◄►◄❌►▲ ▼▲▼ • BNext New CommentNext New ReplyRead More
I spotlighted the neon green radical-led White House ocean grab last week that is undermining the health of the fishing industry.
On Thursday, a fleet of fishermen will gather at Martha’s Vineyard to protest Obama’s destructive eco-policies.
It’s just one more wave of the citizen backlash by thousands of victims of the White House war on jobs (flashback: Pushing back: Thousands of Obama’s drilling moratorium victims rally in La. ).
From the Gloucester Daily Times via the Boston Herald:
Leaders of the recreational and commercial fishing industry are planning a boat protest against federal policies Thursday outside the harbor of Vineyard Haven on Martha’s Vineyard, where President Obama and his family are summer vacationing.
The protest is being organized after a bipartisan, bicameral coalition of federal lawmakers — including the core of the President’s Congressional base on banking and health care issues — have given up hope of working productively with Obama’s top appointee for oceans and fisheries, Jane Lubchenco, who heads the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
Boats from Gloucester and New Bedford, the hub ports of New England, Point Judith, R.I., and New York and New Jersey are expected, according to Tina Jackson, president of the American Alliance of Fishermen.
…A co-organizer is the Recreational Fishermen’s Alliance, the lead organizing group behind the national protest outside the U.S. Capitol in February that drew as many as 5,000 demonstrating against federal policies seen as heavily tilted against the industry and unduly swayed by non-government environmental organizations.
Since her appointment to head the NOAA by President Obama, Lubchenco, who had been an officer of the Environmental Defense Fund and a leader of the Pew Oceans Commission, has pushed to convert the fisheries into commodities markets under a management system known as catch shares.
In a statement to the Times soon after her confirmation by the Senate, Lubchenco’s office said her goal was to see a “significant fraction of the vessels … removed.”
With the stocks rebuilding strongly, fishermen wonder at the need to reduce the size of the work force.
More here from the New Bedford Standard-Times, which reports that organizers expect as many as 100 boats to join the fishing flotilla.
