IDAHO'S MAGRUDER CORRIDER TRAIL AND PLENTIFUL IDAHO FORESTS
Posted on 03/11/2012 7:40:44 AM PDT by Jeff Head
I saw Lorax yesterday with five of my grankids, ages 10 down to 5.
It was a fun kids movie, but clearly slanted towards environmentalism and particularly with an anti-business and anti-lumber company...really, and anti-capitalism bias.
On the way home it provided teaching moments. I asked the kids how many of them did not like lumber companies that cut down and harvest trees and why. All of them said they did not like them because they are "stealing our air," hurting animals, and destroying their places to live.
I pointed to the Boise Mountains which we could see from the windows of my Pickup Truck, which they love to drive in...crew cab, 4x4 with a big V-8, and said,
"You see all that dark green on the mountains as far as you can see...that's forests. Almost all lumber companies do not cut down "all" the forests. In fact, they plant more than they cut. We have more forests in the US now than they did 300 years ago in Colonial America."
I then asked..."Who likes wooden playground swings, see saws, etc., pencils, your furniture, your houses?" They all said they did. I asked them to start looking for things made of wood as we drove...they saw fences, signs, roofs, paper, carts, trailers, etc., etc. I told them that all of that was made from wood by companies who, yes make a profit because those people have jobs...but who also try and make the forests better, and bigger in the process.
After a good ten minutes of them pointing out all of these thigns, I then asked, "Who likes lumber companies now, and why?"
At that point they all said they did because they are really making more forest which makes more air, and trying to protect the forests even if they do cut down some of the trees and all of the neat things we have in society because those companies are working in the forests.
This is a long explanation...but it was a good teaching moment for grandpa and I thought I should share.
AMEIRCA AT THE CROSSROADS OF HISTORY.
SKIP THIS ONE FOLKS
SKIP THIS ONE FOLKS
Good job.
Anyhiow, clearly a left wing propoganda piece...but one that is easy to refute by having kids just look around and think of things they really already know...and helping them now be caught up in the emotion.
You may have mentioned it, but be sure to tell the kids trees live on Carbon Dioxide. Without CO2 the trees and plants die. Without trees and plants making oxygen, we all die.
Beautifully done, Jeff. Teachable moments as only a (favorite) granddad can do.
What a view!!!!! Never been to Idaho..yet...but it’s on my list.
You did an excellent job with the “Teaching Moment”!
And how to effectively deal with it.
“The forests must be, and will be, not only preserved but used, and the experience of all civilized countries that have faced and solved the question show that the forests, like perennial fountains, may be made to yield a sure harvest of timber while at the same time all their far-reaching beneficent uses may be maintained unimpaired.”
John Muir, 1895
Sounds like it was just like the way the book written.
Driving through Idaho in Grandpa’s V8. Man, those are some lucky grand-kids.
I remember the original Lorax on TV, which played at the very start of the enviro movement’s takeover of our economy. Yeah, left-wing drivel. And as a kid, I ate it up (sigh!).
Anyhow, we had a good talk about all of this and they came away from it understanding that there are people with causes who will slant the trth in order to influence them and that they should be critical thinkers and look around them to see the trugh of these things...and then talk to epople who are involved and people they trust.
Good for you, Grandpa.
For any readers who have a few minutes to kill, do a search on how and why the Magruder Corridor got its name.
Yeah. I only get to drive mine around Idaho in a V6.
And with me being a carpenter/cabinetmaker, The Lorax doesn't stand a chance.
Ya gotta get em when they are young.
Whether it’s Radical enviromentalism (quasi-science and anti-human pro-nutbarism) I would say its anti-God in my not so humble opinion,too.
Or, anti-capitalism is delusional and historically ignorant. Compare capitalism to any other system.
But lets all listen, and follow, a bunch of dingwads who would have us return to the pre-industrial era.
No wiat, correction: they want everyone else to return to the pre-industrial era.
They want to fly around in jets and spend other people’s money on lavish galas and so forth while they spread the word.
Thanks for letting me ramble..:)
I loved The Lorax. It was well made.
I disagree with many who have already posted. People need to take care of the environment and not abuse it. Some on the left and right go to both extremes of the spectrum. Thanks to many environmental policies I can visit nature not too far from my house in the city.
I think many here read too much into things and forget to have a good time and enjoy life. They do not think critically.
“Driving through Idaho in Grandpa’s V8”
And I hope grandpa educated the kidlets about how much more expensive it is to run his V8, thanks to the very same environmental whackos. We all like clean air and water; then there are those who just don’t like business and/or capitalism.
Thumbs up then?
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