John Duarte to pay $1.1M fine for plowing wheat field without permit

As someone who must work with the EPA on a daily basis, I can attest that some of the stuff Obama crammed down our throats those last 2 years were so off the wall stupid I am not sure how they could even write up the regs without laughing about it.

Absolute insanity, and not the first time the feds have gone after farmers for BS reasons. The "Pool" is really an irrigation ditch, The EPA has zero oversight and spends its time looking for ways to shaft Americans for every dime it can steal. Under the EPA rules any body of water anywhere from a literal puddle to a drainage ditch to a lake is navigable water and falls under their jurisdiction. In this story the farmer just paid them their bribe / graft and they will now go away.

When I was a kid my father bought some land in WA it had this mess of drainage ditch with over grown grass and weeds. He was going to fill it in and plant a lawn, the EPA came out and said it was wetlands and he would be fined if he touched it as Migratory birds used it when traveling south.... This area was less than a quarter of an acre, The whole property house, front and back yards were only 1.5 acres. Due to this ruling the property value was then lowered and 2 years after he bought the place it was worth less than what he was paying for it. All because of a puddle you could put one foot on ether side of and birds that we never saw in the 3 years we lived there. The EPA is a monster with no leash and no oversight run by power mad zealots.