Foreclose on Wells Fargo: So Many Reasons to Divest

Note: This article and many others I'm writing these days appears at the N. Rockies Indymedia site at rockyMT.org. - Jim
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There are a lot of reasons to get your money out of the big banks – starting in Bozeman with Wells Fargo and U.S. Bank – but I don’t think people realize just how many reasons there are. Let’s look at Wells Fargo, in particular, where Occupy Bozeman has put out a call to divest.

I think everyone knows that Wells Fargo took over $35 billion in bailout money and is neck deep in the housing crisis – most recently being a party to a $26 billion settlement for a lawsuit brought by all 50 states regarding improprieties with foreclosures. What people don’t necessarily know, however, is Wells Fargo’s poor record on the environment, its ownership stake of corporations in the private prison industry, and charges it faces of discriminatory lending to African Americans and discriminatory practices against people with disabilities. Wells Fargo also spends a lot of the money it makes from your accounts on lobbying and political contributions. People may not know just how much money Wells Fargo makes from these practices, and they may not know that not every financial institution functions this way. There are alternatives to all these things, as well as to the high fees, low rates of return, and poor customer service that are also the hallmarks of Wells Fargo.

In brief, Wells Fargo contributes to economic disparity in this country. A first step toward economic justice in our community requires you to divest from Wells Fargo and other big banks. That will help our region, too, because it will keep your money here. More importantly, though, if a divestment campaign like this works – and evidence is that divestment campaigns like this are beginning to take hold – we will actually be taking a concrete step toward empowering the people rather than the economic interests of the one percent. It will represent a dramatic shift toward embracing an economy that considers the community stakeholders first rather than the one we have now that enriches the most affluent at the expense of everyone else.

Let us take a look at some of the reasons why you should divest from big banks in general and Wells Fargo in particular.

Wells Fargo Bank, headquartered in San Francisco, is the fourth largest bank in the United States and is the country’s largest mortgage provider. Last year, Wells Fargo’s net income was approximately $15 billion from $73 billion in gross profits.

Whatever you feel about profit, the bank ultimately is there not to serve its customers but to provide a profit for its shareholders. Therefore, there are often incentives for a bank to take actions that are not necessarily to the benefit of many of the bank's own customers.

That is how Wells Fargo has been implicated repeatedly in the housing crisis. Wells Fargo, like other big banks, engaged heavily in the subprime loans that precipitated much of the economic downturn. In fact, in July 2011, the Federal Reserve levied an $85 million fine, the largest ever of its type, against Wells Fargo for falsifying documents and pushing borrowers to the high-interest subprime loans. Worse than that, there are charges that Wells Fargo has specifically targeted poorer, particularly African American, borrowers for these bad mortgages. The charges are serious enough that the Department of Justice is currently investigating Wells Fargo on those charges.

Wells Fargo could do this to customers even if they believed that the buyer would default because it turned around and sold many of those mortgages to other investors, thus turning a profit. In many cases, the customers would have qualified for a lower interest loan, but Wells Fargo still steered people to the subprime loans because more money was to be made from it with very little consequence. For when the bottom fell out and banks were beginning to wobble and fail, most of those banks were deemed too big to fail, and so there were very few consequences. Wells Fargo received $36.9 billion in the bailout. Then, the government arranged the sale of Wachovia - a bank that was failing - to Wells Fargo in a sweet deal of about $1 per share. There were also relatively few legal consequences. An $85 million fine is nothing for a company that nets over $15 billion a year. Even a $4 billion share in a $26 billion settlement comes out to only $2,000 per person - a small consolation for ruining people's lives. It only amounts to one quarter of profits, and it was money the bank had already saved and accounted for.

The recent $26 billion settlement has to do with how Wells Fargo and other big banks dealt with foreclosing the properties of people who could no longer afford their homes because of high interest rates, a precipitous drop in home values, a lack of buyers, and the subsequent loss of jobs. Wells Fargo and other big banks often falsified foreclosure documents and repossessed homes with either fraudulent or incomplete documentation. They have also been very slow at working with homeowners on reducing their mortgage payments - part of a federal program in which Wells Fargo is supposed to be participating called HAMP (Home Affordable Modification Program).

When Wells Fargo finally forecloses on a home, many of these homes sit vacant as real estate owned properties (REOs). While Bozeman has a great shortage of space available for rent and a problem with affordable housing, Wells Fargo and other REOs sit vacant. Others are up for auction, and still others sit there with their owners waiting to be repossessed.

Most people, however, have some knowledge that Wells Fargo has been a big bank that's continued to profit despite hurting customers, particularly related to its mortgage business. However, there are even more things to consider that are less well known. Some of those are directly related to Wells Fargo's practices, some are related much more generally to the nature of banks. Not all financial institutions are the same; there are key things that make a credit union - for instance - distinct from a huge bank like Wells Fargo.

Let's start with Wells Fargo's record on the environment. When we think of banks, we do not typically think of environmental impact; nevertheless, because banks finance all kinds of projects, we can see what kinds of projects that Wells Fargo finances. All big banks brag about their environmental record, and Wells Fargo is no exception. There is no doubt that corporations have the luxury to do many things - both good and bad. Nevertheless, there are some things you might consider. Wells Fargo is a large financier of the coal industry, a distinction that led one report to list Wells Fargo as the 19th worst polluting bank in the world. The Rainforest Action Network has criticized Wells Fargo for financing illegal logging projects in Indonesia. On the issue of natural gas hydraulic fracturing (or fracking), Wells Fargo has funded Chesapeake Energy all while being one of the leading lenders who will not give mortgages for homes with gas leases. They seem to know a home where fracking occurs is a bad investment all while funding the practice.

Wells Fargo also has the distinction of having an ownership stake in two private prison corporations. They have $120 million in investments in the GEO Group and the Corrections Corporation in America. These private prison corporations house inmates and detain undocumented immigrants for a profit at government expense and use their political connections to influence policies on crime and immigration. This has been particularly true in Arizona, where the Corrections Corporation of America has had a cozy relationship with Gov. Jan Brewer and may have used its influence to pass one of the harshest and most notorious anti-immigrant bills in the country, SB 1070. Activists in Arizona have as a result not only called on Wells Fargo to divest from the private prison industry but also on customers to divest their money from Wells Fargo altogether.

If all that is not enough, last year Wells Fargo settled a case brought by some disabled customers. The suit brought by people who were deaf, hard of hearing, or have speech disabilities alleged that Wells Fargo refused to accommodate them in telephone services. This suit was settled for $16 million.

Is it necessary to add that Wells Fargo is spending more money on lobbying politicians than ever before and does its fair share of contributing to political candidates?

We could go on and on.

All of that may make no difference to you if Wells Fargo were a good choice for you and your money. Certainly, no one can compete with the convenience that big banks provide in offering many branches, many ATMs, and a wide array of financial services. Many people may opt for a big bank if they only live in the area seasonally or must travel a lot for work, if only to avoid ATM fees. Banks may stay open longer, and online banking may be more robust.

However, these positives may actually be more costly to you and yield less return than other financial choices, particularly credit unions. Indeed, report after report after report show that fees and interest rates at big banks are higher, while rates of return are lower. Whatever you save from ATM fees (and local credit unions are often part of national networks and sometimes will reimburse ATM fees), you are losing many times over in the ways that banks like Wells Fargo skim from you.

The biggest reason that a bank like Wells Fargo is so expensive relative to a credit union is that credit unions are not-for-profit financial institutions. They are not sharing their profits with shareholders somewhere else. Instead, they pass the savings to their members, who also as members have some say in their governance. Credit unions also have no incentive to ruin you through risky mortgages or other exotic financial instruments.

Something else working in favor of putting your money somewhere small rather than somewhere large is that very little of the money you put into a big bank stays in the local region. In other words, the money you spend gets put somewhere else. It gets put into the pockets of wealthy investors, into the hands of polluters, and into the hands of the private prison industry. It goes lots of other places as well, but you get the point. If you keep your money in some local context, you should better be able to take action against any abusive use of that money.

It is an understatement, then, to say that there are a lot of reasons to take your money out of Wells Fargo and other similar big banks. We have seen that although Wells Fargo has been fined or settled out of court repeatedly that these sanctions do not make a dent in their profits. The only leverage that we can exert is to make a concerted effort to divest. So long as we give permission to Wells Fargo, they will continue to engage in activities that create the economic hardships we have seen, that widen the gulf between rich and poor, that pollute our air and water, and that abuse those most vulnerable in our society. Without our money, at least they will not be able to do these things in Bozeman.

