The Lamprey Harpoon by the Fishermen's Liberation Front!

All the Bycatch Netted, Reported and Discarded by the Fishermen’s Liberation Front
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THE LAMPREY HARPOON
~ WE SPEAR THE NEWS THAT’S FIT TO EAT~
VOL. 01, NO. 02
1 April 2009
THIS AND PAST ISSUES OF THE HARPOON MAY SOMEDAY BE AVAILABLE IN PDF AT: WW.HARPOON.NET

“America needs prunes. It may not be a young, sexy plum. Granted, it's shrivelled and at times hard to swallow. But this dried-up old prune has the experience we need”………………………Stephen Colbert

IN THIS ISSUE…….
PCFFA FILES 10,000 LAWSUIT………………………………………………….…...……………...…01:02/01.
LAST NEW ENGLAND GROUNDFISH CAUGHT…………….….…………………………………....01:02/02.
LOOK OUT HOLLYWOOD, LOOK OUT BOLLYWOOD, HERE COMES BARROWOOD...………01:02/03.
CALIFORNIA FISH & GAME TO ISSUE PERMITS FOR MOUNTAINTOP MINING………...…….01:02/04.
MEXICAN DRUG CARTELS DIVERSIFY INTO FISHING…………….………….………………..…01:02/05.
_________________________________AND MORE…..______________________________________

01:02/01. PCFFA FILES 10,000th LAWSUIT: The Pacific Coast Federation of Fishermen’s Associations announced the filling of its 10,000th lawsuit, when documents were submitted Tuesday in Federal District Court in Sacramento and Superior Court in Fresno. PCFFA was lead plaintiff among the usual suspects of fishing, environmental, tribal and now progressive farm organizations in the two actions.

Lawsuit # 9.999 is being brought against the Bureau of Reclamation, PCFFA v. Glaeser, to recover 14.8 million acre-feet of fresh water owed fish and wildlife and the San Francisco Bay-Delta pursuant to the Central Valley Project Improvement Act. Since 1993, the suit alleges the Bureau has either failed to provide 800,000 acre-feet of water annually to fish and wildlife or to the Bay-Delta, or both. The actions by the Bureau, the suit alleges, have endangered Central Valley salmon runs and caused economic devastation to fishing fleets and coastal communities.

Lawsuit # 10,000 is a writ filed in Superior Court in Fresno, PCFFA v. Egan, demanding the County District Attorney take criminal action against the Westlands Water District for receipt of stolen property – water unlawfully received from the State Water Project and the Central Valley Project that the projects’ were prohibited from selling or delivering; this is water illegally appropriated from the fish. The stolen water was required for fish protection pursuant to the Endangered Species Act, the Clean Water Act, the Magnuson-Stevens Act, the state Porter-Cologne Act, the Public Trust Doctrine and a host of other Federal and State statutes.

A PCFFA spokesman shrugged off the significance of the number of suits, saying “it just kinda crept up on us. When you’re fighting to protect the fish and fishermen, sometimes you’ve just got to sue the bastards.” PCFFA has had received an amazing 94% favorable rulings in its cases.

The chair of the ABA Litigation Section, Solomon P. Gold, dismissed PCFFA’s win rate saying, “when you sue agencies that claim dams are natural structures, or that fish don’t need water, or that write political science-based biological opinions, of course you’re going to win. The only thing that’s amazing is why more groups aren’t suing and why anyone lets these agencies behave so badly.”

Gold went on to say, “even Bush appointments to the Bench, most born after the ESA and Magnuson were passed, have recognized the elemental merits of the fishermen’s lawsuits.” Gold was equally dismissive about the number of suits filed, saying “when agencies are chronic scofflaws you’re going to have lots of suits against them.”

B.B. “Bud” Corz, an attorney with Northeast California Legal Foundation, announced he was filing counter suits against the “fish eco-terrorists.” The action filed in Siskiyou County seeks to take away federal recognition of the Hupa, Yurok and Klamath Tribes, the citizenship of registered commercial salmon fishermen and enjoin any of the groups from ever stepping foot in a Courthouse again.

“Fish don’t have rights and these miscreants have no right therefore to ask for fish protections,” exclaimed Corz. “If we don’t act to protect our God-given property and right to do anything damn thing we want on it, next thing these commies will be insisting nature has rights.” NCLF is an advocacy group for absolute property rights, the teaching of Intelligent Design and a flat Earth.

PCFFA responded in its trademark diplomatic fashion saying “Corz and his clients need to seek treatment for an acute case of anal-cranial inversion,” as the fishing leaders bordered a plane for New York for an award from the American Trial Lawyers Association and attend Pete Seeger’s 90th Birthday Concert.

