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SSCC #377–NOAA

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Yes, you read that right, NOAA, as in the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration.

The huge humpback whale whose friendliness precipitated a surreal seven-year — so far — federal hunt for criminality surely did not feel put upon. Nevertheless, our unhinged government, with an obsession like that of Melville’s Ahab, has crippled Nancy Black’s scientific career, cost her more than $100,000 in legal fees — so far — and might sentence her to 20 years in prison. This Kafkaesque burlesque of law enforcement began when someone whistled.

So what was so horrible a crime that these agents from the government have spent so much time and effort?

Black, 50, a marine biologist who also captains a whale-watching ship, was with some watchers in Monterey Bay in 2005 when a member of her crew whistled at the humpback that had approached her boat, hoping to entice the whale to linger. Back on land, another of her employees called the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) to ask if the whistling constituted “harassment” of a marine mammal, which is an “environmental crime.” NOAA requested a video of the episode, which Black sent after editing it slightly to highlight the whistling. NOAA found no harassment — but got her indicted for editing the tape, calling this a “material false statement” to federal investigators, which is a felony under the 1863 False Claims Act, intended to punish suppliers defrauding the government during the Civil War.

See, they knew it wasn’t harassment but well, given 3 felonies a day they can up root your life to dig up anything.  When we say dig up, I also mean twisting the facts to make you guilty of crimes you didn’t commit.

If there was ever a clue that something was wrong with our government and legal system, this is a shining example.

State Sponsored Criminal #377: NOAA

Because if you’re an environmentalist wacko, get a job with the feds, then you can destroy anyone who does something you disagree with with the power, weight, and force of government behind you.

via Uncle.

Yeah I’ll be on and off this week…

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I am currently on “vacation” visiting friends and family.  Yesterday I met up with Phil and Scott from RNS down on the Tacoma water front.

Phil’s awesomeness was just radiating from him while at the restaurant.  It was a fun evening and was nice to catch up with friends I usually only see once a year at Boomershoot.

Earlier in the day though the wife and I went to Point Defiance Zoo and Aquarium for the first time since our wedding.

I wasn’t smiling because well, I don’t normally smile.  Don’t know why, but I just don’t smile that much if it’s a staged photo.  We paid a visit to where we had our reception too. 

The Gibbons were out just the same as they were during our reception.  Just as adorable too.

We also found the Sumatran Tiger that was on display at our reception.

Here she is now, evidently she is most likely pregnant too.

And there’s even more cubs at the zoo, here’s baby snow leopards.

Yes, they were just as adorable in person.  There were a couple other cats that were adorable but I only have pictures.  If you have kittens, that’s exactly how they were acting but they were bigger.  I wanted to play with the kitty cats.  We did however stumble across a red wolf puppy.

Yes I know all of these are wonderful cell phone quality, I didn’t feel like lugging around my SLR and backpack.  Yes I had an urge to shoot the little bastards.  The only good wolf is a dead wolf however I consider a zoo a sanctuary and given they are nothing like the Timber Wolf or Grey Wolf.   That brings me to a story of someone who needed blunt force trauma to the face.

You see there are peacocks that run around the zoo uncaged.  They’re beautiful with gorgeous tails. When we finally ran across one it looked like it was shedding its feathers, but still seemed odd.  As TMW and I were talking a couple overheard us and told us that a woman was chasing the peacock earlier and stepping on its tail to get its feathers.  Yeah I was filled with rage when I heard that.  While I am not fond of some animals in the wild, I understand their role and don’t want to drive their extinction.  That said, something like that just disturbs me on so many levels.

So yeah, I’m going to be visiting other friends all this week and will blog when I can.

SSCC #371 – Hillsborough County

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A deputy sheriff has been charged with animal cruelty after she allowed her four miniature horses to starve – one of them to death.

I am at a loss for words.  I help regularly at a horse rescue in the area and seeing what some people do to animals is down right disturbing.  Most disturbing though is what some of these people will attempt to do to the horse rescue that tries to save the horses.   Suffice it to say they try to manipulate the system and say you’re abusing them just the same because they don’t regain the weight overnight… I’m getting side tracked and that’s a story for another time.

Why is she on the count since she’s been charged?

Belo has been released on a $2,500 bail and resigned after she was suspended without pay.

Heaven forbid anyone fire her ass immediately.

State Sponsored Criminal #371: Pamela Belo

Because animal abuse is somehow different when you’re an officer of the law.

via Bob S.

Yet Another Lesson in Wild Animals

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When you are in the wilderness you are not in a Disney movie.  The animals do not think of you as their friend.  You are either food, a threat, or something to be watched.  So with those things in mind, if traveling in the wilderness you need to be ready to deal with animals that may find you a nice dinner.