One worry about such campaigns is the fear that we may not have the power to do enough and that Wells Fargo will continue to churn out record profits no matter what we do. Fortunately, Occupy Bozeman is hardly the first group in recent months to propose divestment. Last fall's Bank Transfer Day, where many thousands of people moved their money from big banks to credit unions, was more than a blip on the radar. In fact, credit union membership is rising. So, there already is a wave away from big banks. The wave, however, is not yet big enough. We need to help it along and need to take creative action here in Bozeman that will foreclose the only properties that should be foreclosed - the big banks, starting with the biggest - Wells Fargo.

Stopping Wells Fargo by itself will not bring economic justice to our community. It will not by itself end the class gap or bring an end to the evils in the economic and financial system. However, it can be an important start toward that goal. If a bank like Wells Fargo can no longer operate in Bozeman, it will have taken massive community support. That will say at least two things. One, it will show people that Bozeman is a place that values its community and is serious about economic justice. Two, in building a strong community movement around this issue, it will provide a forum where the many other issues of economic injustice can be heard, discussed, and acted upon. We will not be a community that considers the expedience of a few more ATMS to mean more than justice.

If you want to help, it starts by getting your own money out of a big bank. It then continues by talking with your friends and sharing this and other information with them. However, more than that, there will be opportunities for more action against Wells Fargo. These things are being discussed at every weekly Occupy Bozeman General Assembly. You have the opportunity to do something. What's more, if you don't, we see what the consequences are. Because we give so much money to the big banks, a lot of people are hurting. You can be part of the solution; do not be part of the problem. It is hard enough taking on a huge corporation; it is impossible if those in our community enable them.

There are so many reasons to take your money out of Wells Fargo. For all the information we are finding related to our divestment campaign against Wells Fargo, you can start your own (and contribute to our) research at occupybozeman.org.

My newest project

I haven't posted in forever. This is my newest project. I built the web site. I'm also currently working on a book after spending a full season at Buffalo Field Campaign.

Northern Rockies Independent Media Network (RockyMT.org) launches
Primary tabs

RSS: http://www.rockyMT.org/rss.xml , http://www.rockyMT.org/local-newswire.xml , http://www.rockyMT.org/national-global-newswire.xml .

Jim

Thursday, November 10, 2011
rockyMT.org



The Northern Rockies Independent Media Network collective is excited to announce the launch of our new website, http://www.RockyMT.org!

Here is our mission statement:

Northern Rockies Independent Media Network is a consensus-based collective located in Bozeman, Montana, supporting non-hierarchical, sustainable community by providing a forum for exchange of media. We dedicate ourselves to featuring voices who might otherwise be silenced by mainstream media on issues that have local significance and/or entail direct action.

That means that right now you can be the media. More specifically, you can publish your written news, your videos, your audio, your events, and your comments while finding out about what's happening in our region. It's easy to do, and you don't need any computer savvy or user account to do so.

We even have a functioning online radio station featuring independent media content from around the country and globe.

Our hope is to provide media resources of multiple types (on the web and in our community) so that your voice can get out there. We serve Gallatin County and immediately surrounding regions, but as our name suggests, we wish this to be a network. If others in what can be called the Northern Rockies want to start their own indymedia efforts, we want to offer free resources for doing so (and can even offer subdomains and web support).

Finally, we are independent, we do not receive any corporate or government dollars. In fact, we are all volunteer activists who live in and around Bozeman.

Check us out, use the website, and even join our collective and get involved with our work. Without your direct participation, this project does not succeed. We look forward to seeing your contributions at rockyMT.org.

Buffalo torture 2010: Firsthand witness account of Tuesday's haze

Buffalo torture 2010: Firsthand witness account of Tuesday's haze
by Jim Macdonald

Here is something to keep in mind before reading any further. When describing through any medium the cruelty of a buffalo haze (forced march), you need to keep in mind that these moments are highly edited moments. We followed this haze for six hours - mostly on foot - it continued for hours longer. It's probably going on right now as I begin to write this account. You miss the step after painful step; each whoop and holler and whistle of an agent on a horse; each desperate breath prolonged over time; each blade of grass or sagebrush plant trampled under foot. I cut out many points of dialogue, many repetitive words of desperation.

Yet, as necessary as editing and cutting down is - much like the video footage I spent the whole morning collecting - you the reader miss so much of the experience over and above the sense experience you obviously cannot fully fathom. I can paint, but I can't breathe life into these words - for that, the sad truth is that you will have to see for yourself. And, if you cannot, then I hope you can appreciate the sadness of it all to take whatever action you have time for (as I know that injustice is pervasive everywhere). Yet, if you are touched, donate your time for the buffalo, even if it's as simple as sharing with others their story or as complicated and involved as organizing (and we desperately need more organizers and activists - especially in my area).

Anyhow, on to a sad story, one that happens every single year . . . the story of the forced removal of wild buffalo back deep inside Yellowstone National Park, the thing that's supposedly the more humane alternative to outright slaughter.

Here is my account of a haze. As I haven't spoken with my running partner for this gauntlet about my intentions in writing this, I will leave her name out of this; however, let me say that I couldn't have asked for a better partner and friend for this ordeal, which is the worst thing I've personally witnessed in my life. To her - as I expect she'll be reading this, too - I just hope I've been faithful to our experience and perhaps more importantly to the experience of the buffalo. I hope, my friend, that something good can from my writing (from the footage that I took as well) that will bring the people out who can make a difference for future generations of buffalo. Alas, it is too late for this one.

Okay, the haze . . .

It is relatively overcast at 8:30 AM, Tuesday, May 11, 2010. The temperature hovers somewhere in the 30s, as an overnight snowfall has already mostly melted. Our vehicle has just followed a horse trailer all the way to a field just past the Romset Summer Homes, which is about 8 miles west (as the crow flies; it's much further by car) of the boundary of Yellowstone National Park. The day before, a patrol had spotted buffalo in the area, and we expect that this is where the haze will start.

From their vehicles, agents appear. Today looks to be a major haze day; we would see agents from many law enforcement agencies (Montana Department of Livestock; National Park Service; U.S. Forest Service; Montana Fish, Wildlife & Parks; Montana Highway Patrol; and more). Out of one of the vehicles pops out Christian Mackay, Executive Officer of Montana's Board of Livestock. Even the bigwigs like Christian are out today, and this is a dispiriting sign that today is not going to be a good day for Montana's wild buffalo population.

Agents mount their horses and begin to ride in the direction of buffalo who we can see just beyond the parking area in the willows. We now follow on foot. I'm carrying a video camera; my partner has a radio. Our job is to get as much useful video footage of hazing operations as possible. Thus, with horses moving and buffalo running, the challenge is to keep up and yet be able to stop long enough to hold the camera steady enough to get something useful for Buffalo Field Campaign as they edit and share footage with other media and the world. Doing that while moving, while keeping your emotions in check, while trying to catch your breath can be extremely difficult. And, when the most crazy abuses happen, it's often at high speed; you aren't stopped, and so you can't effectively document.

So, the agents on horse are moving; they approach a channel that pours into the Madison River as it widens into Hebgen Lake. They stop; the buffalo herd is on the other side, at the moment unconcerned with the danger they face. I am close enough to the agents to hear their radio transmissions to each other. They decide that it is too dangerous to cross the channel with their horses and that they should wait for the helicopter. We relay that information to other Buffalo Field Campaign patrols in the field, who are strategically placing themselves in order to gather footage of the hazing operation.

We worry that the helicopter might plan to run the buffalo into the channel that is deemed too dangerous for the horses.

Within a couple minutes, we hear the loud whop-whop-whop-whop-whop of the helicopter and soon can see it. The helicopter flies extremely low to the ground, not entirely clearing all the trees. My camera focuses on the chopper, as I'm no longer in a position to see the buffalo. We cannot stay at our previous position in fear that the buffalo would be run right over us. The helicopter flies low to the ground, though, and scares the buffalo into movement. Someone later suggests to me that it is the air of the helicopter that moves the buffalo; the helicopter flies forward and backward, up and down, then circles. Sometimes, it is so low the nearby trees actually block the view.

We notice the agents on horseback positioning near a field. Based on the position of the helicopter and the agents, it looks like the buffalo are thankfully not being run through the channel but instead around it and into a big swampy field. The horsemen take off, and soon we see the buffalo and the helicopter. The horses, as though we are watching a cattle roundup from an old Western, move around the herd and direct it along with the helicopter. Here is a big open field where I can take a wide video of the entire scene - buffalo that were once peaceful are now suddenly marching, forced along by helicopter and horsemen. When buffalo go the "wrong" way, horsemen whoop and holler and run them down to turn them around. Confusion sometimes reigns, and buffalo occasionally turn on each other with aggression.

