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Perhaps the scariest thing about the new "emergency measures" being imposed on Gloucester fishermen and the New England groundfishing industry is that no one seems surprised.

Angry? Frustrated? Desperate? You bet — and with good reason.

But the fact that the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's fisheries service, through Gloucester-based NOAA regional administrator John K. Bullard, could and would close specific inshore areas of the Gulf of Maine to all groundfishing and close down the landing of virtually any cod effective today— yes, today — spotlights up the unilateral powers and lack of accountability this government agency has grabbed over the years.

And it raises the ante for federal and state lawmakers to take up both the legislative and legal fights needed more than ever to protect fishermen and the fishing industry not from scavenging offshore foreign trawlers, not from other competitive imports, but from a wing of our own federal government.

Read the full story at the Gloucester Times>>

Want to read more about cod measures? Click here...

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