IT'S A GOOD THING

WHAT'S A GOOD THING, YOU ASK?  I WILL TELL YOU TOWARD THE END OF  THIS POST.   BUT FIRST;   
I was raised on a cattle ranch.   When I was old enough to seek employment, I spent some time working for the Forest Service, in the logging industry and then spent 40 years in the mining industry, ultimately retiring from that business a few years ago.  So what? you may ask.  Well, I'll tell you what.
Ranchers, farmers, loggers etc. had and have a penchant to take care of the land.  They have too, since the land is what supplies their living.  They watch the water sources and develop them as needed, and rotate their cattle herds accordingly.  Then in the 1970's, or there about, the environmental movement started.  This movement had been around for a long time prior to the 1970's, I admit, but it really got a foot hold in the 70's.  And guess what.  Ranchers and farmers and loggers supported that movement.  For a while. Cause they were aware of the need to care for the environment.  It took a while, but eventually they realized that this movement was not to care for the environment, but to remove all ranchers, loggers and any one else they could off of the land.  And they succeeded, by underhanded means, using false stories and pictures.  They would show pictures of clear cut logging, stating that it took place on public forests, when actually it was from timber farms in the Northwest. Private land owned by large lumber corporations. But the politicians back east lapped it up and passed laws that affected the people in the west, without actually learning the facts.  Now the movement has reached a point that any one wanting to run cattle operation, open a mine, or any thing else that involves the prudent use of the land, they have to spend hundreds or thousands or even millions of dollars to prove that they will not damage the land in a EIS.  For those of you that don't know what an EIS is, that is an Environmental Impact Statement. And if the environmental groups decide that it is going to affect an owl or a hawk or a fish or a mouse or whatever they can come up with, then you will not be able to use the land.  So what is a good thing.    
Well, if Adam and Eve had been required to file an EIS, they would have starved to death before they were able to start tilling the land.   AND THAT'S THE VIEW FROM THE DITCH BANK