Before you know it, they cross the field, and we're running to catch up. Splash, splash - this is soggy stuff, as snow pack has only just melted in this area. The terrain is uneven; we are not running on a track or a trail. Buffalo also don't have the greatest footing, especially when stressed. I've seen them fall in snow before and stumble on the ground; here I don't notice that happen - just the obvious fact that they are being forced to move on this ground against their will. This is the beginning of a very long day.

I gasp when I notice that the buffalo are being run fast up a steep hillside that rises to a nearby wooded area. With this group are a number of newborn calves. They have all been born anywhere from that very morning to the last couple of weeks. They too are being forced to run. Everything is happening too fast for me to count; there seems to be a few dozen in this group, but perhaps there were more. In a matter of a few minutes, all the bison are all the way up the hill and out of sight; we are significantly behind.

We're running through the swampy meadow and then up the steep hill. We each have small backpacks, and I'm carrying the small video camera in my hand. At this point, there's nothing to film; all we can think about is seeing if we can catch up with the haze. I'm breathing heavily; my partner up ahead is amazing. Whether running or walking, she moves nimbly. This inspires me to keep moving but to keep pacing myself; I know this is the beginning of a long day. Yet, I know that moving quickly and smartly here is the key; whatever video footage I can get depends on it.

The path of the haze is not hard to follow. Besides the loud buzzing of the helicopter, the trail of the haze is also just as obvious. Grass and sagebrush have been destroyed by an onslaught of 1,000-plus pound buffalo (females, yearlings, and then smaller babies) followed by the horses being forced into this cruel labor. There is an unmistakable path of destruction, and we are trudging desperately over it.

For the first of many times, we feel like we might have lost the haze for good, but around one of the bends on our descent on the other side of the hill, I catch a glimpse of a horse. We are catching up with the back end of the haze, and so we press forward. We keep moving down and notice a road. As it turns out, we are near some more summer homes around the Lonseomehurst Campground along the South Fork, which flows north into the Madison River (Hebgen Lake). We cut down to the road climbing quickly down a steep embankment. Then, we catch sight of not only a horseman but also a buffalo with a newborn calf.

The horseman is Christian Mackay, and he is personally hazing this pair to the main group of bison being hazed. We continue moving south, and I take every chance I can to stop and film this politician playing cowboy for a day. It's hard to film because I'm breathing so heavily. My breath naturally moves the camera up and down; I'm trying to keep my emotions in check so that I can film this. Then, the pair runs up another road (I think it's something called the Contour Road). This isn't where the powers that be intend them to go. Christian rides up the hill with his horse and chases the pair until they return back to the main road. I think I get good footage of this, but it's not satisfying because I'm afraid that the world won't notice what's happening.

Then, the helicopter flies low near us. Suddenly, I see another newborn with her/his mama racing out of the woods onto the road with the other pair. All four take off running scared. The horse chases them, scaring them to run harder. How is it that these babies in their first days of their lives have to spend it running from horses and a low flying and very loud helicopter? Of course, further behind, we start running as well. We are not anywhere near enough to be contributing to the haze, but the thought nevertheless strikes me that maybe I'm part of the rampage of humanity scaring these buffalo. I know that I'm not, but it's a disconcerting thought all the same. The day before, nearby, I was documenting a haze when a second part of the hazing operation had buffalo running right down the road where we were standing, hemmed in by a barbed wire fence and buffalo on each side of it. Could I have blamed the buffalo if they had gored me and hurt me badly? No. Could I have blamed myself? I don't think so, and yet you still wonder.

To our surprise, we see our friends with the vehicle up ahead of us. When we get to the car, we join them, continuing to film the haze as it approaches and then crosses the South Fork, where it soon hits Madison Arm Road and a whole large section of forest south of the Madison River. At this point, there is no reason to stay along Denny Creek Road where we are, and so we drive to a new location, attempting to get in a better spot to film the haze.

It hasn't taken long for these buffalo to be pushed a couple miles and across the river. Yet, again, their day had just begun. Those who were older have been through this every year since they were newborn calves; now their children are joining them for this awful rite of passage.

We drive around the Madison Arm area to the other side closer to the park and in through the Madison Arm road so that my partner and I can re-deploy in the woods. The goal is to get direct footage of the haze while avoiding what are called "lawful orders." A lawful order is not something I had ever heard about in years of protest and activism in other parts of the country; however, they are the main mechanism that law enforcement officers here use to keep us from getting footage of the haze. While they cannot legally stop us from filming, they can keep us away from the operations. Often, patrols will get stuck behind the last vehicle in the hazing operation, and the haze will become virtually invisible much of the way. That is not ideal for bearing witness to the rest of the world about what the state of Montana and the federal government are doing to wild bison.

We are dropped off near mile marker 4 of the Madison Arm Road, meaning four miles from U.S. 191 and just a little further to Yellowstone National Park on the other side of the road and Madison River. We are now in the middle of burnt forest; this is forest that burned only a few years ago. Beneath this forest of lodgepole pine trees is now a lot of vegetation. Though the Christian Mackay's and the Rob Tierney's (another livestock official) have tried to claim there is no bison habitat in these woods, it just isn't true. The buffalo love the burnt areas and find plenty of food growing in areas now exposed to the sun by the fire.

We set up a spot in the woods where we can hide but potentially still get footage of the haze when it arrives. For awhile, we have nothing to do but wait and talk while listening to grim reports from the radio. We talk about our sense that maybe we aren't doing enough for the buffalo, even if we succeed in getting the best footage possible. We talk about what else might be done. This happens between reports from the radio on the progress of the haze. We hear blurbs talking about how one of the hazed females has started to give birth right in the middle of the haze, how two grizzly bears are being caught up in the operations, about how more and more buffalo are getting caught up in it. Some of these buffalo have already been moved so many miles, and here the two of us are still recovering from a relatively short distance that was difficult enough for us (two people who had just run in a 10K race just a month before).

After awhile, we finally see some U.S. Forest Service vehicles, and then we see our first buffalo. Some look extremely tired, but further on they are forced to press. Babies abound; there are so many newborn calves in this haze that I can't keep track of them all. The only blessing is that I don't see any injured buffalo - which isn't to say that there aren't any. Last year, footage shows a newborn buffalo forced to march for miles with a broken leg.

Then, all of the sudden, there is a horse on top of us. As I have been looking through the video camera, I don't see the horse until it is within about 10 feet of me. We try to scatter quickly, but, of course, the agent sees us. He immediately issues us a lawful order to stay away from the haze. As that is rather vague, we continue to run a distance from the haze. The lawful order does us a favor because we are now moving to better positions to catch footage. Now, we can hear the helicopter, the horsemen (and women now) whooping and hollering. We can see the relentless push of the bison - yet so many are stopping for a brief second just to eat before being pushed further. Herds are being combined, family units are being consolidated and in many cases scattered. Just the day before, a cow and a calf were separated from the haze and forced off on their own where they had no choice but to fend for themselves - essentially grizzly bait.

The Fish, Wildlife & Parks agent who gave us the lawful order approaches again and has the nerve to tell us that all our running is spooking his horse and that we need to be further back; this isn't phrased as a lawful order, but we aren't taking any chances. I tend to think that he, the agent, is being spooked by our presence; with helicopter buzzing, bison running and grunting, horses neighing, and an operation that has no business being here, our running isn't spooking his horse! Give me a break. His horse should not be in that position in the first place; what a cruel thing to do to the horse. And, I don't believe it anyhow; his horse is spooked by the entire circumstance that he has put his horse into - whether it is because it is his job to do that or because he is a true believer in cruelty to bison.

In any event, the haze has now moved off the road, and we wait for vehicles to clear before crossing in pursuit. We lose time waiting, but we have little choice after these confrontations with the agent in the forest. We even see the car that was with us move on the road ahead of us. After they pass around a bend, we take off after the haze.

Again, the direction of the haze is easy to follow; vegetation was dead everywhere. I know that we cannot ascertain any feelings for all the dead plants, and so it becomes next to impossible to empathize with that whose feelings you cannot possibly fathom, but I become upset all the same. Cruelty to bison is something that might move you; how much does cruelty to the land move you? Should we just be running roughshod over anything that gets in our way just because we don't understand or appreciate its place in our universe?

We sometimes run and sometimes hike quickly over hills, over dead trees that had fallen all over the place, through muddy and trampled dirt. The helicopter looks like it's too far from us, and we again fear that we've lost the haze for good. Eventually, we hit the Madison Arm Road again. Just prior to that, I realized that we have been on something of a short cut. It was becoming clear to me that this was a haze determined to go all the way to Yellowstone because previous hazes had stayed close to the winding road; however, this one was showing no regard for the road - simply the shortest line to Yellowstone, whatever the terrain. So buffalo are having to move their relatively thin legs up and over a forest of fallen logs and up and down these hills. If any bison have fallen during this part of the journey, I cannot say, but it's hard for me to imagine given the terrain that accidents haven't happened.

