out of c RP and put into row production. So the cap on c RP was reduced to twenty four million acres. It had been at thirty six million at one point. And now we have the exact opposite situation. Farm prices are low, farmers are clamoring to get into programs that they've so they can you know, having some additional revenues so they don't have to you know, sell off the farm or whatever. And so now we have a program that is woefully inadequate to meet the demand. Whereas we we couldn't fulfill that. There was way more program there was demand five years ago. So so five years ago people looked at it and they're like, well, let's take some of the money out because people don't want to use it, right exactly. So I told that was going to be the new normal, right and uh, you know so, and and that money was reinvested in other programs like the regional conservation partnership programs and the other things that are sort of longer term conservation you know, wetlands type programs. You know EQUIP which is does a lot of water and retrofitting of irrigation systems. So it was, you know, the money was put into other places. But conservation reserve program right now is you know, not nearly big enough as it needs to be. So we're trying to get that back up to like thirty two even up to thirty six million. Who was in the next farm bill, And there's people waiting in line to get it waiting in line. Yeah, there was, you know, any equery you open up, people will sign up for it immediately. So but it's just not happening. And that has to be done on the Farm Bill, but that costs a lot of money, and uh, but I would argue that the benefits and this especially if you're not going to you know, take a regulatory approach to things like clean water, you better be doubling down on the voluntary approaches. And that's you know, that's the Farm Bill. So that's when may challenge we're faced to come up here. But that's a national program. So even if we're doing the regional walk around the country. You know, that program is huge in the farm built in the prairie pot holes states, but it's a big deal even in place like New York, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia. They all have pretty significant agricultural economies. So it's a it is a program that really impacts everybody. So that's the main program for private land conservation there. And it has that public access component of it too, So that's a big deal. I think if you sort of you we wandered down towards the southeast. Yeah, we're dealing with you know, a lot of you know, pretty significant water quality issues, which you know stem from things like you know, too much fertilizers and pesticides on fields. But you look at the dead zones have been created off the coast of Florida the last couple of years. And we had sort of the dirty water coming out of Lake Cocechobee, and you know, that really impacted the recreational fishing industry both the east and the west coast of Florida. And uh, you know, and you get down to Florida and it's after these hurricane especially, I mean, at some point folks have really got to bite the bullet and do us necessary to restore it as every glaze, because that is the natural sponge for that entire system. And if we don't have that working, you're gonna exacerbate the flooding, the pollution problems, runoff problems. Yeah, that we're seeing there, and we're not just seeing it there. We're seeing you know, record dead zones in the Gulf of Mexico because all the crap is coming down the Mississippi River. So we've seen dead zones in you know, Lake Erie. You know. So the dead zone is just get too much essentially nutrigen, nutrients, nitrogen, and phosphorus in that water and it comes down and you get these algal blooms, kill off everything underneath them coming down from chemical fertilizers and animal waste. Yeah, exactly. I mean it also could be from the people putting it on their lawns. They could be from septic tanks. I mean, we rent a lot of Florida right even around the Chesapeake Bay. You know, the issue is you know, septic tanks. So but you know, we have just this water quality pro problems, especially in the eastern part of the country, which is so much more a lot more people, uh that we're gonna have to you know, get and get a handle on. And that doesn't even think about things like Flint, Michigan, where we have you know, major water quality problems with drinking water. So I'd say that is a major deal. And then we even get into that, you know, sort of Midwest and the farm country, and we've talked about the farm bill, but you know, that is a place where you know, we I think we really need to invest in terms of the next farm bill and habitat for wealth, source of species, but awesome water quality. We moved out to the West, I mean obviously, then we're talking about the public land states, and that's been a lot of our focus for the past seven years since I've been there. Uh is sort of one knocking back this notion that for some reason we ought to be getting rid of our public lands, either selling him off or transferring to the States, and that was you know, those ideas been kicked around forever since the time of Theodore Roosevelt. But they gave some traction back in the nineteen eighties and the sage Brush Rebellion. But it was kind of can you stop stop on all these to explain a little bit like sure, like like talk about how it was, how controversial it was in Roosevelt's time, I mean, and then and explained the stage brush rebellion and then the new iteration. So you know, think about, you know, what Roosevelt was doing. And you know, and Roosevelt obviously was not a guy who was shy about taking on controversy, I mean, trust busting and all the rest. But you know, he had been out to Dakota's, he had been you know, around the West, and and he had you know, really sort of credited the you know, the wild lands of this country to make him the man that he was, and that was hunting in Maine in the Adirondecks. It was his time was spent in North Dakota after his wife died, and he wanted all Americans to have that experience. And so what he did was we had that time, we were still in the process of getting rid of public lands, had the Homestead Act, and you know, there was no real you know thought at that time of conserving him. But it was really what he saw back in New York State when he was you know, even before he was governor. You know, they created the Adirondack Park. The Catskill Park wasn't because you know, just the preserve of open lands at that time. It has had a lot to do with the fact that you know, that was a drinking order system in New York City, in Albany and you know a lot of the municipalities in New York and they recognized it as being clear cut and you were getting fires and you know, huge erosion that you know, it was impacting folks way downstream. So they created a six million acre park called the Adirondack Park in New York, of which half of it was you know, public and the other half was private. But then heavily regulated within that the blue line as they call it, and you know, that became a model that Roosevelt, you know, saw it could be done for the rest of the and so at that time you were getting the you know, he would have gone out there. He had seen it. You were getting you know, you all of Stone had been created back in the eighteen eighties, so they were starting to be this burdening, burgeoning conservation movement to protect these special places. And Roosevelt recognized they passed the Antiquities Act back then, and he set aside two hundred and thirty million acres during his presidency for the people in perpetuity and the guys that he had to fight, where the timber barons, the mining you know barons. I mean, it was all these sort of captainets of industry who had planned on making a lot of money off these lands at some point. But you know, basically, through sheer force of personality and you know, his political skills, he was able to accomplish that. And you know, that sort of set the standard you know, for you know, what was carried on for generations. We now have about six d forty million acres of public lands in this country. A lot of that was added in when Alaska came into the nation, but it's you know, a remarkable resource. Yeah, there was so much opposition to Roosevelt's designation and of national forest, Like, you know, a lot of the terminology was different. You know, he had preserves and other things and timber preserves. But there's so much opposition to what he was doing that at one point he had a bill coming that would prohibit the president's ability to to do this, and he thought about vetoing it, but he knew that his Vieto would get over ridden. So there was like, like it's rare to get that kind of consensus that you can override a presidential veto, and that's how unpopular. What he was doing was amazing. And I was like the point out that they then went carved his face into a giant mountain. Yes they did, So he was onto something. But well and he was you know, I mean obviously, I mean it was controversial of the time, but I think that you know, the legacy he created back then has been carried on, amplified, you know, presidents ever since. I mean, you had a tremendous amount of you know, new parks and you know, forests were created under FDR, and he created the whole c C C to put people back to work doing conservation projects. You know, we had the Interstate Highway Program under Roosevelt, I mean the Eisenhower which really allowed people finally get out and see a lot of these places. And then you know, under Johnson's administration in nineteen sixties, you have things like the Wilderness Act, land Water Conservation Fund Act, you know, which you know was you know, these seminal parts of you know, the modern conservation fabric. We get to Nixon, who probably never went outside his whole life, but he arguably was the greatest environmental president since Roosevelt. Mean e PA was created, to Clean Water Act, NIPA Dangerous Species Act. All these came during Nixon's time, not because he thought it was something he was passionate about, but he saw it his way of healing the country after a Vietnam you know race riots, yeah, Watergate at that time, and this was something that could bring the country together. So I mean that was the sort of public lands and the environment. You know, we're not a partisan issue at all. At that time. The Wilderness Act in the US Senate had nine votes. The dissenting vote thought it didn't go far enough. Imagine, I mean land and Water Conservation Fund Act had basically the same vote count, you know. So, I mean these things were incredibly popular, and uh, you know, it wasn't until you really it was sort of in the beginning of the