Posted on 07/14/2019 11:20:38 AM PDT by Kaslin
Big government overreach knows no bounds. The latest example of federal regulation that will threaten thousands of jobs and livelihoods of hardworking Americas comes from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. The NOAA says that Maine's lobster industry is to blame for the killing of right whales, an endangered species, and has enacted regulations set to take place this September which will harm the already struggling industry. Yet, the evidence says that the proposed regulation will in no way actually help the whales and will instead only burden lobstermen.
As reported by the Portland Herald Press, NOAA "has ordered Maine to craft a detailed plan to reduce the lobster industry’s threat to right whales by 60 percent by September. Federal regulators say entanglement in fishing gear and ship strikes are driving the whale’s decline, with just over 400 of them left."
Their intended regulation would force the lobster industry "to cut the number of buoy lines in the Gulf of Maine by half this September."
This means that lobstermen would be less likely to catch lobsters that they could then sell to restaurants, distributors, and in other places. Thus, they would lose income and have to fire hundreds of workers.
Even the left-wing progressive Governor Janet Mills says that there is scant evidence that the activity of the lobstermen is to blame for any endangerment towards these whales. Six right whales did, in fact, die this past year, but those deaths occurred in Canadian waters.
"There is a disturbing lack of evidence connecting the Maine lobster industry to recent right whale deaths,” Mills wrote in a Facebook post. “The Maine lobster fishery is not the primary problem for right whales.”
A letter to the editor in Kennebunk, Maine's local newspaper detailed the plight of the lobstermen succinctly:
"...Maine lobstermen are facing what one lobsterman called “the fight of our lives” right now as they face extreme and dangerous new regulations which if implemented could devastate the lobster industry we have today, and impact the entire economy throughout the state and beyond with a trickle-down effect like no other, with the potential to affect seafood markets and grocery stores, bait dealers, seafood processors, truckers, fuel companies, marine mechanics, trap builders, marine supply stores, restaurants, everyday people who buy seafood, and the biggest moneymaker for the state of all - the tourist industry."
Lobstermen are facing the real threat of being forced out of business and a livelihood that they have relied on for many generations. An entire fishing heritage dating back hundreds of years is at risk and the decimation of an entire infrastructure is a stake as a result of regulations set by NOAA and NMFS put into place to try to protect Atlantic Right whales."
To try and stop the regulation, "Mills is directing Department of Marine Resources Commissioner Pat Keliher to come up with a new risk reduction target based on the industry’s actual risk to right whales. Keliher will present a plan to achieve this new goal to the industry in August and the National Marine Fisheries Service in September."
Maine's congressional delegation even sent a letter to President Donald J. Trump asking him to intervene and stop the damaging new rule. Congressman Jared Golden posted the following on Facebook, summarizing the content of the delegation's letter:
Donald J. Trump, Maine lobstermen need your help to protect thousands of good American jobs.
On behalf of Maine lobstermen, I, along with Senator Susan M Collins, Senator Angus S. King, Jr., and Congresswoman Chellie Pingree, urge you to intervene in the implementation of @NOAA’s new regulations on our lobstermen. It's time to #StandUpforLobstermen
Without changes, NOAA’s regulations will wreak havoc on lobstermen and communities up and down Maine’s coast ... but NOAA doesn’t have the data to show that right whales travel through Gulf of Maine where lobstermen work.
These new rules won’t achieve NOAA's desired outcome — helping whales — and will put lobstermen out of business. It’s the worst kind of regulation. Maine lobstermen are looking to you, President Trump, to have their back.
The point of this regulation is to save the right whale from the supposed dangers of the lobstermen. But, if you ask anybody actually in Maine and in the business, it is a ludicrous regulation because right whales are very, very rare in Maine waters.
As CBS 13 reports, " For lobsterman George Anderson, he's never seen one in his 40 years of fishing. 'Seen all kinds of whales, basking sharks, sun fish but no right whales,' Anderson said."
Now, dozens of towns across Maine are pleading with President Donald J. Trump to repeal the regulation. "President Donald J. Trump, please repeal this burdensome misguided regulation and SAVE THE LOBSTER INDUSTRY. #StandUpForLobstermen #Maine #Trump," a Kennebunkport Facebook page pleaded today.
Bring it to the attention of POTUS.
Can’t we buy our lobsters now from Mexico?
And people wonder why industrial jobs have fled to China, Vietnam, India and elsewhere.
Decades ago RUSH LIMBAUGH warned against the COMMUNIST INFILTRATION of environmental organizations. This is another attempt to destroy American commerce and enterprise.
It’s a stupid liberal state.
Let them hang from a liberal government agency’s stupid lack logic.
Maine helped make the liberal government the stupid thing it is.
You can make the same argument about the cause of climate change.
OK now what’s so cool about Atlantic Right Whales? What values are provided by their existence off the Maine coast?
If the past is any indicator then only Americans will be hamstrung while foreigner’s will be allowed to continue on in the same areas. Disgusting.
What comes around goes around - they laughed at us in the 70s and 80s. Its their turn now.
Or the War on Natural Resource Harvesters continues unabated. Soon all food produced in the US will be factory made - the only source of real food will be produced in other countries.
Instead of lobster rolls and clam boats, maybe the summer tourists could just dine at some lovely Somali cuisine restaurants.
They report to PDJT.
PDJT needs to score points with Mainers...great opportunity.
Can’t we just buy our lobster from China?
Exactly.
I was all excited when I saw Portland, then it was followed by Maine. Maine folks are ok, it’s the the Oregon Portlander’s that suck.
Thank heavens they are only killing Right wing, conservative, fascist, pro-Trump Republican whales and not Left wing, communist, socialist, progressive and democrat whales. This is a cause the Left and AOC and her squad needs to take up and get the law stopping the killing of Right Whales ended so that more of them can be eliminated and thus kept from possible subversive Russian influence on the next election. [total sarcasm except that AOC might actually miss that]
I'd tell them to return their election process to the form supported by the former Constitution or screw off...
Just go to Texas, find a Long Horn and throw it across the prairie....thus you are lobbing a steer without going to China.
Time to change my summer vacation plans.
Ugh. I never buy seafood from China. I ask where it’s from if it’s not noted. . Luckily, most grocery stores label where it’s from.
NOAA is overseen by the Dept. of Commerce presently being headed by Wilbur Ross.
Time for President Trump to have a little talk with Mr. Ross.
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