Back at the road, we are a little discouraged because we are behind. Then, we notice behind us a Park Service vehicle leading our vehicle. Somehow, we have moved faster than our friends, though we had started out behind them. The man in the Park Service vehicle tries to play nice with us, expressing in a friendly tone, "You have covered a lot of ground today, haven't you?" I don't particularly care if he is being sincere, if he is trying perhaps to let us know that maybe he's not the biggest fan of the haze - something you hear is true of many rangers. The fact is that he is a part of it and helping to enable it. And, today just as much as yesterday or tomorrow, I don't want to hear friendly words from sympathetic and yet complying officers of the law. Until he stops, I perhaps am angrier with him than I am with every Christian Mackay in this world because I know that Christian is a true believer in his torture of buffalo; I know who he is and what to expect from him. But, we could deal with him if he and his ilk didn't have the support of the people who work for the National Park Service.

So, I ignore him and joined my friends in the vehicle. It looks like we are only an hour from our shift change, where we would be relieved from the field. I do not want to be relieved. Though I am tired and have already seen more cruelty than I had in my life, I don't want to abandon my post in the field. I know that my partner and I have perhaps a better chance than any other group in the field at keeping up; we just need another chance. Then, almost just as quickly as those thoughts leave my lips to my friends in the car, our chance comes. We saw the haze off the road across a field.

Out we go trying to catch up.

We run some more, and we keep gaining ground on the agents and the buffalo. It seems they are having more trouble. We are soon back into burnt forest, and the fatigued buffalo are becoming more aggressive. Individuals and small groups run in different directions; the whooping and hollering of the people on horses becomes more frantic. Horses race them down, and calves are run off of positions just as easily as the yearlings and adults. There is no regard for anything except moving these animals in the right direction. The helicopter continues to hover nearby; it seems it is driving another group of buffalo into the main haze group. Then, yes, it is obvious that it is.

All of a sudden, this group of buffalo being hazed by the helicopter starts to merge in with the main group, but they keep running. They are running straight toward the spot where we are standing. "Oh no!" or something like that I shout. It is extremely scary for us, and we have to scramble away as quickly as possible. If it's scary for us, it must be that much scarier for the buffalo who have just gone from a morning of peaceful grazing to this awful trail they are now blazing back into Yellowstone. Whenever I can, I film, but when buffalo are running straight toward you, you run just like they do, and you are thankful that someone has your back.

Our emotions continue to well up; it is getting harder and harder to contain them. Sometimes, I'm angry; more often I am intensely and emotionally sad for what the buffalo are going through. And, yet, my emotions are also mixed with more positive feelings. I am happy with our ability to catch up repeatedly with the haze, happy as I could be with the footage I have been getting, and extremely happy to be out there with someone who I can call a friend, who is feeling and seeing things the way I am, who is extremely empathic, who is extremely dedicated, and who can keep me running and moving and inspired to keep my wits about me. Nevertheless, mixed feelings are still being drowned in growing sadness.

We keep moving through burnt forest, now not falling behind but actually starting to move to the side of the haze. These animals are all exhausted, including some of the horses. I see an agent actually stop in the forest and tie up his horse while the others continue. We move forward, lose sight of the animals, but then notice that we are actually now in front of the haze at mile marker 1. In fact, we are now almost directly in front of the haze that is now back on the road.

I get my closest footage from this vantage. Buffalo after buffalo, now a much larger number than had started our day, move past the shot of my camera that I keep fixed on a spot. Newborn calf after newborn calf . . . Behind me, I can hear my patrol partner apologizing to each as she or he goes by. The group out front, not immediately being pushed, stops along the woods for grass. They keep congregating near me, and I realize a couple times that I need to keep moving back. I hear a yell about a bison getting close to me, and I retreat as quickly as I can, again so thankful to have my partner looking out for me. The same Fish, Wildlife & Parks agent that had given us the previous lawful order approaches us yet again, yelling that I had gotten too close and telling us that this would be the last lawful order he would give us about getting too close to the haze. We assume that he means it would be the last lawful order until we would both be arrested. Having a 2-year-old child and a significant other back at camp, I am in no mood to tempt fate, and neither is my partner. Our footage might be useless if we are pulled from the field by agents and our tape confiscated.

So, we keep as far away as possible, but sometimes we are accidentally close to the haze again. Near here the road veers away from the Madison River, and we accidentally keep veering toward the river. We end up along the shores about a half mile from U.S. 191. So, we hike until we reached the road, and I'm thinking our day is about to be done. When we reach U.S. 191, traffic is stopped in both directions. We catch a glimpse of the haze we've been diligently following forever and the buffalo being forced across U.S. 191; soon these animals would surely soon be forced across the Madison River and into Yellowstone National Park. Their journey is not nearly done, though.

Radio patrols ask us to move to the northeast bluffs of the Madison River on the other side of U.S. 191 and to the Yellowstone National Park boundary. As we hike up the hillside to the steep, tall, and sandy bluffs overlooking the Madison River, there is a feeling of spectacle and confusion. Cars are all around; locals and tourists alike are out with their cameras watching the hazing. A newborn calf and its mama head by themselves north on U.S. 191. To give them space, we actually go into the very wet and swampy area below the Northeast bluffs until we are sure we aren't disturbing them.

At this point, we're both physically tired - we've covered a lot of ground, but we still are hiking uphill to the top of the bluffs. The hope is to get a better view of the haze from on high. However, we yet again think that we are outside the main part of the action.

We hit the top of the bluffs when a local's chihuahua comes running at us threatening to attack us. After having survived too many close calls with buffalo running at me, I am both skiddish and yet bemused by the absurdity of this scene. We get around and make it to the park boundary. It's clear some of our friends are out on patrol from this point. The Park Service is also up there, and we run into the same guy who had tried to be nice to us from the vehicle. Here he told us that he knew of us and the lawful orders given to us and that we're the ones who have been out spooking horses. The suggestion seems to be that we had better be careful or else.

The helicopter continues to buzz around low to the ground. Surprisingly, he flies over us where we now spot a group of buffalo inside the park at the top of the northeast bluffs. The helicopter all by itself forces these buffalo on the hillside in the park to race down the very steep and very sandy bluffs into the water below and the woods on the other side. So, all the sudden, we are in another part of the hazing operations, and my camera is fixed on buffalo going down the side of a cliff. We move along the bluffs, now inside of Yellowstone National Park and where the buffalo have just been driven off; in the distance, we can see the main haze being moved down the Madison inside the park. You see, these operations don't stop at the park boundaries; they continue for miles and miles inside the park. There are often further hazing operations inside the park of buffalo that have never left it to make room for the buffalo being pushed in - this can go on well inside the Wyoming border within 10 miles of Old Faithful.

Five park rangers on horseback come up from behind us. At this point, we are frazzled and worried about getting arrested. To our luck, there are some teenagers and a woman (a longtime Buffalo Field Campaign volunteer who has just arrived) who serve as eyes and ears for us. They let us know about bison still on the bluffs that are close to us, about agents coming; they are a fantastic help to us. Our senses are shot; all I can hear playing over and over in my brain is the buzzing of helicopters, the whooping of agents on horseback, the babies marching over fallen logs, buffalo charging in our direction being chased by horses, and mamas and babies being separated from their families. What is immediately around me mixes in with all these very fresh images now burned forever in my memory.

Still, we move along the bluffs, now at a much slower pace due to our exhaustion. We still almost catch a group of horses and see yet another buffalo forced to race down the cliffs, apparently to funnel her into the Madison River valley. Down below we see the occasional mama and calf that hasn't yet been rounded up by the haze running scared in the forest below.

We stop, though, knowing we can't keep up with the fast pace of the Park Service horses as they mop buffalo into the river valley, knowing that we've reached our physical and emotional limits. We don't yet realize how far into the park we have hiked.

We finally get word that our shift is about to be over; the haze continues.

In the end, I don't know how far the haze went or for how long, but it was still going on when I left a couple hours later. My partner - my ever dearer friend - and I hiked back out and to the vehicle waiting to take us back to camp. It was filled with others who all had their own stories and perspective on the day. When we saw a group of buffalo on U.S. 287, a group I had briefly seen hazed the day before and who I had kept watch over for an entire night on the highway, I could no longer keep my emotions in check. Yet, I was too dehydrated for the tears to flow. I was crying without tears, and I couldn't take it emotionally anymore.

And, I've been in that place ever since.

Whatever good I took from the day - my ability to keep up with the haze, to work with a wonderful and amazing person, to stand bravely and take footage - was lost and has been lost in the powerful images that I'm remembering and desperately trying to paint for you with my words. I know these words fail; I knew they would fail before I tried. Yet, I have to try. I have to do anything I can to let you know about it, to let you know what these animals are going through. Because, if you are inspired, you will help them, help me help them, or work on something completely different with them in mind.

