This American classic is said to represent the “essence of the American wilderness . . . a creature of great beauty . . . its presence is captivating . . . powerful and imposing, and at times dangerous.”
The National Wildlife Federation press release was referring to grizzly bears. It might have been referring to Rep. Helen Chenoweth.
Chenoweth, 59, is an Idaho Republican whose views can be so strident she makes many Idaho Republicans look like limp-wristed Democrats on Nantucket. The divorced grandmother lived for many years in a mountain mining town, is charming, engaging and as hard-core right-wing as one can get.
She’s a velvet howitzer with a “Stepford Wives” glare.
Irate with the government’s declaring Idaho salmon an endangered species, she held “endangered salmon bakes.” Militia members love her, ever more when she declared that bona fide frustration inspired the Oklahoma City bombing. She said a Forest Service affirmative-action plan for northern Idaho is wayward because Hispanics don’t like the cold.
She was one of 15 Republicans voting against reopening the government in 1996. She pushes bills to force federal agents to get written approval from local sheriffs before entering towns. Indeed, she disdains the feds, almost as much as allegedly left-wing conservation groups.
Almost as much as she hates grizzly bears.
I was ignorant of this antipathy until stumbling into her bravura performance only days before Congress split for its long, unjustified summer vacation.
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At about 11 p.m. one evening, Chenoweth went to the well of a virtually empty House of Representatives and held forth for 40 minutes on grizzly bears. She ended with a unique challenge to colleagues, but she started like this:
“I would like to begin my comments tonight, Mr. Speaker, with a joke. A preacher was being chased down the mountain by a grizzly bear. Just as the bear was about to catch him, the preacher fell to his knees and made a plea to God. He said, `Oh, Lord, I implore you to make a Christian out of this bear.’ Shortly after this prayer, the grizzly bear immediately fell to his knees and proclaimed, `Dear Lord, please bless this food I am about to eat.’
“Mr. Speaker, that was a joke, but, unfortunately, what I am about to share with members tonight is not a joke, it is reality. I rise this evening to speak about the proposed introduction of these man-eating animals in my state.”
What followed was so engrossing, I skipped my nightly ritual of staring at ESPN’s “SportsCenter.”
“I will tell the members straight out,” she asserted, that the introduction of grizzlies by the Fish and Wildlife Service would “shut down human activity” in a Western area so big it could encompass Connecticut, Delaware, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Vermont and Rhode Island (she unveiled a dandy, red-colored map there to prove it).
In bemoaning this “huge and dangerous problem,” she told blood-soaked sagas of grizzlies run amok. An Alaskan elk hunter having part of a bicep bitten off. A woman losing her nose. A Montana teenager finding his head in a bear’s mouth and then losing a large chunk of skin and muscle under an arm and down a thigh.
For her, introducing the bears into Idaho “is like pouring toxic substances into a water supply.” She bashed the federal government and “extremist” environmental groups as the culprit.
Before we get to her dare to members, a few facts:
The grizzly bear was listed as an endangered species in 1975. There once were 100,000 in the lower 48 states; now there are perhaps 600. It’s an adaptable animal, able to live anywhere from the Arctic to Mexico, but its reproductive rate is low and propensity to come into conflict with human beings high, and when it does, it usually loses.
After years of haggling, the government announced a plan to reintroduce grizzlies into six large areas out west, including wilderness in central Idaho. The Idaho area is the biggest block of potentially good habitat, meaning roadless country with minimal potential conflicts with humans.
The Idaho political establishment went bonkers. Politicians, and many others, don’t want bears anywhere. Bears give people the creeps, though they are an important part of Americana and saving them might be one of the greatest conservation victories ever.
Further, the risk to people seems minuscule, certainly less than encountering a teenage thug on a city street. The government’s rough idea is to capture about three or so in each of the next three to five years and move them into the six areas. It then would hope that grizzlies meet and mate.
Over the next 50 to 100 years, if lucky, one might wind up with 250 to 300 bears, said Tom France, senior counsel for the National Wildlife Federation in Missoula, Mont.
France symbolizes the goody-two-shoes conservationists Chenoweth hates, but he also may blow her argument to smithereens. That’s because of a potentially path-breaking alliance he helped craft with the timber industry Chenoweth once served as a lobbyist.
Realizing public unease over the proposed reintroduction, France began discussions with the industry. “The industry is somewhat more sophisticated than the Idaho political delegation,” he said.
Together, they developed a proposal to give the government proposal a new legitimacy and respectability.
Under a compromise they reached, the government, which France concedes is often inept and insensitive to local concerns, still would be in charge and manage the species. But the bargainers devised a citizens management component.
The governors of Idaho and Montana would appoint a citizen council to be involved intimately in the reintroduction. The federal government would handle day-to-day management, but a local committee would oversee a range of issues, including safety and sanitation standards, as well as local acceptance of a deadly predator in their midst.
France thinks their accord may be a model for future conservation attempts. His view is echoed by Bill Mulligan, owner of a small sawmill in Kamiah, Idaho, who helped bargain for the industry.
Mulligan is no closet liberal. He is a Cheno- weth constituent and supporter. He agrees with her on most matters, but thinks she is simply off base on this.
“I understand where she comes from,” he said last week. “But, we have crafted a unique solution that not only moves the grizzly bear issue but other land-management issues in a collaborative way. It could signal the beginning of how we deal with tough resource-based issues in the West.”
Now, for the Chenoweth challenge.
She concluded her harangue by asking that “any member of this chamber, whether they are Democrat or Republican, Eastern or Western, conservative or liberal, if faced with the possibility of having Ursus horribilis introduced into their district I would be happy if they would stand up and vigorously object to this.”
“If there is one in this body who feel that they could defend having the bears in their district, please see me, and I think we can arrange something.”
Interesting. So last week, I called freshman Democrat Rod Blagojevich, who represents the North Side of Chicago.
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What about introducing grizzlies in his district, to some place other than Lincoln Park Zoo?
“Well, we could swap Brian McRae (underperforming Chicago Cubs player traded Friday) for a grizzly bear,” he said.
He was reminded Wrigley Field is in Rep. Sidney Yates’ district, not his.
“But I have the parking lots on the other side of Clark Street,” Blagojevich said. “We could put them there, and still light a fire under the Cubs. The team desperately needs some ferocity.”