nineteen eighties, but the nineties got amplified and he's all of a sudden became partisan issues. So what happened with the stage Brush Rebellion, I mean it was you know, it was Reagan, you know, sort of paid homage to it. You know, he as he was campaigning for office, you know, he's expressed support for the folks that wanted the federal government off their back. I mean, it was sort of political rhetoric. Rhetoric for him. He ended up and adding about ten millions of acres of wilderness during his tenure as president. Part but and at that time, it was easy to write it off as a bunch of kooks. And then you had, you know, a look at later he had the shovel Brigade and Elko, where the four Service is going to close this road to an outhouse, and you had the local was rising up in a national shovel brigade to go and open the road back up. I mean, it was easy to write off this whole movement as cookie and since then, as you know, a lot of money has gone into it. And the same people that vote fought Roosevelt back in the nineteen teens, you know, same industries. You know, we're back, you know, doing the same thing, but this time it was much more sophisticated. They've been funding things like the American Legislative Legislative Exchange Council ALEC, too craft model legislation for states demanding that the Feds turned back their lands to them. You have you know, nonprofits created to do nothing but lobby against public lands, all funded by industry. And you know, so you have a much more sophisticated effort to chip away at that federal state, which you also had starting with Reagan and David Stockman, there was a whole theory of shrinking federal government known as you know, starving the beast, that if you keep systematically denying the agencies the funds they need to operate, eventually you shrink government to the size and over North with his famous quote was to the size where you can drown it in the bathtub. It's eloquent. Yeah, and it hasn't done a great job in terms of you know, entitlement spending, defense spending, anything like that, but did pretty darn good job of cutting back the authority and the ability of the agencies to do their jobs. And what that did is just continually breed discontent locally that you know, the Forest Service doesn't manage this forest and we're getting these big fires, which is all true, and you know, so I think there's a you know, so that's been a well orchestrated campaign to sort of keep the agencies from getting the resources they need to operate. You know, well, I mean the Forest Service today I think has something like eighteen hundred campgrounds that are closed because they can't afford to keep them open. And you can take you can, you can complain all you want about you know, the agencies priorities and they could do a better job with this and that, and you know that's probably legitimate debate to have. But you know that the idea that they're going to do more with less, you know, they're not. They're gonna do less with less, and they have been for years. Yeah, it's a cynical approach. And and you know there's that reason. I don't know where it ended up. You I'm sure you know the answer to this, the I think it was, was it six to two? That's gonna be the one that stripped law enforcement and that that's just the case. That's the case of just like you said, like shrinking until you can draw in the bathtub, to strip law enforcement capabilities from the Forest Service and the Bureau Land Management. Rob Bishop has another bill right now and they had a hearing on it last week. Um, you know, I can't remember how the you know what the title is, but essentially what it does is turn over wail and gas permitting and development authorities to the states and away from the Feds. And oh, by the way, you don't have to comply with NIPA or the Endangered Species Act or the Administrative Administrative Procedures Act. So essentially waves all the federal requirements. You know, the states you know oversee it all. Yeah, but we're the ones, you know, still paying for everything on those agencies lands paying for a short term long term. Can we set up something where maybe if you live in those states where they let that happen, and then like ten or twenty years down the line, when all those people want to move somewhere else, that we can somehow be like no, no, no, no, Now you're living in Utah when you let all that happen, so you don't get to come up here to Montana or maybe living Okay. Oh so anyway, the public lands issue has been a big one, and I think that you know, I mean, listen, you guys were you know, Steve, you were instrumental in this sort of pushback against Jason chafets an HR six one. The whole idea of just selling off lands to quote balance the budge, which I feel like that idea is starting to fade though, and it's becoming a different now. It's like, I feel like that idea is starting to fade, and what the new idea is is you'll be like, Okay, well maintain the ownership structure that we have, but we'll just strip away all the protections we have for those lands so that they become like industry playgrounds. Right, So you're you're saying this the change in tactics now to you know, just the chipping away at the federal authorities, and you know that's gonna be the next battleground. In fact, we've just launched a whole new site called sport some this country dot Org. You know that basically the mantras is not enough just to keep it public and we need to and it as sort of a group of tenants that we ought to demand from our public lands. They need to be well funded, yeah, they etcetera. I mean the things that you know we need, no they need. You know, it's not enough just to keep the public and then not getting the resources they need to manage them. That's not the way it works. Okay, so not I'll let you continue on to other parts. Imagine you're gonna want to jump over to California, maybe the desert southwest. I don't know. Yeah, you know, it's uh, I mean, what we're seeing right now is all the fire and stuff. And you know, obviously California is a little bit different situation because that's mostly private lands out there. But you know, in the Northwest where you had you know, I mean obviously you spent a lot of time in Montana in that state. You know that burned a lot of acres this year, twenties some odd different major fires over the course of the summer, and you know we're going to be seeing probably a lot more of that. One the climate is changing, but two is you know, we've just have been a senate su poor job of managing these lands for so long that we have this you know, big fuel burden built up at that just is not sustainable. And yeah, we've been trying, and of course you know that feeds right into the narrative while we need to go in and clear cut him, and that's not the that's not the goal. I mean, sure someplaces maybe you want to do that, but we just need to do is just basic sensible forest management, especially you know near the net urban interface, you know where a lot of the problems are. And you know, again that requires some money, and there are different ways of doing it, and there are some really you know, sort of cool models of groups like Turkey Federation and others going in there and actually doing the sales for the forest service and returning you know that what they called stewardship contracting, returning a lot of that money back into improvement of the resource. So you can get creative in this stuff. But because people people don't want to spend the money preventatively, they'd rather just have catastrophic financial losses after big fires. Yeah apparently, Yeah, so I mean you cynically again, that sort of pays into that narrative that Jesus FEDS can't be trusted with any of this stuff. But the fact is that, you know, if they were, you know, they weren't. The way we treat fire overall as budget issue is crazy. It's the only national disaster that's not considered a natural disaster, so hurricanes, tornadoes, any of that is comes out of FEMA, and UH fire has to come out of the core agency budget. So as a result, I think in the nineteen nineties, the agency force er is suspending about seventeen percent was budget fighting fires. Today it's in that fifty five to sixty percent range, which means they literally have no money to do anything else like preventing future fires. So it's just an insane you know, the way we do this, And there's we may actually get that past this year to change that, and you know, so you have you know, the catastrophic fires then get paid for in emergency funds so they don't have to come out of the agency's hide. But it's just insane the way we deal with this. Right now, I was gonna ask about that, like how have people always been trying to work to to change that, to make it tourn them into well, I mean hasn't been an issue until the last twenty years when these sort of catasty profit fires really started cutting down. So but since then, yeah, um, and we thought we had to deal several times. And during the abadministration that got killed the last second, and largely got killed because of you know, sort of the radical environmental community not wanting to sort of you know, see a return to the old days of major clearcuts, which is not what this would do at all. And because it was always sort of combined with the the way you change the budgeting with some modest forest reform to make it easier to actually go in there and do some of this management. And uh, you know, because part of the issue too is that anytime a timber sales proposed, you know, you're gonna go three years of litigation. You had to get you before you actually get in a cutney wood. And the meantime, a bunch of mills are already closed in the West, so it's much harder to do. So we we gotta get this thing fixed and fixed pretty fast, and nobody wants to go back to the old days of just you know, sort of way over harvest and you know the spot at owl controversies and all that, but there's a happy median in their some place and if you do, you're good. Forest management is good for wildlife generally, you know, good for all sorts of things. You know, there's an area where forest fires and the public lands debate came together. Maybe you can touch on that real quick, where some states had looked at just ran models to see what the world would look like should all this land fall into the states. Are you familiar with this? No, I haven't seen that. And remember some stuff came out of Wyoming where they looked at just the forest fire costs because states don't. States need to run on a balance budget, well right, and they when they were and I don't know, I don't even know whose offices came up, but someone just took a look at it and they're like, you