And, I've been gloomier and gloomier and sadder and sadder since. But, I am determined to write and do more.

There's still a lot of buffalo in Montana, and so hazing operations are no doubt going on right now as I'm writing. You may all wonder why this happens or expect me to go into the whole policy; I've done that before. The absurdity of the policy and the execution of the policy could take up accounts much longer than this one. But, it would be hard to understand even if the policy were the most sound policy you could dream up how the consequence would be this kind of cruelty and torture to these beautiful, roaming grass eaters. How can any of that matter to what I'm writing?

So, I have to hope what I'm doing means something and that I have the creativity to do more and the inspiration for others in joining me to do more. I know that I can't stop the state and federal government by myself; I need friends. I need partners. I need people who want to work with me. And, I need to overcome some of my own weaknesses.

Okay, writing has exhausted me, too. I'll leave my account at that and pray that you were not only touched but moved to act in some way as well. And for those of you reading who are acting, who are there far more than me, who have been far more dedicated than me, please help me be as strong as you are and as strong as those buffalo who keep you strong. Just as I needed her pulling me along by moving a little more quickly than I thought I could, I need all of you to do the same in your own ways.

Jim Macdonald
May 12, 2010
Bozeman, Montana

A newborn buffalo breathes (iconic?) significance into my disjointed narrative (of intimate specifics?)

A newborn buffalo breathes (iconic?) significance into my disjointed narrative (of intimate specifics?)

by Jim Macdonald (April 22, 2010)

We trudge through the mud and melting snow, feet thoroughly soaked, thinking mostly of the best route to a dry step. Then, we stop; we have to stop. Fifty yards away we see a small group of bison roaming slowly in our direction. We immediately scan trying to count, when I notice to my delight the smallest little buffalo calf I have ever seen. She or he is sucking milk from her mother. The calf is so newborn that afterbirth is still visible from the mother. Our hearts melt; we let out high-pitched cries of excitement. Tears almost start flowing from my face. Here are two of us witnessing a joyous day for the small group of buffalo, other expectant moms in their midst. The baby, whose legs look like little sticks, sucks milk, walks a few steps, then sticks her or his nose to the grass, before finally returning for another drink. The other buffalo, now aware of us, continue to eat grass and meander.

We get low and quiet, trying to take in the scene, excited and overwhelmed with emotions. However, the bison are in our path; we have to hope they continue to move because there's no good way around them. Because we are so wet, we plant ourselves on a dry patch of grass toward the edge of a steep hill. The herds keep moving, and there's occasionally tension between some of the buffalo cows, especially near the calf. In small little rushes, they creep closer and closer, pinning us into our location. I begin to become frightened and start gathering my things for further retreat. Then, the buffalo, agitated with each other, begin a quick jog right nearly on top of our position. To my chagrin, I'm now only 5-6 feet from the calf and two other buffalo. I let out a cry of "Oh no" as I fear being trampled, but they stop short, giving us time to scramble down a few more feet. Separated from some of our gear, other buffalo eventually stop nearly on top of it; our radio goes off while this is happening, and we fear that the buffalo will become spooked. Then, they plop down and sleep, leaving us 2 1/2 hours to wait for them to get up and move so that we can recover our stuff. We watch them sleep, some completely on their sides, and I wonder how they sleep without getting very uncomfortable from their horns. Are they about ready to give birth?

I could go on, but let me stop. I experienced all of this just two days ago on Montana's Horse Butte Peninsula just west of Yellowstone National Park. And, I think it's important to stop and understand the context of this situation. These 10 buffalo are some of the 3,000 or so wild bison that are usually not found in Montana, except in the spring time during calving season. By May 15, management plans decree that they will be forced to return back into Yellowstone National Park. Agencies including the Montana Department of Livestock; Montana Fish, Wildlife & Parks; the National Park Service, and the U.S. Forest Service will take these buffalo, newborn and all, using helicopters, ATVs, agents on horseback, and force them to march miles and miles back into Yellowstone. Newborn calves taking their first steps will be required to run the gauntlet; last year, video shows one of them being forced to march with a broken leg. Another agency, the U.S. Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) came to Horse Butte yesterday and took bull bison for a study. According to eyewitness reports, APHIS "first darts the bulls to inject a drug to knock them out, then collects their semen by inserting a large vibrating probe in their anus. Before injecting the downed bulls with the reversal agent that wakes them, they spray-paint a thick blue line across their magnificent hind quarters." APHIS has been doing this north of the park and now is disturbing the beautiful scene I described above.

In other years, this cruelty also includes slaughter of large numbers of the herds. The management plan for 2008 ultimately led directly to the death of more than 1,600 bison.

Why does this happen? The absurdities are for other essays; they have been talked about at great length by others.

I want to focus on where the unique presence of living and breathing buffalo finds life in a real moment couched within a cruel context, one that often has us look at bison as generalities at the expense of seeing them the specific way I did in my story. What I mean by that is so often we think of buffalo as iconic; we think of them merely as symbols perhaps of an America that used to be with 30-40 million bison roaming the Great Plains, an ancient beast of the past that we've memorialized in buffalo nickels, in state flags, on the very seal of the U.S. Department of Interior. And, even if we realize that buffalo are still around, we generalize them as I have in this sentence here. We talk about "the" buffalo, rather than this or that grouping of buffalo. Buffalo become nothing more than an idea, whatever you make of that idea - whether we are talking about the relationship with Plains tribes, or a healthier alternative to beef, or those animals that are commonly found all over the roadways of Yellowstone. We often idealize buffalo and yet forget that right now there's a calf that's not more than a few days old, taking in the cold night of Horse Butte, probably bedded against her or his mother, with no idea that maybe as early as tomorrow that that calf's herd will be forced on something akin to a Trail of Tears, only one that happens year after year after year.

It is not that buffalo are not iconic and that the relationships they hold to us aren't often true; it's that when we forget that there's a mama likely giving birth or about to give birth somewhere in those hills that you get to from Rainbow Point Road, outside of the manmade political boundaries of Yellowstone, we make these general notions of what buffalo are meaningless or altogether false. It is okay to wonder about the history of destruction of the bison as a story in a genocide that the general "we the people" have often failed to acknowledge, but when we don't see these buffalo snorting and peeing and chewing grass (or like the buffalo nearest our gear, making the chewing motion for hours without ever actually dipping her head to the grass), we aren't likely to grasp the presence of the story. What happens to the buffalo isn't simply an abstraction about yesterday that somehow relates to today; it's an abstraction about yesterday that is having real consequences now, has real actors right now, and is of urgency to those of us living and breathing with them right now.

Let me try to illustrate my general idea, my specific point with another story.

By day, the spot in the Porcelain Basin, within Yellowstone National Park's Norris Geyser Basin, could teem with tourists. For most, it was a spot of unearthly thermal activity and astounding colors. Imagine Venus, only with trees nearby; it seemed poisonous and unearthly, except for those trees growing where nothing organic seemed plausible, even if that seeming is actually untrue - the colors are caused by algae growing at different temperatures in the water of the thermal runoff.

However, at night, all we could see was the darkened outline of the boardwalk where we held each other tight, the clouds moving about, sometimes moving away enough to expose the moon. By moonlight, we could see darkened steam rise all around us. What was unmistakable was the popping and crackling of the geysers and thermal springs; we could hear the water rushing under us. Yet, most of all, we saw each other, two people daring to find a lonely spot at the end of this boardwalk. I saw her face, her arms, her legs. My own body felt sexual excitement, though I was embarrassed by it. You see, I had never even so much as kissed a girl. Here I was on only my second date with my new girlfriend (my second date ever with anyone); I couldn't possibly know that it wouldn't last much longer. This night, there was a kind of magic, holding her close, sharing stories, and feeling all the intensity one can feel when one's affections at last were met with affection in kind. Just before deciding to leave, she put her cold lips to mine twice. Yet, even as this chemistry between us was the only thing that mattered, I somehow doubt it would have meant the same thing without the boardwalks, without the cold air, without the shivering going on just above a cauldron of sizzling heat. This I knew was a special moment; these moments are far too few in life.

I was 20; it was June 1994. I will never forget it or the sour circumstances that followed. Four nights later on a different boardwalk and in a different geyser basin, she broke it off with me, saying she feared I could never be happy. That followed a few weeks later with the most intense depression of my life; a depression so deep that I had no interest even in killing myself - I had moved beyond that. When she left Yellowstone reasonably wanting nothing to do with me, I never saw or heard about her ever again.

