Without our rivers, what is left?
DEEP INSIDE MOST TROUT anglers lies an understanding that the existence of clean water and healthy public habitat are what get us out of bed in the morning, especially on weekends. Many have sacrificed lucrative careers, either by stalling out in the middle when the job-responsibility-to-annual-vacation-day ratio became optimal for fishing, or by running away to the woods and the humble yet happy life of farming nickels and dimes.
It depresses me to wonder how many of us might not acknowledge this understanding at the ballot box. We compartmentalize. Sure, all but the intentionally deluded see the variations in precipitation patterns and higher average temperatures of recent years as preventable threats to rivers and trout, but if one stretches the imagination, it’s still possible to vote on economic policy and foreign affairs as though there’s a real difference between global peace and prosperity and all that goes into a world in which a rainbow crushing a caddis is still possible.
The problem with single-issue voting is that it too often demands freedom for some at the expense of freedom of others. The trout platform, on the other hand, enhances values across the board, which would argue against trout being a single issue in the first place. In a day of trout fishing, there’s gasoline, phone reception, rain or no rain, highway patrol, sandwiches, beer, and whiskey. These necessities—blessings, really, in the context of the greater planet—are made available to everyone, whether they throw the fly or not. It’s no easy feat. Levers must be pulled, switches switched, decisions must be made from on high.
That’s without taking into account the actual act of fishing, which is where things get dead serious for me. At a minimum, the trout candidate protects water, its quality, and its quantity. Which means he or she promotes healthy forests and watersheds. To maintain a vested public, the preferred candidate also protects access to these treasures for any American who may at some point pay taxes, serve in the military, worship whomever, or seek recreation in response to either a stressful job or a well-earned retirement. Angling teaches other values that, I would argue, should inform the characteristics politicians must possess in order to earn our votes. Empathy is a big one for me.
In our practice of fishing, we frequently hold another being’s life in our hands. Hopefully, we contemplate the gravity of this, and our better self emerges. Whether we choose to prolong its life or end it, we give the fish our sympathy, our mercy, and our respect. Through this generosity, we benefit our fellow anglers, a truth not diminished by the fact that the actual choice we are making might be to benefit ourselves.
Could life be better than this, to have another’s fate so entwined with our own? The cynic might say so, to which I would counter that cynicism is little more than a failure of imagination. Cynics have forgotten how to believe in things. They are quitters and cowards, and they have ruled politics for too long.
Flowing water presents an alternative perspective, one of optimism and renewal. Breaking down and building up, rivers borrow and pay back with interest. They embody the attitudes our country needs right now, a resistance to confinement, a perpetual search for the possible, through, around, or over obstructions.
No matter where you stand in a river, there is always an upstream and a downstream, a coming from and a going to, a headwater snow to a wide-mouthed delta. In the mountains live the fishing guides, the hotel maids, the young seasonal workers serving older seasonal passersby who dump money on chardonnay and silence. Downstream live the load-haulers, the people who grow your food, the keepers of insurance policies, and yes, the lawyers. No matter where you stand in a river, there is someone you owe and someone who owes you. Which is not only a good thing, but a right one. This year, I’m going to vote for it.
TONER MITCHELL is the New Mexico Program Manager for Trout Unlimited’s Western Water and Habitat Project. He lives in Santa Fe.
I grew up supporting naturalism and I have supported clean waters and healthy drainages since the 1960s.
Is that a trout platform? Even in sal****er or angling for fish outside of trout drainages?
Have you, Mr. Mitchell, walked river and stream banks shortly after trout season opens? Or along the same types of fishing access points in mid-summer?
That image, spoiled by trash, litter, dead fish, bundles of monofilament and plastic bobbers in trees or on wires, is the image that comes to many non-angling types when they hear of a “trout platform”.
Nebulous maudlin dream images akin to outfitter and guide advertisements do not make a platform.
Worse, they bring to mind single minded activism, one that chooses civilization obstruction/destruction rather than change to any portion of a drainage.
One can read about this level of activism today by reading the EPA and Army Corps of Engineers’ attempts to declare all land where rain might fall or condensation might run as under the ‘wetlands’ designation.
Why? Because they claim a desire to ‘protect’ these wetlands.
Claiming a purist view for a political platform is sophistry. I will not support vague dream statements as a legitimate anything!
The best political statement one can make is that they will seek the best common sense answer for all parties; not just the ones with activist agendas or the biggest donors.
Thanks, Toner. The above reply validates your thinking.
And thank you, Kerry.
Awesome, Toner. Sharing this with as many as possible. Glad to see Tom posted it on the web in addition to in tha magazine.
Hi Toner, while I’m not a single-issue voter, I appreciate your perspective. And IssueVoter.org let’s you track the issue(s) you care about year-round! Americans can get alerts before Congress votes on new bills, send your opinion in 1 click, and automatically see a scorecard of your rep’s voting record so you can keep them accountable. I hope you’ll check it out & feel free to email me feedback.