Library district and the friends of the Morgan Library the prudent leather Library Friends in the trust, the murray family, the holding her confluence, can you see, Old Firehouse books and all of those who are here tonight who contribute to these events. Pat. Thank you david. We got some really great events coming up for you. Tonight again i want to remind you that our commitment to you is to get really great authors to you to come and talk to you. We can enjoy differences of opinion and provocative authors and i think youre going to hear the time. We welcome that. On friday and saturday october 18th and 19, is going to be the fort collins book festival we have various menus in old town. The theme is readable feast. Culinary arts hospitality and food systems. For more information you can visit ww w. Im sure you can find that on a variety of websites. And on tuesday october 29,. Will have Jonathan Waterman author of chasing denali. It investigates the reporting some hunting of the Mountain Bike gold miners in 1910. How much gold do you think they found at the summit of denali . I think they found 40 feet of snow up there but probably not a whole lot of gold right. And we are very excited to announce that on wednesday february 12, we are going to host doctor mona honda author of what the eyes dont see, its about the order crisis and it will be here and you will see more announcements about that. Youll see these book tours that we put on your chairs and there are two things i like to draw your attention to. If you would fill out this, it has two sides to it, and with your some of your informational we ought we announce author events to you. The second is a little survey of what authors you would like to see and we take that and we put it into our popper and we work with the brain a partner, renee, and we look at that to discover which authors to be invited. We will be collecting those right around when q a starts, and then will be drawing from those to give to three free books. The other thing is, you can become a friend and actually donate to these programs and sustain them and we always appreciate that if you would still be inclined. Now i like to in introduce firehouse books, they been a great partner with us. She is going to introduce the author. Renee over to you. [applause] good evening. My name is renee, i am the admits court nader at Old Firehouse books. In just a minute i am going to be inviting her and introducing our author for this evening. I would like to cover first of all thank you to the Publisher Viking and petrone for offering this opportunity in fort collins. I think of course Morgan Library and partnering with Old Firehouse library. Take you to the helton for hosting these events. Last but not least, thank you to all of you. If youve ever wondered what the secrets to bringing your favorite authors coming to town is. Allow me to let you in on that secret. It is all of you. When you purchase a book at our store, it means something. Me something to us, giving something to the author into the publisher and most importantly to our community. Without the support of our readers and our community, we would not be able to host a number events we do. We couldnt offer our story our or our store and many other things. Without our community, we wouldnt be able to keep our doors open. Thank you sincerely to all of you for coming out and supporting us. Now he would like to introduce christopher. Tonight we are here to celebrate his first book, this land. How capitalism and corruption are ruining the american west. He has been a freelance writer for more than 20 years. His work has been an array of areas. National geographic Rolling Stone specific standard and many other websites both large and small. According to his website, he is a recipient of the ward latest sleeping writer ever. Cut [laughter]. This land is a product of those years of research and watering. Before i forget, since i didnt write it down, also thank you to cspan book tv for being here in recording this event. Without further ado, lets welcome christopher. [applause] hey. Hows it going. I have never done this befo before. [laughter] [applause] so my normal state of affairs is i am alone in a room with a piece of paper and thats not speaking before crowds. Know that i am terrified. [laughter] all right, so ive been asked to speak a little bit about why i wrote this book. Personal me tell you a little bit about myself. I am not a westerner, im a new yorker. So you can stop doing now. Boop new york sucks. I hate new york to dori about it. Only new york city. I live in the mountains north of new york. As a new yorker, i came west years ago in my 20s and just wandered around and knew very little about the west. I was stunned to discover the dom in the Forest Service domain. The public lands and stunned to discover i was an owner of these lands. That they are all our land in a shared commons and when i thought about it further, i thought to myself, my god this is an incredible experiment in socialism in the worlds most hyper capitalistic nation. Work all a shared ownership of the commons. And then struck me is a horse story goal and anomalous in american history. I wrote the book to celebrate this fact that we are all owners of this land and that we have entrusted our government to safeguard the land and protect it. We have laws in place, passed by congress to protect the incredible biodiversity on these lands. Unfortunately, the people that have been entrusted in this task are not doing what they are supposed to be doing and protecting the land the way they should. They have been captured by the very interested and captured by the