It is not useful to say 'follow the money' in re Patrick Moore, he had it made in the shade either way - Greenpeace is not exactly a nickel-and-dime outfit, he would have had lots of book-selling press power no matter what, plus he stood to inherit considerable [which would have happened a couple of years ago, when his father Bill passed away] ..... it wasn't the money, it was the glory, the ego strokes, imho .... just like his father, showman personality, the only way to really anger the guy is to ignore him .. which was never possible within sight and sound of Bill, any conscious being would be compelled to love him or hate him, or both at the same time
Patrick grew up in an inlet on Vancouver island where his father ran a highly personalised logging camp, kingdom unto itself .... he is old enough to recall the days when logging was tough difficult work, and brought status to its members, glory even, and a very decent wage ..... this was before all the fancy equipment with heated cabs and stereos etc, also before so much of this coast was logged off .... you can fly now over areas logged when P was young, and they're fine strong stands of timber again, healthier and straighter in most cases than the decadent stuff that was taken .... i know this for a fact, because i fell some of that timber, and have flown over those settings recently, i knew Bill Moore, only in the way that thousands of others did, still enough to recognise where P would be coming from
Forestry and politics should not be mixed, yet it inevitably gets politicised ... so much money in it, so many heartstrings pulled at the sight of stumps, strong feelings all round .... personally i like the look of a stump, got fruit trees planted here in and around a few stumps, could have dug them out first but then thought why not leave them, they're organic, and it's the old and the new together, cycle of life, all that good stuff .... got one snag stump here with fifty feet of its trunk beside it, must have fallen a hundred years ago, plants growing strong in them, it's beautiful, it's a dead thing rotting yes, but beautiful
On the BC coast we get all our rain from offshore weather systems, plenty of it .... this means that by clear-cutting we cannot desertify this land, that's impossible .... in fact you cannot keep the jungle down here, without constant hard work or heavy equipment [or if you had too much money like they do in those two fantastically extensive clearcuts called 'Vancouver' and 'Victoria', choke the ground with asphalt and white plastic condos] .... this is where Patrick Moore grew up, and it is of here he is thinking when saying that about clear-cutting, no doubt .... you can't do the same everywhere on this planet, in many places with less maritime influence on climate when you open up the ground to sunlight the timber will not come the same, the ground will dry up and bake - here you have to get sunlight to the seedlings, they are shade-intolerant, and the rain comes no matter what
It could be argued that this is not foreign affairs .... yet, the same things are happening here as in foreign affairs, in all human affairs in general actually - you've got some artificial dichotomy of two 'sides' battling it out, looking for advantage, people carefully neglecting firm facts they don't like and touting hard the shakey ones they do .... same same .... Patrick Moore says a goodly number of eminently sensible things that bear repeating, and does so to excess, in what amounts to partisan manner .... meantime there are lots of people on the other 'side' making important vital points, in just as partisan a manner .... it's certainly as amusing as foreign affairs, anyway |
