Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke lifts lead ban

| March 3, 2017

On his first day in office as the new Interior Secretary, Ryan Zinke lifted the ban imposed on hunters and fishermen in National Parks by the Obama Administration in it’s waning hours. Based on feelings and nothing more, Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) Director Dan Ashe banned the use of lead ammunition and fishing tackle on January 19th – the day before the Obama Administration ended. From The Hill;

“After reviewing the order and the process by which it was promulgated, I have determined that the order is not mandated by any existing statutory or regulatory requirement and was issued without significant communication, consultation or coordination with affected stakeholders,” Zinke wrote in his order.

[…]

Gun rights advocates, sportsmen’s groups, conservatives and state wildlife agencies were united against the lead ban.

Lead is standard in ammunition, and lead-free bullets are more expensive, leading opponents to accuse the FWS of trying to reduce hunting. Furthermore, opponents say, scientific studies do not show large-scale harms from lead use in hunting and fishing.

Category: Veterans in politics

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Mick

BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!!!

(pun intended)

Hondo

It’s good see responsible adults with a firm grasp on reality in charge after 8 years of being ruled by petulant, naive children believing in unicorns.

Mick

Shack!

Bill M

What you said, Hondo!

2/17 Air Cav

Putting aside the “lead” issue, the way President Trump’s immediate predecessor effected the ban was plain wrong. This rights that wrong. Now, if, w/ statutory authority from Congress and notice and comment given and invited by the agency, a ban ultimately results, so be it. That “pen and phone” tyranny in place of the rule of law was sickening.

Veritas Omnia Vincit

This is the correct approach, if we determine as a society that the lead we drop in our waters is significant enough to be a threat to our wetlands it’s always wise to generate appropriate legal remedy.

However to take action without knowing if we even have an issue seems nothing more than one more control mechanism in a society that has long since ceased to be “free”….when you can’t buy and eat a dog without being charged with cruelty to animals you’re no longer living in a free society….we can’t own a weapon without permission, we can’t drive a car without permission, and we can’t choose what products to put in our own adult bodies without permission…we’ve not been “free” for sometime.

It seems to me the modern American public wouldn’t know freedom if she hiked up her skirt and wiggled on their face for an hour.

rgr769

You had me with you until you mentioned buying and eating “man’s best friend.” I don’t want to live in the equivalent of a third world shithole where that is OK, because “freedom.”

Veritas Omnia Vincit

Change it to a pig then…point remains the same, cultures clash to be sure but freedom for me for thee means I don’t much care what you do with your livestock….as long as it doesn’t criminally impact me or my right to be free.

Graybeard the Barbarian

Dog meat has been a food item in many places over time.

If you don’t want to eat dog meat (and I’d join you in that druther) that is fine.

But say a Cambodian (to use a random example) decided to have a dog-meat meal, and butchers the dog for that meal, does he need to worry that some bleeding-heart PETA-freak will call the law on him for “animal cruelty”?

Or if a man has a dog which starts killing chickens – which provide him with eggs to sell and eat as well as with Sunday dinner – and he shoots the dog to put him down, is that “animal cruelty”? Which is crueler: a .22 to the brain, or the dog tearing the guts out of a live chicken?

I’m all for taking good care of my animals – my pets die of old age as a rule – but to put one down and then be charged with animal cruelty is inane.

Freedom from governmental or activists’ tyranny should be a given.

Right now, that has not been the case.

jonp

Why would you want to eat a dog when cows are so tasty?

11B-Mailclerk

This isn’t the forum for dating stories.

HMC Ret

Now I won’t feel so irresponsible when I drown worms during my ‘fishing’ endeavors. Love to do it but not often successful. Caught a 38 +/- pound cat once on bacon. Yummmmm, bacon.

Veritas Omnia Vincit

Who doesn’t like bacon, except vegans and who gives a shit what those skinny, underfed, little pukes think?

2/17 Air Cav

Bacon pancakes. For Twist, I think I’ll be Makin’ Bacon Pancakes today. That song is worse than a forehead birthmark, except the ditty cannot be cut out from one’s brain.

Claw

Best bait I ever came up with for catfish (other than chicken liver) was Wal-Mart whole frozen shrimp sprinkled with paprika and left to thaw and marinate in its own juices for two days.

Old Whiskers sure did like it. (at least in Wyoming anyway) Can’t use shrimp here in Idaho, though. They’re too worried it may pollute the Snake River waters too much for their precious trout to live in.

SFC D

Henry’s Lake is full of fresh water shrimp. Trout from there are pinker than salmon.

Ex-PH2

What was the ‘lead in hunting’ issue about, anyway? Was that because some birdbrain
“thought” that hunters would get lead poisoning from eating venison from a deer? Or what? In regard to lead in fishing, while Pb does have a low melting point, it ain’t that low.
But in retrospect, someone probably told that moron bodaprez that lead could melt in warm stream waters and poison the rest of the fish, right? Or was he just being an idiot, as always?

just some feller

Ex,

The carrion fowl, eagles, etc., supposedly get lead poisoning from eating carcasses with birdshot remaining. This ban was “for the children birds.”