industry. Grayson, and mining. Again and again and of Course Research and interviewing people who have worked for the dom, we try to do the right thing but are higher up say no, you are not going to do the right thing. Youre going to do with the livestock industry in the Mining Industry tells you. From my perspective thats a tragedy. The land is beautiful and it is one of the last of wilderness and wild places that are not subject gated to the metastatic growth of techno industrial homo sapiens. Our species who has an intent on taking over every last inch of planet earth. For the sole purpose of abandonment. In economic growth. More money, money money money. I dont know, that seems to me dishonorable. It is not a future that i want to hand down to my children, my two daughters. I also wrote this book forum. Can read to you a little bit . Okay. So this is chapter one and it opens with a quote. From a guiding Charlie Russell who was known as a cowboy artists and he spent he died in 1926, he was during his time quite renowned for his portraits of cowboys and native americans in western landscapes. Here is what he commented on about the west towards the end of his life. This is a quote which i open the book. In my book a pioneer is a man who turned all of the grass upside down, strong barbed wire over the dust that was left, poisoned the water, cut down the trees, killed the indian who owned the land, and called it progress. If i had my way, the land here would be like god made it. None of you sons of bridges would be here at all. [applause] so that is charles russell. Boy oh boy. If he were here today he might include more. Just saying maybe. He was a harsh man. I will read to you a little bit and forgive me, ive been wondering the public lands trying to figure out whats left of the wild in the west. Utah, nevada, idaho, oregon, wyoming, the states with the most public land. The big wide open. What guthrie was talking about when he was saying this is your land. Is a gigantic experiments in socialism that was. Who couldve imagined it in the most capitalistic country in the art. Where everyone can say they own hundreds and millions of acres but no Single Person can claim it for themselves alone. This makes for higher living. You can camp pretty much anywhere, from the worlds loveliest places at the bottoms of canyons and at the tops of mountains wherever you please. Come along just dont wreck it for the next person. Mostly i camp and living out of the tent, a tiny thing, enough room for me and one adult male wolf or two women. Our 26 weasels. Driving my rickety old super which gets me where i need between breakdowns as slowly as possible. Try not to think about the return east, back there are the reasons i go west. The problem is the species common in the east all our phonics. Say my native habitat in new york city. A creature self regard. Staring at the unreality of screams, tripping over itself on the sidewalks, and turnstiles, in museums, supermarkets, subways, wherever there is so you associative grass and steel concrete. The human sardine can. In a countryside of the east, the public lands are few. Mountains are privatized. Rivers in the banks seashores and meadows, force give harmony with no trespassing and keep out an electronic surveillance. I was with my seven yearold daughter and some guy comes down and says i am the stream. Get out. All right so you own the water flowing through the stream okay buddy. Always the threat of a prosecution of taking a walk in the woods. Forget about moving across the landscape freely. Spontaneously voluntarily and forget about finding the videos of this planet not reduced to the reminder of your fellow men. There is such a thing as enough of him. Where is in the west, and the lands that were never privatized, and the country of the cougar and the bison in the sage grouse and the wild horse and the wealth. Where there is not enough water for the madding crowd but just enough for the wild things. A man who is so free in his aloneness that he might not see another human being for weeks on end. Many months if he hamza genius for hiding high in the crabs like the cries of old. I entered by a guy once with that route in a canyon near death valley. Who came west from his overpriced little apartment. Leaving behind his useless shiny junk and job and deserted in the company of the big books. Bible, koran, to define the truth offer free, low rent due this month or any other. It is still possible in this country to find wild open spaces where the ribbons of the Natural World go on as they should. Relatively understood by industrial man. I fear the opportunity though, it could up it could disappear in our lifetime. So thats the open of the book. From there, i end up visiting an area of nevada, the egan rage of nevada, south of the town to be late. I came upon a machine called a bill. I like to describe to you what a ball hog is all about. Its an incredible machine, very efficient. Its engine roars, it runs on treads like a bulldozer. Its front spinning blade. It has one use, and one use only, the destruction of the forest in which i stand. A forest of opinion and juniper that the deer of Land Management manages and on our behalf. These are ancient trees, load with age and short and squat and patent trucks and nice bark. Maybe 20 feet to the crowds, the pygmy forest. Its called the woodland and found on tens of millions of acres in utah and nevada. The juniper forest is a great survivor in the arid lands, drought resistant adapted to heat, and deliciously sweet smelling. These two species, after the sagebrush, are the florida of the great basin in the colorado plateau. But they have no