CBS Sunday Morning - disappointment

Steve Sanford

Steve Sanford

Well-known member
All~

One of my cold-month habits is to watch CBS Sunday Morning most weekends. I especially enjoyed it yesterday because I could watch it with a bunch of family in front of the Christmas tree. I like it because it tends to present a positive view of its many topics. I was disappointed, though, to hear the guest commentary by Joel Sartore, a very-accomplished photographer for National Geographic. I sent this letter to CBS earlier today:

CBS Sunday Morning:

As a career wildlife conservationist (retired from 35 years with federal and NYS agencies) I was very disappointed to hear Joel Sartore's distortion of the role of hunting in the protection of endangered species. Given his own long career, I must believe that he is aware of the role hunters have always played - from the time of Teddy Roosevelt onward - in both advocating for and funding many of the core programs - including treaties with other nations and our system of National Wildlife Refuges - that protect the future of our wildlife and their habitats. His commentary reinforced invalid stereotypes of hunting by not distinguishing between the historical market hunting - which was a significant decimating force for many species about a century ago - and recreational hunting. Since the early part of the Twentieth Century, hunters have funded the majority of government fish and wildlife conservation programs and have not contributed to the Endangered or Threatened status of any species in the US.
During my career, whether I was protecting wetlands, helping to clean up hazardous wastes, minimizing the aquatic life wasted in power plants, or directly managing Endangered and Threatened Species, I was proud that my salary was derived from hunting and fishing license fees or excise taxes on firearms and ammunition. Most citizens have no knowledge of this relationship and Mr. Sartore's commentary was a disservice to all who care about the future of our living resources.
Respectfully,

SJS

Although my note may not open any eyes or minds, I do feel compelled to provide a different perspective when I see a need. BTW: Their e-mail address is on their website.

All the best,

SJS
 
Nice that you took the time to write them about your experience and truth. But speaking the truth is not a part the mainstream media. And they never let the truth get in the way of there agenda.
Gene R.
 
CBS has always been anti-hunting........brings to mind many years ago they ran a story titled " The Guns of Autumn". The story was very slanted.
 
Brandon~

Thanks. Whenever I see the quote on your posts, I think of Edmund Burke's "All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing." So, retired old crackpots like me write to legislators and the media......

All the best,

SJS
 
Very nice Steve. I think we may very well be at the precipitous of a conservation renaissance. It may be wishful thinking. BTW, conservation didn’t start with Theodore. His uncle – Robert Barnwell Roosevelt certainly set a good example for Theodore in his early days by funding Seth Green’s work with fish culture. Grover Cleveland did great work building a foundation, and of course George Bird Grinnell, who knew Theodore Roosevelt well, preceded most in terms of volunteer conservation. There were a few others, but all were sportsmen, and all contributed to the ideals of Conservation. Hitch
 
Thanks for what you did, Steve. I'm glad you took the time to do this. Bev and I will normally watch this program because "most" of the time it is put together so well.

Wasn't it CBS that did that footage about hunters shooting polar bears out of helicopters? By the time the truth came out where we found out that someone had spliced in footage of Fish and Game biologists darting them for research, the damage was done.
Al
 
I to watched this edition, to me it was a very negative & slighted view of our sport. To me it was very disappointed to here such one-sighted comments. These comments only fuel anti-hunting.

Happy New Year
 
The Communist Broadcasting System? They purposely put out left wing, anti gun, anti hunter, anti rural America, anti traditional American propaganda every day. It's what they do. They want you unarmed and defenseless for when the day comes that the SHTF. They're laughing at your letter.

Ed.
 
Once I maintained that "The Truth" had strong legs, particularly as it related to the value and purpose of sport hunting in our society; eventually distancing itself from the swirling fog of misinformation over the passage of time. Over the last decade that perspective has suffered significant erosion, as the current direction of our social media dominated society has essentially resulted in a broadening of the dichotomy between discourse and discussion, and "communication". An entire generation is developing, on a near-global scale, without the inherently developed and maintained skills to apply logic and reason to a set of evidence to arrive at an independantly developed and held, evidenced-based conclusion. IS it really any wonder why our society has a near-continually eroding land ethic?

