As you may have heard, invasive Burmese pythons have nearly wiped out populations of white tail deer, raccoons and other mammals in the Florida everglades. Now I am not an absolutist when it comes invasive species. I like wild horses and tumbleweeds, for instance. But I am biased against giant frick’n snakes that can eat small children and large dogs illegally sneaking into our country. That’s just me. (Oh and my one word response to the objection that there are no reports of feral Burmese pythons eating children: “Yet.”).
I’ll go one further: I think it is the right and proper role of government to protect us from giant alien snakes that are destroying our environment, threatening our children and pets. If you want to call me a RINO for that, go for it. I can do without the cowboy poetry festivals, but invasive giant snake genocide: mark me down for a yes.
I understand that the serpents are very well suited to survive in the Everglades, they have no natural predators, they possess the ability to swim and go without food for up to a year, and the native animals have no natural fear of giant snakes etc etc. Ecologists talk as if this is a lost cause. This amounts to blanket amnesty for illegal immigrant giant snakes.
The Hell, I say: We nearly wiped out the buffalo in this country because a bunch of guys made money off of buffalo hides. Thousands of years before that, mankind eradicated the woolly mammoth with spears. Spears! Give me five thousand Ted Nugent fans and all the weapons they can carry and the waters of the everglades will run red with Burmese snake blood.
You see, I don’t think we need a vast new government bureaucracy to kill snakes. Heck I think if we created a vast new bureaucracy to kill snakes we would very quickly end up subsidizing people to raise snakes to kill them. But, are you telling me that during a time when unemployment is outrageously high, the government can’t put a bounty on snakes and get results? I don’t know what the right number is but for the sake of argument if we had a hunting season in which you could bring in unlimited number of Burmese pythons for $50 per pound, my hunch is Burmese pythons would be erecting memorials to the great snake genocide of 2012.
Seriously, I need two hands to count the number of cabinet agencies I would shutter. I cringe every time I remember George W. Bush saying that whenever somebody hurts, the government has to move. But when it comes to an invading army of giant snakes, it’s time for the government to get moving.
Faster, please.