value for logging. Or wood products. No value that can be measured in money. Therefore, they must be wiped out for other enterprises. For cattleman, i later learned, so that the egan range will be productive. For cows and not wasted. The bull hog operated and funded by the department of interior, at our expense with our tax dollars, charges through the forest as i stand in the kind of fume incredulous at the pace of its destruction. The beautiful old nold trees are devoured of the mouth of the mobile vulture. Knocked down and shoot up in fragments defecated. The howl and whine of the engine and the spinning blades the torturous toppled the trees. The cracking and crushing of drunks. The shadows spinning out of beams seconds before its almost too much to bear. Whats left is the flattened treads smashed wasteland. A bombed area of juniper. Within 15 minutes, the first that i entered is gone. This is happening or is plan happen in an area roughly the size of vermont. The m massive d4 station of the womens across the west is now exceeding the size of vermont and the vermont being fivepoint 7 million acres across the west. I had been darting from side to side as a bull hog passes. And now to finally i show myself, for there is no tree left to hide behind. The operator drops down and sees me and then realizes i am no threat. A man with a camera and a notepad, puny. Someone will do nothing to stop him. He cowers back up and goes and soon the mouth of the machine spends ferociously. The cab where he says his cage and shadows and to where i can see no movement or new aunt or organic presence at the helm. As if this were a robot. A drone. May is prime nesting season for birds in the juniper by them. Hawks and mountain chickadees, and how strands, flickers great flycatchers, scrub jays, live here. Between the trees nest the poor wills, all that are caught, hard ground to red mist of the server mechanism. For no reason other than to expedite commerce. Thats one reason while i wrote the book. You see birds on the ground inability mr. Wet. For the expansion of grazing ground. For an industry that produces los than 2 percent of all beef produced in this country. All the life stock grazing in this country produced is los than 2 percent. Seems to me, this is not a very Fair Exchange there. All of those beautiful birds there for beautiful beef. Especially even in the state of affairs today, the massive extinction ongoing across the planet as a result of the metastatic growth of techno industrial man. Now you dont have to read the book [laughter] you got it, every time i have it been at one of these events, i go on and on. I had of leaving. Id rather just engage in a conversation with you guys and your questions and have a conversation. That is far more interesting to me than reading to you. Yes sir. [inaudible] i am total american and i love this country i would never leave it. [laughter] yes sir. [inaudible] who have been so rebellious against the blm and the grazing and ive seen their grazing rights but do they really represent cowboy culture and the ranching industry. Not at all. Not a bit because they are much against the federal government and the life stock industry loves the federal government. What about monday . The bunnies are in a crisis. They just want to make trouble. If you want to sit down and have a conversation with these guys, they dont really have a clear thought in their head is sort of this mosh of wacky ideology of more of fundamentalism. Its just tedious. Public all his ego dont they . I think the purpose of the bundys and the bundy heights is to create an atmosphere of terror when it comes to land managers. They have further stymied their ability to actually protect that land. They do have a purpose for that purpose is, a larger purpose to deregulate the public lands that and not enforcing the law. I like to know if we own the land and its gone through congress. Why are these people and why is this happening. [inaudible] why is this being done and why is there no controls over it. The destruction of the b. Why are we as a society allowing this to the abuse. The simple fact is that as i mentioned earlier, the very regulators are supposed to be regulating on behalf of the American People are in fact regulating on behalf of the tiny minorities have business interests. This is an Interest Group politics. This is commonplace, is a captured creature of wall street. Department of treasury, department of Energy Department of defense, they are preachers and captured creatures of the military, like going and et cetera et cetera. Its not have the norm. Its in perfect keeping with the corruption and capture of our government and service of private industry. At our expense. At the broad expanse of the commons and the things we hold dear together. Does that answer your question sort of . Okay. Are Government Agencies involved with getting rid of old and certain certain situations . Absolutely, yes the Us Department of agriculture is a branch dedicated to the very purpose. Its called Wildlife Services and its run under the Animal Protection and Health Inspection service which is a branch of the usda. Wildlife services what they do is they slaughter by the tens of millions every year all sorts of wildlife all across the wet west. Mostly they do so on behalf of the livestock industry. Wolves, do get killed by Wildlife Services if they can be proven to have deck redated as the term goes, right upon cattle or sheep. Wildlife services is funded to the tune of Something Like hundred and a hundred 50 million a year to week destruction across the public lands. Wildlife services is spread and disseminates what are effectively