A 43-year-old professor says she fought off a grizzly bear that stalked her and her nieces by throwing everything she had at it – including a package of macaroni and cheese.

This woman though isn’t alone in her mistaken belief, preview this list of incidents previously discussed here:

So yet again we have the oh so familiar incident where a couple of people.  I think my favorite was she used bear spray and it continued to charge.  I think this is the money quote:

“All I could think about was this bear is so close to me I can see its teeth,” she said. “I could have kissed it. I wished I had a gun.”

Carry your damn guns.  You never know when you may need it, two and four legged varmints are both dangerous.

h/t Mad Rocket Scientist

SSCC #366 – Henrico County

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A bereft Henrico County family says its son died near Cool Lane, robbed of his life and $15.

“He’d taken the bus up to my place to borrow the money last night; he just wanted a video or something,” said Henry Hamiel.

I already hear you asking how this could be a state sponsored criminal, it starts off as an everyday crime.  The police weren’t involved and were merely investigating the death.

The unidentified officer and a detective had arrived at the home to notify family members that Ellerbe had been killed. His body was discovered shortly after 6 a.m. Wednesday, face down near an alley.

The pitbull ran from the backyard of the home toward at least one officer, who pulled his weapon and shot the dog in the home’s front yard, according to Ellerbe’s sister, Latoya.

“They had told me my brother was dead and I’d come out back to cry on the porch and Tiger must have heard them. He ran into the front yard and the officer shot him,” LaToya Ellerbe said.

Let me get this straight.  A young man was killed, over the money in his wallet. You travel to the home to inform the family, and then to add insult to injury, you shoot the young man’s dog.  You shoot his dog, YOU SHOOT HIS !@#$ING DOG.  (Stops and spends 5 minutes saying woosah, remember the pressure points).

What in the name of god were you thinking.  Maybe you should back off, yell up to the house, even try calling them on the phone.  This is the 21st century, you do have a phone don’t you?

No instead you walk up to the house, invading the dogs territory, you see it running at you, and assume it is going to attack you.  You then plug the dog with a couple new holes with a lead slinging instrument and then tell the family, “Your son’s dead. BAM BAM, oh was that his dog?  Yeah, you’re gonna need to bury him too.”

If I walk up to someone’s house and someone’s dog runs at me, I don’t just get to shoot it and claim self-defense, neither does the mailman.  So why do these people get a sudden free pass to shoot any dog they want.

State Sponsored Criminal #366: Officer John Doe*

Because the correct way to inform someone that their son is dead is by shooting the boy’s dog first.  Nothing say’s I’m sorry for your loss than killing the family pet.

h/t Patrick at Popehat

*If you find it contact me, I want his name for the count.

Another Incident with Wild Animals

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Wild animals are making the rounds as of late.  It started off with a man attacked by a bear, then another one got into get in a pissing contest with a Bison.  Then information came out about a coyote problem in Seattle.  Now we have an incident involving some of our tree-dwelling cousins.

 The chimpanzees dragged the man for more than a mile, under a fence and into their enclosure at Jane Goodall Institute Chimp Eden near Nelspruit, The Telegraph newspaper reported.

Armed escorts were required for the paramedics who went to treat and rescue the victim.  But they’re just smaller animals that couldn’t possibly be a danger to humans right?

“These chimpanzees have six times the strength of a human being so you have to respect them and we certainly do,” he said.

So if you still think that wild animals, no matter their size, don’t present a threat or danger to humans, remember that’s your choice and opinion.  Facts state that humans are not on the top of the food chain by PFM.  They are there because of their tools and without them they are nothing but walking meat popsicle. If you choose to go into the wild unarmed, or even around suburbia, that is your choice and you can live with the consequences of your choice.  You have no right to force your moral choices though on anyone else.

On Being on Top of the Food Chain

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So Tuesday I mentioned an incident where some enterprising individual thought he would stand his ground with a bison and lost.  I stated the following:

When armed however we are far superior to those other predators.  It’s tools that make the difference and for that reason your position on the top of the food chain is considered negotiable to mother nature.

I have also previously talked about how we are self demoting ourselves and our position on the food chain.  Well the situation isn’t getting any better.  Actually it’s going down hill fast and it appears it is showing no signs of stopping.

Like several other neighborhoods in West Seattle, the Seola Beach area is sandwiched between ravines and greenbelts, so it’s not surprising that coyotes live there. But in the last few weeks the animals have been showing up more and more, and residents say the coyotes are taking an aggressive stand.

