Sportsman Heritage Act Or Sportsman Used And Betrayed Act?

[Tim Smith]

http://rivermud.blogspot.com/2012/04/sportsmens-heritage-act-laws-with-cool.html

A friend of mine blogged about this recently. He was vastly nicer than I would have been.

[Al Agnew]

Thanks for posting this, Tim. I honestly wasn't aware of it, and I still don't know how much to cheer and how much to boo. Some good things and some questionable things, for sure.

[gotmuddy]

IV. A part of the Act makes it legal for hunters to import the "parts" of legally killed polar bears from other countries. I honestly didn't know you could not import a legally killed polar bear. Glad Congress is interested in fixing it. Not because I hate polar bears or want to see hunting pressure on them increase, but because it's pretty obvious that opening up the border to a few dozen polar bear rugs is not going to cause a huge wave of polar bear poaching. However, the USFWS policy of "no endangered species shall be imported" would now have exceptions if this law passes. That means that serious poachers, when caught, will state in court that it's legal to bring "some" endangered species into the country, and that the singling out of polar bears is arbitrary and capricious (it certainly seems so). Again - cause for celebrating? I.......guess?

according to the USFWS the polar bear is not endangered.

[Tim Smith]

according to the USFWS the polar bear is not endangered.

I think the current status is "threatened". There has been a tug of war over that recently...because of course, there's no global warming and the fact that the southern-most populations are falling apart is no indication they're in any danger at all.

Al, it looks to me like the current bill is a Trojan horse using sportsmen to get federal lands almost universally open for mineral extraction. Some mining and drilling is necessary. A free for all is not.

[Outside Bend]

according to the USFWS the polar bear is not endangered.

The Marine Mammal Protection Act prohibits the import/export of polar bear trophies.

IMO it seems a lot of these "fixes" address pretty minor problems. Public lands are already managed for multiple use, more legislation enshrining that ideal seems redundant. The EPA component seems like mental gymnastics- lead is lead, and it seems pretty arbitrary to say EPA can regulate it if it's in soil or water or gas, but can't regulate it if we shape it into bullets or pellets.

The polar bear issue just leaves me shaking my head- I guess I just didn't realize how important this issue was. I guess I figured, given the current economic climate, there wasn't a huge constituency of folks shelling out the dough to go on a polar bear hunt. Considering all the other issues on our legislator's plates, it seems trivial to take this up, and only reinforces to me how vapid many of our elected officials truly are.

Only time will tell whether this legislation is of any benefit to sportsmen. But to me, the fact this was the best they could come up with, and the most they could agree on, says more about our Congress than the "issues" they're attempting to tackle.

[gotmuddy]

I guess since I am not a hunter I dont understand why someone would want to shoot a polar bear. Do they taste good?

[rfd515]

I guess since I am not a hunter I dont understand why someone would want to shoot a polar bear. Do they taste good?

http://www.deschutesangler.com/Fly+Tying/Hair+and+Fur/Polar+Bear.html

[Wayne SW/MO]

As written that article makes a lot of presumptions, without actually allowing any debate. I have no idea at this point what the bill says in the fine print, but "human use" could be seperated from "economic use". None of the fears are backed up by wording in the bill, so this chicken little will wait for more details.

This in no way assumes I believe the bill to be harmless to sportsmen, but the devil is in the details. .