Friday, March 17, 2006

When All You Have Is A Hammer

I Guess Everything Looks Like a Nail


I’m going to start this rant at the end, and then work backwards to the beginning--where I think that the problem lies.

Please take a gander at these paragraphs from Thursday’s edition of The Brunswick News online edition:

“The eagles under her control will be turned over to the DNR, Page said, but the responsibility for placing the rest of them will lie with her.

If she is unable to find a new home for the sanctuary, Page said that federal mandates require her to place the birds with educational programs or euthanize them.”

You see that?

That is your Federal and our State Government at work, ladies and gentlemen.

Instead of allowing people like me and you to own and maintain certain animals and specifically listed birds as pets in our homes, the stupid assed idiots that we have elected (and/or the highly paid morons that have been hired by those same elected idiots) would rather that the animals be KILLED if government approved “shelter space” isn’t available.

Is this a prelude to what is going to happen when we finally give government full control of our sick citizens and our old people?

Just kill grandpa when the nursing home is full and you don't want him doddering around your back yard or climbing up in your Philodendron in the foyer looking for his wallet.

Yeah...that's a good solution...an atypical form of a government solution.

I don't know where to place the blame here--with the tree hugger socialists in general, or maybe it should go squarely on the backs of the gullible Democrats that have been responsible for passing most of the endangered feces species legislation in the first place.

I just know that this "spotted owl and snail darter fish" crap makes my head spin. How the hell can people that grew up inside concrete buildings, surrounded by miles of asphalt and concrete know one damn thing about any living being except possibly cockroaches and ants?

They can have my fair share of ants and roaches--just leave my red tailed hawks and chipmunks alone, dammit.

Now to the beginning of the story.

There is an elderly couple, Al and Emmy Minor, which are fortunate enough to own land out on Sapelo Island about ten miles from here. Sapelo is one of Georgia’s many pristine barrier islands that doesn’t have a road connecting it with the mainland.

If you go to Sapelo, you either go by boat, else you put on your bathing suit and swim a few thousand strokes.

I’d love to live there, but I hear grocery shopping is a bitch--plan on taking the day to do it.

Any way…Mr. and Mrs. Minor have, since the early 1980’s, leased 10 acres of land to a non-profit animal sanctuary operated by Nan Page.

It has cared for more than 10,000 birds, including owls, pelicans, red-tailed hawks and gulls. Small mammals such as opossums, otters, raccoons and foxes have also been cared for.

Ms. Page is lamenting her problem in losing her lease on the Minor’s land at the end of this month. She may have to close the shelter as a result.

But what is the real reason that this much needed shelter is on the verge of being shut down?

Enter the aforementioned stupid assed government idiots, stage right.

May I have a drum roll…please…

GOVERNMENT REGULATIONS are making it impossible for the shelter to continue to operate because the couple that owns the land can’t or won’t be able to meet their (the government’s) requirements.

Al and Emmy Minor, founders and former operators of the sanctuary, are not renewing the center's lease on the 10 acres that has been used for wildlife shelter and rehabilitation when it expires March 31.

"It's just become too much for us to handle, age-wise," Mrs. Minor said.


While officially removed from the sanctuary's day-to-day operations, the Minors still live close by and have remained involved in a lessened capacity.

Birds – including hawks and eagles – come to the sanctuary by way of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the Georgia Department of Natural Resources and veterinarians' offices.

Mrs. Minor said the center currently houses about 11 birds, including a newborn bald eaglet.

In addition to the challenges involved in keeping the nonprofit center afloat financially and maintaining its facilities, Mrs. Minor said an increase in regulations has taken a toll on current director Nan Page's efforts in running the facility – challenges which, in turn, take a toll on her.

"Sometimes they just make it so difficult," she said of the rules. "To go to a school carrying a hawk, Nan needed permission from Fish and Wildlife. They said each hawk used needed to live in its own separate cage. And then she needed another cage to transport them to the school. Then she needed a big van just to hold the required cage."

What kind of crap is that?

I want to go out and kick anyone's ass that is stupid enough to force well intended people to KILL ANIMALS in the name of government regulations.

Isn't the prevention of the abuse and death the orginal reason for having laws about protected species in the first place?

What have these people been smoking?

I wish I had the money and land to take on this enterprise. Since I don’t, all I can do is point it out to YOU, my readers, and hope that someone steps forward to come to the shelter’s rescue.

I’ve heard that success is obtained when opportunity meets planning and preparation.

Government seems to simply involve idiocy and stupidity meeting tax dollars.

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