"Hunters in Wisconsin killed more than 200 wolves last week, far exceeding the state’s limit as they scrambled to take advantage of Trump-era wildlife rules..."

"... that they worry may be tightened by the Biden administration. At least 216 wolves were killed in less than 60 hours, exceeding the state quota of 119 and prompting Wisconsin to end what was meant to be a one-week hunt four days early.... Environmentalists... said the large number of wolves killed in such a short time underscored the need for President Biden to put the gray wolf back on the list of animals protected under the Endangered Species Act. 'These animals were killed using packs of dogs, snares and leg-hold traps,' Kitty Block, chief executive of the Humane Society of the United States, said on Tuesday. 'It was a race to kill these animals in the most cruel ways.'... The resurgence of wolves in certain parts of the country has been called a success story for conservationists. But as their numbers grew, ranchers have had to contend with wolves’ appetite for cattle and sheep. Conservationists counter that wolves keep deer, elk and other species in check and therefore help prevent more vegetation loss.... Hunter Nation said the large number of wolves hunted in such a short period of time showed that the population had 'significantly increased.' The group said that in 2014, it took two months for hunters to kill about 100 wolves. 'This season it took just three days!'... Richard M. Esenberg, a lawyer for Hunter Nation, said it was misleading for animal rights activists to claim that hunters had killed double the number of wolves allowed by the state. The state had set a quota of 200 wolves, with 119 for hunters who applied for permits with the department and 81 set aside to the Ojibwe Tribes under their treaty rights.... But the tribes consider wolves to be sacred and made a deliberate decision not to hunt them, said Dylan Jennings, a spokesman for the Great Lakes Indian Fish and Wildlife Commission, which represents the tribes. The tribes saw their allocation as a way to conserve a large number of the wolves — not to give hunters more animals to kill, he said."

From "Wisconsin Hunters Kill Over 200 Wolves in Less Than 3 Days/The gray wolf lost Endangered Species Act protections last year, prompting a recent hunt that killed at least 216 wolves — far exceeding a quota set by state wildlife officials" (NYT).

So many conflicting interests there. But obviously there are a lot of wolves, and presumably the endangered species category needs to be restricted to animals that are quite scarce, not animals that we love. Here you have an animal that is loved — even regarded as sacred. The hunters probably love the animal in a hunterly way. Some people hate or fear wolves, and some farmers and ranchers have anti-wolf economic interests. I have no idea what the solution is, but I think I'd recommend rationality over sentimentality. It may be rational to defer — to some extent — to the tribes' belief in the sacredness of the wolves and that corresponding reverence for wolves that lives in the hearts of some of the people.

"'They’re coming to take your gas stoves' is a central message of Californians for Balanced Energy Solutions (C4BES), an astroturf group formed to push back against electrification in California...."

"It’s all part of a large, broad, and well-funded campaign against electrification being waged by the [gas] industry. APGA has the Media and Public Outreach Committee, set up by the industry with the goal of 'winning the communications war' over electrification. AGA has the Sustainable Growth Committee and the Building and Energy Codes Committee fighting against electrification.... This industry campaign... comes in response to a rapidly spreading grassroots 'all-electric movement' that has dozens of towns, cities, and counties passing new building codes or ordinances to encourage electrification or, as in Berkeley, California’s case, simply prohibiting gas hookups in new buildings. It’s getting ugly. When the city council in San Luis Obispo planned a vote on an energy code to encourage electrification in buildings, the leader of the opposition (a worker at a gas utility and a board member of C4BES) threatened to bus in protestors and spread coronavirus at the city council meeting.... [F]or the individual homeowner, as for society at large, managing harmful pollution eventually starts to seem a little silly when equally effective, affordable, and pollution-free alternatives are available. It’s time to start making new buildings all-electric and switching out all those existing gas appliances, including gas stoves, for electric alternatives."

From "Gas stoves can generate unsafe levels of indoor air pollution/An accumulating body of research suggests gas stoves are a health risk" (Vox).

"They’re coming to take your gas stoves" is the message, we're told, but the article shows that the message is true. The question is how unhealthful is a gas stove and how sound is the belief that a gas stove is better. People are into seeing the blue flame, so there's a psychological advantage. That psychological advantage can be destroyed by the fear of pollution. All of that belongs properly to the realm of advertising and propaganda.

We've addressed this topic before. A year ago I blogged a NYT article called "Your Gas Stove Is Bad for You and the Planet/To help solve the climate crisis, we need to electrify everything."

"While Wordsworth — who wrote of the French Revolution, which was raging when he was aged 19: 'Bliss was it in that dawn to be alive' — is recognised as a revolutionary..."

"... arguably his views on poetry were stronger.... In ['Radical Wordsworth: the Poet Who Changed the World,' Sir Jonathan Bate] cautions against popular assumptions about the poets. He writes that 'among those labelled Romantics, there were abolitionists, vegetarians, advocates for women’s rights and animal rights and what we would now call an environmental ethic.' Wordsworth, while championed as the inspiration behind the national parks movement and a believer in spiritual attachment to the environment, would balk at some of the aims of Extinction Rebellion. Bate... said that although Wordsworth may have lost the radicalism of his youth, he would also have had reservations about modern concepts, such as rewilding, which is letting nature rule unhindered by human intervention. 'He’d say that not just because, like so many of us, he went from youthful rebellion to aged conservatism but also because he believed that the conservation of the environment depends on respect for ancient traditions of stewardship, as exemplified by the hill farms of the Lake District.'"

From "William Wordsworth ‘would have marched with Extinction Rebellion’" (The London Times).

I had to look up "Extinction Rebellion."

It's funny to take a dead person and make assertions about what side he'd be on in some current dispute. But which version of this dead one is relevant? Might as well take your pick:

“The young Wordsworth would have marched with them,” Bate said. “But the older Wordsworth would have written sonnets saying, ‘Lock them up’.”

"It is giving us this quite extraordinary insight into just how much of a mess we humans are making of our beautiful planet. This is giving us an opportunity to magically see how much better it can be."

Said Duke University conservation scientist Stuart Pimm, quoted in "As people stay home, Earth turns wilder and cleaner. These before-and-after images show the change" (by AP science writer Seth Borenstein, published at Madison.com).

Another quote — from Chris Field, director of the Stanford Woods Institute for the Environment: "In many ways we kind of whacked the Earth system with a sledgehammer and now we see what Earth's response is."

With photographs and maps, the article concentrates on the reduction in air pollution. There's also a bit about wild animals taking the opportunity to show themselves on city streets. But I'd like to see more about climate change.

All the article says is:

The greenhouse gases that trap heat and cause climate change stay in the atmosphere for 100 years or more, so the pandemic shutdown is unlikely to affect global warming, says Breakthrough Institute climate scientist Zeke Hausfather. Carbon dioxide levels are still rising, but not as fast as last year.

But this can be viewed as an experimental head start on the Green New Deal we've heard so much about. What had seemed impossible to begin is now a way of life we've plunged into. We've gone much further than what the climate activists were proposing, though we've done it for a different reason, by government order, under the fear of death by disease, and seemingly only for a few weeks (or months).

Why aren't people saying that when we emerge in phases from this lockdown — as we must, or we face economic doom — we should not attempt to go back to everything that we were doing before but go forward into some livable, workable form of the Green New Deal?

Shouldn't the Democrats be saying this? Where's Joe Biden?

Could Donald Trump and the Republicans offer something like this? I know the term "Green New Deal" has a Democratic Party sound to it, but why can't they present something visionary and future-looking that inspires hope instead of merely presuming that what's best is whatever we happened to have had in the past?