landmines on the public lands. The m44 cyanide trap. Fortyfour cyanide trap is a sting loaded trap planted in the ground for predators. If you are walking along and you are a child or a grandchild, they could curiously explode and origin dust throwing cyanide into your childs mouth and thats the end of that. This happened to a 14 yearold boy in idaho. Named kenyon mansfield. It happened to an older gentleman named dennis law of utah who both i interviewed. To answer your question, yes the us it government is involved in slaughtering all sorts of wildlife on a rapid basis. What state primarily with the wolves. Remember that wolves are still protected under the endangered species act and i believe montana and wyoming. Anyway so the states and even in those states where they arent protected, there are loopholes in the knee endangered species act and states that when wolves can be shown to have preyed upon livestock they can be killed. Just remember the primary population of wolves in this country are in the northern rockies, minnesota and michigan and youve got whats called the wolf in mexico and arizona. Inaudible. [inaudible] [laughter] so are you advocating preservation versus multiuse. Traditionally have advocated for multi use. Like recreation, preservation, mining, industrial use. Where did you start your research and why did you become so adamant about any type of multi use of our national. 1976, multiuse balances out all other values but in practice is not happening. When i get my passion, i dont know i like wild places, i would tennessee to get out the wilderness so i can love humankind again. Its like there is a great value to wild places that are untrammeled and free of human domination especially given its a. I and i will hartman again and again especially given the broad domination that the planet now by human beings. We live now no longer than in an open world is a close world in that world has been closed by us. Cant keep our greasy little mitts off of everything. Weight wasnt what was your first question you asked me how i got in this gig russian mark [laughter] is it your premise. Were talking about millions and millions of acres in the west, that is a huge. I think in our present context of climate that people with the right and likelihood of a climate apocalypse, given present trends. Given the fact of the six mass extinction, given the widespread destruction and subrogation so much of the earth, yeah i think we could do with a certain degree of humility and restraint altruism and to say hey, you know what, just let this remain untouched and going to stand back and be large and generous rather than petty and grasping. Does that answer your question. Yes, preservation. As for multiple use, let me give you a quote from the bait great backpacker William Douglas who also happen to be the longest Supreme Court justice. Hes a backpacker nut. To read his book my wilderness, two volumes, hes like the scampi. The cosmic waves of the stars blowing through my hair and then meanwhile hes like adjudicating on all sorts of really complex legal matters. Man, all right. 1961 this was when it was published. Multi use was making catalan and sheep men and lumberman and minors named beneficiaries. After they raised forests. The rest of us could use them. Define campsites, amongst subs. To look for fission waters heavy with silt from erosion. To search for game and ridges that have pounded to death by sheep. He nailed it. He nailed what multiply use is all about. Its somatic it. The whitewash and a cover up for abuse. Multiple abuse would be more apt. The microphone is for cspan. [applause] [laughter] llama question. Did you meet very many into jewish people on your track and how they feel about your work and i guess thats a simple question. I did not. I didnt feel it was in need. This is not an individualist issue. It is irrespective of class ra race, whether you are a cheyenne or a book a night, doesnt matter. Its all our lands now. The past is the past. The past is horrendous and shameful but its done. I think the best way forward with regard to indigenous right and what glances that there has to be for example the black hills. He should probably be given back to the sioux tribe, but in terms of the broad public lands, we are all in this together. Its not a matter of indigenous versus nonindigenous. I interviewed some indigenous. One guy was incredible, his name was really long. He told me this bizarro story that i thought was complete or strip but was apparently true. So we were driving around wyoming. We passed this town and it easy, i said rain, whats the origin of the name. He said, my girlfriend drove through it a couple years back and she went into the chamber of commerce and spoke with someone there in the official told her a good story. He said there was a native American Woman who was bathing in a local stream in her breast fell out of her blouse and she said zero re pc. [laughter] i said rain, this is bull shipped right. He said no man thats a real story thats the chamber of commerce man. Thats the real history. Reindeer stands last. Yes. [inaudible conversation] [laughter] cowboys capitalism and corruption are running the west. I understand the capitalism and corruption part whats the cowboy part. Is the most rapid use of public image. It is the most single most destructive use in biodiversity loss and ecological loss. That explicit. Man you got your time. [laughter] are you familiar with the movement to describe legal rights to environmental attributes and do you support that . Absolutely, yes. Hes asking about if i was familiar with the movement to ascribe natural rights and kind of