01:02/02. LAST NEW ENGLAND GROUNDFISH CAUGHT: The last New England groundfish, a four inch haddock, was caught over the weekend in the net of a Gloucester trawler, the Stygian. The event was a bittersweet one. Some fishermen said they’ll miss fishing, but fishery leader Vito Vitoleoni said, “By God we did it on our own terms – we closed ourselves down by taking the last fish, not letting some government agency close us while there was still a fish to be taken.”

New England fishery experts say the quick demise of the troubled U.S. Atlantic groundfish fishery was facilitated by the implementation of a program of catch shares (also called individual fishing quotas) that got around the old restrictions on days at sea. Once the “days at sea” restriction was lifted for the catch share program - which allowed fishermen to choose when they want to fish - they chose to fish every day. And, under an earlier adopted sector allocation, even “good fishermen” (the term used for hookers from Nantucket) could participate in bad fishing. A “hard TAC” (total allowable catch) limitation was intended to protect the fishery, but since managers under a catch share program had to monitor the catch of every vessel, not just the overall quota, they quickly deemed Hard TAC management “too expensive” and scrapped it.

Reactions around New England were mixed. Members of the region’s congressional delegation stressed the need more than ever for fishermen’s health care, saying now that the fleet was permanently tied-up, injuries will become far more frequent since the bars in New Bedford are far more dangerous than anything at sea.

In a NOAA press release, the Commerce agency said it was “thrilled at the success of this exciting new way to manage fisheries,” referring to the catch share program. The Conservation Law Foundation issued a terse press release, saying simply, “We told you so.”

The group ED, which had pushed for adoption of catch shares in the fishery, said New England fishermen were very lucky. “Thankfully the New England Council and NOAA Fisheries adopted catch shares, otherwise fishermen would not have quota shares to sell to cushion themselves from catching the last fish,” said ED’s New England Person-on-the-Spot Biff Byington. “Financial instruments such as derivatives, mortgage-backed securities, and quota shares are the wave of our nation’s economic future.” ED is a neo-conservation organization that adheres to the teachings of Milton Freidman, Ayn Rand and Bernard Madoff, and helps fund catch share and water privatization programs through its Earth Divestiture Fund.

An audit of the New England groundfish catch shares, however, found almost no fishermen still owned quota. 97 percent of the shares are controlled by J. Peter Pendergast the chief shareholder in the food giant Big East Eats. Big East controls all of the food production and distribution on the Atlantic Coast from Daytona Beach, Florida to Rockport, Maine and west to the Mississippi. Pendergast, through his K Street lobbying firm, had convinced New England Council members and Commerce officials - following a meeting at Pendergast’s Boca Raton country club in January – to amend the catch share program by deleting the term “control” regarding quota shares, and to change the limitation on ownership from “a person” to “a living thing.” This was hailed as a compromise and Pendergast agreed then to caps on ownership of quota shares.

“I recognized the need to give something on this issue,” said Pendergast a few months ago, “so I decided to follow the lead of those great California farm families – the Salyer’s and Boswell’s in the way they dealt with acreage limits on federal water entitlement. Thank you lord, it worked.” As a result of the Boca Raton agreement, Pendergast, his wife, five children, three grandchildren, assorted nieces and nephews, mistress in Boston, boyfriend in Provincetown, a dog (Dubya), two cats, three moose on his property in Maine, and two dozen of his potted plants now own nearly 100 percent of the quota shares to the New England groundfish fishery.

However, with the total collapse of the fishery, quota controlled by Pendergast is worthless. He was in Washington this week negotiating with Treasury Secretary Timothy Geitner for a government buy-out of Big East’s toxic quota shares. “If the government doesn’t bail us out, Big East will sink,” said Pendergast. “Big East is too big to fail; if it does, the whole Atlantic seaboard will starve.”

At least one fishery wag was elated. Lars Jihad, a consummate fish blogger and know-it-all, declared New England groundfish “a great victory over the vast Pew Conspiracy” as he issued a fatwa against environmental groups, sport anglers, and commercial fishermen who didn’t see things his way.

