Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Michael, because I messed up the information from the bridge yesterday?
Did I get this right from yesterday's show, that you're
good with self defense?
Speaker 2 (00:15):
That I'm good with self defense? I don't know that.
I wait, wait a minute, that he's asking legitimately concerned
that I'm okay with self defense? Sure? Huh? I don't know.
Have we ever even mentioned the word self defense on
this program at auto once? And then I don't think
ever we never do any segments that focus solely on
(00:39):
acts of self defense. We don't do any of that,
So I don't know. And then, by the way, you
may have gotten and maybe you didn't. I don't remember,
but I did not realize that during the drone strike
that the Ukrainians once again damaged a bridge. I'm not
(01:02):
sure it was the same bridge. And the reason I
don't know for sure is because I haven't delved into it,
because I don't care.
Speaker 3 (01:09):
I mean, congratulations, they hit a bridge. That's fantastic, right going,
and ex.
Speaker 2 (01:14):
That being gone, Okay, I'm done here. You signed it
up for me. I'm glad they hit a bridge, and
I'm glad i'm doing today. Yeah. Well, and I'm surprised
you've done that much work today, I'm glad they hit
a bridge. If they destroyed it, that's even better. So
power to them. And the fact that because I was
too Look, if you take think about a story, and
(01:39):
I'm focused on they took out somewhere between let's say,
thirty and forty percent of Russia's strategic nuclear bombers. That's
what I'm focused on.
Speaker 4 (01:52):
Right.
Speaker 2 (01:52):
The fact that they, oh, by the way, we also
damaged bridge somewhere kind of goes right over my.
Speaker 3 (01:58):
Head, and I think it is more of a damage
the bridge versus taking out the bridge. So it looked
like it hit something like the structure in the water
that could cause it to crumble, but it still look
like the bridge was standing, which you.
Speaker 2 (02:12):
Know, if we really wanted to go full on Alex
Jones here, maybe that's what happened to the Key Bridge
in Baltimore. Maybe the Ukrainian said, you know, we're tired
of the of the American Americans like giving us everything
we want. Let's just send a drone over. But instead
(02:34):
of attacking the bridge directly, they attacked that cargo ship
and caused the cargo ship to drift over and take
down the Key Bridge. Maybe that's what's going on, which
is kind of interesting. I'm not prepared to do this
story today, but the Wall Street Journal had an article
yesterday that I'm still digging into about how the Russians are.
(02:58):
You know, let me back up, because I I want
to set a little backdrop for you. So, you know,
how we suddenly have well we get all the fires
in Canada, which are truthfully those are probably natural fires.
But we have gigantic wildfires breakout in this country, or
(03:18):
we have an electrical grid go down and people aren't
quite sure. Well, we're not really sure what happened here.
You know, maybe there was a transformer blew up somewhere,
but it causes a brown out or a blackout, or
we've got massive you know, train derailments, or we've got
you know, whatever. It might be, things that in the
normal course of business you would think in a complex,
modern society, you know, sometimes feces happens, and that's just
(03:43):
something that's happened. Well, the story in the Wall Street Journal,
to just sum it up very generically, is that the
Rooskies are actually recruiting civilians to go do things like
start wildfire burned down like the one in particular in
the Wall Street Journal was a shopping mall in Poland
(04:07):
where they were where they managed to set a fire
to this imagine Park Meadows or Cherry Creek here in Denver.
Just suddenly, you know, some sort of oh we had
an electrical shortage or something, and the entire mall was
wiped out and killed people and it was awful, and
you know, the news media would descend upon it and
(04:29):
cover it as a horrific tragedy. And you know, some
mall walkers were killed, and some shoppers were killed, and
some children were killed, and there was all this property
damage and the you know, the insured amoun is going
to be a billion dollars and it's just a horrible deal.
And then that's all they cover about it. And then
it turns out that, oh, the mall was burned purposely
(04:53):
by civilians recruited by Russia to go burn down the mall. Hmm.
So you want to think that perhaps just perhaps the uh,
some of the things I haven't I haven't come to
that conclusion. I'm just saying, these are the things that
I wonder about.
Speaker 3 (05:15):
You did a promo yesterday for I think it was
a Wall Street Journal as well.
Speaker 2 (05:19):
Stated something about the hurricane guy. Oh yeah, did you
do any research on that before? Yes? Actually, what I
didn't do my research on it. I went back and
checked some of the sources in the Wall Street Journal article,
and it's apparently true. Although the White House. I wonder
if we happened to have that in the over here
(05:43):
on Grambient. Let's see find see that you Now you're
doing more work? Oh, I did was ask a question.
I wouldn't call that.
Speaker 3 (05:50):
Real work, okay, because you did create the promo for
it yesterday, so this is yesterday's work.
Speaker 2 (05:57):
I'm not really doing any work today. Okay, all right?
Do you think we should explain people while you're not
doing any work? A couple of people? Now, must well
tell everybody else because you won't be here tomorrow, and
you will be here all of next week, right and
the following week, so you're out. So you're actually gone
for like seven work days something like that. Yeah, yeah, okay,
(06:20):
but and not that I care, but are you coming
back as long as I'm a badge still works? Okay?
Oh well I didn't.
Speaker 3 (06:28):
I mean, I've been fired from the other jobs.
Speaker 2 (06:31):
I kind of need this one now. No, I'm just
I'm curious. Uh, let's see. No, there's nothing current in
the in the soundbites about it. But there was a
Wall Street Journal article yesterday that a guy who is
an assistant secretary. Now here's the hierarchy. You have the secretary,
(06:53):
the deputy secretary, then the undersecretary that's Rice slot In,
and then with the under secretaries, then they have all
these assistant secretaries. So they're like the fourth tier of
in terms of the cabinet structure. Which one gets the coffee,
that's usually your personal assistant. Okay, yeah, I mean you know,
(07:14):
you don't expect a bureaucrat or an undersecretary to get
his coffee or dike coked.
Speaker 3 (07:19):
If secretary is in your title, I expect to be
delivered coffee.
Speaker 2 (07:25):
Well try that with me and see if you get
any coffee. Try that with means, if you get anything,
get a middle finger. Oh yeah, well you get that.
Regardless of that, that's pretty much my good morning to you.
