As we read the paper each day, we specifically look for articles that spend YOUR TAX DOLLARS. We look for the reasons why those dollars are being spent and how it effects property rights. In today's King County Journal there were two articles of direct interest, both effecting your property rights. The first article was governmental entities arguing over how much of the King Conservation District Money each will get and the autonomy each district will be allowed to exercise in the spending of YOUR MONEY to save salmon. The headline read:

In the King County Conservation article, they are talking about a paltry $5,800,000, which of course is chicken feed in comparison to other projects, like Ron Sims' request for $355,000,000 of YOUR TAX MONEY to attend to river levies to protect 25,000 acres of King County flood plain. 25,000 acres is about 2% of the total land area of King County and works out to a cost of over $14,000 per acre, which Ron wants of YOUR TAX MONEY. Ludicrous!

All of this saving-salmon stuff is driven by the Federal Endangered Species Act (ESA) and this is the same Act that wiped out over 40,000 logging jobs, lumber processing mills and wood products employees by designating the Northern Spotted Owl (NSO) as endangered, when in fact the NSO was endangered for purely natural reasons that had absolutely nothing to do with logging or loss of habitat. This is the same Act that drove the State Fish and Wildlife Department to fine and possibly throw in jail, one Gwen Bartol (Covington, WA-K/C Journal, Sunday, July 16th 2006) for daring to clean up her property around a salmon-bearing stream. This is the same Act that drives state (the GMA) and local governments (the CAO) to take away your property rights. This same Act, over 31 years old, has maybe saved 10 species out of over 1,300 listed as endangered. But this same Act has done more damage to property rights than almost any single act of the U. S. Congress. And the U. S. Congress has just renewed this abject failure of legislation, when it should have been repealed outright.

But there was another article in the King County Journal this morning about the Puget Sound Partnership (PSP) (https://www.pugetsoundpartnership.org/) which I have written about before. The PSP is Queen Gregoire's pet baby to "Save Puget Sound" with YOUR TAX DOLLARS. Unfortunately, we are unable to provide a link to the specific article because it was taken from the Associated Press. However, what we can provide is their budget. The article says they are going to spend $150,000,000 in the next two-year budget cycle, but their website says something QUITE different. Take a look at their budget at:

In our first e-mail message on PSP (5-26-06) we said: We just recently sent an e-mail to the entire Washington State legislature about WWRC, Washington Wildlife Recreation Coalition (https://www.wildliferecreation.org/) a government organization that has spent over $360,000,000 over the last 10 plus years of OUR tax money, to buy up 150,000 acres of private land for some nefarious, radical environmentally driven, reason. NO RESPONSE from any one legislature. Not one.

Now we discover that our illustrious governor has established the Puget Sound Partnership,

(See https://www.pugetsoundpartnership.org/legislative/papers/Treasure@Risk.pdf)

with a beginning cost of $42,000,000 (for planning and ramp up of course) and a 2005 - 2007 biennial budget of just under $572,000,000. That's over a half a billion dollars my learned representatives and senators. Here is the organizations proposed budget (pdf). Take a look. It should blow your socks off. But Hey. What's a few billion here and there.

1. What will the health of Puget Sound be by 2020, if we do nothing? A very important question before spending billions of dollars on clean up. Mother nature has ways of "healing itself".

2. When is the City of Seattle going to stop flushing its collective toilet into Elliot Bay, every time a major rain storm overflows the sewer system into the storm drains? Another very important question.

3. What affect does British Columbia's City of Victoria flushing its untreated collective toilet into the Straits of Juan de Fuca, have on the overall health of Puget Sound?

I'm sure that there are many more questions that could be asked before spending $572,000,000 of OUR TAX MONEY, but PSP is on a fast track. Queen Gregoire and her covey of special interests and so-called stakeholders, are going to shove this tribute to her legacy down your collective throats. They will use every trick in the book and some blatant propaganda, spending YOUR TAX MONEY, to convince you that this tribute to her legacy is in your best interests, no matter how much you have to pay, or how many freedoms you have to give up.

I'm not saying that we shouldn't do some important things to make sure Puget Sound stays reasonably healthy, but a true cost/ benefit analysis must be applied to the most important of those priorities. Stopping the Seattle and Victoria BC collective toilet flush could go a long way towards this goal. But what they will do instead is to put more restrictions on land development by stopping any new on-site sewage treatment systems and spending millions more working out a monitoring system for on-site systems, giving government more authority to trespass on your property.

In the final analysis, all of this control over your lives and your property is being funded by YOUR TAX MONEY. Until WE THE PEOPLE take back control of our government and OUR TAX MONEY, this travesty of lost freedoms and property rights will continue unabated. Government is hopelessly out of control and WE THE PEOPLE let them get there, using OUR TAX MONEY as their weapon.

"The brutal reality is that only a ground swell of national rural outrage will reverse the course of socialism and environmental extremism in America and return us to a Constitutional Republic. Farmers, ranchers and rural landowners can and should be the catalyst to incite that outrage because they are being required to bear the entire brunt of environmental protection, while city folk get off scot-free. Rural landowners own the 'land' and the 'land' is their power, if they will use that power ……. before they lose it forever." Ron Ewart

“There are those that recognize danger and act. There are those who "see" it, but do nothing. But unfortunately there are way too many of those who don’t "see" anything at all.” Ron Ewart

Ron Ewart, President

NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF RURAL LANDOWNERS

P. O. Box 1031, Issaquah, WA 98027

425 222-4742 or 1 800 682-7848

(Fax No. 425 222-4743)

Website: www.narlo.org

"THE NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF RURAL LANDOWNERS"

The National Association of Rural Landowners (NARLO) is a non-profit corporation, duly licensed in the State of Washington. It was formed in response to draconian land use ordinances that were passed by King County in Washington State (Seattle) in the late Fall of 2004, after vociferous opposition from rural landowners. NARLO's mission is to begin the long process of restoring, preserving and protecting Constitutional property rights and returning this country to a Constitutional Republic. Government has done a great job of dividing us up into little battle groups where we are essentially impotent at a national level. We will change all that with the noisy voices and the vast wealth tied up in the land of the American rural landowner. The land is our power, if we will just use that power, before we lose it. We welcome donations and volunteers who believe as we do, that government abuses against rural landowners have gone on for far too long and a day of reckoning is at hand. To learn more, visit our website at www.narlo.org.

President Roosevelt, in his 1933 inaugural address said, “…. The only thing we have to fear is fear itself”. I maintain that the only thing we have to fear is unbridled government. The only way unbridled government can exist is if WE THE PEOPLE allow it. Unfortunately, we have.