01:02/03. LOOK OUT HOLLYWOOD, LOOK OUT BOLLYWOOD, HERE COMES BARROWOOD: Ever since the hit series Northern Exposure, television and movie producers have expressed interest in filming in the 49th state, reports fishery correspondent Bonnie Belch this week in the Alaska Journal of Commerce. Currently the popular reality show Deadliest Catch is produced in Alaska and the documentary Red Gold filmed in Bristol Bay was recently released. Now comes news of a joint production between film producers the Coen Brothers and documentary maker Michael Moore for a new movie to be shot in Alaska. It stars British actor Sacha Baron Cohen as offshore oil supply ship captain Ben Stevens and Will Farrell as his trusty sidekick, former President George W. Bush. The film tells of the exploits of the two precious middle-aged ex-pols as they seek to avoid the public spotlight and their fathers, endeavoring to make America energy independent on the melting ice and offshore Alaska.

It will also star Tina Fay as the sexy, saucy, ya betcha Governor Sarah Palin and her entourage of five pregnant, abstinence-only, children. Making a cameo appearance will be Steve Martin playing the boys’ boss, kindly old Halliburton chairman Dick Cheney. Martin’s role will include some song and dance numbers, including a toe-tapping little ditty called, “If I only had a heart.”

Titled Drill, Baby, Drill, the film takes place throughout the state from the boys busting up a fisherman’s bar in Dutch Harbor after an unemployed crab fisherman referred to the two as a “pimp and a whore,” to crashing a UFA meeting in Juneau where Stevens thought they’d find refuge, to confronting a milquetoast Interior Secretary.

There is also an exciting chase scene in Ketchikan with angry Lutherans pursuing Stevens, Bush and Palin to their boat after the three attended a Sunday service and began speaking in tongues and waving their arms during the singing of a “Mighty Fortress is Our God.” This is followed by a harrowing scene of the gallant three braving the weather and five sick children – seasickness, morning sickness, whatever – as they work desperately to untie their vessel.

Kindly old Mr. Cheney arrives on the scene looking for a hunting partner to join him aboard a helicopter. Finding none, Bush calls his old friend Rumsfeld and arranges for an unmanned drone to take up Mr. Cheney, since no helicopter pilot could be found. Cheney is strapped to the drone with a shotgun and rifle and sent up – the drone safely remotely controlled by an operator thousands of miles away - where the former vice-president pursues wolves, elk, bears, geese, salmon and assorted natives waving to him with their middle finger. He also encounters a Russian MIG - which can be seen from the Governor’s house - which he fires on.

All in all, this promises to be an exciting film in the genre of World War II propaganda movies as the nation and heroic men and women fight for American energy independence. Producers expect as much kissing as there was in the previous film Cohen and Ferrell co-starred in, Talladega Nights, and it should be rated PG.

01:02/04. CALIFORNIA FISH & GAME TO ISSUE PERMITS FOR MOUNTAINTOP MINING: The California Department of Fish & Game has announced it will begin issuing permits for recreational mountain top removal gold mining after a court enjoined the agency from issuing permits for sport suction dredging in salmon rivers. The suit to stop suction dredging was brought against CDFG by the Karuk Tribe, Klamath Riverkeeper, Cal Trout, PCFFA and others to protect salmon. The Department had sided with the suction dredgers (49ers) after sizing up each side’s armaments – deciding they were going to get sued by either side anyway. The dredgers had AK-47s, grenade launchers and IEDs, so the Department’s choice seemed obvious.

Since Judge Sawyer had already outlawed hydraulic mining in 1884, the dredgers were at a loss for how they could hunt gold for fun. That’s when they came up on the idea of using federal economic stimulus dollars to fund their avocation. This is a project that wasn’t only shovel ready, it was bulldozer ready. Partnering with Moline, Illinois heavy equipment manufacturer, Caterpillar, the group has applied for a stimulus grant to purchase earthmoving equipment from Cat for every sport miner.

The deal was brokered by Governor Schwarzenegger’s office. Since it involves gold mining, not coal mining, the EPA moratorium on mountain top removal does not apply. And, because mountain top mining involves dumping soil and filling of streams - no CDFG permit is required, according to the Governor’s office; permits are only required for stream crossings. As part of the permit package-stimulus deal, perennial gubernatorial campaign contributor Blackie Meyerson and his Sierra Nevada Logging Company was called in to do “salvage removal” of all the timber on the mountain tops, clearing the way for the miners and their “dozers.” The Board of Forestry was instructed to approve SNLC timber harvest plans.

“This is best of all worlds” said recreational miner Billy George Bozeaux. “We get to drive these dozers, which are like giant ATVs, and still hunt for gold. We want to thank the Governor, his staff and Fish & Game leadership for recognizing our mining rights against these extreme environmental groups.”

PCFFA is readying suit # 10,001.