Oh there you are, good morning. Anyway, he is an
assistant secretary in DHS for some program office that deals
(07:46):
with weapons of mass destruction. So maybe you can draw
a correlation to what he's now doing or not but
he's the currently acting director of FEMA, and there was
a report while I was down at the undisposed location
that he was working on and they did not have
yet a plan for the upcoming hurricane. Well, actually, we're
(08:10):
already in a hurricane season for the hurricane season. And
I found that a little misleading because there are standardized
plans that are always in place, that are always being revised,
always being updated, always being checked, you know, I mean,
it's an ongoing process. But the headlines were shrieking everywhere
(08:32):
that FEMA doesn't have a plan for hurricane season this year,
and I thought, well, that's bull crap. In fact, I've
even said the I'm X something to the fact that
that's bull crap. That there are always plans. It's pretty much,
you got a library of plans. You got a library
of plans, and in that library of plans, you got
the hurricanes, you got the tornadoes, you got every kind
(08:53):
of natural man made disaster you can possibly think of,
and there's a plan for that. Now. Most of those
plans go to he sees the minute the event occurs,
because every event is different. But I was just kind
of ticked off because, look, I'm not trying to defend
this guy at all, because he said some really stupid
stuff like, well, you know, I'm writing a plan. Well,
(09:17):
you deal with the weapons of mass destruction. Hurricanes are
a little bit different. Although they can act like a
weapons weapon of mass destruction, that's not really what you
were doing at DHS. Long story short. Now there's a
follow up story in the Wall Street Journal that says,
you know what, we're just gonna throw away the plan
and just use the plan we already had. We seem
(09:37):
to contradict what he said the earlier, or at least
the media is contradicting themselves earlier who said that they
don't have a plan for hurricane season and then suddenly, oh,
there is a plan, but we're just gonna throw away
that when I was working on and we're just gonna
work on something differently. I don't know. It drives me nuts. Well,
the media drives me nuts. Plus Feena drives me nuts.
(09:58):
The situation with FEMA is this, it really does need
to be revised. It really needs to be restructured. It
needs to be downsized or reformulated or something any or
all of the above. The point being that it pretty
much acts as As I've always said, it acts pretty
much as the person walking around with the checkbook. So
(10:22):
a disaster happens somewhere, FEMA shows up. It does not
have planes, trains, and automobiles. Any planes, trains, and automobiles
that FEMA might have, they contract app for from some
private entity to provide those and or they reimburse state
in local governments. For example, if if California sends some
of their firefighting equipment to Colorado to fight wildfires or
(10:45):
vice versa, there's either some mutual aid agreements that would
cover some of that. If it doesn't cover all of it,
and it's a presidentially declared disaster, then FEMA will step
in and cover some of those costs. And over the years,
FEMA's gone from normally acquiring that state and local governments
have at least a twenty five percent. You know, they
got to have some skin in the game, and it
(11:06):
usually was twenty five percent and FEMA would cover seventy
five percent. Well, over years, that's kind of gotten where
it's just almost natural that always because presidents can't resist it. Oh,
governors are asking for one hundred percent coverage, So yeah,
we'll go ahead and go gover one hundred percent. Well,
that kind of turns FEMA into nothing more than a
(11:26):
block grant program. So why don't we just start issuing
block grants? And as I always believe, even when I
was the FEMA director, that we ought to be pushing
some of these programs out of the federal government and
back into state and local government where they belong. Then
why don't we do that? But you see that the
(11:47):
reporting kind of prevents that from happening. A inertia and
the fact that for example, and don't hold me to
this number, but when I was the under secretary and
the director of FEMA, I think I I had like
eighteen authorizing committees that I had to deal with. So eighteen,
whether that was nine in the House and nine in
(12:07):
the Senate or ten in the House and eight in
the Senate, I don't know, doesn't make any difference. The
point is it was an astronomy, not so much as
deal d necessarily, but it was an astronomical number for
that size of an agency. To have that many committees
that you have to report to on the Hill in
order to get anything done, it's just utterly absurd. The
(12:29):
bureaucracy is just metastasized beyond any sort of recognition. So
the idea of restructuring, reformulating, doing something different with theme
is a good idea. Ever, getting that done is pushing
the noodle uphill, and I don't know that it would
(12:52):
ever get done, even though it probably should get done.
When you dial nine to one to one, who are
you reaching? Are you reaching someone at five hundred C
Street Southwest, Washington, d C. Where FEMA is located. No,
you're reaching hopefully a assuming the answer. If they answer,
they can dispatch somebody you're which in Denver is questionable.
(13:16):
You are reaching your local jurisdiction who has primary responsibility
for public safety in your municipality or your county or
whatever jurisdiction kind of jurisdiction you live in. So this
story was all just another example of how everything it
is exhausting. It's not just exhausting in terms yes, I've
(13:41):
turned into bitch mode now. It's exhausting not only in
terms of trying to formulate stories that are interesting, that
are interesting to me. For if I'm not interested in
I'm not going to cover it. You know that. If
you don't know that by now, you haven't been listening.
To this program. If I'm not interested in him and
I don't talk about it. Second, it's exhausting too. In
(14:05):
terms of both I hope she's not up yet and
in terms of both family I e. Spouses asking questions
about what's this about the email or what's this about
you know, immigration, or what's this about that? Or is
that true? And then you have to go. It's like
I'm constantly doing the program. I'm constantly talking about everything
(14:29):
going on, and people are constantly For example, yesterday I
had to I had to run an eron, had to
go to the meeting, and then I had lunch with
a friend afterwards, and I finally during lunch said can
we talk about something else? Because all about immigration all
oh my gosh, all about immigration, all about Boulder. I'm like,
(14:52):
you know, and he doesn't listen to talk radio, and
I'm like, really, if you want to know what I
think about it, here are the here's where you can
download the app, get the app, turn on your radio.
Do that. The point I'm trying to make is the
cabal on both sides. I mean, even conservative media does it.
(15:15):
Everything is so such hyperbole and is designed because there's
their business model requires Now, I mean, just this building
right here, we require eyeballs and ears. Without eyeballs and ears,
this business doesn't exist. And the same is true for
(15:39):
a newspaper, a website, a television station, a radio station,
all of it requires eyeballs and ears and clicks, whatever
it might be, in order to maintain their business model,
in order to turn a profit, to keep the revenue up,
keep expenses down. You got to do all of that stuff.
So what do you do? You make everything the app
(16:00):
it's a little worst that it can in order to
attract that viewership or that listenership. Now, I hope I
don't do that, because I come on and I'm just me.
Uh So, for those of you who always think, oh,
I'd love to be a friend with Michael, you probably
really don't want to be a friend with me, because
I just I'm I don't really much have a filter anymore. Dragon,
(16:24):
I'm not sure I ever had much of a filter. Yeah,
i'd agree with that, Yeah, because I think the lack
of a filter may be part of the problem I
head in DC. Oh you asked me a question. Oh
you wanted me to give you a DC answer. Oh,
I'm sorry, I told you what I thought you were
really asking me what I thought. Oh, you really wouldn't
to be just to give you you wanted to be,
(16:45):
to play back what you want. The answer to be, Yeah,
you want the fluff, you want the bs, And I'm
actually telling you what I really think about the issue
you asked me about. I apologize. I'm so sorry I
forgot that, I forgot where I was. Now I can't
really do it, but I want to get started on it.
