Hey, what’s wrong with this idea?  It sounds great on paper, on the radio, in the NMFS whale room in Gloucester and in the court room where the court jesters fiddle with legal words.

 We could probably write pages on the absurdity of the whole concept.  We should probably compare the whole situation to a Chinese fire drill egged on by the lunatic fringes who wear the “green” environmental-conservation hats to hide their ignorance in matters of the sea and their indifference to their fellow man who are in this case, the fishermen.

 The National Marine Fisheries Service, however, should know better and certainly should place the fishermen above the whales when taking actions even to save whales.

 One of the reasons I had thought that a more reasonable approach had been developed in the whole D.A.M. affair was that after the first fiasco last spring, a second alert further south and east in the Great South Channel had included a request for a “voluntary” removal of gear from part of that zone.  This was, I thought, a much more reasonable approach if the Service is determined to do its DAM dance at all.  Then came December and apparently the Service had felt it needed to return to its role as villain on the stage and in the sea.

 The message that apparently is not getting through to the fishing agency and beyond it to the green “wing-nuts” hiding in the balcony is that the Dynamic Area Management idea as it is currently orchestrated isn’t the way to go.  The whole idea is designed to save whales.  Unreasonable and unworkable rules that fishermen can’t do won’t save whales.  It has in fact worked against the whale campaign because it has turned people away from wanting to help.  Therefore, the DAM doesn’t save whales.

 At this point I feel it is only fair to point out that NMFS has, to their credit, adjusted part of the alert to a voluntary removal of gear and a request to not move anymore gear into the area.  These are reasonable requests if the Service is still intent on issuing a D.A.M. alert.

 While we are on the whale stage, NMFS would do well to reject the latest proposal to combine the Critical Habitats in Cape Cod Bay and the Great South Channel by extending that designation to cover the area between the two.  Once again this proposal is coming from yet another band of nonsensical individuals with tunnel vision who do not care about fishermen.  Acceptance of such a proposal will only open the door to more requests until everywhere in the ocean is designated as a Critical Habitat.  This folly, in turn, would only place the Service into the position of having to generate even more rules for more areas until the whole program becomes so complex, unenforceable and unreasonable that it crashes from its own weight.  At that point one must wonder whether the whales benefited at all.

 NMFS must consider itself as being the protector of the fishermen and not just the resources.  This is part of its mandate as a fisheries managing agency.  It is not there just to save whales.  The whole concept behind managing the fisheries is to do so for the greatest benefit for the Nation’s citizens.  Fishermen are the citizens, not the whales.  If we can help the whale out in the process that is an added benefit but fishermen, in this case, come first.

 Can we bring down the curtain now on this tragedy of errors?

 Bill Adler