know, as far as US assuming control of this massive amount of federal land banks, but no thanks, we couldn't even pay for the firefighting. Well, I mean that's and you have governors like Matt Meade in Wyoming just saying we couldn't afford to take over these lands. And people have to remember too that you know, state lands and federal lands have very different end dates. Seeing a lot of the states, you know, the state lands are used to maximize revenue, largely for education in the state, and they don't have that multiple use mandate that the federal lands too, so it would be a very different management. But you know the point about fire, you just you couldn't pay for it. So if you're a Republican you know, Western governor legislature, and all of a sudden you have a catastrophic fire, or in your projections about oil being a hundred dollars of barrel, it's only fifty dollars a barrel, and you're gonna run a deficit. You have a couple of choices. You can either raise taxes or you can sell off an asset. And it doesn't take a rocket scientist to know, you know what, they probably do the asset in the land. Yeah, exactly. Um, Okay, what's next in the walk around the country. Well, I mean I think that uh we can you move up toward Alaska, and I mean, obviously you've got a lot of experience up there. But Scott Pruett, the director of the Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, has just opened up you know, basically given the green light to the Pebble Partnership to proceed with permitting for the Pebble Mine in Alaska, which would be potentially you know the world's largest open pit copper or gold mine, you know, right at the headquarters of the new Segak and Queejack rivers, which are the most predictive salmon rivers in the world. The ABA administration had you know, sort of laid out some very high hurdles in any mind in that area would have to clear in order to get permitted, and essentially you know, doing a veto of that mind before what every even got applied for permits because the company had laid out in his sec filings you know what it intended to do, which was to create a massive mine up there. And as reason it's called the pebble deposit is that's it's not just one deposits scattered all over the place like a bunch of little pebbles. So there's no way to go in there and do a little bit of mine. It wouldn't be economical. The only way it makes sense is to had do a really big mine, which then requires really big infrastructure and it require eternal mitigation because you have to create the world's you know, probably the world's largest tailing pond, and uh, you know, you have to make sure that doesn't fail, because it fails, it takes out you know, those rivers, and that would require literally mitigation and basically remediation forever. It's hard to understand who is for Pebble Mind except for the people who stand to run the business, because it's one of those few issues where the commercial fishing industry, hunters, recreational fishermen, the tribes, tourism, no one wants it. I mean even you know, the former Senator Ted Stevens, you know, very Republican conservative senator, you know, said that this was the wrong mind and the wrong place, which it absolutely is. So it doesn't even have the sort of traditional political allies that most development projects in Alaska do. But that has not stopped the proponents from going to the Trump administration and getting them do very quickly without even look talking to their scientific team. And there's a great piece that CNN did on this, you know, just last week or the week before, you know, I decided to green light the mind again and literally not even talking to their scientific team, but the public comment period has ended just recently, is that that's probably not gonna matter. But that's not gonna matter. I mean, listen, I mean that we're gonna still beat this mine because you know why it'll get beaten, because you go ahead and I'll tell you why I think it'll get beaten. Oh my god, I love to hear your theory. First. I think it'll get beaten because it will become a it will become maybe one of the biggest standoffs. I mean, like literally a standoff. I think that there's people are so vested in saving that area that I think that you will see a you will see a mass gathering of such disparate types of individuals who are interested in wild lands and wildlife physically there on the ground. I just think that, like I think that if it came down to like breaking ground, I just don't think it will happen, because it has just it's just gotten. I mean, that area has gone from being a place that few people really knew about to becoming almost a household term. And it's one of those I think it's gonna be one of those, and like those environmental or conservation fights that really motivates people to get involved on the ground, and I don't think it will ever be like oh they beat us legally, we give up. Never, it won't be like that. And but the problem is that you know these you know, it's it's hard to kill these mining proposals like zombies. Every time, if you think it's dead, it pops up by some other name. And we saw that in the Blackfoot in Montana, which we finally managed to kill, but it was twenty years. Different mind proposals come up, you know, up there with the McDonald you know mine. But no, I mean what I think the public partnership, the conventional wisdom, what they're trying to do now is to give it enough you know, legs, enough momentum that you know, they can get some investors and then sell out. And because you know, I think that there's I think it's gonna be a very hard lift for this thing to be developed. But uh, you know, I think it's something we ought to try to, you know, kill once and for all. Now with the you know, the steak through the heart, it was it was trying to remember the year I didn't even like, I didn't even have a kid yet. Okay, my kids, my oldest kids seven, I didn't even have a kid yet, and I was at the thing about pebble mind um at a fundraiser for you know, to fight pebble mind. And I remember saying then, I'm like, they'll never build this mind. What are you talking about? And then since then I've grown increasingly fearful. Yeah. No, I mean when you when you can't kill it, then it's you know, still alive, and it just keeps popping back up, and you know the consequence is, yeah, of it being built are just so dramatic that I don't think any of us can get complacent on this one. Yeah. Well, you said, the most productive salmon fishery in the world, significant portion of all salmon in this country come out of there, and his supports and entire economy up there, commercial fisherman, recreational lodges, you know, hunting industry is you know, phenomenal around there. And would you know, be totally changed if that mind goes in. And plus you don't just pop up a mind. You put in the roads, you put it, you gotta build a power plant, you gotta do the tailing ponds. I mean, this is major industrial development. Yeah, that's one of the biggest fears about the mind is as you said, it has a large open pit. Is so I have a large lit'll create a large lake of toxic material. Correct in an active seismic Yeah, in a in a volcanically or sorry, seismically active area, well, a lot of volcanoes. So you know those two go hand and held back by an earth and damn I think the one of the longest earth and damn held tailor the longest earth and dam contained tailing ponds in the world. It would become. I mean, of course, now the company is saying, no, no, we're just talking about a little mine and we're not talking about what ignore what we said in our SEC filings. This is gonna be a little bit of mine. It's not gonna cause me damage. And you know, just nobody's gonna believe that except maybe Scott Pruett. Yeah, can you talk about how how much are you? How much can you? Can you talk about Scott pru It. I mean, I don't know the guy, I've never met him, but everything he's done has been anti conservation. I mean, usually there's a certain amount of balance, even if there isn't, I mean, there's a rhetorical balance, there's none now. I mean it's all about you know, just giving industry. It's you know, green light cutting back and regulations. Listen, nobody loves the e p A and nobody loves you know, regulations, nobody loves bureaucrats. But you know, I'm I remember as a kid, you know, the Cuyahoga burning in Ohio, and you know, it's we have come so far that I don't think anybody really wants to go back to the battle days, but that you go ahead. I was just gonna say that maybe why because we don't have like a river that's on fire right now, and that's why we're so complacent about it and letting something like that happen. And I think you're exactly right. And and listen, EPA has done all sorts of stupid stuff over the years, like a lot of overreaching. There's some legitimate there's some legitimate complaints, but I don't know that that's ever caused to I got complaints with my wife, right There's like legitimate complaints that people have, but it's like you don't you know, yeah, no, it's burning damn house down. So now it's been really really distressing to see but I mean there are some bed rock environmental laws that still have to be unless Congress wants to go in and mental laws, which you can't do. I mean they could do, but they can't. They can't even pass a new post office. Um. You know, it's it's gonna be very hard for Scott Prue to get away with a lot of this stuff. So what is it like? I know, you don't know him, and and and I don't know him, and I'm sure that he uh, absolutely convinced that he loves his family and loves his country. What is the vision? Like, what is the vision unfederal industry and unfederal sort of capitalism, thinking that it'll just that they'll find a soft spot down the road and and and and uh and retain some semblance of clean air and clean water and wildlife. And I guess that's fishing resource. I guess that's the thinking. I don't get it. I mean, sure, there are a lot of you know, a lot of companies are doing a good job out there, and they're good actors, and I trust some of them to do the right thing. But I also know that there's a place in this country for actually a strong regulation because people don't always do the right thing, particularly when a lot of money is involved. I was having a conversation with you, Measure. I was having a conversation with Governor Mead from Wyloming and UH and he was telling me something that that kind of made me feel better about things in some way where he was like some of like when it comes to mineral and energy extraction in his state. He's found that like some of the more forward thinking companies working on the ground UH do are looking ahead, Like