Yet, for a night, the reality was intensely magical; longing for moments like that again - and I've had more than a few but not nearly as many as I would like - would drive me nearly insane more than once.

We can talk iconically of Yellowstone, of places - if you know them - like the Norris Geyser Basin, of first kisses, or first girlfriends. We can talk iconically of moments. Yet, how often do we really allow ourselves to search the intimacy of experience and to know Yellowstone, to know a geyser basin, to know a first kiss? Do we remember? I think we do often; we often have something in mind. Yet, we don't share, and we cloak ourselves in generalities, and we don't let ourselves deal with the reality of today, of how those pasts still are very present today. We bury and we run and we symbolize and generalize, but we disembody it. We don't dare share what it is we are feeling and experiencing, bottling it up - perhaps unable to express it, unable to share it. In my case, I know I am afraid right now; why else would I be driven to write an essay like this? I am afraid for that calf especially; however, I also fear for myself and wonder what sorts of things might accidentally trample me (how is that for cloaked metaphors and generalities? - I'll have to keep writing to do better).

And yet, we have to keep the narrative together - we have to see how the icon lives and breathes now, or how that living and breathing moment has a special significance. We have to see those 10 buffalo, that precious and sweet calf and her family, as breathing beings but also inside a context of now and of history that we cannot and must not ignore. And, we have to see our lives like that as well. We cannot run from these experiences just because they do not fit well with our current narrative; I doubt I could have written tonight if this thought didn't bother me greatly.

Truthfully, right now there are buffalo that need a break to go their way. They need agencies hell bent on pushing them cruelly back to stop, and they could use our help to stop them and recognize them as living and breathing and struggling right now. And, just as truthfully, it would help if we could see this situation as part of a longer narrative that we cannot ignore, that needs our care and attention. Just as I need to work out things in my past experience and incorporate that fully into the specifics of my current experience, just as we all do, I think in the course of doing that we can also weave in what's going on right now on Horse Butte.

I hope you're okay, buffalo! I will do whatever I can to help. And, as for the rest of the stuff I shared and why that would arise in the course of these thoughts, I think I'm ultimately getting at trying to live more magic moments. Starting with the buffalo and all the people who are seeing what I'm seeing would be an excellent place to start.

A critique of national parks as "America's best idea"

A critique of national parks as "America's best idea"
by Jim Macdonald

Anyone who has been watching the epic Ken Burns six-part documentary on PBS entitled The National Parks: America's Best Idea cannot help but be swept up by the places captured by his camera. When I see Yosemite or the Grand Canyon, I want to drop everything and plan my next adventure, discovering new places I have never seen. When I see familiar video and old pictures from my beloved Yellowstone, a flood of pleasant memories overwhelms me. For evoking such responses in a well-traveled man like me, for doing so to a large number of people for whom the national parks is but a sketchy mystery, Ken Burns should be applauded for that alone.

Ken Burns does many things well both at the sweeping level as well as in minute points (for instance, one I quickly noticed was in not sharing the discredited story that the national park idea was dreamed up at Madison Junction in Yellowstone back in 1870). What I'm writing from hereafter shall be critical, but I don't want to take more away than I will in the following paragraphs. By all means, if you've never visited a national park, if you want a basic primer on the history, if you want to see beautiful things and be inspired, please take the time to watch this documentary. I can't imagine watching it and not wanting to visit some of these places, not wanting to know them more, and not having a greater sense of many of the complicated issues that surround the parks. It is worth at least some of your time.

My biggest problem with The National Parks: America's Best Idea, filmed by Burns but written by Dayton Duncan, is that we are left with a generally positive view of American history. Whether we are talking about the "national park" idea itself, the process by which national parks were "saved," or many of the characters involved - coming to mind right now are Teddy Roosevelt and John D. Rockefeller Jr. - I am afraid to say that I believe that the story is far bleaker. That we can be inspired still by these lands is less a testament to the so called "national park idea" so much as the accidental force of American history that allows them to be temporarily saved while everything else is ripped to shreds.

Let's start with what it is to say that the national parks are America's best idea (although that view was qualified by one historian who suggested it was the second best idea). What does that really say if that's true about our country? It says to me that in a country that basically destroyed an entire continent, it found fit to preserve only the most spectacular landscapes and wildlife refuges it could find (and even then, only barely and not entirely). The "best idea" is that we didn't absolutely destroy every last inch of the place; we had destroyed Niagara Falls, cut down the eastern woodlands, turned the Great Plains into a dustbowl, forced native peoples to the point of extinction, killed almost every last buffalo, and nearly poisoned every stream looking for ore before then damming them. We poisoned the air, but we managed to save these last refuges by keeping them within the public domain. Wow, good on us! And, that says nothing about slavery, sexism, economic classism, and on and on.

Yet, when we "saved" some lands as national parks, Burns would have us believe that this a "movement" of preservationists, some enlightened people in government, and the fortuitous involvement of the railroads. A movement? In what sense? As noted in the documentary, the first mention of a "national park" was by the artist George Catlin, who wanted to close off the west so that native tribes could live as they had always lived. Yosemite was set aside as a state park as an obscure bill during the Civil War, on the pretense that the land was useless. The first national park, Yellowstone, was made a national park in large part because the Northern Pacific Railroad believed it could best profit off the park if it only had to deal with the government. Other parks were set aside often by the efforts of wealthy elites. John Muir is a nice voice to quote, inspiring many ultimately to see the national parks as a movement, but the truth is that parks were not set aside because there was a cogent "national park" idea, not because there was a strong impulse to protect the areas from capitalistic exploitation, not set aside because of the force of a movement, but they were set aside by the very same capitalistic, exploitative forces that were at the same time destroying everything else.

When Jay Cooke financed the Northern Pacific Railroad, at least until he went broke after in part causing the Panic of 1873, he understood that the railroad would be most profitable not by simply supporting extractive industries but also by promoting ridership, by promoting the places along the line that would be attractive. Yellowstone, i.e., Wonderland, was that place, and it was easiest to exploit in the hands of a single owner –in this case, the U.S. government - not in competing with local businesspeople who were already trying to set up shop before Yellowstone became a park (and even as it was being "discovered.") Burns, for his part, makes note of what the railroads were doing in the parks, but he fails to make as much of it as I think is necessary to understand the story.

My point is this: The railroads - the greatest forces of capitalism and destruction in the West - are both the destroyers and the saviors of wild lands. That is, it was not some interest against the grain of destruction that saved the national parks; it was the very same force that did both at the same time.

Another example of the destroyer being the savior was Gen. Phil Sheridan, often credited with having a large part of saving Yellowstone's bison herds and for pushing for the military rule that "saved Yellowstone." Sheridan had just finished destroying the buffalo herds he was about to save. The great slaughter of the 1870s of bison was policy of the U.S. government and of the military, and especially Sheridan and Gen. Sherman in particular. Market hunting on the plains was encouraged in order to starve native tribes and force them into government reservations, thus opening the land for settlement and clearing the way for the expansion of the railroads. It was the same total war strategy that Sheridan and Sherman used to win the Civil War. When the Texas legislature considered passing a law to stop the buffalo slaughter, Sheridan himself showed up to testify against it, saying that the hunters had done more to solve the Indian problem than anyone in the field of battle had ever done. Yet, when the buffalo were about to be destroyed for good, Sheridan shows up in Yellowstone to save them, teaming up with a Senator from Missouri who had supported the Confederacy - George Graham Vest. Why did Sheridan do that? Change of heart? A love of the "national park idea"? No, Sheridan, like most military commanders, believed that the military should control the West, not the Department of the Interior. The buffalo issue was a convenient wedge in the military power play. Yes, Interior was powerless to defend the buffalo, was corrupt in its collusion with the railroad companies, but it was the military that had overseen the policy destroying the herds in the first place.

So, the very same force in Phil Sheridan both destroyed and saved the buffalo.

We also find a similar story in Teddy Roosevelt, the man so eager to kill animals his entire life worked so hard to protect them from extinction. How can you kill animals if there aren't some left? That passes for enlightenment? Surely, it was a step above those who actually did kill animals all the way to extinction. Yet, Roosevelt's view, like that of Gifford Pinchot (his chief forester) was that wildlife and landscapes and forests and waterways were ultimately there to serve the good of the country. They are ultimately expressions of the nation itself. And, out of this manliness, this patriotism, we get what seems to be the paradox of protection and setting aside and reserving and sometimes even preserving. But, it's the very same force that calls on both. That's how Roosevelt could at once support a dam at Hetch Hetchy and support preserving the Grand Canyon as is; he operated from the very same idea in a way that could lead to multiple, apparently conflicting ends.