personalize it to ecosystems to a whole landscape on a biotic level and i was saying, yes, i absolutely subscribe to that. In ecuador, new zealand, the courts have upheld the granting of personhood to ecosystems similar because ecosystems function is in credible interleaved relatedness. But approaches assigned of ascensions we havent discovered yet we are not smart enough yet to discover that ascension. I think is there. There was an interesting lawsuit brought by whose group name i forgot. I want to establish legal establishment and the Colorado River and the judge in the case, he threatened the lawyer in the case, with disbarment if he brought it forward. Then of course the lawyer chickened out and that was that. That was in to the lawsuit. This guy here in the plan. Diner standard disparagement of the way the Forest Service and manage lands but you speak to the way the 85 million acres of our National Parks in the hundred and 50 million acres of our National Wildlife refuges and maybe a hundred 210 million acres of our 700760 wilderness areas which are preserved through the wilderness preservation act. You speak about the way those are managed and maybe some enlightenment and judgment. First of all what are the National Parks. They been reduced to visitation zero visitation. From mass industrial recreate ration. Its driven by all of the various business interests by the patagonia area and all of the various venture capitalist organizations that wants to sell you as much junk is possible to take it back the woods. There is an entire industrial apparatus out there that seeks to turn on National Parks into automotive havens, places of honey put this, massproduced vistas. Industrial vistas. Drive from one point to another to another to another. Then go back to one of the gateway communities where you can eat a nice meal and an expensive restaurant. I dont go to National Parks because they are overcrowded and the whole. Of getting out out in the is to be i think is with wildlife and foundering communion with other inhuman. As for wildlife refuges, take for example the wild life refuge that came became rather famous for a time in 2016, when mondays lunatic sons and ben and ryan decided to take it over are you familiar with this whole wretched episode . In january 2016, they arrive on and take over the interNational Wildlife refuge. They claim that the petition Wildlife Service which manages malley National Wildlife refuge and manages a lot of the land surrounding the refuge, had behaved in an overregulated local renters and they wanted to free the land from suppression. Actually it turns out that there is massive over closing of the mall massive overgrazing. The monument manager there, has bent over backwards to accommodate the abuse of what should be a refuge for birds. Migratory birds. That doesnt hold true for all wildlife refuges. And i wouldnt be in a place to say what is happening of all of them. I do know in my experience looking at wildlife refuges in the White American west that too often the original purpose of a refuge for wildlife has been abrogated by or compromised. Was the one youre talking about. In southwestern or southeastern oregon. Not far from the town of burns. [inaudible conversation] more questions. So, wilderness is generally pretty well protected. There are areas where you have grazing in wilderness it would obviously be impossible to have a wild ecosystem where you have an invasive bovine in that negatively affecting their processes. Of the place. But the wilderness areas that i have seen are pretty damn good. Thats just my personal experience. There probably are wilderness areas that suffer from too much human visitation, i would say wilderness areas for example have Mountain Bikers that are violating wilderness acts that they are going to in those wilderness areas. They have been barred the use of all mechanized transport to the. Of being in a wilderness is no machines. Without the domination of the machine. Is there an organization that we can support that is doing something about this. And what can we do. No. [laughter] start one. Is there an organization that is doing something about these broad issues ineffective way and what can we do citizens. First part of the question is no there is not. Im talking about an organization is really taking on these issues and the livestock industry and these very powerful in vested interests. There is not one that i know of. Maybe western mars project. Thats a damn good group. They are pretty good. They make some silly compromises over the years but they are pretty good. Looking at you in some sense, well, congresspeople tell them what you value and what you care about and that you value this land is a great comment. It is your land. If you want to be managed on all citizens not just for you if you are minorities. Now for the privilege. But for everyone. So get involved. There is the National Environmental policy act that mandates that all citizens can have some sort of participation in landuse decisions. On the public lands. The federal land policy act as well. There are mechanisms for participation, just requires making yourself heard and present and saying hey i care. I care about the self. Are any of our senators sympathetic to this. There are some that are this guy is great guy from arizona he is a great guy. I cant give you any other. Eric can you think of any other. [inaudible]. [laughter] senator udall down in mexico has been very strong sitter senators in vermont has been good, senator warren in massachusetts has been good, senator booker in new jersey has been good. Im not from the west. Thats where i mentioned hes from the west. But