A Centrally-Planned Inferno

Writing at American Greatness, Edward Ring outlines how central planning by entrenched environmentalists set the stage for California's latest rash of deadly forest fires. The whole thing is worth a read, and correctly calls out the most consistent greens for wanting to "destroy industrial civilization." Here's a sample:

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"For decades," [investigative journalist Katy] Grimes notes, "traditional forest management was scientific and successful -- that is until ideological, preservationist zealots wormed their way into government and began the overhaul of sound federal forest management through abuse of the Endangered Species Act and the 're-wilding, no-use movement.'"

Although Ring unfortunately does not bring up the possibility of privatizing our forests and national parks, this is an opportune time to consider this long-range solution to the problem of widespread forest fires. I will not do so in depth now, but a few questions should show why I think so. Would the owner of a forest, valuing trees for whatever purpose, depart from proven best practices for managing his forest? Would he do so, knowing that nearby property owners damaged by such a decision, could sue him? Almost certainly not, on both counts, but people do have free will. And this leads to a final question: Without top-down planning, what would the chances be of widespread, entrenched mismanagement? Nil.

Although these questions indicate that privately-owned forests and parks would almost certainly have prevented the wide-scale forest mis-management that set California ablaze, we should remember that this is a benefit. The underlying reason we should privatize our forests is that running parks and forests is outside the proper scope of government in the first place.

-- CAV

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