What I'm getting at is that in the Ken Burns view of history, dynamic people rise up within the American democracy and do dynamic things that have often had profoundly good, if complicated, effects on all of us who live now. These people see the problems and rise against the grain often to do things that are heroic. The national parks, in the view presented by Ken Burns, are that refuge, are that ingenious system blended by John Muir's ecstatic reverence and practical American know-how (think Stephen Mather or Horace Albright as examples) that have managed to use what's best of what's uniquely American to protect what's best so that we can now have these reservoirs (or perhaps, preservoirs) of inspiration as we face our current world dilemmas.

Yet, I'm here to tell you is that the same grain that committed genocide to our native peoples, that raped the land, enslaved other people, and continues to foul up our air and water is in fact the same grain that set these parks aside "for the benefit and enjoyment of the people" (unimpaired for future generations.)

John D. Rockefeller, Jr. anyone? Or, is my point clear?

Still, even if Burns is right and I am wrong, the original point would still be true. If the national parks are America's best idea, that would be a particularly sad state of affairs to admit about our history. It would be as if John Muir's worries about the impossibility of fighting those who would despoil everything were in fact correct. Surely, it would be a miracle if these lands survived much longer under such an onslaught. In fact, they survive as well as they do because they are outgrowths of the same corrupt, exploitative system and are simply a part of it. It didn't hurt that Mather and Albright really did find a way for millions of people to "see America first" (to borrow the slogan of the Great Northern Railway).

Unfortunately, it's not enough that these places have been set aside. Ecosystems are far larger than park boundaries; animals trapped within them ultimately don't help these parks flourish. I'm thinking particularly of the dynamics of wildlife in Yellowstone and the suffering of its northern range, of buffalo not allowed to re-establish habitat, of wolves and grizzly bears. Perhaps, it would be good enough to protect parks simply to let the story of our country play out, but over time, it won't work. You can save the boundary, but you won't save the land (even without another Hetch Hetchy dam).

So, the hard truth I'm ultimately driving at is that the force of American history is bound to undermine those things that it has managed to set aside. Even though we can admit that there are some accidental preservation that's bound to happen within even the most ruinous system, it won't work. Nature is not a parcel; it cannot flourish simply by setting aside refuges. That is to say, even at its best, the national park idea is not a particularly good idea. Whether we are talking about people acting against the force of American history or in concert with it, it ultimately cannot be positive simply to set land aside within a political boundary. In the short term, yes, I can and have been inspired to ecstasy like John Muir, drawn into the magic, understood the power of place, and been replenished time and time again. However, for the buffalo that face slaughter or forced movement every year, for native peoples who have lost their connection with wildlife and land essential to their self-identity, the present is already a disaster of sorts. Time will only erode things more, the only hope being that the system that confines beauty within national park boundaries disappears faster than the parks themselves. The hard truth is that we who have been called Americans come to terms with our truth, that we haven't been a particularly good people, at least to our land, at least to people not counted as among our own. Perhaps, this is true the world over - I suspect it is - but in the caste we've been placed by Thomas Jefferson and others, it most certainly is.

If we don't come away from the national parks without a profound sense of despair conjoined with our wonder, I don't know if we've really understood what it is to see both the Lower Falls plunge into the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone and it's multi-colored walls within the same land where buffalo are routinely rounded up and shipped to a slaughterhouse in order to protect the interests of the livestock industry. The very same forces at work in the very same place, and we have every reason to be appropriately inspired and pained.

There are no uniquely American forces to join in the quest for preservation, or for encouraging a president with the flick of his pen to do so. That force, if it exists, rests with a fundamental change in the way we look at land and people and the way we've organized both within this nation; it is even to question the nation itself, not just this nation, but any and all that would claim a land as its own to do with as it pleases.

As I write, I wonder if I am one with the very same forces of American history or someone set against it. Somehow, I doubt as a single writer that I am a force at all, not until I and that writing am attached to an actual movement. I'd suggest an actual movement, not the one imagined by Burns, actually begin.

From within the cauldron of boiling pools under the stars, we imagined we were alone and in love. Then, the man in green and brown approached before nicely kicking us out. "It's for your protection; it's for the good of your park," he informed us. I understood what he was driving at from within his world, but I couldn't help wonder if it might be different if .... And, if more inspired, ecstatic voices wonder along, then maybe ... well, until, that supervolcano goes off, anyhow.

Tom Hoyle's firsthand account of the rescue on the Firehole last week

A couple days ago, I shared with you quite a rescue story on the Firehole River, a story that hasn't been otherwise reported out of the park office or in Yellowstone.

Another person who was there, Tom Hoyle, shared his version with me by email and gave me permission to post what he shared with me verbatim. Thanks, Tom!

Here it is:

***

I was also involved in the rescue at the Firehole River as was my son Jeff and son-in-law Rick Wenger. We were in the river at the bottom of the first set of cascades where the river sinks into the Firehole canyon. We were right next to the eddy at the bottom of the falls just getting out of the water when we see a blond haired boy pop up from the eddy and scramble out of the river. He was very concerned about losing his mothers shoes!!!. We realized in about two seconds that he came thru the cascading falls. I immediately ran up the hill slightly the boy concerned that someone might try to follow him. As I crested the hill and could see the river I saw two others people in the swift water. A man ans a teenage boy. Andrew, the boy, was at the brink of the falls in a sitting position facing downstream. I asked him if he was OK and he said he was fine. I them went a little upstream and asked the man (Andrew’s father) if he was OK and he said the “he couldn’t hold on much longer” At that point I ran halfway down the hill and yelled for my son and son-in-law to come quickly. The river was very shallow where the man was – about 12 to 18 inches but also very swift. At first we tried to pick up a long lodgepole pine pole but it wasn’t long enough. And the river was too swift to hold hands to form a human chain. Several others arrived to help. We asked for someone to call 911. I was just going to run to my car to get a rope when someone showed up with a long yellow tow strap. On the fourth attempt one of the young men was able to get the strap to the father in the water. We (probably 5 or more men) walked out in the water to get the father. I was first and grabbed his wrist but I also fell down in the swift moving water. We all pulled and got the father out of harm’s way in short order probably no longer than 10 minutes. He was is good shape and went to the small hill above the river where his son was perched in the rocks.

We then focused our attention on Andrew in the river. We talked to him and again he said that he was stable and had a good perch in the river with his feet and legs holding him there. Another person showed up with a small (3/8”) rope which was thrown upstream of Andrew and he got it on the first throw. We then had him tie it around his chest and secure it. At some point about this time another man showed up who identified himself as a rescue ranger at McKinley park. He tied the rope off to a long (60’) log that was by our feet parallel to the river and part in the water and the larger trunk out of the water. At this point we felt good the we had the 15 year old Andrew somewhat safe. A few on the bank above us were yelling at us to just pull him in. But with the angle that the rope was to the river as soon as we pulled he may have gone partially over the first falls. We let his father make the decision to wait for help to arrive. Rangers started to show up and prepare for the rescue. We asked for a life vest which we were able to slide down the rope attached to Andrew. Later we did the same thing with a ranger’s helmet. At this point we felt that we had a good backup plan to bring him to safety if he slipped into the river. We also suggested that the rangers set up a team downstream at the bottom of the cascade which I assume they did. As Robert said we waited for a very long time for the park rescue ranger to enter the water. As we talked to the rescue ranger his plan was to tie on to the boy and then cut our rope free and be pulled in by the upstream rangers on the end of the rope. As it turned out the water was too deep and too swift and the ranger started to slide into our rope. At that point the ranger grabbed the boy and started to head to the side of the river. I had earlier put on a life vest on and had swapped places with Robert and had a very good view of the rescue. I could see the rescue ranger with his arm around the boy. However the boy’s face was clearly visible to me under about a foot of water. We very quickly pulled the boy and ranger to the river's edge and got the boy safely on shore. When the ranger (this was a very strong guy) got out of the water he just sat on a log and was breathing heavily. Clearly this used a lot of energy. A few minutes later I looked at Andrew sitting on a log with a blanket over him shivering uncontrollably. This part of the Firehole River is quite warm but it still cools the body down.

A word about Robert. For most of the wait time he was first on the line and talking to Andrew and was able to keep focused for a long period. He did an outstanding job. I believe that he is a police officer

I was also happy to have my son Jeff and son-in-law Rick with me as they are very athletic and were a great help when needed. My grandson Bradley Wenger (7) was there but left the area with Jeff when the rangers cleared the rescue site of extra people.

The rescue ranger from McKinley was very professional and a perfect person to have assist. He made a lot of suggestions which most were accepted by the park rangers. He is the type of person that you would want to lead a crew if you were in trouble.

Another person in the water was a trauma nurse who did some mountain climbing. He provided good suggestions and support also. I believe it was his life jacket the we put on Andrew.