01:02/05: MEXICAN DRUG CARTELS DIVERSIFY INTO FISHING: The Pacific Fishery Management Council’s new catch share program for the albacore fishery is expected to open up new business opportunities south of the border. Under the Pacific Albacore Fishery Rationalization Plan, shares to the albacore fishery will be distributed among albacore boat owners. To help speed fleet consolidation and “eliminate riff-raff” the regional body decided to allocate quota only to albacore bait boats with annual catches of $750,000 or more per year. “This gets rid of the trollers who the Council felt were too small. They were expendable,” said a PFMC release.

One provision of the new catch share plan, however, has run afoul of NAFTA, that would have restricted quota ownership to U.S. citizens. This was ruled an impediment to investment by the three nation trade organization, ordering quota ownership to be open to citizens of any North American nation. This in turn, has opened investment opportunities to various Mexican drug distribution and export companies, who have been seeking to diversify their businesses and reinvest their American dollars.

“The albacore fishery just seemed a natural for us,” said Jaime Jimmenez, Sinaloa’s press officer. “Many Mexicans are employed as crew on these boats, this will give them a chance to become captains.” Jimmenez went on to explain the significant opportunities for the companies to expand in the MSC-certified albacore fishery and to bring more efficiency to their operations by utilizing the vessels in the shipment of goods between the U.S. and Mexico.

The news of the interest by the cartels was welcomed by albacore bait boat owner Sebastian Duarte. “The more buyers – whoever they are – that are out there makes my quota share worth that much more. I could never make it big if I could only sell to other fishermen or crew. Under the Council’s plan, I don’t have to race for fish and, if I can sell my quota for enough, I won’t have to fish anymore – just retire and spend my winters in Cabo and summer in Montana,” said the 38-year old Duarte.

MORE…….
An unnamed DEA agent said the fact the cartels were diversifying must mean the U.S. is winning the war on drugs. The NRA, in a release, said “these types of business agreements, not the socialist president’s spending, are what is needed to bolster the economy. This will make the export of American- made assault weapons to Mexico much easier. Presently, bureaucratic roadblocks often stand in the way of their shipment to Mexico by highway. This fish/cartel deal is good for U.S. munitions manufacturers.”

In a NOAA press release, the Commerce agency said it was “thrilled at the success of this exciting new way to manage fisheries,” referring to the catch share program. ED Pacific Coast Person-on-the-Spot Muffy Mullingford also hailed the albacore catch share program and interest by the cartels; the organization had pushed for the adoption of the Council’s albacore individual quota plan.

“We’re so thrilled,” said Mullingford. “With the cartels buying up albacore quota they should take advantage of this opportunity under the catch share program to consolidate their operations thereby ending the race for supplies and control, making their operations much more efficient and profitable, eliminating personnel losses and exporting when the U.S. drug market is strongest. This provides a rationalization for drugs.”

01:02/06. WTO RULES ON SUBSIDIES – FISH HATCHERIES CLOSED, RESTORATION PROGRAMS HALTED: A ruling last week from the World Trade Organization in Geneva will have far-reaching implications for the Pacific Coast salmon fishery. In a petition brought to the international body by two Norwegian firms - Marine Growth and Quisling Fiskennmaken, controlling 92 percent of the world’s farmed salmon production - the WTO ruled that mitigation fish hatcheries and salmon habitat restoration programs, such as those funded by Pacific Salmon Restoration dollars, amounted to fishery subsidies and were therefore prohibited.

The ruling won praise from the U.S. branch of the GAA, an international organization promoting aquaculture. At a meeting in Silver Spring, Maryland where GAA-US had just received at $46.8 million grant from NOAA for offshore aquaculture development and another $360 million from NOAA in grants directed by Congress for restoration, the group said ending “subsidies” used to restore wild fish populations were long overdue.

West Coast salmon fishermen’s organizations reacted quite differently. They pointed out the government monies were to mitigate fish losses, caused by dam operations, or restore habitats caused by land use and other non-fishing activities. They said there was no relationship between the programs to help the fish and overfishing, which was purportedly the reason for WTO rules against fishery subsidies.

Oceania and WWF, which had backed the WTO rules on fishery subsidies, countered the fishermen’s objections. “Obviously if there are salmon for fishermen to catch, there is a potential for overfishing. Therefore the ruling by the WTO is correct. How can we stop overfishing if there are fish and fishers are fishing?” asked a petulant Peggy Priss, WWF’s representative to the fish subsidy negotiations. She went on to say her organization “would not oppose government assistance for aquaculture, however, because “fish farmers don’t overfish.”