(17:08):
So every every day I sit down and do the
Michael Brown minute. Ran across the story that we had
we've had another gray wolf killed. This wolf, let's see,
(17:29):
was killed in It was killed last Thursday at a
ranch in Pitchkin County after it killed two calves and
injured one over the Memorial Day weekend. So maybe it
was a Thursday before Memorial Day. But sometime in the
past two weeks we've had another wolf killed. Think of
(17:50):
me to thinking how many wolves have we killed, how
many wolves have we brought in? How much has it
cost us to pursue this pet project of the first
Gentleman Marlon Reeveese. Because this is just a situation where
the spouse of the governor has said, I mean can't
(18:11):
you see that two of them? I mean, come on,
let's be honest. They're you know, they're laying in bed
all lovey dovey, and Marlin's like, hey, you know, Jared,
I love gray wolves. Could you get me some gray wolves?
And Jared says, sweety, I'd love to get you some
gray wolves. Yes, dear, yes, dear. Whatever you want, I'll
(18:33):
get you some gray wolves. Now, of course, Jared doesn't
pay for it. You and I pay for it. So
I got to wondering, what has this cost us? Well,
guess what you might want to tune out for the
next segment because you're gonna get irritated. Michael, I had
heard that nearly one hundred of the fires in Saskatchewan
(18:56):
were human caused. That's a huge number of Oh, whoops,
it's good to put up my koop far. I love
the cat.
Speaker 4 (19:10):
Oh.
Speaker 2 (19:11):
I think he was talking about wild fires in Canada,
but I was paying more attention to the cat.
Speaker 3 (19:16):
Yes, true, and uh, it is a national hug your
cat to day.
Speaker 2 (19:21):
Well, it sounded to me like he was choking his cat.
So long as it's not the chicken. Well that's what
I was. That's where my head was but I have
class and I wasn't going to say that.
Speaker 3 (19:31):
But you wait what No, not a chance.
Speaker 2 (19:36):
I would have would have never crossed my mind to
say that on air. So let's go back to wolves,
because this whole story about another wolf being put down
in killed put down is such an euphemism. You know,
let's let's put let's put Rover to sleep. No, you're
(19:58):
euthanizing Rover. You're killing over real quick. I want to
get to this text message from seventy one to fourteen.
I kind of like it.
Speaker 3 (20:06):
Michael, Marlon Reese has now killed more wolves than most
wolf hunters do in their lifetime.
Speaker 2 (20:14):
BINGO, excellent, that it is beautiful. That's excellent. That's excellent.
So we had another wolf killed in Pitkin County because
it had killed a couple of calves and I don't
know who knows just it, you know, it was doing
wolf activity. Imagine that. Who could have ever seen the
possibility that if we bring you know, gray wolves back
(20:36):
into Colorado, that we might have farmers and ranchers and oh,
I don't know, pet owners, dog owners, cat owners losing
their animals. Who could have seen that? Marlon? Huh? But no,
you care more about, you know, your own little animal
rights desires and getting your stupid government governor husband to
do what he You know, I mean, I would ask
(20:58):
who where's the pants in the family, but it might
not be appropriate, so I won't ask that question. But
obviously Marlin does because he gets the governor to push
Proposition twenty twenty. I'm sorry, Proposition one fourteen adopted in
twenty twenty. Now, what are the that's the one that
introduced the wolves, the reintroduction to gray wolves. So I
(21:19):
got to think you, how much money have we spent
on that? And how much has that cost been per wolf?
And what is it accomplished? Well, here's the overall cost. Now,
now you know you're paying for this, right, you're paying
for this. Since twenty twenty, the wolf free introduction program
(21:42):
has cost about almost five million dollars four point eight
million dollars through November of last year. That's the last
time period for which I can get any numbers. Now,
almost five million dollars four point eight million dollars in
the grand scheme of things may not seem like a lot,
but let me give you some perspective. That's nearly double
(22:05):
the initial two point four million dollars that they had
estimated for the first three years. So, Jim, Jiminy Christmas,
you mean you mean a government program to do something
as stupid as reintroduced gray wolves into Colorado is costing
double what they estimated it would cost. And yet the
pop bureau that faces a budget shortfall, a budget deficit
(22:28):
they've got to close, and they can't figure out where
to do it. Maybe I'll stop reintroducing wolves. That'd be
the first place. Initial projections estimated annual costs at about
eight hundred thousand dollars a year, but actual costs skyrocketed
to more than two million dollars per year, partly because
of the higher than expected depredation compensation and of course,
(22:51):
the administrative costs of the program. Now, what's doesn't dragging?
Do you on your paycheck? Do you get compensation? I
get a paycheck. Well, when you whatever that little amount is,
do you ever check to see if you got any
depredation compensation? Because it sounds wonderful, like oh, because it
(23:15):
sounds like depravity, like which you and I are pretty
much experts in depravity.
Speaker 3 (23:22):
I cannot recall as to if I've ever seen that
on my check stub.
Speaker 2 (23:26):
Well, that was the phrase used in my research, depredation compensation.
You know what that is. That's what we pay the
farmers and ranchers or the pet owners for the animals
that they own that were killed by the wolves. And
that was that's been higher than expected. In other words,
(23:48):
the bureaucrats of the Cover Up Parks and Wildlife Office
sat down and thought, Okay, we'll bring some wolves in,
some wolves. You know, they they might we don't know,
we can't believe this would actual happened, but we think
the wolves might actually accidentally, you know, because they just
you know, doing what wolves do. They might kill a
(24:09):
cow somewhere. They might attack a steer or a dog
or a chicken. I who knows, and we're gonna have
to compensate the farmers or the ranchers for that. Well,
that's been higher than expected. Then I got to wondering,
what about the costs of the wolves themselves. Well, actually
they don't cost anything directly because they're captured from wild populations.
(24:34):
We've had ten from Oregon in December of twenty three,
fifteen from British Columbia in twenty twenty five. Now I
wonder if they got do they have passports to come
across the border. How did that work out? Did we
check them for diseases or anything? Do they have legal status?
Did they get a tourist visa? How did they get
across the border. Anyway, we brought fifteen m from BC.
