I shouldn’t do “outraged at Fox News” blogging, because I’ve never watched Fox News. I am given to understand that it is biased in ways I wouldn’t like if I did watch it. I knew someone named Hannity would be doing a show on water and the San Joaquin Valley, and despite my interest in those topics, I knew I’d never bother to watch it. Nevertheless, I did see a write-up of the show here, and my craziest hope rose with every word I read. They couldn’t have… they didn’t… there’s no way… but it sounds like. OH HOLY CRAP. They put Zeke Grader on the show! I don’t know Zeke Grader, but he’s legendary. He’s a super strong fishing and ecosystem advocate and he’s funny as hell. I’ve loved him ever since this quote:
Commercial fishermen heaped blame Friday on the Bush administration for managing the [Klamath] river in a way they contend favors farmers, dam operators and timber companies at the expense of fish.
“The federal government has done absolutely nothing to help, and fishermen are angry,” said Zeke Grader, executive director of the Pacific Coast Federation of Fishermen’s Assns. “It’s almost like they created this Klamath situation to make them look competent on Katrina.”
I still won’t watch the program, but apparently Grader pointed out that fisherman are also hurting, leaving Fox News watchers to resolve the dissonance of two competing groups of picturesque resource extractors, both real manly and conservative. I’ll leave them to their dilemma.
On the public record 
Zeke is what the kids nowadays call “teh aw3s0m3.”
My recollection of the Klamath water decision, which occured early in the Bush Administation, was more than just favoring farmers over fish. It was a dog whistle that the Bushies were going to make war on the endangered species act and any relevant law, agency or policy on the environment they didn’t like, which was almost all of them. Which they did in myriad ways. They couldn’t have cared less about farmers in California. Like all their actions, it was a purely political act devoid of any policy concerns, conservative or liberal. I doubt any of them could have found the Klamath on a map before, during, or since.