like people in the mental mintal extraction industry, there are some forward thinking companies that are looking ahead for environmental issues and conservation because they're in there for the long run. And they realized that that creating trouble on the ground causes a lot of problems for their business. And he was speaking particularly to sage grounse issues, because the one sure way to screw yourself for for doing business on the ground and whelming was to push the sage grouse down into such low numbers and habitat destruction that it would need to be listed on the Endangered Species Act. So he was talking like a smart company, it's gonna see that problem and whatever your motivations whether you love the bird or not, you're gonna see that problem. It's like, what's good for that bird is gonna be good for our business? At this point, what industry wants a certainty, I mean responsible industry. They want to know what the rules are. They don't want to, you know, swinging back and forth every four or eight year is when of new administration is in place. And you're exactly right, and you know that means right that you know, something like the sage grouse is a long term play because it's not just the sage grouse. And if the sage grouse trust going down, there are three fifty other species that fend on that same ecosystem, and you're gonna start have this cascade of listings that potentially could shut down everything or just to cause the undoing of the Dangerous Species Act. And I don't think anybody well, I mean some people do, but most people really don't want that to happen. And I think that, you know, industry is I think actually you're gonna start seeing industry pushing back pretty hard against what the administration is doing on things like you know, water and air. And I think that you're already seeing that in the climate front because the industries I think recognize that, you know, climate change is real. You know, they've got to do something about it, you know, like things like the Paris Agreement where you know, eminently reasonable and voluntary, and you know it does not help them in their businesses to have you know, say, clean energy technologies you know coming out of China and not out of the US. So we're not going to go back to the days of you know, West Virginia fueling the nation by coal. I mean, it's just not gonna happen. It's not gonna happen because the reason is not because of anything Barack Obama did. It's because you know, gas is you know, so much cheaper than coal now ye natural gas, and so I mean that's the crazy thing here is we're kind of letting the tail wag the dog on a lot of those things are being proposed, and uh, you know it's not the future. I mean, we need to be looking forward, not in the rear view mirror all the time. M Can we move on? And can you give me explain for people? Um, unless you think this is boring, I don't think it is. The land like the land and water conservation fund and why it's always in the news. So nineteen sixty five there was a deal struck when oil and gas companies wanted to start developing the Outer Continental Shelf. And uh so that's the basically offshore oil and gas to fundment and which the federal government regulates, so because it's in our waters but not owned by any exactly, so it's the sort of the three. It's outside the state waters, it's out in federal waters, and there was obviously Gulf of Mexico off California. There are a lot of areas that industry wanted to get and developed. And the quid pro quo that was done at that time was in terms of, in exchange for opening it up, you know, the industry agreed to pay you know, into a fund nine million dollars annually that would then be used for, you know, to basically it's just developing a non renewable resource, to invest in protecting you know, natural resources, and so that was used for a land acquisition for city parks, you know, for you know, basically outdoors things, boat launches, yep, yep. So they're you know, like you know, in Montana, I think about you know, seventy of the fishing access sites were purchased, you know, by Land and Water Conservation Fund, so it's you can be used for a bunch of different things, you know, officuely, you know, use it to buy in holdings and federal lands to sort of yeah, just you know, make management easier and better. So it has you know, a huge variety of benefits. Um The problem is that Congress didn't require that money to be spent. So instead of it just being like an entitlement, something that automatically goes out after it comes in, it has to get appropriated by Congress. So only one time in the fifty two years of Land and Water Conservation Fund has been fully funded, and every other year I'm not understanding. So basically they said, here, the oil and gas industries pay nine million dollars every year into a fund for land. They're paying their they're paying their share, they're paying their share. That the problem is that instead of going out the way it had been intended by Congress, Congress raids that money for other things or deficit reduction or whatever it might be. So it's not protected in the way that like Pittman robertson money, it has to stay on task and get spent within the window of time and precisely so it is you know, so that is what the fight has always been, is that there was a deal cut, but Congress has never lived up to this end of the deal. Was it just a mistake or an oversight that you didn't carry with it like a through plan. I mean, it depends on who you talk to. Um, probably not. I think they thought Congress at that time listening past unanimously. Basically it wasn't controversial. Everyone thought this was a good idea. I don't think there was really an intent at that time. It had to be made mandatory because you know, who's gonna fight, you know, doing this stuff and just the you know, but then you know, things changed, So where does it stand now? Like so so, like why do you always why did you see that? You're always hearing about it? Well, let's see, it's is, you know, in terms of our community, the hunting and fishing community is probably the single most important you know, sort of access program we have in terms of providing new access because you know, those areas and there's you know a lot of them are used directly for I mean, let's think about how the demographics have changed. In the Western United States, you have the Forest Service a owns all the mountaintops and the more productive river bottoms owned by private individuals. Old days, you can knock on anybody's door, cross the land and get to the forest, go hunting and fishing. You know, that's changed. You know, so you have a lot of posted signs, you have a lot of that lower lands least, it's just shut off a whole bunch of access. So Land War Conservation Fund is an incredibly important tool for sort of reconnecting the public with a lot of their public lands. And it doesn't all just outright acquisitions. It could be just you know, buying an easement on some property that includes an access easement or includes a conservation easement, and you know, so it can be used in a lot of different ways. You can be used to know, maintain traditional forest management practices on forest lands. But what it does is it opens that land up to the public. So what's not being done that needs to be done, Well, Congress needs to appropriate the money is one, and so that's you know, the first thing, and then there's a huge backlot of projects. So I mean, if Congress were ever to kick out you know, nine million dollars like they're supposed to, or even four dred and fifty. You know, there are plenty of projects in the queue waiting that are not controversial, they're just waiting to be done. And it's also things like historic battlefields and you know, things like that that you can be purchased with this. So what needs to happen is that Congress needs to you know, I mean I think at this point it needs to go off budget, and you know, maybe maybe not the full you know, Mike Simpson's got a bill in the House that would you know, basically, you know, take four hundred fifty million off budgets so it automatically goes the agencies every year for these programs, and then the other four h fifty mill end is dedicated to basically the maintenance backlog we have on our national national parks, national forest, blm lands, refugees, and one of these bills would make it take care of itself for some number of years. Yeah, I mean, it depends on the way the bill is written. It could be forever. It could be five years, could be ten years. I think you know, Simpsons is a ten year program if I recall because it wasn't there. There was previously a long there's like a long quiet period, right, but then it expired. Yeah, so it was its expired two years ago. Congress did a three year reauthorization. Okay, that's why that when I said, like, why you always hearing about it, I guess because it's just they're they're doing short term renewals instead of long term rewal. And the idea was to a short term renewal and then try to find a longer term fix because I think nobody was happy with the fact that it wasn't getting the money that it needed. But that hasn't happened, and uh, I don't think it's going to happen, So we'll see. But in the meantime, you know, it's supposed to expire next year. Know, even if it expires, is not the end of the world, because there plenty of federal programs that have been expired and Congress still puts money into them. So but it's it just makes it much more as you know, tenuous, and I think that it's just bad government too. I mean, you want, if this program is important, you know, reauthorize it and make it work, but don't play these games. Can you um do a similar thing and break down on on clean water rulings and headwater rulings and explain that. Yeah, so the whole issue is and there were two Supreme Court decisions in the early two thousands that you know, play you basically put into question what is and what is not under the jurisdiction of the Clean Warter Act. And in particular, you know, wetlands will back up and even just just break down the Clean Water Act. So Clean Water Act was passed in the early nineties seventies, and it had to focus on navigable wars. That was the term in the bill, and it was all is interpreted until the two thousand's as navigable waters include even unnavigable like headwater streams that are critical to making that headwater, making that main river function, because you you, if you screw up you know the upstream, you know those headwaters, you know those you know, the tributaries, is going to screw up the main stream stream as well as you know scientifically, you know, accurate interpretation. Same thing with