I’m not sure but I believe that 45 minutes was in waiting for the right diameter and length of rope to arrive. The Yellowstone team were well organized and very professional. The ranger doing the rescue was definitely the right man for the job, Smart, strong and able.

Andrew and his brother (who went down the falls) and family are from Iowa. Andrew was attending a rigours wrestling camp in Montana prior to there visit to Yellowstone.

My son Jeff talked to Andrew's brother that went through the cascade. He told my son Jeff that he almost gave up as he couldn't catch a breath and thought that he would sink to the bottom but just put in an extra effort. We were glad he did. It is one thing to help in a rescue and quite another to recover a body.

Yellowstone is a beautiful area but the rivers and hot pots and animals have to be respected.

The names and addresses of all people involved in the rescue were recorded by the park rangers

Tom Hoyle retired engineer (age 63), Richland, WA

What it was like to volunteer with Buffalo Field Campaign

A small group of us with Buffalo Allies of Bozeman went down to volunteer with Buffalo Field Campaign on Saturday. I'm going to share a little here so that you know how easy it is to do and how much fun besides.

Buffalo Field Campaign lives west of the park near Hebgen Lake and is mostly comprised of volunteers, a number of whom spend November through May looking out for the bison populations roaming out of Yellowstone. Because buffalo that leave Yellowstone are not generally tolerated by the state of Montana and have been subject to killing and hazing (or forced movement) in large numbers, Buffalo Field Campaign was founded to stand up for the wild buffalo of Yellowstone. Their primary focus is media and outreach, documenting what happens to the buffalo and educating the public at large in the hopes that the slaughter stops and that buffalo are respected and treated as wildlife, i.e., without being forced to stop at the arbitrary boundary of Yellowstone National Park. Buffalo Field Campaign was founded in the winter of 1996-1997, during one of the worst buffalo slaughters on record.

Our group, Buffalo Allies of Bozeman, was founded by a small group of us in Spring 2008 during the worst slaughter of wild buffalo since the 19th century, and we were founded in large part to serve as a locally-based support group for other activists, including and especially Buffalo Field Campaign, working on the buffalo issue. We are in part here to help with the needs of other groups working on the buffalo issue.

One goal that I have always had is to empower local people to take action on behalf of the buffalo. From my years in the anti-war movement, I became convinced that local movements have the greatest power to bring about change and are the most sustainable. Whereas national organizing can bring an issue to large numbers of people, often the participation is passive. People think that action amounts to signing petitions and giving money, but no one is expected to put their heart and soul into it. So, when I lived in Washington, DC, I did not know how you could be an anti-war activist and not take action with the oppressed communities in your locality. We spent a lot of time in our activism not simply marching but also serving the homeless community; we spent time trying to understand how militarism affected our neighborhoods. Being in Gallatin County, Montana, we are drawn necessarily to our environment, to what lives in our environment, and one crucial part of that is the buffalo.

The point I am trying to make is that Buffalo Field Campaign has often depended on volunteers from across the country and across the world, sometimes from across Montana, but the Gallatin Valley has not always been a ready participant in buffalo activism. Bozeman has the reputation of a sleepy town of recreational enthusiasts and college students but certainly not social and environmental activists. However, if I am right about the ultimate need for local empowerment to local causes, then the success of the movement for wild buffalo will depend a lot on our success in Bozeman, the largest population center close to the wild buffalo migrating from Yellowstone National Park.

That's why we organized a number of us to go down to Buffalo Field Campaign to ski and look for buffalo.

This winter, only two buffalo have been killed. One was a buffalo in Idaho back in the fall; the other was killed on the first day of Montana's bison hunt in November. Outside of that, bison have simply not left the park and have not really come close. Two hypotheses have been offered: 1) Last year's record kill have left fewer bison to leave the park; 2) The mild winter has left grass plentiful and easily accessible within the park.

Nevertheless, we felt it important to go down to Buffalo Field Campaign anyhow because we want to build a base of people who can be volunteers that can be called on when necessary. We also want this base of volunteers to be able to educate the general public here in Bozeman about what it's like in the field with buffalo and how people can take action on their behalf. Before this fall, none of us who went down on Saturday could have told you much of anything about what it was like or how to take action. Now, we feel we understand enough that we could hold our own workshops to let people know what it is like. In fact, on December 6, we did just that, after Mark from our group (whose picture you see) took the first steps for us.

Volunteering with Buffalo Field Campaign is a lot of fun. At the very least, it's a ski trip into the Yellowstone borderlands in the world's most beautiful place. Saturday was quite sunny, and the snow was pristine, fields of white going on forever.

When you volunteer with Buffalo Field Campaign, they like to know when you are coming to give them a heads up of what to expect. When you arrive, one of the volunteers will give you a tour of their grounds and how they operate, and you are bound to meet several people. There are usually somewhere between 10 and 30 volunteers living there from anywhere ranging from days to months. It's quite an operation and worth seeing. A lot of camp life obviously involves keeping the camp going. Every day, meals have to be prepared, grounds have to be cleaned, there are maintenance chores. If you come to Buffalo Field Campaign and have a particular skill - like say, fixing cars - you will find something to do that does not involve going out into the field with buffalo. Whatever skill you have - whether you think it's relevant or not - Buffalo Field Campaign can probably find a use for it.

However, a great many people coming down want to go into the field. Before that happens, you have to understand what the campaign does and what its tactics are. As I mentioned, Buffalo Field Campaign is primarily a media campaign. When crews go out into the field, they take with them video cameras and radios in order to record and report what is happening. The campaign is nonviolent and nonconfrontational; they are there to document. If people want to take other kinds of actions - like for instance, setting up a blockade to stop a Montana Department of Livestock agent from reaching a buffalo - that is something you will do on your own. Actually, Buffalo Allies of Bozeman would support you - talk with us! - but is not what the campaign does when they are in the field.

When you are ready to go into the field, and assuming there is snow on the ground like we had, Buffalo Field Campaign has you covered. I had my own set of boots and skis and was ready to go, but some in our group needed boots and skis. They'll do their best to set you up, though the truth is that they could use more bindings, boots, and even skis. One of our group repeatedly had an issue with his boots coming out of the bindings. One thing we can do in Bozeman is to provide ski equipment to BFC. However, if you don't have skis, that should not stop you. And, if you have never skied, that shouldn't stop you, either! One person in our group had only skied once while another hadn't skied since childhood, and yet within no time they were on their skis moving forward. There are patrols to flat areas, as well as very hilly areas, and what's more, you will always be paired with an experienced Buffalo Field Campaign volunteer.

If the snow isn't good, people snowshoe. If there's no snow, they hike. Patrols on the west side of the park go along the Madison River at the park boundary, to lowlands near the Department of Livestock's Duck Creek trap, as well as to high overlooks like Sandy Butte. In our case, we went to the top of Sandy Butte, from which you can see the entire Madison valley inside the park. Sandy Butte is quite high, and though none of us were especially experienced skiers, most of us made it up. There we saw about four (perhaps, as many as six) buffalo, all of them small dots on the landscape, the largest small dot below us on Duck Creek, still about two miles from the park boundary. Apparently, buffalo have made it repeatedly to that spot without daring to venture closer to the park boundary. Though the buffalo weren't near, we were encouraged by seeing any at all, especially from such a stunning point.

In the nearby distance, we heard the roar of snowmobiles, sounding like the Daytona 500 or a plague of locusts. It was quite a contrast in worlds and cultures, separated by the well marked park boundary.

In any event, we had a blast on skis and returned to camp. When you return, you will be encouraged to stay for dinner, which they will provide. Dinners generally consist of vegan, vegetarian, and wild game alternatives. There's always plenty to eat. Before or just after dinner, every night, the group has a meeting, where they share their patrols and make sure that volunteers cover the tasks for the next day. People will be encouraged to share their experiences on the patrols and be part of whatever decisions need to be made at the meeting.

Obviously, Buffalo Field Campaign would like people to stay the night and continue to volunteer. But, just as obvious, people in Bozeman much more often than not will need to return to their homes. However, each time you return, each time the people and places become more familiar to you, the more useful you will become as a volunteer. At this point, we in Buffalo Allies are mostly just tourists on skis, but we are getting information and experience that will continue to help us help Buffalo Field Campaign and the buffalo.

I can say very sincerely that this is a very delightful experience that people should be encouraged to have. If someone wants to go up next week, we might be willing to go with you. And, if by chance we can't, we could tell you everything and set you up with the volunteer coordinators.

In the spring, the buffalo will come out of the park to calve. They are likely to face troubles then, especially if they are in no hurry to return to the park. We can do something about this and be a positive force for the buffalo and a steady source of solidarity for Buffalo Field Campaign. Please consider joining us as we work to make that happen.