The state has a hammer so it sees every problem as a nail. For example if they state is trying to prevent the demise of a species of bird they inevitably look for something that can be killed and label it as the problem:
To save the imperiled spotted owl, the Obama administration is moving forward with a controversial plan to shoot barred owls, a rival bird that has shoved its smaller cousin aside.
[…]
The plan to kill barred owls would not be the first time the federal government has authorized killing of one species to help another. California sea lions that feast on threatened salmon in the Columbia River have been killed in recent years after efforts to chase them away or scare them failed.
[…]
Just how many barred owls would be killed and where remains undecided, although officials said hundreds of birds are likely to be killed with shotguns.
This post isn’t so much about environmentalism as it is about the fact that states only know how to wield violence to solve perceived problems. They have decided that the dwindling population of spotted owls is a major problem meaning there must be something that can be killed in order to help the population recover.
Whether the problem be drugs, poor foreign relations, or endangered animals the only solution is to wield violence until the problem goes away.
The biologist in me wishes to point out that if your species is competed to extinction, well it was your time. This is not a problem that we can just fix, nor one we created nature decided that spotted owls need to go.