🚀 go-pugleaf

On Fri, 28 Jul 2006 18:34:17 GMT, "gatt"
<LiveFromTheClocktower@gfy.com> wrote:

>
>"ef_hutterite" <efhutterite@montanan.org> wrote in message 
>news:l5hic2p4ipt10m4ikaqncve54goitiejm6@4ax.com...
>
>>>It's a well-known fact of life among REAL loggers, honey.
>>
>> And a non sequitur to protest spiking!
>
>In one sense.  In another, when the media or the logging industry propaganda 
>passes it off like it was a deliberate spiking, it clouds up the truth of 
>the issue.
>
>One thing you see if you observe the local industry is that there is a LOT 
>of almost mafiaesque corporate crime, particularly with the local operations 
>(not so much with companies like Weyerhauser, at least that I've ever 
>identified.)

Yes.  Absolutely.  What happens is that companies that have those
interesting backchannel connections with Weyerhauser are the ones that
lead in the corporate crime channels.  Back in the mid-80s, when I was
working with a friend on Northeastern Oregon logging issues, I did a
lot of trace-through research which focused on the interconnections
between Weyerhauser, Potlatch, Boise Payette/Boise Cascade, and a few
others.  Generally, Weyerhauser remained above the fray, while the
backchannel connections played the games.  My friend got a bit nervous
about loaded log trucks driving a bit aggressively with
none-too-secure bindings....

And then there was the time we got pictures of them (which "them" I've
now forgotten) hauling in a bulldozer into a designated Wilderness
Study Area.  Of course, that area ended up getting torpedoed and
burned off in a big summer fire, and there were plenty of rumors among
the locals, loggers and enviros alike, about corruption and
mishandling of the firefighting.  You know it's bad when both groups
think there's something rotten in the woods.

Or some of the shenagians that were passed on to me by a sympathetic
friend who was an insider for a while in the Yellow Ribbon Coalition.


>But on the flipside, there are honest, above-board and conscienscious 
>companies like Vanport Logging that are real example-setters and deserving 
>of environmentalist support.  Which, by the way, they've gotten.  The only 
>problem is, if you're a smalltime logging operator and you work too well 
>with the treehuggers, you're likely to get blackballed by the rest of the 
>industry in terms of things like timber auctions, which are generally 
>invitation-only and likely as not fixed.

Yes.  Then there's what happened to Pacific Lumber.

>
>(For example, the USFS might decide to auction off a parcel of public land. 
>The auction takes place at the Federal Building in Eugene, and only a select 
>group of operations are invited to participate.  The public is prohibited 
>from bidding, monitoring or even attending the auction and if you try, there 
>is a group of ex-FBI types working as consultants that will harrass you, 
>videotape you, threaten you, and, were you out in the woods and not in front 
>of law enforcement, thump you.  Something going on in the auction?   We 
>aren't allowed to know.)

Yep.

Then again, there's absolutely nothing quite like the feeling of being
four months pregnant, going in to testify at a field hearing, and
realizing that half the people there would gladly hurt you if they
could.  That was one of the scariest things I ever did--mainly because
of the pregnancy.

jrw