It's hard to believe that this guy was once sort of believable as a candidate for the Oregon governor's office. Back then, he portrayed himself as a conservative. Obviously, times have changed - and his true colors have emerged.
This politician clearly doesn't know much about science, but of course it doesn't pay to let a few facts get in the way of a good story.
Atkinson's thesis is that Nature should be left alone. Everything humans do is bad. In other words, he's parroting the standard Leftist canards.
In his latest piece, he attacks dredge miners: I’ve seen what its members have done to some of the great rivers in the West. Dredge miners dump all the material they remove from a river bottom downstream, changing the entire structure and hydraulics of streams and their fish habitat.
In his view, rivers should never be subject to change. Dredge miners change river structure, and therefore that is a very bad thing. Of course, periodic flooding changes river structure as well, as any resident of Tillamook knows all to well. Oddly, while dredging and flooding exert similar forces upon river structure and associated riparian areas, floods exert much more dramatic effects, and over far larger distances.
Yet the good Senator has never been a voice rising to the defense of residents in Tillamook, who have long been pushing to dredge flood materials away from the mouths of the several rivers feeding into their bay. You see, flood action is okay. Human activities which mimic the conditions on a significantly smaller scale are somehow evil, and must be fought.
If you believe in protecting Oregon’s rivers, you too should be outraged.
Atkinson follows the Leftist line of insisting upon "outrage" - pushing emotion ahead of scientific fact. "You should be outraged." Oh, really? And why, exactly?
We know that fish favor disturbed habitat for spawning; such areas are by far the most productive in any given stretch of river or stream.
Atkinson may be an avid fisherman, but he lacks any understanding of what it takes to produce successful fish runs.
Atkinson can fish with the best of them. Anybody can fish. Not anybody can catch. (Cue Atkinson holding a salmon image).