Steve, Twain felt a similar compulsion...
"Well, my book is written—let it go. But if it were only to write over again there wouldn’t be so many things left out. They burn in me; and they keep multiplying; but now they can’t ever be said. And besides, they would require a library—and a pen warmed-up in hell."

Mark Twain-1889, following the publication of: A Connecticut Yankee In King Arthur's Court
Brandon~

Thanks. Whenever I see the quote on your posts, I think of Edmund Burke's "All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing." So, retired old crackpots like me write to legislators and the media......

All the best,

SJS
Click to expand...
 
Hope your letter does some good, as not responding gets the Steam Roller movin' faster. I remember when Dan Rather went to Pymatuning, mislead people and filmed, THE GUNS OF AUTUMN. That was my life lesson in "TV Journalism" = CRAP.
 
Steve,
I assume this is the segment you were talking about?

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/the-endangered-species-act-turns-40/
 
RL~

Twain is another of my heroes - thanks for the quote. When reading Twain (or watching Hal Holbrook....), though, it is unsettling to realize how many of his observations remain valid today.

All the best,

SJS
 
Nice little anti-hunting dig while fawning over how "civilized" we are today...how greed has to be kept in check - thank goodness for the Government and the "enlightened".
Of course, we aren't going to discuss something like the passenger pigeon, lost not to overhunting, but to clearing vast tracts of land and its view as a pestilence on farm crops...birds poisoned, roosts blown up, etc. Made extinct in the name of progress...Or perhaps we should note that our waterfowl would be more populous, water would be cleaner, less erosion, etc. if places like Iowa hadn't lost 95% of their traditional wetlands. But that would mean pointing fingers at practices like tiling and draining so a few more acres of corn or beans or rice can be planted. And that conflicts with the ag lobby.
Or maybe we should note the damage the Corps of Engineers has done to our waterways...channelizing, routing, dredging, and draining like a big bunch of happy plumbers, ignoring the impacts elsewhere.
But instead I guess we can celebrate a piece of legislation that saved the whooping crane and bald eagle, while using pictures of a flock of sandhill cranes to prove how far we've come.
 
Steve:

I think you wrote a fine letter, and I certainly don't disagree with anything you said. I also didn't see the piece as it was presented on tv--I just read the essay at the link that someone posted. Perhaps I'd have a different reaction if I watched the video as it was presented.

But I didn't see anything very objectionable in Sartore's essay. The truth is that unregulated hunting was a major factor in the decline of many species that are either extinct or on the endangered species list. Bison, passenger pigeons, whooping cranes, and alligators all come to mind. While loss of habitat, wetland alteration, pesticides and other pollution have also been important (and acknowledged by Sartore), legal and illegal harvest has been and continues to be a factor for many species.

In some cases simply regulating hunting has, by itself, resulted in complete recovery. The alligator may be the best example of this, and I believe it was past the middle of the 20th century before some of the Gulf states regulated alligator harvest. Alligator populations recovered almost immediately when hunting pressure was removed, and they were off the ESA list and restored to status as a legal species for regulated harvest quickly. Today's hunters can rightly celebrate their participation in a sustainable harvest, but that doesn't change the fact that it was hunters just a few decades ago who got alligators listed.

Meanwhile, for many ESA-listed species, illegal harvest continues to be problem, with examples of poaching of whooping cranes by "hunters" in several recent years. (You may recall that in one case a judge fined a convicted whooping crane poacher just $1 for the offense.) Here in Maine there have been at least two "fishermen" convicted in recent years of harvesting endangered Atlantic salmon. One was selling salmon and other poached fish; the other harvested a radio-tagged salmon and wardens followed the signal right to his house. I certainly believe there are a few not-quite-so-stupid poachers out there who haven't been caught.

While it's true that folks like Teddy Roosevelt, Ding Darling, Aldo Leopold and others were hunters AND conservationists, who emphasized the role of hunters and anglers in conservation, it's also true that none of them ever pulled any punches when pointing out that some hunters were irresponsible game hogs. Darling was merciless on us duck hunters, as you can see here: http://www.dingdarling.org/cartoons/duckseason.html



Sorry to jump on the soap box. I must be cranky after having a full week off when our season was still open and being frozen out of all my spots.
 
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