you will not often find legislature from the west who support the kinds of stuff we are talking about because they are beholden to very powerful extractive commodity user interests. [inaudible conversation] [laughter] do you have an opinion our local issues for example we have a senator who has just lobbied very strongly and successfully to move the biella men corners from washington dc to Grand Junction. Secondly, direct today were we have a congresswoman from denver, who is just put in a bill that would reduce the regulations on guides and outfitters i make it easier forum to get permits to use the public lands. Any thoughts about that . Its called the sour act and so ar. There are the recreation eric industry is a multi billion dollar industry is very powerful. Its going to be easier for the soy act will be an example of making it easier. What was the other question. Grand junction, [laughter] so i live in Grand Junction for a while and, thats really the primary issue for me. Look the whole idea of moving the deal a man from dc of course is to create a more easily captured headquarters. You have it right in the belly of the beast. The visual and tension of the utah legislation which was vocal in this whole effort to move the deal amounts headquarters west. They original intention was to bring it to utah and utah is the state that is rapidly against the kinds of protections we are discussing here. Having a blm heated and utah makes it far easier just to mangle public land policy even further. The elected officials and utah. Elected officials both state and federal in utah have over the years events a hostility to protect the land to preservation to the species and the cleaner acting clean water act and other pieces of legislation. So, a lot of this has to do with the cultural predilections of mormonnism. Mormons really do believe in the book of genesis, the whole idea that the earth is made totally for human dominion, theyre trudeau minionist and this transplant lates into certain policy from this legislatorsorso selfdescribe as mormons. I root about any book. Have to good to utah officer this. Can you people come with me . I just wanted to ask you how many ers of research did you do. Ten years. Was it focused on specific states or the west of the mississippi or focuses olargest public land states, so that list i presented when in opener of the book. So utah, wyoming, nevada, oregon, thank you. Basically what is known as the intermountain west. For example, in definition of the west i use the book, i dont include coastal california as the west. I dont include coastal oregon or washington as the west. The west is more in the intermountain and interior areas. I was an archaeologist and i wrote Environmental Impact statements for the federal government, and my question to you is how much strength do you think nepa has . Nepa is constantly unmined. And as you know, have hold on. Her question was she was a former archaeologist working writing Environmental Impact statements on what for what agency . All of them, bor, bia. So she was working on Environmental Impact statements as an archaeologist for various proposals for development in at blm Forest Service, did you say bor. Bor bureau of reclaimation plan. So in the book i interview a lot of folks who write Environmental Impact statements where they say this project will negatively is so likely to negatively affect wildlife or archaeological finds or prehistoric dwellings or whatever might be that the project cannot go forward as currently conceived and that would have the eiss rewritten and told, okay, you can either quit, right, or good along with it. And so these are people who are in the sense trapped with going along with because they have mortgages and families and need health care. Not everyone is a hero. So they cant make that kind of heretic decision to stand up heroic decision to stand up to systemic posts that would crush them. Thats what happens to whistle blowers. They get destroyed. Dont get heroized, theyre ruined. Studies create many [inaudible] and none of most places we are like how much their implemented but they are implemented, they are done in a good faith effort to mitigate those the not in all cases but. But to a large degree for the projects to get approved they have to do mitigation so much thats positive. In second question do is you see any pri miss for multiple use or or just total preservationism across the millions of acres. If we follow the law, shaw, multiple use but if we follow the law, then there will be very little multiple use because the laws are in place to protect these other values beyond the extraction of money from the landscape but we dont follow the laws we put in place. That congress put in place at the behest of the American People. Wasnt Like Congress was like, all right, were just going to chang the whole system all of a sudden from 1964 to 1976 when you head invery environmental laws and prokes put in place, it we the wilberness october of 64, or nepa or the clean water act, Clean Air Act or fltma. Federal land policy management or the endangered species act of 1973, the most powerful act of them all because it mandates if youre going to protect endangered speciesover ha to protect the lab nat which the species surveyed and that means widespread landscape level protections that bars exploitation to protect that little inch long liz satisfied. Its incredible that lizard. Its christian credible that Congress Passed the laws and not so incredible that we tend to ignore them, given all the industrial capitalistic injuries that would be effectively affected if these laws were fully enforced and fully regulated. So