Above All, Politics: Senate kills Bipartisan Sportsman's Act of 2014

If there were ever any doubts that Washington is broken, [last Thursday's] action in the Senate on the Bipartisan Sportsman's Act of 2014 should permanently erase them.

The U.S. Senate failed to pass a vote that would have advanced the Bipartisan Sportsman's Act of 2014. Granted, the bill had picked up 81 amendments - many of which had neither anything to do with the outdoors or the support of the outdoor community - but the vote was more about partisan politics than merit.

The outdoor community wasted no time in responding to the effective flushing of sportsmen's hopes for a second consecutive session.

The NRA's Institute for Legislative Action's Chris Cox said the NRA was disappointed that the bipartisan Sportsmen's bill had "fallen victim to Sen. Harry Reid's political agenda. By refusing to allow a reasonable amendment process, Sen. Reid effectively killed this legislation."

Cox went on to call the legislation "substantive measures which would have enriched America's hunting and sporting heritage."

American Sportfishing Association Vice President Gordon Robertson said he found it "very disheartening that the Senate process and partisan politics pulled down, for the second time in two years, a comprehensive sportsmen's package that would have benefited this nation's fish and wildlife resources as well as hunters and anglers."

Robertson then succinctly summed up what had happened.

"The failure had nothing to do with the merits of the bill and much to do with mid-term elections this year," he said, "Neither party wants to give an advantage to the other. Although we understand that this has always been the way of politics, but we also understand that good public policy requires discipline to do what is right for the nation. The former is what killed this legislation and other recent bills in the Senate."

"We are deeply disheartened that a bill with 45 bipartisan cosponsors and the support of the national sporting community could fall victim to a fundamentally broken Senate, where some legislators' support for sportsmen is only a talking point," said TRCP President and CEO Whit Fosburgh.

"While we support an open and deliberative legislative process - including Congress' right to engage in debate and offer amendments - we believe that this process should not come at the expense of advancing commonsense legislation that benefits natural resources conservation, public access and the nation's outdoors economy."

That's all very high-minded rhetoric, but I have one question for everyone who seemed flabbergasted at what happened [Thursday]: what did you expect?

The Majority Leader of the United States Senate is given consistently high marks for his (allegedly) steadfast support of gun rights by the NRA, the NSSF and other groups. I'm told this support is because without Reid "many more anti-gun measures would come to the floor of the Senate."

Maybe I'm a cynic, but that doesn't speak to Reid's steadfast support of anything except his dedication to keeping his job, except possibly minimizing the damage the left-leaning loonies like California Senator Dianne Feinstein and others could do the party in the upcoming election cycle.

Feinstein's apparently unbeatable at home, but not every Democrat lives in California. And Reid's slick enough to know that curbing her loony legislation scores points on both sides of the 2A ledger.

The ASA's Robertson hit the nail on the head describing what was wrong with the much-needed legislation- nothing.

"We understand this has always been the way of politics," he wrote, "but we also understand that good public policy requires discipline to do what is right for the nation. The former is what killed this legislation and other recent bills in the Senate."

At this point, all the organizations express slight hope of the measures being reintroduced before the end of the year.

And they've all thanked the bills' sponsors for their best-efforts on their behalf. That response is quite likely why I'm not a short-list for any job requiring me to "interface" with Washington.

It's time outdoor groups started calling for scalps on tent poles in November rather than smoking peace pipes.

Republished from The Outdoor Wire.