Monday, August 06, 2007

Should Mother Nature be allowed to take her course?

Today in Oregon another hot issue has hit the airwaves. Excuse the pun that opening statement is about to create. It seems that Oregon state forest fire team leaders are being demoted and have been demoted recently because they don't speak Mexican. The reasoning is that most team members don't speak English so it's a safety issue that their leader yells commands to them in a language they don't understand easily. Why are there so many non-English understanding people on the fire crews. Because the job pays about $9 and hour. So does that mean all the safety manuals, instructions and notices and whatever they should have been reading and adhering to must now be in Mexican? Should a person be fired because they don't speak a specific foriegn language? When is this state going to make English the official state language?
On a related forest fire note. There is a fire burning in central Oregon that nobody is fighting. The reason is they can't fight it using mechanical devices. The fire is burning in a state wilderness area and it is illegal to take motorized devices or machinery into the area to fight it. They can't even fly over it to hit the fire with water. On the good side, the fire is taking out the beatles that have been attacking the trees in the wilderness area and killing the trees that are there. So now the wilderness area will be burned, the beatles will be diminshed and Mother Nature can do her thing.
That brings up another issue from a few months ago. If there is a forest fire should we allow Mother Nature to take her course or should man go back in and replant?

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