More on Endangered Species act and Salmon

I think that this television interview is pretty good, though I would have mentioned that there is no obvious evidence that wild raised salmon have an great advantage over hatchery fish. The higher rate of survival of hatchery salmon up to the point that they are released in the wild is offset by a higher death rate after that, but in the end the overall survivorship rate is the same.

Sonya Jones' Radio Show

Sonya Jones' radio show is picking up steam. For those interested, you can listen to her show ("Sonya's Gotta Scream") from noon to 2 PM EDT on Saturdays. At least one of her topics this week is vote fraud.

New Op-ed in Washington Times: Property-rights dispute

Retirees Shirley and Herbert Leu had a problem. Part of their backyard was collapsing into a ditch that ran along the U.S.-Canadian border. Before building their 4-foot-high retaining wall, the Leus made sure they were in compliance with all local regulations related to improvements made on private, residential property. It never dawned on the Leus that this would lead to an international incident and an ideological battle over private property. The debate became one of whether an international commission could simply come onto their property, remove their wall and then send them the bill. . . .

A comment tread can be found here.

Once I get the audio link to work, this will be what I will be listening to from noon to 2 PM EDT on Saturdays

Just follow this link and hit the listen button here. A synopsis of the show is given here.

Sonya Jones makes the New York Times and MSNBC!

This is a weird case. Basically all the salmon have ancestors who were hatchery fish but somehow the number of hatchery fish among the salmon does not count towards whether the salmon are endangered or not. Go figure.

NY Times:

Sonya D. Jones, a lawyer with the Pacific Legal Foundation, a property-rights group that has for years pressed the government to count hatchery stocks when determining whether a salmon species should be protected, said the group believed that Wednesday’s decision and the 2001 ruling, by Judge Michael R. Hogan, were “in direct contrast” and that it expected to appeal the latest one.

MSNBC:

Sonya Jones of the Pacific Legal Foundation, which represented the builders group, the Washington Farm Bureau and Idaho water users, said the case would be appealed to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

Seattle Times:

Sonya Jones, an attorney with Pacific Legal Foundation, a property-rights group that repeatedly has sued to overturn Endangered Species Act listings, said the group was "quite surprised" by the judge's ruling.

Her group was preparing to file an appeal, Jones said.

"If this decision stands, it opens up a floodgate of listing decisions," she said. "One more time, the ESA is used to regulate the use of private property."

More bad advice on gun safety

A Wake Forest University Baptist Medical Center survey claims that 70 percent of gun owners do not store their firearms "safely." A doctor associated with the study claims: "This concerns us a great deal because having guns in the home increases the likelihood that they will be used in a suicide or unintentional injury.” Of course, there is no discussion about who accidentally fires these guns (hint not law-abiding citizens and not children in those homes) and no mention of the fact that locked guns lead to even more deaths because people are unable to use guns to defend themselves. I don't even see a discussion of how rare accidental gun deaths are or that with suicide there are so many other methods available.

Thanks to Sonya Jones for sending me this link.

Some of the wackiness behind environmental some regulations

Personally, I found this case pretty amusing. As I understand it, the question is whether you count only the wild salmon and ignore hatchery born salmon. Even if hatchery born salmon live to have offsprind at a lower rate than wild ones, why not still give them a weighting equal to the relative rate that they propogate? Anyway, fighting the good fight out there in Oregon, Sonya Jones does a better job than me of explaining everything at the link here.

New Op-ed on What Should We Advise Women who are being Stalked?

Sonya Jones and I have a new op-ed on the recent failure of restraining orders in protecting women: Flawed Laws Help Stalkers Victimize Women.

What do you do when the police can’t protect you?

Police may be the single most important factor for reducing crime, but there is something the police themselves understand: They almost always arrive at the crime scene after the crime has occurred.

Expecting people to trust the police to protect them and to behave passively is a recipe for disaster.

The last couple of weeks have seen a couple prominent murders where restraining orders did women little good. Numerous news organizations, such as ABC News, have run headlines asking "How Do You Stop a Stalker From Killing You?"

Unfortunately, despite acknowledging that "many women find themselves on their own," the media are drawing the wrong lessons. To simply advise that women "Get the hell away from him" often doesn't go anywhere near far enough. . . .

Hacking into people's websites

Sonya Jones reports that someone hacked onto her website and posted something troubling. (revised)

Sonya Jones has two interesting posts up

For those few soles who have time to check the internet over this Christmas weekend, Sonya Jones has two interesting posts on guns. The first is a personal post.

A friend of mine in Dallas, about 7 years ago, was confronted with a carjacker. He was sitting at a red light in Oak Cliff (not the best neighborhood) when was accosted by a unwelcomed passenger in his truck. As the unwelcomed passenger entered his truck from the passenger side bearing a gun, my friend had a handgun stashed barrell-down, between the seats (pre-concealed carry laws), and pulled it up and shot the would-be perpetrator/murderer. My friend went immediately to the police station to turn himself in and waited for a few hours until the police recovered a dead body from a front yard in the vicinity. The Dallas County grand jury no-billed my friend, saving tax payers at least $100K in trial fees. . . .

The second is a link that she has to a story about "Everyone’s favorite (and only) congressional rock band, the Second Amendments, is packing up its amps and hitting the road." The group is going to play for the troops. Pretty neat stuff. Rep. Jon Porter (R-Nev.) plays the keyboards, Reps. Collin Peterson (D-Minn.) on lead vocals, Thaddeus McCotter (R-Mich.) on lead guitar, Dave Weldon (R-Fla.) on bass, and Kenny Hulshof (R-Mo.) on drums.

Thanks for the link Sonya.

Some commentary on the Roberts confirmation battle

Sonya Jones has some interesting commentary on the opening confirmation hearings. It is worth a read, but of particular interest:

Sen. Durbin (D-Ill) opined in his opening statement today that history's assessment of a justice depends on whether he expands freedom.  He said that his vote for Roberts depends upon whether Roberts will expand individual freedom or not.

Ok, fine.  Does that include economic freedom?  How about expanding freedom by limiting  government's power under the Commerce Clause?  How about we expand the freedom of property owners by protecting them from money-hungry municipalities?  What about the Boy Scouts' freedom of association?  What about freedom in gun ownership?  What about the freedom to criticize politicians during elections?

Debate on piece defending price gouging

For a running debate on piece with Sonya Jones that defended price gouging: follow this link to FreeRepublic.com.