Hi all, Got several phone calls this afternoon from as far away as New Jersey pertaining to The Council for Enviornmental Quality-which is run by the anti everything human group -and The Ocean Policy task Force will be coming up with a report by the end of this month. Also that the King Obama administration will not accept anymore public input for the federal stratagie being worked out that could prohibit recreational fishing in all federal,coastal and state waters. .Kinda makes me a bit concerned as this clown has already shown he has forgottten that he works for us not the other way around.Seems that we're a very strong voice that needs to yell foul and tell the politicians that they work for us. Have any of you seen this. I finally found the site on the Drudge report site. Ron

While everyone should be concerned about the MSP process I would point out that virtually every piece of federal legislation or "rule making" is announced in the Federal Register and has a defined period of public comment. I question the motives of the writer, Mr. Montgomery. In the interest of full disclosure...yes I'm a Democrat, I voted for the guy and I'm not to happy about current fisheries policies. Public comment on that is closed!

While everyone should be concerned about the MSP process I would point out that virtually every piece of federal legislation or "rule making" is announced in the Federal Register and has a defined period of public comment. I question the motives of the writer, Mr. Montgomery. In the interest of full disclosure...yes I'm a Democrat, I voted for the guy and I'm not to happy about current fisheries policies. Public comment on that is closed!

Federal legislation is NEVER published in the federal register. The federal register is the official publication of federal regulations which is what you refer to as "rule making". The task force you guys are talking about is not a federal agency and they simply issued a draft report (to the president) and asked for public comments on it. Federal Agencies can and often do extend the time for public comment the people who make up this "task force" could have easily done the same.

Mike -Since we're on the same side here I don't want to turn this into a pissing contest.....but I have worked in a federally funded program for 32 years; proposed changes in federal regulations are published in the fed. register. I have,in my official capacity, submitted written comment on proposed changes published in the FR over a dozen times. My point here was not to legitimize the current process as I'm very skeptical of how much "public" input is going to be considered, but to point out that in every decision making process there is a period of comment and eventually that comment period ends. The tone of Mr. Montgomery's article was very inflamatory as evidenced by the widespread comments it elicited on virtually every fishing web site. Most guys think that no comments were accepted in this process which is not true. I don't believe for one second that the anger of fisherman has not been recognized; whether our concerns are addressed in any final recommendations is in doubt given the policy direction that has been followed by NOAA and others. The short timeframe allowed for what is an unprecedented proposal to change the rules of ocean use seems to indicate to me that there is an agenda being followed.....comments or not. That is troubling. I'm glad to see groups like the Congressional Sportsmans Caucus are commenting on this and everyone should certainly continue to contact their reps, etc. to make their opinions known. I posted on another site my thanks to you, Twofinbluna and others for doing a lot of legwork to keep everyone informed on current fisheries issues; as I said we're on the same side here. I just want to make sure that when we draw a line in the sand we're doing so based on a strong position not the latest rant. This rant excluded of course. Good fishing....and keep up the good work. John