(24:58):
But there are cost involved in doing that. Planes, helicopters, crates,
all the logistics because you got to capture the wolves,
you got to relocate the wolves. For example, capturing those
fifteen wolves in British Columbia involved helicopter operations and travel
costs alone since twenty twenty have totaled more than one
(25:19):
hundred and sixty thousand dollars. So you taxpayers, all you people,
I just heard the trafficking report. All you taxpayers, you know,
slopping down the twenty five stuck somewhere up north, trying
to get to work, you know, so you can earn
a paycheck. Well, some of the dollars that you're going
to earn went to pay one hundred and sixty thousand
dollars for travel costs alone when this program started. Now
(25:44):
I can't find specific costs for wolf capture because that's
all kind of embedded in the broader program expense which
we'll get to. But what about the broader program expense,
guest staff salaries. It's you got to remember all these
government programs are implemented and then they are administered by bureaucrats.
(26:13):
We have spent about two point six million dollars on personnel.
Now that includes the Colorido Parks and Wildlife staff, and
it includes as a subset, things like the would you'd
like to have this job? The wolf conservation program manager.
(26:37):
And then of course we contract out for biologists to
do the monitoring and the actual management. We paid to
contractors for things like facilitation. The Keystone Policy Center more
than half a million dollars to contractors. So you've got
staff salaries two point eight million dollars, you got contractor
(27:00):
fees over a half a million dollars. And then, because
this program is controversial, we want to what propagandis, so
we have to have what's called public engagement and public planning.
That one of those costs. Well, you got public meetings,
you got to develop the wolf management plan. You've got
(27:24):
to hire external firms for outreach. That's a nice way
of saying you got to hire a pr firm to
manage all the blowback you're getting from this damn program.
And of course there are all these unspecified amounts they
go to places like the Keystone Policy Center. And then
you have monitoring because you got to monitor the wolves, right,
(27:46):
just like they monitor you and me all the time. Well,
we got to monitor the wolves. They're fitted with GPS callers.
And then you have all the post release monitoring that
involves satellite tracking, and then you got it. And of
course all of that contributes to personnel and equipment costs.
(28:07):
So the initial setup costs for twenty twenty one to
twenty two, excuse me, The best estimates I can find
for the initial setup costs were three hundred forty four thousand,
three hundred twenty three dollars and four hundred and sixty
seven thousand, three hundred eighty seven thousand dollars for twenty
(28:29):
twenty two to twenty twenty three. That's covering all the staff,
the planning, all those things I just just described. So
as of March of this year, just a few months ago,
Colorado Parks and Wildlife has paid more than three hundred
and forty eight thousand, more than a quarter of a
million dollars in wolf depredation claims since they began the reintroduction,
(28:55):
I found four specific breakdowns feral livestock a ranching operation.
They were paid two hundred and eighty seven thousand. No,
don't get mad at them. It's not their fault. And
in fact, you ought to feel sorry for them, because
if you know any farmers and ranchers, whether they're huge
(29:19):
ranching operations or small farming ranching operations, doesn't make any difference.
These this all these cattles, this cattle, the cattle or
their livelihood. It's like the bodega owner. All of the
crap they've got in the bodega, that's their inventory. That's
how they make their money selling that. Well, the farmers
(29:41):
and the ranchers care for this, for these cattle. They
want them to be healthy, they want them to be fat,
they want them to be marbled, they want them to
be good so that when I you do them at
Perry Steakhouse at Delicious, they were paid two hundred and
eighty seven thousand, four hundred and seven dollars for fifteen
(30:03):
cows that were killed reduced conception rates. Because you lose
a cow, you lose the ability to produce a calf.
And of course we could have lower calf weights. Now,
why would they have lower calf weights? Because the calves
are too busy running around trying to escape the wolf
and you know the dogs, I mean just the You
(30:27):
know how if you get really anxious, you get really nervous,
and you suddenly have some sort of anxiety disorder, you
lose weight. Well, so do the calves because they sense
the predators, brooches and sons. They were paid more than
(30:48):
fifty six thousand dollars for cattle losses, and there's some
smaller claims which I'll get into next.
Speaker 4 (30:54):
I understand that the cattle is being replaced on our
tax dollars, But has anybody figured out what the cost
of a child would be if they were attacked and killed.
Didn't think about that, did they?
Speaker 2 (31:12):
They didn't think about quiet when they did this program.
All they thought about was Marlon Reese wanted to reintroduce
wild gray wolves back into Colorado, and he threatened to
cut off Jared unless they did it. And so Jared
got the Democrats, the Marxist down to the Pulit Bureau
(31:34):
to do it. And now I'm going down this stupid
rabbit hole of what's this cost us? And a broader
overall question is what has it accomplished? See, in all seriousness,
has it made the environment better? Because we have all
(31:54):
sorts of animals, insects, organisms that go ext or you know,
migrate or move all the time. You know, elk used
to roam the Great Plains. Where do you generally find elk?
Now in the mountains it's it's unusual, but not unheard
(32:18):
of to see an elk, you know, down below somewhere,
but generally, because of human beings moving into their grazing areas,
they've moved off the Great Plains? And where do you
find the buffalo? Now? Now? I see the buffalo all
the time when I go to the undisclosed location because
Turner has one of his ranches down there. And so
(32:39):
I ted Turner, and so I see, is he's still alive?
Ted Turner still alive? I think he is? Yeah, I
think so, Yeah, I think so. So I see, I
see the buffalo all the time, But I don't see
you know, the roaming herds that you saw on you know,
like Dances with Wolves or something who dances with wolves?
I mean, I guess we can't do those movies anymore,
(32:59):
because I mean this program has done nothing to the environment.
Is it has accomplished anything? All of a sudden, it
is cost us. Let's go back to the cost. So
I'm going through the depredation claims have been paid to
farmers and ranchers. And we went through a couple of
the big ones, the Faral Livestock Group and Brushes and Sons,
(33:20):
and then there have been smaller claims. There was about
four thousand dollars paid for two calves and a lama
across three different ranchers, and we have some pending claims.
Feral Livestock is now looking for one hundred and twelve
thousand dollars for missing cattle, and they have one hundred
thousand dollars claim from another Grand County rancher that's currently
(33:40):
under review with a decision expected sometime this summer. Now,
let's go back to pre twenty twenty three. In twenty three,
about sixteen thousand dollars was paid for three sheep and
a working dog. Yeah. In twenty twenty two, twenty two thousand,
six hundred dollars was paid out for fourteen different killings.
(34:06):
So where's this money coming from to pay all these depredations. Well,
There's something called the Depredation Fund. Compensation covers confirmed kills.
I'll tell you more details about that. It pays for
missing livestock, reduce conception rates. You have obviously the stress
(34:27):
that I mentioned earlier. You know you have weight loss
because of the wolves, and we compensate for that. Compensation
covers confirmed kills up to fifteen thousand dollars per animal.
So what's the cost per wolf and where's the money
come from? While you're stuck in traffic to get to
(34:48):
your job to pay your taxes. This is where it's
going next
Michael, because I messed up the information from the bridge yesterday?