01:02/07. MIRACLES OF GENETIC ENGINEERING - BIOTECH FIRMS PETITIONS FOR DESIGNATION OF THREE NEW SPECIES OF SALMON: Thanks to modern science, mankind is not just discovering new species, we’re creating them. Sea Booty, the St. Louis-based genetic engineering firm has asked the American Fisheries Society to designate three new types of salmon the company has developed as species. The first, a fast growing variety of Altantic salmon, utilizing genes from other fish, is capable of breeding and producing offspring and is called Salmo frankenfishus or an Igor salmon.

The second two are both varieties of Pacific salmon, also capable of breeding and producing offspring. Oncorhynchus loxus, was created by crossing coho salmon with steelhead and then genetically modifying them with genes from a brine shrimp and a desert pupfish to create a warm water, high saline tolerant species of salmon - salmon are a cold water fish. The new species was created to grow in locations such as the Great Salt Lake, the Dead Sea, the Salton Sea and the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta. The new species opens up numerous opportunities for stocking salmon in places where they could not survive before. Better yet, says Sea Booty, the fish taste just like lox - no salt curing or smoking is needed. MORE “This is lox right out of the water,” said Dr. Frank N. Stein, Sea Booty’s director of development. This species will be known as lox salmon.

Finally, in response to complaints about the amount of wild forage fish needed for rearing farmed salmon, the company has developed a salmon that does not require any fish protein. The impetus for this species came during the development of the Chilean salmon industry. Anchovy, pilchards and other protein sources were often too expensive for profitable operations. It was then that the Pinochet government offered to step in and help by supplying farmers “disappeared” which were ground up and made into pellets that would supplement the fish meal. “That prompted us to develop a new species, derived from chum and chinook salmon utilizing genes from a white shark, an American alligator, and a turkey vulture,” reported Stein.

“We did encounter difficulties after the Pinochet administration left office and our supply of 'disappeared' dried up,” explained Stein. “The Bush Administration did come through supplying us a feed source from its extreme rendition program – we called it ‘extreme rendering’ – but since then we’ve had to rely on Chinese officials, and that source is problematic because the pieces are often harvested first for organs and there is a high lead content.”

The feed source outlook has improved now as a result of an agreement reached with North American funeral directors, who have been plagued with a shortage of cemetery plot space and new regulations aimed at curbing greenhouse gas emissions from crematoriums, to develop a new recycling program for disposal of human remains. The development of this new species thus addresses two 21st century problems – keeping salmon cheap in the marketplace and what to do with the body.

The new species, if approved by AFS, will be called Oncorhynchus pinochetia, or the Generalissimo salmon. Sea Booty hopes to have these new salmon on the market soon and has already made a deal with Sustainable Fish, Inc. – a start-up company of 23-year old art majors, funded by two large foundation grants, who go around telling markets and restaurants what fish are sustainable – to list the three new species for use in salmon farms as “best catch.”

01:02/08. DRILLING AGREEMENT REACHED FOR ANWR, BRISTOL BAY, ARCTIC OCEAN, LOST COAST: Department of Interior officials announced Monday an agreement with the State of Alaska for drilling in ANWR, in Bristol Bay and the Arctic. Under the agreement each Alaska resident will receive a monthly royalty check of $13,201.69, adjusted for inflation, for the rest of their lives as long as they stay in Alaska.

Alaskan’s stipulated under the agreement that they wouldn’t work again either. Under an agreement with the Schwarzenegger Administration in California, the royalty payments to the state from oil drilling the Lost Coast will go to pay for monitoring and enforcing its network of no-fishing “marine reserves” which California had no money to pay for.

“Thanks to me this is a real victory for all Alaska,” said Governor Palin. “It means we won’t have to worry about those darned oil or mining impacts on our fish, because we don’t have to fish anymore. We don’t have to work anymore. As long as you can walk to the mail box once a month, you’re taken care of.” Palin made the announcement from Houston where she was speaking to a rally attacking the Obama welfare state.

Part of the drilling agreement was negotiated by ED and involves the government offering offshore tracts, rather than just leasing them. Under an ITP [individual transferable parcels], or ocean shares, program oil companies can buy and sell parcels as they see fit without government interference and they don’t have to give anything back. Once they’re done drilling they can just scrap a rig on the site or sell the parcel to someone else.

“This program will create incentives for oil companies to drill,” said ED oil person-on-the-spot Kjell Phillips. “And by giving the companies the parcels, instead of selling leases and requiring royalties, their start-up costs will be less, which is important because ocean acidification eats away at the rigs.”

April Fool’s from the Slightly Insane Staff of the Pacific Coast Federation of Fishermen’s Associations