This is just so wrong.

Because of a lawsuit by the Center for Biological Diversity (what the heck is that anyway?), the state Fish and Game Department will stop planting rainbow trout in the Kern River above Kernville until 2010.

The purported reason is that the plants threaten endangered species such as the Golden Trout.

Sometimes you just need to back up and look at the big picture. Let me help you do that.

I'm not sure there's been a Golden Trout in that stretch of the Kern River in decades, maybe centuries for all I know.

That stretch is a popular fishing spot for families and fisher people of all sorts. Many businesses rely on that to keep afloat.

Does this mean the Golden Trout be dammed? No. There are plenty of Golden Trout in, of all places, the Golden Trout Wilderness further up in the Eastern Sierra.

I'm one of those fishermen who happily trek up to the higher elevations to catch the little cuties. And I put them right back because it's the right thing to do and they're too small to eat anyway.

But I also go camping at Rivernook just outside of Kernville and I love to catch rainbow trout there. And I'm suggesting people and the Kernville economy is more important in that area that trying to entice some Golden Trout back to that area.

That's a win-win situation. There is no need to have Golden Trout everywhere.

For any further discussion, I would refer you to George Carlin's Saving the Planet speech.