Did I get this right from yesterday's show, that you're
good with self defense?
Speaker 2 (00:15):
That I'm good with self defense? I don't know that.
I wait, wait a minute, that he's asking legitimately concerned
that I'm okay with self defense? Sure? Huh? I don't know.
Have we ever even mentioned the word self defense on
this program at auto once? And then I don't think
ever we never do any segments that focus solely on
(00:39):
acts of self defense. We don't do any of that,
So I don't know. And then, by the way, you
may have gotten and maybe you didn't. I don't remember,
but I did not realize that during the drone strike
that the Ukrainians once again damaged a bridge. I'm not
(01:02):
sure it was the same bridge. And the reason I
don't know for sure is because I haven't delved into it,
because I don't care.
Speaker 3 (01:09):
I mean, congratulations, they hit a bridge. That's fantastic, right going,
and ex.
Speaker 2 (01:14):
That being gone, Okay, I'm done here. You signed it
up for me. I'm glad they hit a bridge, and
I'm glad i'm doing today. Yeah. Well, and I'm surprised
you've done that much work today, I'm glad they hit
a bridge. If they destroyed it, that's even better. So
power to them. And the fact that because I was
too Look, if you take think about a story, and
(01:39):
I'm focused on they took out somewhere between let's say,
thirty and forty percent of Russia's strategic nuclear bombers. That's
what I'm focused on.
Speaker 4 (01:52):
Right.
Speaker 2 (01:52):
The fact that they, oh, by the way, we also
damaged bridge somewhere kind of goes right over my.
Speaker 3 (01:58):
Head, and I think it is more of a damage
the bridge versus taking out the bridge. So it looked
like it hit something like the structure in the water
that could cause it to crumble, but it still look
like the bridge was standing, which you.
Speaker 2 (02:12):
Know, if we really wanted to go full on Alex
Jones here, maybe that's what happened to the Key Bridge
in Baltimore. Maybe the Ukrainian said, you know, we're tired
of the of the American Americans like giving us everything
we want. Let's just send a drone over. But instead
(02:34):
of attacking the bridge directly, they attacked that cargo ship
and caused the cargo ship to drift over and take
down the Key Bridge. Maybe that's what's going on, which
is kind of interesting. I'm not prepared to do this
story today, but the Wall Street Journal had an article
yesterday that I'm still digging into about how the Russians are.
(02:58):
You know, let me back up, because I I want
to set a little backdrop for you. So, you know,
how we suddenly have well we get all the fires
in Canada, which are truthfully those are probably natural fires.
But we have gigantic wildfires breakout in this country, or
(03:18):
we have an electrical grid go down and people aren't
quite sure. Well, we're not really sure what happened here.
You know, maybe there was a transformer blew up somewhere,
but it causes a brown out or a blackout, or
we've got massive you know, train derailments, or we've got
you know, whatever. It might be, things that in the
normal course of business you would think in a complex,
modern society, you know, sometimes feces happens, and that's just
(03:43):
something that's happened. Well, the story in the Wall Street Journal,
to just sum it up very generically, is that the
Rooskies are actually recruiting civilians to go do things like
start wildfire burned down like the one in particular in
the Wall Street Journal was a shopping mall in Poland
(04:07):
where they were where they managed to set a fire
to this imagine Park Meadows or Cherry Creek here in Denver.
Just suddenly, you know, some sort of oh we had
an electrical shortage or something, and the entire mall was
wiped out and killed people and it was awful, and
you know, the news media would descend upon it and
(04:29):
cover it as a horrific tragedy. And you know, some
mall walkers were killed, and some shoppers were killed, and
some children were killed, and there was all this property
damage and the you know, the insured amoun is going
to be a billion dollars and it's just a horrible deal.
And then that's all they cover about it. And then
it turns out that, oh, the mall was burned purposely
(04:53):
by civilians recruited by Russia to go burn down the mall. Hmm.
So you want to think that perhaps just perhaps the uh,
some of the things I haven't I haven't come to
that conclusion. I'm just saying, these are the things that
I wonder about.
Speaker 3 (05:15):
You did a promo yesterday for I think it was
a Wall Street Journal as well.
Speaker 2 (05:19):
Stated something about the hurricane guy. Oh yeah, did you
do any research on that before? Yes? Actually, what I
didn't do my research on it. I went back and
checked some of the sources in the Wall Street Journal article,
and it's apparently true. Although the White House. I wonder
if we happened to have that in the over here
(05:43):
on Grambient. Let's see find see that you Now you're
doing more work? Oh, I did was ask a question.
I wouldn't call that.
Speaker 3 (05:50):
Real work, okay, because you did create the promo for
it yesterday, so this is yesterday's work.
Speaker 2 (05:57):
I'm not really doing any work today. Okay, all right?
Do you think we should explain people while you're not
doing any work? A couple of people? Now, must well
tell everybody else because you won't be here tomorrow, and
you will be here all of next week, right and
the following week, so you're out. So you're actually gone
for like seven work days something like that. Yeah, yeah, okay,
(06:20):
but and not that I care, but are you coming
back as long as I'm a badge still works? Okay?
Oh well I didn't.
Speaker 3 (06:28):
I mean, I've been fired from the other jobs.
Speaker 2 (06:31):
I kind of need this one now. No, I'm just
I'm curious. Uh, let's see. No, there's nothing current in
the in the soundbites about it. But there was a
Wall Street Journal article yesterday that a guy who is
an assistant secretary. Now here's the hierarchy. You have the secretary,
(06:53):
the deputy secretary, then the undersecretary that's Rice slot In,
and then with the under secretaries, then they have all
these assistant secretaries. So they're like the fourth tier of
in terms of the cabinet structure. Which one gets the coffee,
that's usually your personal assistant. Okay, yeah, I mean you know,
(07:14):
you don't expect a bureaucrat or an undersecretary to get
his coffee or dike coked.
Speaker 3 (07:19):
If secretary is in your title, I expect to be
delivered coffee.
Speaker 2 (07:25):
Well try that with me and see if you get
any coffee. Try that with means, if you get anything,
get a middle finger. Oh yeah, well you get that.
Regardless of that, that's pretty much my good morning to you.