wetlands. Yeah, you may not be able to flow to both through that wetland, but as you know, hydrologically connected to the river, it plays an important filter system and hence this under their jurisdiction. The Clean Water Act that was thrown into question and by these two Supreme Court decisions that basically told E. P. A. In Congress to go back and do a better job of defining what is and what is not in because there's a lot of ambiguity and confusion. And you know, as a farm pond, you know, a part of the Clean Water Act is an irrigation ditch. They are all sorts of examples you can throw out, are that or ambiguous at the time, and so Congress of course didn't get his act together to you know, sort of revive and it's just like an annoyance that festered, like, yeah, so what are we talking about when we talk about what are these what constituency waters? And you had this ambiguity, you know, from the two thousands on about what was covering what was not covered, which basically meant that you know, if some you know dude wanted to go and you know dredge his you know, wetland in order to put in a parking lot, he could probably do it because you know, this this ambiguity under the courts. So the administration comes in and they you know, say, okay, if we're gonna settle this, we're gonna do what the Supreme Court asked us to do. And they did several years of science that define you know, what isn't what is not hydrologically connected, and then produced a new rule called the Waters of the US. And it was controversial right from the bat because you know, obviously the developers and you know, supposially especially the developers that have gotten sort of comfy with the ambiguity. So so the bo administration reduced a new rule. They did a several years of scientific study that you know, showed very clearly that headwater streams and adjacent wetlands were you know, hydrologically connected and hence you know, part of the Navigal waterways. And they released the rule, which immediately, you know, the developers, you know especially came out you know, sort of really hard against it. And uh, you know, in addition, they got a lot of the farm groups to come out against it. Two, even though the rules specifically exempted literally every agricultural practice you could think of, farm ponds, ditches, everything else were specifically exempted by the rule. I think the real estate guys and developers are smart enough to know they should not be the face of the opposition, so they got the farmers out there to be the face of the opposition. And as a result, it became you know, super controversial. A ton of lawsuits you know, were filed, and Trump administration or Trump when he was running for a Senate of the President excuse me, railed against it as you know, government overreach, which it isn't um And then so now Scott Pruett and E. P. A has taken the first steps to reverse it. Now it's not that easy just immediately reverse or rule like that, because there is a long rulemaking process and the abodministration went through in order to put that rule into place, and they've got to unwind that through a similar type process and involves public comment and all the rest. So it is uh, I mean, it's going to be in the courts. It's gonna be you know, fought administratively for the next few years, and there's just still gonna be a lot of ambiguity over what is and what is not covered. In the meantime, E p. A is probably not going to enforce many of these, you know, laws involving headwarter streams and wetlands. But yeah, we'll see it's uh, you know, gonna be a big battle for several years to come. But that's one where you know, I think the people really need to stand up and you know, really talk about the importance of clean war. Yeah, and it also have huge implications for fishing and waterfowl and and I mean every species. I mean and listen, I mean we have lost so many wetlands in this country. And uh, I mean the notion that you continue to keep draining wetlands and getting rid of them and you know, not have an impact on say waterfol hunting is just ludicrous. I mean, you've seen the flooding we've had this year, you know, and you know, if you sort of restore wetlands, you take care a lot of that without having to build more dikes. Um. You know, we've talked about already about the clean water problems off the coast of Florida and the Gulf of Mexico and Lake Erie. I mean, those are all you know, coming from not you know, a pipe someplace, but from runoff you know, coming off of fields and you know, coming off of pavements and parking lots. And people's lawns. So I mean that's where you know, there really needs to be something done here. And I mean I thought that personally what the administration proposed was not triconian at all. It was common sense. And uh, but now we're throwing back into this limbo because the you know, the changes coming out of ep A right now. So it's frustrating, but yeah, hopefully it will. We'll stick with it now, um the last one I want and then you then you can do whatever ones I have and a hit. But these are just things that I feel like people know there's something, but they don't really know what. Right. He was hearing about it all the time, the interpretations of the Antiquities Act and how it applies to monument designations and what's going on right now. Can you do like a bit a little bit of a deep dive on that, okay, thank you? Um So, Antiquities Act was the vehicle by which Theodore Roosevelt used to protect two thirty million acres and it allows the president to you know, basically create monuments out of you know, the federal estate. And it's been used and the way the law was written originally it was for historical artifacts and unique places, and it was supposed to be a size you know equivalent to protect those special resources like battlefields, archaeological sites, and you know, but that's been interpreted very broadly seen by Roosevelt himself, you know, to you protect you know, the view sheds and you know watersheds and you know all the rest. That's what surprised me that you said earlier, I didn't know that he was using it for that. He used it for things that weren't like cultural sites. Grand Canyon got you know protected. It was one of you know, was his national monuments and you know that was a big chunk of land and yeah, yeah, there were a bunch of you know, cool cultural things in there, but it was basically the grandeur of the place that moved Roosevelt. And it's been your presidents to use it ever since, you know, to you know, set aside you know parcels big and small. And then you know, in the nineties seventies, you know, the BLM, you know, finally had his own organic act to the Federal Land Management Policy Act to Flip Month and it was you know that sort of you created a real agency for what had been basically the Bureau of Lands before, whose job had been to dispose of lands largely. And you know, since then, you know, there has been a variety of other monuments. You know, part of the problem here is that, you know, first of all, there's a lot of misconception about how the Antiquities Act works. First of all, it doesn't take private land. It only changes protections on federal lands that exists. I think that a lot of people don't understand that. So it's you know, this whole notion that it's a land grab is you know ludicrous, um. And it can be changed by Congress, and Congress has gone and changed them many times, sometimes adding protections. Generally, you know, they've taken a monument turned into a national park and you know, so Congress, you know, first of all, Congress can go back and if they don't like the Grand Staircase Monument or bearers ears, they can go back and fix it. But you know, the Utah Delegation doesn't have the votes to do that. And uh, in there are other places like in you know, Idaho, there was you know, the there was a you know wilderness bill that Mike Simpson had been pushing for years, um. And you know, and he hadn't been all to get it through. And then finally he heard that the Obaministration was the Boulder White Class Wilderness, you know, the bombed he you know, was going to come in into a national monument there, and that was a galvanizing force for you know, the folks in Idaho to come together and pass their bill. And so there's no need for the Obaministration to do anything there. And that's the way it's supposed to work. But the problem is that Congress has been so broken now for a long time. They're not really doing lands bills anymore the way they used to, you know, wilderness bills, wild and Scenic river bills, things like that. And you know, in their absence, I think that the Obamaministration felt, probably correctly, that it had to go in and protect some these areas like beer Azers, which are getting kind of looted and you know, beat up, and you know, just there was a lot and there was a lot of pressure on the abadministration from the tribes come there and do something to protect this area, which everybody agreed need to protecting, even the Utah delegation. And uh, I think that the problem was that the you know, there's a lot of the politicians out there didn't like the process by which had been done, to which I would respond, going there and past your own bill. I mean, that's the way it's supposed to work. If you don't like what they did, go back and fix it. And the notion that we're going to just be undo the Antiquities Act and go back or use to come back in and have President Trump go back and undo a bunch of monuments are done before. I mean, I think it's allows you precedent because you know, we then that opens up basically any monument that's been created since the beginning of the Antiquities Act was used back in Roosevelt's time potentially for any administration come in and say I'm gonna undo that one or that one, and all of a sudden, it's you know, open season on these lands. And over time, most of these areas, I think probably all these areas, you know, I think local communities learned to embrace them and really like the fact that there's something special. I mean, you've hunted up in the Missouri breaks in Montana, and that was that was created by Antiquities Act. As in the monument designation It was highly controversial at the time, but now I think there are very few people up there that think that's a bad thing. And I think a lot of folks really like the fact that it has been protected and it brings some notoriety that Ariam brings some tourism in. So with people now like like, now you hear that just reviewing the last thirty years worth of monuments. So can you explain like how this review idea came from, where the review idea came from, how they carved out that window of time, and and what the