Ring of Fire

The West is burning in more ways than one Stationed in eastern Oregon, we are circled by wildfires to the point that the few access roads teeter on the edge of closure, smoke haze hangs low in the sky and floating ash stings eyes and hampers breath. Despite the poetic license above, geographically speaking, the description isn't overblown. Hundreds of fires are blazing in California, Idaho, Washington and Oregon, where this little valley is hemmed in by smoke from roaring conflagrations that moved so fast dozens of homes and thousands of cattle stand helpless before wind-driven flames. But this is just the physical metaphor of how Western society is burning and America, under the present administration, is leading the way. (There was a real temptation here to add "to hell," but I got a grip on myself.)

As a denizen of the West, witnessing wildfires is not an unusual occurrence. However, decades of public lands mismanagement by the forest service and other government agencies under the purview of the Department of Agriculture have led to the burgeoning fire hazard; a hazard that could have been deterred with responsible supervision of our forests and grasslands. But 40 years of teaching "ecology" have so undermined common sense that America's woods, range and farmlands are under attack with every stray spark, stab of dry lightning or vicious act of arson. The real crime is that most government employees, USFS and Fish and Wildlife workers who are now authorized to strap on firearms to "protect" their charge, have no clue as to what they are safeguarding other than a paycheck and retirement plan. Farmers, ranchers, loggers and fishermen have a true respect for their industry and what it takes to ensure the survival of the resource that provides their livelihood. Government managers have no stake in the resource they oversee. Yet when a fire explodes in a dry canyon and knowledgeable locals arrive to build firebreaks, they are denied access to public lands by public servants waiting on USFS fire crews to arrive. Why? To avoid government liability for possible injury, of course. Bureaucracies would rather dole out a pittance to damaged parties after the fact than institute preventive measures, such as allowing the public (whose lands these were meant to be) contracts to log marketable deadwood or permits to cut firewood. Hence the uselessness of under-responsive, ill-informed FEMA. This practice of making citizens outlaws on their own land¹ via onerous EPA, BLM and other agency regulations signals the crash and burn of the West. In this collective philosophy of government resource management is included the whole western world. Government is the role model for avoiding responsibility in every instance, and among the most egregious examples of responsibility dodging is the nuclear deal with Iran.

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Believing that the United States, is nothing more than a glutton of world resources, the Obama administration partnered with five countries and the UN in totally surrendering to a terrorist regime everything it could ever want... and what Iran wants is to destroy us. The misnamed treaty is a greater representation of handing over the vast and lush resource of our forests to flaming whirlwinds that devour our very substance. Iran is a fire fueled by burning hatred for all that is not acceptable to the ayatollahs, which includes other forms of Islam. And Secretary of State Kerry brokered a deal that gives them the fire and the means to deliver that fire to our doorstep. This ill-conceived agreement completes a ring of fire around the United States and a lesser one circling our ally, Israel. Observing how Iran is on the verge of walking away with a prize for belligerence, North Korea upped the ante with threats against South Korea though a face-saving dance continues. Obama has rewarded Castro's tyranny by receiving Cuba as a trading partner. ISIS was already on the bandwagon recruiting poor, disillusioned western youth through social media. Is it far-fetched that some newly turned ISIS devotees are torching our backwoods as a rash of fires appear almost daily with nary a thunderstorm in sight? A match that ignites an inferno among our treasured trees is a shadow of an ICBM that carries a warhead across oceans. The ultimate destructive force is being delivered into palms itching to annihilate the West. It is stupefying that we and our fellow western nations have instilled elected and appointed officials with a will to forego their own freedom in an effort to be "fair" when they have no concept of the word's definition. Fairness would assure all parties receive some benefit, but the nuclear deal only guarantees Iran an ability to blow away all of us according to a mullah's whim. Obama's idea of a fair outcome is endangering the existence of our allies, our nation and, were he to better examine this folly, himself. Firestorms occur naturally and intentionally, but supplying the fuel and the detonator for such a blaze, whether a forest burned or a country atomized, is beyond stupid... it is insane.

1. A. Dru Kristenev, 2^nd Edition, 2015. Administrative regs or "Law of the Land?" Pg. 215, Pay Attention!!; ChangingWind