The solution to this problem isn’t to kill the varmints.  No that would be bad.  The answer is to live trap them and relocate them.  Which is funny when you see the following shortly there after.

And the neighbors aren’t just worried about their own safety, either. Many believe the coyotes are killing off pets.

"Neighbors have talked about losing cats and dogs," said Kristi Coluccio. "Good dinner for coyotes, too."

The situation actually is bad enough that parents are fearing for their children and keeping them inside.  If you’re that fearful, why don’t you deal with the problem permanently.  Relocating the animals is only temporary.  Even then the animals no longer fear humans.  They have no reason to.

The animals are acting aggressively towards humans because they do not appear to be a threat, and actually appear to be walking 180lbs meat popsicles with much smaller juicier varieties that haven’t aged as much.  When their buddies bob and frank don’t eat dirt after being around humans they don’t associate humans as being dangerous.

For a long time wild animals avoid humans because by god if we saw them, we killed them.  Animals learned, and rightfully so, who the top predator was.  We have shoved our predatory status to the side though, and now many are acting surprised that wild life are learning there is no longer a need to fear humans.

Why should Wiley E. Coyote fear humans when a bunch of hippies have run to the state whining about how animals should be protected.  How humans shouldn’t be allowed to hunt them.  How the animals just want to live in peace and are not a threat to humans.

Yeah listen up there sparky and shut your patchouli eating ass up for a second and listen to me.  Any wild animal if given the chance would kill you, doubly so if it is any type of predator.  It is our tools and our history that causes animals to give us wide berth.  You’re meddling with the system has lowered our status on the totem pole and has opened up innocent people to animal attack.  Not only attack though but disease and pestilence carried by the animals is now left to spread unchecked.

Don’t come crying to me as this gets worse, and it will.  Mice are already problems in DC, and what’s that, you can’t kill the mice?  Mice that can carry bubonic plague and other diseases.

Do I like animals? Yes. 

Do I kill animals for the “thrill of the kill”? No.

I kill them for many reasons ranging from food, to pest control, to effective conservation.  Conservation? I hear you ask.  Yes conservation since over population actually weakens a herd as a whole limiting available resources limiting the overall health of the animals.

Besides, none of you tree hugging hippies can say a damn thing to me.  You know why?  Because while I try to act ethically and put an animal out of it’s pain and suffering, you tree huggers made sure I spent an extra 45 minutes waiting to get the O.K. from the state.  Why?  Because you were delusional about the condition of the deer and what needed to be done.  Yeah, who really cares about the animals again?  Not to mention hunters spend way more on conservation than you tree huggers.

My suggestion to the residents, get some of these and start shooting the damn things.

h/t Ry via email.

Wild Animals are Wild!

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Seriously folks, nature is not a Disney movie like some would have you believe.  Wild animals are exactly that, wild, and you need to keep your distance or be prepared to suffer the consequences.

Officials in Yellowstone National Park say a Massachusetts man was gored by a bull bison that threw him 10 feet in the air and then pinned him to the ground.

The man, who is in his mid-50s, suffered a broken collarbone, shoulder blade, several ribs and a groin injury in Saturday’s encounter near the Norris campground. He was airlifted to an Idaho Falls, Idaho hospital and is expected to recover. His name was not released.

So the man didn’t taunt the animal which is a plus, but he let the bull approach and then refused to move away.  Eventually the Bison got tired of said moron being in his territory.  Being a larger animal than this puny human, unsurprisingly the Bison won.

For those who think somehow being on the “top” of the food chain makes you magically superior, let me enlighten you.  We are not on top because of some pure fanciful magic*.  Humans are on top because we figured out how to make tools.  We figured out how to manipulate the environment to our advantage.  It was our intellect that placed us at the top of the food chain.

Given that it was our intellect, not our brute strength, you better bring a tool with you if you decide that you’re going to challenge another creäture within the chain.  Without the tools we are but a walking bipedal warm Popsicle for things that have claws and brute strength.  Most predators could kill us without as much of a batting of the eyes if we are unarmed.  When armed however we are far superior to those other predators.  It’s tools that make the difference and for that reason your position on the top of the food chain is considered negotiable to mother nature.

This man is very lucky, he decided that he was going to try to stare down an animal larger than himself.  Why he chose to do that we may never know.  It was obviously a very poor idea, doubly so since he didn’t bring any tools for the fight.  What the hell did he think was going to happen?  The Bison would just shrug it off, seriously what the hell is up with you city slicker folks?  This is almost as bad as the woman who tried to pet the moose.

*The F in PFM doesn’t actually stand for fanciful, but I’m sure you can figure it out.