review process is revealing. Well, you know, I have no idea why they picked you back to you know, the Clinton administration. So it was Clinton administration, George W. Bush, George H. W. Bush, um in Obama and Obama and you know, so that was the time period. I guess it was Grand Staircase, you know, which was Clinton did back in the nineties. Was probably the impotitional why they started. That was the time frame. And you know, but you know, and then how they did the review process. If he read the report, it was leaked by the you know, Washington Post, and to say that it is austere would be in you know, understatement. It is really skimpy, and it has minimal facts, and a lot of the facts they put in there are just flat out wrong. I mean, they tighted two of these national monuments under one review in New Mexico, you know, Rio Grand del Norte and another one, and uh, you know, I've talked with Martin Heinrich, as have you, and basically they claimed that there were road closures when there were none. They claimed that you know, they were funding and fishing had been disallowed, which it hadn't been. So I mean, it was just replete with these factual inaccuracies. And this was a report that was sent to the president and Heinrich was grilling the deputy director of BLM, you know, John Rouse, in a hearing, you know, a couple of weeks ago and basically saying, yeah, none of this is true. I mean, how did you come up with this stuff? And you know, Ruse basically says, you know, we were never asked to look at it, so I can't really say. So this thing goes out of the Secretary's office to the president without the career people who actually knows something about it having reviewed it. I mean, it's just a you know, in a pretty crappy way to you know, sort of you know, do policy in my mind, and and kind of detail what some of the recommendations might be. Well, some of the you know, they've excited I think, you know, up to six there would be boundary reductions. They didn't say how much it would be, but they just said it was too big and ought to be reduced. And those are things like bears ears in grand staircase. Other as, they said management needed to be changed and to allow more development, more hunting, fishing, whatever. I mean, I was with I was up in Maine yesterday and with you know, the guy who was the proponent for the whole catad and Woods and Waters, which is the monument that was donated to the federal government by you know, a family up there acres and then turned into a monument. So one of Zinkie's recommendations in the review that went to the president was that the management plan be changed to allow more hunting, fishing and timber harves. Well, there is no management plan. It was just created. There's three year process to develop a management there's gonna change. So, I mean, this is the sort of you know, amateur hour. We've be kind of dealing with on this thing, is that a lot of these recommendations have gone to the White House just don't make much sense. So what are the hunting and fishing restrictions, But there are some timber restrictions. So part of the way they did that one part of his awful inn September. The other part is open for you know, limited timber harvest and uh yeah, but it's just sort of you know, pandering to some of these voices that want me to return to a timber economy that's never going to return to. I mean, yeah, there's gonna be some but you know, it's again, this was private property that you know that nobody had any right to do anything on it before, and it was donated to federal government for everybody, and it has some minimal stipulations as to what had to be respected. So I think we got a pretty good deal out of that. And I'm not sure why we're going back and looking at it all. Right, are the things that I haven't brought up that you wish I had brought up, or that you want to bring up, like like a little issue things, you know. I think that you know, one thing we probably talked about is just the whole broader issue of you know, funding for conservation in this country. Because we talked about a little bit in terms of the Forest Service, and yeah, the agency is not having the budgets they need to do stuff. But you know, we you know, we think back all the way to the nineteen seventies and you know, at that time, you know, the investment in conservation in this country and that is sort of e p a. The land managing agencies, it was about two and a half percent of the federal budget. Today it's less than one and so we've had this sort of gradual erosion and uh, you know, and that has seen and you know, not only in just things like campgrounds on the Forest Service lands, but justin you know, much other ways and a lot of otherwise. I mean, right now, the states, you know, are sort of required to carry the burden on a bunch of things like you know, managing non game species, and hunters and anglers basically pay for conservation the states through exercise taxes, through license sales, through stamps, and to excent about of the state's fishing game budget are paid for by you know, sportsmen. But at the same time, you know, they use those dollars, and we understand to manage monarch, butterflies and you know, owls and a lot of other species that are not game species. And that's okay, but at some point, you know, especially given the erosion of funding over time, we gotta find some new revenue sources. So there is a you know, Blueberd panel was put together that was led by you know, Johnny Morris and as pro Shops and some others that's sort of laid out, you know, almost a land water conservation fund model for much broader non game and they're going to take you a much bigger chunk about one point two billion off budget that would go to the States to basically pay for non game management and well and gas injury strict supportive of this. You know, Shell was on that panel. You know a lot of feather folks are. But the problem we're going to have is that, you know, again it's just additional spending in a time we already have these big deficits, and you know that's going to be the problem because it's not new money. If this is money, it's already going to the general treasury that now gets being dedicated non game management as opposed to just you know, paying for whatever the government pays for. So, I mean, I think that's we're gonna have to get creative over time about you know, funding of conservation because at some point, particularly with you know, some of the trends we're saying in hunter numbers, uh, the money is not always going to be there that has in the past, So we've got to find some additional sources of revenue. And that's another thing we want to probably talk about too, is just sort of those numbers that came out of the Fish and Wildlife Service, which show that you know, sort of a decline from about hunters down to about eleven million. But it's weird because they kept saying that everything was statistically insignificant. That sounds pretty statistical statistically significant. I don't know if it meant because they're they're counting it differently. I don't think even in the report, it keeps saying like statistically insignificant, even though it's like like a couple like millions more fishermen less hunters, but it called all it called those numbers statistically into significant in the report, which I never understood. Yeah, and I don't get that either. I mean but because I think that everybody in the industry thinks it's significant. And you know, the folks was after like a and it was coming on the heels of an uptick. Yep, we've had an uptick before and now we got a downtick. And it could be tied to so many it's so hard to suss out what it's coming from. Well, I think it's a combination of things, because the economy always factors into it. Yeah, it does. But you know, think about you know, first of all, there are some broader sociological demographic changes. I mean, you know, I think you know, the guys like yeah, me, fifty five year old white guys. You know, we're starting to you know, and you know my you know, father's generation. You know, they're not hunting anymore. And you know, so you have that sort of cliff of these guys that are sort of carried the industry for a long time, there aren't going to be there. And so I think that's one thing that we're dealing with. I think that you know, just how we've you know, done look at the fishing versus the hunting. The fishing side, you know, Pittman Robertson, is you know that is the hunting side. Dingle Johnson's YXT side tax for the fishing side, Dingo Johnson allows the states to use a small portion of those money as they get for recruitment, reactivation, retention, the three RS, and so that's what funded the whole Recreational Boating and Fishing Foundation has just done the take Me phishing campaign that you've probably seen the sort of a similar program for the Spanish speaking folks of almost auspice Car. I'm not a Spanish speaker, so I said that probably wrong, but they've done really aggressive outreach promoting fishing and boating that has, I am positive, has driven a bunch of those fishing numbers up. Hunting side. They're not allowed to use the excise tax for any you know, the three R activities, so you don't have an equivalent program on the hunting side that you do on the fishing side. There's no take me hunting campaign out there, and we're trying to get you know, there's a bill in Congress right now that we're pushing called basically the PR Mockertization Act to allow the States to use the small portion of those PR funds for recruitment retention, reactivation, which you've got to do if they're going to stay ahead of this curve, because you know, it's just you know, the people that have basically been funding you know, hunting and hunting and fishing in the future. I mean, we're coming to a cliff, you know, as these baby boomers you know, start of get out of the game and we don't have those young generations coming up behind them, and so it's not gonna happen organically. We got to make a real effort to push for that. And then I think in the hunting side too, you have things like you know, I've man, I I'm going off script here, but you know, things like the hunter Education program, which is you know, I think is you know, kind of a twentieth century you know program, and we need to be thinking about the way kids learned these days. You know, my kid, my son who's twenty now, you probably took hunter education six or seven years ago. We had to do in the eleven hours of classroom. And we know you had to spend a whole in when I took it as a kid, you have you spent the whole weekend. Yeah, and your kids and kids nowadays you've got you know, soccer practice, swim practice, you