JSF

Ex-PH2

I remember something like that from the days after Rachel Carson published ‘Silent Spring’. The fallacy in it was that birdshot is used in hunting deer, or that bird hunters (turkey, pheasant, quail, etc.) don’t take the carcasses with them.

rgr769

Using lead shot to hunt waterfowl has been illegal under federal law for many years because of the impact on the environment. Lead shot on the bottom of water courses and ponds causes problems for creatures that inadvertently eat them. But the total ban on lead for hunting is just progtard feelz good bullshit. In Mexifornia, all use of lead ammunition is now banned by state law. Lead containing bullets or shot in meat have never been a problem, unless you bite into one and break a crown. Stray lead bullets in the ground do not present a hazard to the environment. Small lead shotgun pellets in dead birds can be a problem for carion eaters.

In answer to your question about King Putt’s motivation, deterring hunting is the principal motivation, plus proggie “feelz good” for the environment, because feelings are always more important than reality.

jonp

No it isn’t. There is no evidence that lead in the environment from human activities such as fishing etc have any negative impacts on wildlife. As a wildlife biologist I was in on some of the research dealing with not only Loons but waterfowl and carrion supposedly eating game that had died after being shot by hunters using lead ammo. No link was ever proved but that didn’t stop state governments from banning lead sinkers and the drumbeat against lead ammo. The goal on that one is to make ammo so expensive it will drive people from hunting and make guns too expensive to shoot for recreation

11B-Mailclerk

Probably more impact from people dumping old lead-acid vehicle batteries in or near stream and rivers. The rotted out plates are almost fully oxidized, and the resultant mess is also acidic, this readily soluable in water. Solid lead is relatively stable, especially if the environment is not particularly acidic.

Thunderstixx

We’re doomed !!!

Herbert J Messkit

Secretary zinke rode a horse to work his first day

just some feller

I noticed in the photo that his stirrup was not adjusted properly. Wonder if he is used to riding?

Anybody else notice that as well?

Ex-PH2

Looks like his first pony ride, but so what? He can learn. At least they gave him a nice, calm Tennessee Walker.

A Proud Infidel®™

IMHO that’s almost as good as a Missouri Foxtrotter.

rgr769

You are correct for an English saddle he is riding. That stirrup leather should be shortened about two inches, so he can keep his heels down. But it is just about right for a western saddle, maybe only an inch too long, at most. Something tells me he has not logged any miles in either a McClellan or English saddle.

Cacti35

At least 7 states have banned lead wheel weights. The EPA was worried that a lost lead wheel weight would eventually be ground into dust and pollute the streams. I know I was very concerned too. I used to see little poor kids sitting on the side of the road licking lead weights. My doctor told me my problems all stem from crimping lead fishing weight with my teeth when I was a kid.

11B-Mailclerk

Actually, bans on readily available surplus and scrap lead are intended to reduce availability to those who cast their own projectiles.

“Wheelweights” are a common starting point for homemade bullets.

David

I have a coupla hundred pounds each of ingots of pure lead, wheel weight, and linotype lead in my garage. Of course it is only for holding that east wall down.

Dave Hardin

I wus gunna koment but da affek uf lead on me mind has aulredie sturted

26Limabeans

Put the lead back in gasoline dammit.
I want 113 octane to come back along with high compression engines that can use it. No more burned valves and gummed up fuel systems.
I don’t give a damn about fish. Fish stink.
Horsepower rocks.
We licked the lead paint off window sills as kids and nothing happened but just look what happened to those kids that drank the koolaid.

rgr769

You are so correct. They are all stuttering proggies now.

Graybeard

On the other hand, I remember when my wife’s 70’s Dodge turned 100,000 on the odometer and we took a pic cause we’d made it that far. Now we’re waiting on 300,000 on a Ford and hoping for 500,000…

26Limabeans

“70’s Dodge”
You could swap motors in your driveway for cheap on a Saturday afternoon.
But yeah, modern motors do last longer for a number of reasons.

A Proud Infidel®™

Speaking of Dodge, remember their “Slant 6” engine? Not the best in acceleration but damned if they didn’t last forever and a holiday! I remember seeing plenty of 60s Dodge Darts with that engine still going in the late eighties and early nineties.

NavyEODguy

Had one. Slant six 225CI, push button automatic. That thing purred like a kitten.

When I joined the Navy I gave it my brother next in age.

Got home on boot camp leave, car gone. Asked my brother what happened, he told me it wouldn’t crank or turn over. He sold it to a junkyard for $50.

