In the 1970s, Safari Club International asked the federal government to approve its import of 1,125 not-yet-killed trophies of 40 endangered species, including gorillas, orangutans and tigers, according to the Humane Society of the United States.

For almost two centuries, American gray wolves, vilified in fact as well as fiction, were the victims of vicious government extermination programs. By the time the Endangered Species Act was passed in 1973, only a few hundred of these once-great predators were left in the lower 48 states.

It doesn't really matter whether it's the federal government that oversees the protection of endangered species and open space conservation or the state,

Federal agencies shouldn't be able to dodge their obligations to protect endangered species by delegating important decision to the states. The state doesn't have the authority to protect endangered species the way the feds do.

Endangered species are our friends.

I do think we're an endangered species. But that we do have a plan to save the rainforest.