talk but multiple use. Lets have multiple use but follow the law. Instead of engaging in the routine lawlessness i her they transcribe ten and again from people inside in the Forest Service and blm, current employ he use retire employee that these are agencies that are lawless and goes on no big deal, i follow the decide damn law. White dont our the goddamn law. Why dont the agencies follow the law. Im getting a little militant here, little excited. That gal in the back. Could you tell us a about bit thought he structure of the book. Is it lots of for better lots of rants but any hope i mean, i love the rants, but is there any place where hope that you fifth us or places to good or things we do in your book . She is asking what the structure of the book is. Dont know, maam. Look it the structure of the become. Its just broken into three parts, the first part is called battle, the second part is be trail and the third far is resistance the first part, battle, chron yells the battle between he blm and the bundy family. The second part is the widespread betrayal of the land, of the kinds of preservation vales by the democratic party, specifically barack obama, and the third partes about how we can form some sort of resistance third party is kind of many ways it is eschews common pattern. You have 400 pages and this is so messed up and nothing is going to change and then theres 20 paints says but if we all eat kosher cuptakes, everything would be find. Kosher cupcakes. At the end of the become im like, oh, man, this is hard. Going to be hard fight and going to be long and difficult and i dont know if it can be won. Thats the structure of the book. A ray of sunshine. I know, a lot of people i well, they blame me for the depression. Blue shirt. Okay. I have worked for both in the bureau of lan management and the Forest Service in the rockie mountain region, and can attest to much of what you talk but. There are instances where things go well, but they dont tend to be the big things. Personally, my family donated considerable money to a water foul life refuge southwest of laramie, wyoming, and they used that money to make a lot of improvements so more people could come out and enjoy the wildlife. Its a migratory one. And we were horrified to discover last year that the fish and Wildlife Service now is allowing hunting season in the wildlife refuges, at least some of them. Typical. Because, because nra can you hear her family donate notice establish a wildlife refuge think fish and Wildlife Service is managing the wildlife reef fuming and now the fish and Wildlife Service is allowing hundreding in same refuge. For what reason. Because the hunting revenues are going down because because the hung revenues or declining. Fewer people are hunting so the National Rifle association and a lot of the wildlife biology agencies in various states have been pressuring the fish and Wildlife Service to allow hunting to train kids to hunt. They should come to new york state because we have deer problem. That are out of control. Theyre eating out the understory of the forests so all hunters should come to new york and kill deer because we wont allow wolfs and cougars to come back. Yes, what she describes is a typical behavioral pattern on the part of the fish and Wildlife Service, allowing grazing and allowing hunting on which your refuge, refuge from, like, lead bullets. So you have pretty thoroughly elucidated what you call the skitsside disposition of the blm and in the for rest service and you have kind of mentioned you dope propose a solution. Have you witnessed or experienced effective means to kind of counteract the negative things . What positive things have you seen people do that were effective and made change. Lawsuits, lawsuits work. Because again the key issue here is violation of routine and blatant violation of federal law so if you can hold the agencies accountable to the law and make them follow the law and regulate on a lawful basis, then that can effectively change. Let me tell you a quick story. Roger rosen, blm biologist for many years, toll me a story but going into a meeting with department of interior lawyers and a group of blm district managers from across the west, ask doi lawyer said to the managers you guys, we keep losing the lawsuits. What are you doing . Youre we cant defend these lawsuits because youre violating the law. The blm managers start laughing and say, you dont pay us enough to follow the law. Of we followed the law, id have every congress person, every elected official in my state, every county commissioner, on my ass to get me fired. Id be ostracize. Fro the community. My reputation would be systematically ruined. So, what we do these are the blm managers in responsible to the increased louse doi lawyers, we wait for the conservation groups and the environmental groups to sue us to force to us follow the law so that then we can act within cover and basically enforce the law and then tell the elected officials, we arent doing it, its then vie rows who are forcing tout do it and thats how twisted things have gotten, the only way tone force the law is by our own federal regulators are force they dent like it, tone want it. They want to do the right thing but they trapped in a system of perversity that doesnt allow them to express their love of the land. [applause] thank you. Youre watching booktv on cspan2. Booktv, television for serious readers. [inaudible conversations] good evening, everybody. Can you hear me okay . Aisle jonathon wollen, the deputy direct or of event heard at politics and prose. Thank you for coming out tonight. 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