And we are not a bunch of criminals either. We can discuss the pros and cons of everything from commercial collecting to gov't policy to museum practices, but IMHO it all pales in comparison to the continuous specimen loss through erosion. When a fossil is lost to the elements, ALL the data is lost forever. What we need are some creative new ideas on how to make fossil preservation and data collection self-funding, so that orders of magnitude more fossils can be rescued each year. Since you guys seem so eager to take shots at me, I'll tell you right where I stand so you wont have to make any more presumptions.
Erosion is the bogey man of paleontology.
We have already discussed the Baucus vs House Bill. I'm reminded of the old Cope-Marsh tradition, where they would smash bones rather than let the other guy get them.