know, study halls, you know, whatever it is. There's a super scheduled and busy and as especially around Washington, d C. Where I live, it was not easy finding a class. We find them down in Fredericksburg, Virginia, like an hour south of DC. You could do the whole class in like eleven hours. And he said, like it's the worst day of his life. He said it was just so incredibly boring, and he was he wasn't allowed to do it online. I mean, it sort seems to makes sense to me to BUI allow kids to do it online, that's how they learned these days. And then you have them go out in the field with somebody who who has a hunting license, who knows how to do it, who can basically certify they've taken them out and been a mentor to him. And uh, I see, I see both sides of this issue, man, Like I definitely where you're coming from that it shouldn't you shouldn't be coming in and making it hard for people to go participate in the activity. On the other hand, um, I see that it's like a serious discipline, sure, and it's it's like a real thing. You're out there, you're out there dealing with You're out there trafficking in life and death. And I totally agree with you. But think about I mean, a lot of the online classes now are really good. There are a lot better than some old dude standing in a VFW hall, you know, sort of you know, droning on about something, kids space and out, you know, not paying attention anyone. You know, you're right, yeah, because that's the thing I'm not looking at, is like it's almost yeah, you could probably put you could probably put something together. Not probably, you probably surely put something together. It's equally educational, I think doesn't require parents like changing their work schedules around and taking like days off work in order to make it happen. And plus, you know, just the kids are so scheduled these days. I mean, you'll get to this point soon with your kids, but you know, they have so much stuff going on. Is you know, tough to do. And partly if you're especially if you're in an urban area, there's just no place close. At least there wasn't, and that was a huge deal. And I mean, I think there has to be a sort of an outside component the whole thing. They need to go out with somebody. They have to have that experience, They have to have somebody to explain to him how it's done, because I mean, the classroom is not enough by itself. But one of the good things that the States have done is they created his apprentice programs now and you know that's suming. I've taken a bunch of people out with that, and you know, that's a huge step in the right direction. Make sure to get them interested before they have to sort of sink that investment of you know, going through the whole process. Yeah, I think I do like those programs a lot um And that seems like a really that seems like a good solution to go through it. And I'm sure it's not something that probably gets abused too much, but it has been nice to see that that allowing people, Uh, there was no Verton when you know, when I was younger, there was no version of that at all. You know, I think you if for firearms deer, you're fourteen years old, but if you got your I think that if you got your dead uncle neighbor sitting in the blind with you focused on what you're going on, I don't see any reason you need to wait to be fourteen. No, totally agree. I mean, my other pet peeves just how compa the licensing systems are. And you have every state has their own system that's different than the other states. And you have, you know, a bunch of states don't even have mobile friendly. You know, I went out in Wyoming a few weeks ago, and you know their site it's not mobile friendly. So you're you're trying to like buy a fishing license and you're expanding it and trying to find the right button, and it's just a total pain in the ass. And you know the notion that you mean, you can go to Amazon and I can type of my information. I can buy anything anywhere in the country with just a click of a button. I ought to be able to do hunting a fishing licensees. I probably buy a dozen every year, and it's everyone. Some states do it really well, others don't. I mean, there are a couple of states that will send me email reminders that I gotta get my hunting license, and I do, but most don't. And uh, you know, so, I mean, you know, the states have got to come into the twenty one century in terms of marketing and making it consumer friendly. And plus it's just if you look at the rigs for you know, you you hunt all over the place. I mean just going through those rags and figure out what you can do, where you can do it. What the limit is here is so complicated. We gotta figure out a way to But I fetishize those things. I agree that they're complicated, but I do but you know how to read them. But imagine if you because I hear the thing, I don't. I know how to read them. But I still find myself like we have a great like we have a great network of people around the country who are very enthusiastic hunters and fishermen. So every time I'm going somewhere, I still will get the rag, look at it, and I'll still don't have to call somebody and be like, hey man, I'm like, am I looking at this right? Like you can do this and not that, Because even after a long time, after decades of looking at a lot of rags, I still look at rags and like, I don't understand what they're talking about. Yep, I rest, I rest my case and I call and that at that point, I like call buddies. We're doing that all the time, all the time trying to figure out like so what now, But you're right, and like it just thinks the As an example of how hard is to get a license, I was trying to get licenses here from Maryland a few days ago online and uh, I get to like the final stage. I'm supposed to make a password, you know, to set up some accounts that I can have a license, and all it says is one, um Uh it has to be alpha and numeric characters. Right, Well that's not true. It actually also has to have a special character, except it's not written there. So I'm calling that all my connections here like dude, what is going on? Pulling my hair out, and it's just like yeah, we almost just showed up here with no licenses and how to do the Walmart thing at midnight? You know. Yeah, so I mean we gotta do a better job with things. Like here's the thing that I think is doing it. Uh. I'm sure that the licenses are pain and yeas is a factor. I'm sure that UM restrictions are a factor. But they I noticed two things go on. One, if you go and talk to a hunter, who isn't just who isn't concerned about conservation, like just hasn't had been engaged in those conversations, has been exposed to like kind of like long term thinking about the well being of fishing, wildlife and hunting and fishing. They're not going to tell you, like, man, the one thing this world needs is more hunters, because they already know that they're in like bad competition for hunting spots, so it's hard to get someone. I would think that most people look and they're like, oh, it is you know, some percentage less hunters and fishermen than they were five years ago. Great, because that means more spots for me. And I think the other part of it is is that it's still for people getting into it who didn't grow up around it. It is hard hard to find a place to hunt and fish unless you're just unless you're an obsessed person. Yeah, access is a huge issue on this because you know, you know, look around d C. I mean, a guy who works in our office, you know, talks about he was when he was a kid hunting Quail and False Church, which is ten miles outside d C. Whether I can tell you right now there are no Quail and Falls Church. You walk down the street with a shotgun, you're going to jail. And uh, you know, it's just gotten harder and harder to get to those places. And when you do get to them, there are a lot more people there because we have left places to go and you know the end and that's not going to change. What we have to do is just you know, things like that Farm Bill program I talked about that encourage private land ords and open up their land. You know, things like Land and Water Conservation Fund, which is actually creating new you know, hunting territories, fishing territories. Yeah, so I think there has to be a major push on access. And listen, I'm gonna give Zinkey a little bit credit here because you know, I think Interior if they've done a bunch of the pushed down a bunch of stuff on access, which is good, and I think that's part of the equation. And I think we can't ignore that, but also have to have conservation you know, that goes with that, because again, you can't just sort of open up access if there's too many people there, if there's no game there, if it's been industrialized, you know, what good is access for that? So no, we just need to be thinking you know, much bigger on all these levels. Yeah, it's uh, can you can you go back to the first part when you're talking about how good everything is. Listen, the fact that we're able to have a lot of these arguments is luxury because you know, you can go to a bunch of Europe You're not gonna have these arguments because there's no opportunity. So, I mean, listen, we have a lot of challenges and we need you know, all the meat eaters out there engaging and you know, making their voice heard because you've seen what they can do. But you know, listen, we don't get I mean, you can't get too bummed out because you know we've got it great. I mean, this is an amazing resource we have. No I know, I appreciate it, man, I I appreciate how you framed. The thing is that you framed to be acknowledging, uh, the great treasures we have, but then taking the threats to them very seriously. Yeah, because I think that if you aren't in all aspects of life, if you are aggressively looking at what's coming around to screw you, you're you're messing something up. Absolutely. If I don't know this one I don't know if you're comfortable with this one. Um, we're so new into the new administration UM and a lot of changes and you know, personalities emerging and and you know, procedure starting. What are some of the like if you had if you had a thing where you could list out three things or four things that you think the new administration and various secretaries and in pointees um could be doing. It's not too late. The political risk isn't gray, Like, what are some just good common sense slam dunk things that we could expect that we might hope to or expect to see out of our the current iteration of our federal government. And if if I were advising over there, and you know, they had the goal of being you know, the legacy of being a good conservation administration. I mean, there are a few things I think you can listen. I