Oh there you are, good morning. Anyway, he is an
assistant secretary in DHS for some program office that deals
(07:46):
with weapons of mass destruction. So maybe you can draw
a correlation to what he's now doing or not but
he's the currently acting director of FEMA, and there was
a report while I was down at the undisposed location
that he was working on and they did not have
yet a plan for the upcoming hurricane. Well, actually, we're
(08:10):
already in a hurricane season for the hurricane season. And
I found that a little misleading because there are standardized
plans that are always in place, that are always being revised,
always being updated, always being checked, you know, I mean,
it's an ongoing process. But the headlines were shrieking everywhere
(08:32):
that FEMA doesn't have a plan for hurricane season this year,
and I thought, well, that's bull crap. In fact, I've
even said the I'm X something to the fact that
that's bull crap. That there are always plans. It's pretty much,
you got a library of plans. You got a library
of plans, and in that library of plans, you got
the hurricanes, you got the tornadoes, you got every kind
(08:53):
of natural man made disaster you can possibly think of,
and there's a plan for that. Now. Most of those
plans go to he sees the minute the event occurs,
because every event is different. But I was just kind
of ticked off because, look, I'm not trying to defend
this guy at all, because he said some really stupid
stuff like, well, you know, I'm writing a plan. Well,
(09:17):
you deal with the weapons of mass destruction. Hurricanes are
a little bit different. Although they can act like a
weapons weapon of mass destruction, that's not really what you
were doing at DHS. Long story short. Now there's a
follow up story in the Wall Street Journal that says,
you know what, we're just gonna throw away the plan
and just use the plan we already had. We seem
(09:37):
to contradict what he said the earlier, or at least
the media is contradicting themselves earlier who said that they
don't have a plan for hurricane season and then suddenly, oh,
there is a plan, but we're just gonna throw away
that when I was working on and we're just gonna
work on something differently. I don't know. It drives me nuts. Well,
the media drives me nuts. Plus Feena drives me nuts.
(09:58):
The situation with FEMA is this, it really does need
to be revised. It really needs to be restructured. It
needs to be downsized or reformulated or something any or
all of the above. The point being that it pretty
much acts as As I've always said, it acts pretty
much as the person walking around with the checkbook. So
(10:22):
a disaster happens somewhere, FEMA shows up. It does not
have planes, trains, and automobiles. Any planes, trains, and automobiles
that FEMA might have, they contract app for from some
private entity to provide those and or they reimburse state
in local governments. For example, if if California sends some
of their firefighting equipment to Colorado to fight wildfires or
(10:45):
vice versa, there's either some mutual aid agreements that would
cover some of that. If it doesn't cover all of it,
and it's a presidentially declared disaster, then FEMA will step
in and cover some of those costs. And over the years,
FEMA's gone from normally acquiring that state and local governments
have at least a twenty five percent. You know, they
got to have some skin in the game, and it
(11:06):
usually was twenty five percent and FEMA would cover seventy
five percent. Well, over years, that's kind of gotten where
it's just almost natural that always because presidents can't resist it. Oh,
governors are asking for one hundred percent coverage, So yeah,
we'll go ahead and go gover one hundred percent. Well,
that kind of turns FEMA into nothing more than a
(11:26):
block grant program. So why don't we just start issuing
block grants? And as I always believe, even when I
was the FEMA director, that we ought to be pushing
some of these programs out of the federal government and
back into state and local government where they belong. Then
why don't we do that? But you see that the
(11:47):
reporting kind of prevents that from happening. A inertia and
the fact that for example, and don't hold me to
this number, but when I was the under secretary and
the director of FEMA, I think I I had like
eighteen authorizing committees that I had to deal with. So eighteen,
whether that was nine in the House and nine in
(12:07):
the Senate or ten in the House and eight in
the Senate, I don't know, doesn't make any difference. The
point is it was an astronomy, not so much as
deal d necessarily, but it was an astronomical number for
that size of an agency. To have that many committees
that you have to report to on the Hill in
order to get anything done, it's just utterly absurd. The
(12:29):
bureaucracy is just metastasized beyond any sort of recognition. So
the idea of restructuring, reformulating, doing something different with theme
is a good idea. Ever, getting that done is pushing
the noodle uphill, and I don't know that it would
(12:52):
ever get done, even though it probably should get done.
When you dial nine to one to one, who are
you reaching? Are you reaching someone at five hundred C
Street Southwest, Washington, d C. Where FEMA is located. No,
you're reaching hopefully a assuming the answer. If they answer,
they can dispatch somebody you're which in Denver is questionable.
(13:16):
You are reaching your local jurisdiction who has primary responsibility
for public safety in your municipality or your county or
whatever jurisdiction kind of jurisdiction you live in. So this
story was all just another example of how everything it
is exhausting. It's not just exhausting in terms yes, I've
(13:41):
turned into bitch mode now. It's exhausting not only in
terms of trying to formulate stories that are interesting, that
are interesting to me. For if I'm not interested in
I'm not going to cover it. You know that. If
you don't know that by now, you haven't been listening.
To this program. If I'm not interested in him and
I don't talk about it. Second, it's exhausting too. In
(14:05):
terms of both I hope she's not up yet and
in terms of both family I e. Spouses asking questions
about what's this about the email or what's this about
you know, immigration, or what's this about that? Or is
that true? And then you have to go. It's like
I'm constantly doing the program. I'm constantly talking about everything
(14:29):
going on, and people are constantly For example, yesterday I
had to I had to run an eron, had to
go to the meeting, and then I had lunch with
a friend afterwards, and I finally during lunch said can
we talk about something else? Because all about immigration all
oh my gosh, all about immigration, all about Boulder. I'm like,
(14:52):
you know, and he doesn't listen to talk radio, and
I'm like, really, if you want to know what I
think about it, here are the here's where you can
download the app, get the app, turn on your radio.
Do that. The point I'm trying to make is the
cabal on both sides. I mean, even conservative media does it.
(15:15):
Everything is so such hyperbole and is designed because there's
their business model requires Now, I mean, just this building
right here, we require eyeballs and ears. Without eyeballs and ears,
this business doesn't exist. And the same is true for
(15:39):
a newspaper, a website, a television station, a radio station,
all of it requires eyeballs and ears and clicks, whatever
it might be, in order to maintain their business model,
in order to turn a profit, to keep the revenue up,
keep expenses down. You got to do all of that stuff.
So what do you do? You make everything the app
(16:00):
it's a little worst that it can in order to
attract that viewership or that listenership. Now, I hope I
don't do that, because I come on and I'm just me.
Uh So, for those of you who always think, oh,
I'd love to be a friend with Michael, you probably
really don't want to be a friend with me, because
I just I'm I don't really much have a filter anymore. Dragon,
(16:24):
I'm not sure I ever had much of a filter. Yeah,
i'd agree with that, Yeah, because I think the lack
of a filter may be part of the problem I
head in DC. Oh you asked me a question. Oh
you wanted me to give you a DC answer. Oh,
I'm sorry, I told you what I thought you were
really asking me what I thought. Oh, you really wouldn't
to be just to give you you wanted to be,
(16:45):
to play back what you want. The answer to be, Yeah,
you want the fluff, you want the bs, And I'm
actually telling you what I really think about the issue
you asked me about. I apologize. I'm so sorry I
forgot that, I forgot where I was. Now I can't
really do it, but I want to get started on it.
