Jarsky letter: Public lands

Change takes homes and livelihoods of many hardworking people. They liked their ways of life, too. They didn’t take assault rifles to crooked lenders or companies. Many ranchers graze their cows on public lands, and pay the heavily subsidized rent they agreed to. They don’t shake down the feed store at gun point.

The beauty and magnitude of the American West is due to the preservation sentiments of the majority of Americans, and to the albeit imperfect government they trust to protect their cherished legacy. We don’t want to get ranchers off their lands. We want to get their cows off ours.

I’m a lifelong westerner and my values matter, too. The documented 20 years of freeloading trespass committed by the principles in the Malheur matter were not subjected to government overreach. I object to the trampling of wildlife’s habitat and the unregulated deletion of cows’ waste into my creeks. The sloppy reporting of coastals and easterners confirms that they forget us except for their week to ski or bike or raft where we live. We take their money, but it will not be left in Idaho when it becomes the brownwater capital of the world.

This story was originally published March 4, 2016 at 11:42 PM with the headline "Jarsky letter: Public lands."