mean, development and conservation are not necessarily opposed. I mean, you can do smart development, you can target it. You know, whether we've been What's been frustrating so far is the absolute failure of you know, Interior, for example, to articulate any sort of positive conservation vision. And they've done a good job articulating an access vision, which I appreciate and I think is important, but there has to be that commenced a conservation vision. And it doesn't have to be you know, it can be things like, you know, how do we do how do we get more oil and gas out but at the same time do it smarter? I mean, how do we do things like, you know, protect migration corridors, which are you know, sort of iconic big game, you know, areas that are incredibly important. It's a ribbon cutting every time it crosses a highway. And I think there are things that you can articulate that are very positive for conservation that aren't anti industry in any sort of way. And I think that there was a bunch of that stuff that if they were to think about and if they cared, they would artcirculate those sorts of strategies. If if you don't like you know, regulatory approaches to clean water for example, I mean, as I said before, you better be doubling down on the voluntary approaches things like the farm built. But we have not seen any of the rhetoric that connect those dots. It's just a been about getting rid of regulation, unfettered capitalism, you know, and you know, not even any thought about how are we going to achieve our clean water or sidal goals with that, or fisher wildlife goals. And I think there are things we can do, you know, any administration could do if they really wanted to, and if that is the legs that they want to leave, you know, to be strong in development would also be strong in conservation. And the frustrating part is just we haven't even seen the rhetoric being strong in conservation. I've noticed that absence. Yeah, I mean in in technology has changed. I mean we've done a lot of work with the oil and gas companies about in surround you know, trying to do it smart and you know, if you go I mean I remember one oil and gas executive showing me a picture of the Jonah field in Wyoming, which is basically his quarter acre pads as far as the eye can see, and he says, using today's technology of your diagonal drilling, of reservoir mapping, you know, we can develop that exact same every ounce of oil and gas in that field under with ten of the surface impact. And by the way, yeah, we can do it more cheaply because that's less pipelines, less roads, less pads and you know, but you know, industry is you know, like you know, a lot of industry is not progressive. They're going to keep doing it the same way they've always done it, you know, just punch holes as they move along, because that's the way they're used to do it, and they've made money doing that. But if you have a government that says, you know what, this is the public's lands, we're gonna do it a little bit smarter than that. You're gonna minimize your footprint, We're gonna help you do that, they can do it. And so you could be really good on development and be really good on conservation. But we just haven't seen that yet. No, I think that that's the kind of um. I think that that's the kind of approach and the kind of language to be using, though and thinking about it and stepping away from this this sort of like this this this adversarial all one way or all the other approach, which winds up being kind of crippling. Yeah, I agree. I mean that's been you know, just the debate has been so shrill and so polarized. That doesn't need to be. I mean, you know, smart people can disagree about you know the way to approach some of these things, but you know, there ought to be some basic, you know, bottom lines. You know, we want a strong economy, we want energy independence, we want protected land. Yeah, we want robust hunting and fishing, and U you know, just okay, how do we do it achieve all that? And you're not gonna do it by administrative feat You're gonna get a bunch of people in the room and you're gonna figure out everybody's gonna compromise a little bit. So I was talking to a politician recently who was describing his decision making process, and he described this point at which the radical environmentalists you measure their anger and then sort of the radical fringe of the extraction, you measure their anger. And when you feel that they're both kind of equally angry at you, you've probably found your path forward. As you you you you feel it, and then you know that you're maybe somehow coming in out of compromise that people. I think that's exactly right, and I think that you know, unfortunately, you know that you know that we we see the tail wag the dog sometimes on this stuff, and that you know, squeaky wheel get in the grease. You know, the loudest screamer intends to get the attention. And and what's really frustrating is that you know, you know, you you think about you know, even just the way the press handles a lot of these issues, it's not sort of a thoughtful discussion about you know, this middle ground. It is, you know, the so polarized. I mean, it's the you know, drill everything, and it's the you know, lock it all up, and there is no discussion about that, you know, that in the middle And that's you know, the space that we try to occupy because I think the hunting and fishing communities country has always sort of been that sensible center, I mean pragmatic. I mean, we use the land, we drive cars. But at the same time, you know, we have a legacy we want to maintain and pass on to our kids. So what is the what does t RCP need and what's how do things look with TRCP going forward? Well, how should people follow what's going on and get involved? What do you need from people? Yeah, you know, we uh, you know, we we're sort of a coalition of a lot of groups. We fifty six formal partners range from you Ducks Unlimited and we will do your foundation to a f l c i O and you know, the Outdoor Industry Association, and uh, you know that's always a delicate balancing act. But I think that we've always probably that keeps you centered, that keeps a centered because you know, we have you know, sort of various you know, extremes on all sides, and you know, we park a lot of things at the door and we just focus on the stuff we can all agree on. And uh, but you know what, I think that the fault of the hunting and fishing communities over time, as we've become complacent, we've become checked out. We haven't let our voices be heard, as we sort of fractured into you know, our little species groups fixing up our little wetland or our stream or whatever it might be. And we've been you know, sort of more interested in doing that than engaging in some of these you know sometimes you know, sort of nasty political conversations that you know, people get mad at you, but you know, people got mad at the Order Roosevelt a whole lot. And I think that, you know, if we're gonna sort of keep what we have in this country, you know, sports him to gotta be willing to speak up and not just about you know, when somebody they perceived some has gonna come and take away their gun. They got to talk about when somebody's gonna take away their land too. And uh, you know that's where I think we've we've failed over time is as a community from really standing up with that. And so it well, we need is people to get engaged. We need people, they think, come to our website rsp dot org. You know, sign up, you know, send a check. That's great. But we're really trying to do is just sort of you know, re established that voice of the hunter and angler in federal policy, because it's not the voice of the radical environmentalists, it's not the voice of industry. It is, you know, it's that sensible center that I've talked about that we've yeah, we need in this country. All right, you got anything you want? That was that was your end? But do you have another end? No? No, I'm I've got all sports hands. But now listen, Hey, thanks for all all that you've done and when the meteors have done, you guys have been great. Yes, anything you wanna any follow up questions? No, I don't think so you can't tell I'm in a good mood or a bad mood. Now it is daunting, man. And there's the thing you just said to that that um, the thing you said kind of hit with like the species groups, because I like, I like a lot of that stuff. But it does you know, when you when you focus in on that level, if you're like, oh, you know, I like the hunt pheasants, I like, I like the hunt turkey, and and you just get involved on that level of conservation, you can plug along and sort of miss like big picture issues that are going on. Well, I mean people come to me messy issues. Yeah, they say, hey, what's your relationship with the n r A. And I said, well, listen, we don't do you know, Second Amendment stuff. Those guys don't need us. They do it just fine. I said, However, I have nothing but respect for the fact that the n r A and the gun community has made any attack on a gun law any place, an attack on everybody for us, as his act opposite, it was a muleteer problem. It's not a trout problem. It's a trout problem. It's not to say it's not a grouse problem. And we die this death with a thousand cuts because we're so sort of vested in our own little critters and we don't come together and recognize that, you know, the water quality issues in Florida may not directly affect me, but we gotta stand together in terms of conservation in this country. Yeah, I'm gonna close it on that thought and go to TRCP dot org. You can also get on your guys mailing list, which is great because that's how I even know all. That's how I even know what all is going on. We'll send out emails regularly to you and you and you keep people apprized of things when they need to do comments on things or contact your representatives about stuff that they should be getting involved. It's nice. It's like, was it like usually three or five report? Yeah, like what's up this week? Yeah, yeah, that kind of half read it. Then I just make wid explain to me later. You know, we try to keep the good folks engage, but we tried to keep it light and fun as well. And uh, because you know that you've gotta have a little bit of you know, dessert with your vegetables. Yeah, I know. It's like a good amount of hunting and fishing stuff in there, and a good amount of how someone's gonna come screw you on hunting fishing down the road. There we go, all right with Fosburgh. Thank you very much for joining us. Uh, you got to come back soon and do status updates on this stuff. Good. Let's actually talk about like hunting and fishing next time. Next time we will, all right,