(17:08):
So every every day I sit down and do the
Michael Brown minute. Ran across the story that we had
we've had another gray wolf killed. This wolf, let's see,
(17:29):
was killed in It was killed last Thursday at a
ranch in Pitchkin County after it killed two calves and
injured one over the Memorial Day weekend. So maybe it
was a Thursday before Memorial Day. But sometime in the
past two weeks we've had another wolf killed. Think of
(17:50):
me to thinking how many wolves have we killed, how
many wolves have we brought in? How much has it
cost us to pursue this pet project of the first
Gentleman Marlon Reeveese. Because this is just a situation where
the spouse of the governor has said, I mean can't
(18:11):
you see that two of them? I mean, come on,
let's be honest. They're you know, they're laying in bed
all lovey dovey, and Marlin's like, hey, you know, Jared,
I love gray wolves. Could you get me some gray wolves?
And Jared says, sweety, I'd love to get you some
gray wolves. Yes, dear, yes, dear. Whatever you want, I'll
(18:33):
get you some gray wolves. Now, of course, Jared doesn't
pay for it. You and I pay for it. So
I got to wondering, what has this cost us? Well,
guess what you might want to tune out for the
next segment because you're gonna get irritated. Michael, I had
heard that nearly one hundred of the fires in Saskatchewan
(18:56):
were human caused. That's a huge number of Oh, whoops,
it's good to put up my koop far. I love
the cat.
Speaker 4 (19:10):
Oh.
Speaker 2 (19:11):
I think he was talking about wild fires in Canada,
but I was paying more attention to the cat.
Speaker 3 (19:16):
Yes, true, and uh, it is a national hug your
cat to day.
Speaker 2 (19:21):
Well, it sounded to me like he was choking his cat.
So long as it's not the chicken. Well that's what
I was. That's where my head was but I have
class and I wasn't going to say that.
Speaker 3 (19:31):
But you wait what No, not a chance.
Speaker 2 (19:36):
I would have would have never crossed my mind to
say that on air. So let's go back to wolves,
because this whole story about another wolf being put down
in killed put down is such an euphemism. You know,
let's let's put let's put Rover to sleep. No, you're
(19:58):
euthanizing Rover. You're killing over real quick. I want to
get to this text message from seventy one to fourteen.
I kind of like it.
Speaker 3 (20:06):
Michael, Marlon Reese has now killed more wolves than most
wolf hunters do in their lifetime.
Speaker 2 (20:14):
BINGO, excellent, that it is beautiful. That's excellent. That's excellent.
So we had another wolf killed in Pitkin County because
it had killed a couple of calves and I don't
know who knows just it, you know, it was doing
wolf activity. Imagine that. Who could have ever seen the
possibility that if we bring you know, gray wolves back
(20:36):
into Colorado, that we might have farmers and ranchers and oh,
I don't know, pet owners, dog owners, cat owners losing
their animals. Who could have seen that? Marlon? Huh? But no,
you care more about, you know, your own little animal
rights desires and getting your stupid government governor husband to
do what he You know, I mean, I would ask
(20:58):
who where's the pants in the family, but it might
not be appropriate, so I won't ask that question. But
obviously Marlin does because he gets the governor to push
Proposition twenty twenty. I'm sorry, Proposition one fourteen adopted in
twenty twenty. Now, what are the that's the one that
introduced the wolves, the reintroduction to gray wolves. So I
(21:19):
got to think you, how much money have we spent
on that? And how much has that cost been per wolf?
And what is it accomplished? Well, here's the overall cost. Now,
now you know you're paying for this, right, you're paying
for this. Since twenty twenty, the wolf free introduction program
(21:42):
has cost about almost five million dollars four point eight
million dollars through November of last year. That's the last
time period for which I can get any numbers. Now,
almost five million dollars four point eight million dollars in
the grand scheme of things may not seem like a lot,
but let me give you some perspective. That's nearly double
(22:05):
the initial two point four million dollars that they had
estimated for the first three years. So, Jim, Jiminy Christmas,
you mean you mean a government program to do something
as stupid as reintroduced gray wolves into Colorado is costing
double what they estimated it would cost. And yet the
pop bureau that faces a budget shortfall, a budget deficit
(22:28):
they've got to close, and they can't figure out where
to do it. Maybe I'll stop reintroducing wolves. That'd be
the first place. Initial projections estimated annual costs at about
eight hundred thousand dollars a year, but actual costs skyrocketed
to more than two million dollars per year, partly because
of the higher than expected depredation compensation and of course,
(22:51):
the administrative costs of the program. Now, what's doesn't dragging?
Do you on your paycheck? Do you get compensation? I
get a paycheck. Well, when you whatever that little amount is,
do you ever check to see if you got any
depredation compensation? Because it sounds wonderful, like oh, because it
(23:15):
sounds like depravity, like which you and I are pretty
much experts in depravity.
Speaker 3 (23:22):
I cannot recall as to if I've ever seen that
on my check stub.
Speaker 2 (23:26):
Well, that was the phrase used in my research, depredation compensation.
You know what that is. That's what we pay the
farmers and ranchers or the pet owners for the animals
that they own that were killed by the wolves. And
that was that's been higher than expected. In other words,
(23:48):
the bureaucrats of the Cover Up Parks and Wildlife Office
sat down and thought, Okay, we'll bring some wolves in,
some wolves. You know, they they might we don't know,
we can't believe this would actual happened, but we think
the wolves might actually accidentally, you know, because they just
you know, doing what wolves do. They might kill a
(24:09):
cow somewhere. They might attack a steer or a dog
or a chicken. I who knows, and we're gonna have
to compensate the farmers or the ranchers for that. Well,
that's been higher than expected. Then I got to wondering,
what about the costs of the wolves themselves. Well, actually
they don't cost anything directly because they're captured from wild populations.
(24:34):
We've had ten from Oregon in December of twenty three,
fifteen from British Columbia in twenty twenty five. Now I
wonder if they got do they have passports to come
across the border. How did that work out? Did we
check them for diseases or anything? Do they have legal status?
Did they get a tourist visa? How did they get
across the border. Anyway, we brought fifteen m from BC.