Out of curiosity I went by the junkyard one day to see it sitting out front with a for sale sign. I asked the guy about it and he told me “some kid” sold it to him because it wouldn’t turn over. He started laughing & told me it cost him $20 for a new starter.

I was so friggin’ pissed!

lily

I can’t imagine a law enforcement officer fining a parent for a kid having a lead fishing weight. That’s tyranny.

Joseph Williams

I really like lifting the lead ban. I will continue to use Barnes all copper bullets in my rifles and handguns. Why, I really like the bullets because of 98.9 weight and peals back into 4 petals making it 2 @ half larger than itself. I have NOT had to track a deer since I started using these buttets . Joe

jonp

I have not had to track any deer using lead bullets I cast myself in the garage and for far less than those all copper ones cost you. To each his own

A Proud Infidel®™

So was that lead bullet ban anything other than a last minute “Fuck You” from the previous administration? I love how the Trump Administration has gone about throwing regulations to the winds, I hope it continues.

USAFRetired

Do a google search on former director Dan Ashe and you’ll find his official bio and even better a letter he sent out to folks last summer that he was bragging about being a beltway insider for the last 34 years.

Perfect example of why the DC swamp needs draining.

Joe

Sad story! There will be tens of millions of additional animal deaths a year due to lead poisoning, an estimated million and a half ducks alone. What do you guys have against ducks? And lead from bullet fragments will leach its way into the soil and water, working its way up the food chain. But at least you can buy cheap bullets!

Ex-PH2

Wow. Look at Joey the Rockclimbing progtard grabbing our sleeves for attention! And no back up for his whine, either! That’s impressive! But let’s DO throw out those emotional, hyperbolic ‘millions of this and that’ statements, shall we? I know it’s strange, Joey, but since humans have been hunting ducks, geese, turkeys, pheasants, quail, and many, many other edible wildfowl, as well as domesticating them for use, the notion that MILLIONS and MILLIONS of them will die off just because one type of bullet is used instead of another is completely ludicrous. You failed, as always, to even come up with a sensible response. Bowhunters don’t use ballistic weaponry, for example, because they hunt with crossbows, compound bows, and recurve bows, plus the arrows, which give fine results and can be recycled. That saves the hunter some money. And since you don’t know your ass from a blithering hole in the ground, you left out that part about LIMITS, XX birds/deer/whatever per hunter per season. The fishing and hunting license fees are a tax that goes to the various states’ wildlife and conservation departments for little things like forestry and marked trails and stocking fishing lakes. In fact, the deer population in my area is so damned thick that the state is now paying hunters to go into the various forest preserves and cull the herds, because there aren’t enough coyotes around here to do the job, and if the deer herds aren’t thinned – the job of any predator – they kill off grasses and wildflowers that are important to any ecosystem. Loss of native species leads to invasion by non-native species such as purple loosestrife, a pest, or buckthorn, which is also a nasty, fast-growing pest plant that has pushed out native oaks around here. But I don’t expect you to understand any of that, mostly because you’re simply a moron. However, since a 150-pound adult deer crashing into YOUR vehicle can kill you when YOU are driving at night and the deer crosses the road right in front of you, I don’t expect you to understand anything… Read more »

Joe

So shoot your precious deer with steel instead of lead.

ex-OS2

Don’t want to, Joe.

Ex-PH2

What do you think broadhead hunting arrows and crossbow bolts are, you imbecile? Plastic tubing, maybe?

Oh, wait! MY precious deer? Wow! Joey the rock-climbing idjit just let us all know that he really is NOT environmentally friendly, after all. He thinks deer should be shot, just because, and there’s that whole failure of his to understand anything with more than one syllable.

jonp

No there won’t. Where on Earth did you come up with those fantasy numbers? There is no evidence, none nada zippo that lead from bullet fragments does anything but sit inertly in the soil. None, sorry about that

Ex-PH2

It’s just joey’s usual ‘making stuff up’ gig to get attention, jonp.

Do you think he’d be quite so smug and noisy if an adult wild turkey cock attacked him and ripped his face off? They’re nasty things during breeding season.

jonp

jeez, did I read your comment wrong on the first go around. Adult wild turkey cock…hahahahahaha

your right, they as are most animals during that time, are wildly aggressive. Human males are like that right about closing time at the local watering hole

jonp

Also, great post on the first reply

Ex-PH2

Tah!

rgr769

Hey dipshit progtard, the reversal of the recent anti-lead bullet regulation has no effect on the federal laws banning the use of lead shot in shotgun shells for hunting waterfowl. You probably never knew this, but one does not hunt ducks with rifle bullets, you moron. So everyone who hunts ducks or geese will still have to use non-lead shot, just as they did before King Putt’s last minute regulation change banning hunting on federal land with lead bullets.

ex-OS2

Joe, did you gnaw on window sills as a child?

UpNorth

Not only did Joey the Rock-Climbing Zero chew on window sills, he peeled the walls of his home, over and over, and ate the peelings.