(24:58):
But there are cost involved in doing that. Planes, helicopters, crates,
all the logistics because you got to capture the wolves,
you got to relocate the wolves. For example, capturing those
fifteen wolves in British Columbia involved helicopter operations and travel
costs alone since twenty twenty have totaled more than one
(25:19):
hundred and sixty thousand dollars. So you taxpayers, all you people,
I just heard the trafficking report. All you taxpayers, you know,
slopping down the twenty five stuck somewhere up north, trying
to get to work, you know, so you can earn
a paycheck. Well, some of the dollars that you're going
to earn went to pay one hundred and sixty thousand
dollars for travel costs alone when this program started. Now
(25:44):
I can't find specific costs for wolf capture because that's
all kind of embedded in the broader program expense which
we'll get to. But what about the broader program expense,
guest staff salaries. It's you got to remember all these
government programs are implemented and then they are administered by bureaucrats.
(26:13):
We have spent about two point six million dollars on personnel.
Now that includes the Colorido Parks and Wildlife staff, and
it includes as a subset, things like the would you'd
like to have this job? The wolf conservation program manager.
(26:37):
And then of course we contract out for biologists to
do the monitoring and the actual management. We paid to
contractors for things like facilitation. The Keystone Policy Center more
than half a million dollars to contractors. So you've got
staff salaries two point eight million dollars, you got contractor
(27:00):
fees over a half a million dollars. And then, because
this program is controversial, we want to what propagandis, so
we have to have what's called public engagement and public planning.
That one of those costs. Well, you got public meetings,
you got to develop the wolf management plan. You've got
(27:24):
to hire external firms for outreach. That's a nice way
of saying you got to hire a pr firm to
manage all the blowback you're getting from this damn program.
And of course there are all these unspecified amounts they
go to places like the Keystone Policy Center. And then
you have monitoring because you got to monitor the wolves, right,
(27:46):
just like they monitor you and me all the time. Well,
we got to monitor the wolves. They're fitted with GPS callers.
And then you have all the post release monitoring that
involves satellite tracking, and then you got it. And of
course all of that contributes to personnel and equipment costs.
(28:07):
So the initial setup costs for twenty twenty one to
twenty two, excuse me, The best estimates I can find
for the initial setup costs were three hundred forty four thousand,
three hundred twenty three dollars and four hundred and sixty
seven thousand, three hundred eighty seven thousand dollars for twenty
(28:29):
twenty two to twenty twenty three. That's covering all the staff,
the planning, all those things I just just described. So
as of March of this year, just a few months ago,
Colorado Parks and Wildlife has paid more than three hundred
and forty eight thousand, more than a quarter of a
million dollars in wolf depredation claims since they began the reintroduction,
(28:55):
I found four specific breakdowns feral livestock a ranching operation.
They were paid two hundred and eighty seven thousand. No,
don't get mad at them. It's not their fault. And
in fact, you ought to feel sorry for them, because
if you know any farmers and ranchers, whether they're huge
(29:19):
ranching operations or small farming ranching operations, doesn't make any difference.
These this all these cattles, this cattle, the cattle or
their livelihood. It's like the bodega owner. All of the
crap they've got in the bodega, that's their inventory. That's
how they make their money selling that. Well, the farmers
(29:41):
and the ranchers care for this, for these cattle. They
want them to be healthy, they want them to be fat,
they want them to be marbled, they want them to
be good so that when I you do them at
Perry Steakhouse at Delicious, they were paid two hundred and
eighty seven thousand, four hundred and seven dollars for fifteen
(30:03):
cows that were killed reduced conception rates. Because you lose
a cow, you lose the ability to produce a calf.
And of course we could have lower calf weights. Now,
why would they have lower calf weights? Because the calves
are too busy running around trying to escape the wolf
and you know the dogs, I mean just the You
(30:27):
know how if you get really anxious, you get really nervous,
and you suddenly have some sort of anxiety disorder, you
lose weight. Well, so do the calves because they sense
the predators, brooches and sons. They were paid more than
(30:48):
fifty six thousand dollars for cattle losses, and there's some
smaller claims which I'll get into next.
Speaker 4 (30:54):
I understand that the cattle is being replaced on our
tax dollars, But has anybody figured out what the cost
of a child would be if they were attacked and killed.
Didn't think about that, did they?
Speaker 2 (31:12):
They didn't think about quiet when they did this program.
All they thought about was Marlon Reese wanted to reintroduce
wild gray wolves back into Colorado, and he threatened to
cut off Jared unless they did it. And so Jared
got the Democrats, the Marxist down to the Pulit Bureau
(31:34):
to do it. And now I'm going down this stupid
rabbit hole of what's this cost us? And a broader
overall question is what has it accomplished? See, in all seriousness,
has it made the environment better? Because we have all
(31:54):
sorts of animals, insects, organisms that go ext or you know,
migrate or move all the time. You know, elk used
to roam the Great Plains. Where do you generally find elk?
Now in the mountains it's it's unusual, but not unheard
(32:18):
of to see an elk, you know, down below somewhere,
but generally, because of human beings moving into their grazing areas,
they've moved off the Great Plains? And where do you
find the buffalo? Now? Now? I see the buffalo all
the time when I go to the undisclosed location because
Turner has one of his ranches down there. And so
(32:39):
I ted Turner, and so I see, is he's still alive?
Ted Turner still alive? I think he is? Yeah, I
think so, Yeah, I think so. So I see, I
see the buffalo all the time, But I don't see
you know, the roaming herds that you saw on you know,
like Dances with Wolves or something who dances with wolves?
I mean, I guess we can't do those movies anymore,
(32:59):
because I mean this program has done nothing to the environment.
Is it has accomplished anything? All of a sudden, it
is cost us. Let's go back to the cost. So
I'm going through the depredation claims have been paid to
farmers and ranchers. And we went through a couple of
the big ones, the Faral Livestock Group and Brushes and Sons,
(33:20):
and then there have been smaller claims. There was about
four thousand dollars paid for two calves and a lama
across three different ranchers, and we have some pending claims.
Feral Livestock is now looking for one hundred and twelve
thousand dollars for missing cattle, and they have one hundred
thousand dollars claim from another Grand County rancher that's currently
(33:40):
under review with a decision expected sometime this summer. Now,
let's go back to pre twenty twenty three. In twenty three,
about sixteen thousand dollars was paid for three sheep and
a working dog. Yeah. In twenty twenty two, twenty two thousand,
six hundred dollars was paid out for fourteen different killings.
(34:06):
So where's this money coming from to pay all these depredations. Well,
There's something called the Depredation Fund. Compensation covers confirmed kills.
I'll tell you more details about that. It pays for
missing livestock, reduce conception rates. You have obviously the stress
(34:27):
that I mentioned earlier. You know you have weight loss
because of the wolves, and we compensate for that. Compensation
covers confirmed kills up to fifteen thousand dollars per animal.
So what's the cost per wolf and where's the money
come from? While you're stuck in traffic to get to
(34:48):
your job to pay your taxes. This is where it's
going next
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