My friend and partner owns a ranch in north Texas where he keeps longhorns, horses and goats. He's a GOP voter, but one with a Libertarian bent. He uses Great Pyrenees dogs to keep the coyotes away from the stock. Recently, he spotted a mountain lion on the place. He's thrilled.
He's not alone in that sort of sentiment. If you read hunting magazines you'll find articles describing large predators as "amazing", "efficient", "powerful", "elusive". This is a good thing.
I grew up in Texas. I had a BB gun by the time I was 7 or 8, and I spent many summer days walking around Lake Belton plinking with a .22. Most of the kids I grew up with shot rifles, shotguns and pistols, and I used to go to gun shows in Austin. I could never afford many guns, so I'd trade for pocket knives.
Now that I'm grown up, I'm not so interested in shooting rifles or pistols (although I own one of each). Nowadays I'm into archery, and I really enjoy it. Many of my friends still hunt. They hunt ducks, deer, wild hogs, dove, turkeys - whatever.
There aren't as many hunters as there used to be. The sport is dwindling. But, it still cuts across "class" lines. Millionaires hunt, and so do the working poor. The idea that hunting is a redneck sport isn't accurate, unless you define redneck as Ivy-educated and liberal. Sure, there are redneck hunters - there are also Yankee hunters.
Hunters and their families should be the natural allies of environmentalists. Both are concerned about habitat preservation, and conservation of wild places. Yes, hunters want to conserve habitat so they can shoot ducks, or geese, or whatever - but the end result of both efforts is the same, I think.
Both hunters and environmentalists are opposed to, or should be opposed to, corporate development of wild areas. Nothing fucks up a deer lease like a housing development.
There are relatively few hunters left. The numbers of game they kill are small compared to what we as a nation kill on the road each year. Household cats probably kill more rabbits in the USA than all the human hunters combined.
The near-extinction of large predators has led hunters to revere animals like bear and moutain lion and wolf, instead of loathe them. Sure, there are still bitchy anti-government types in areas where wolves are being re-introduced - but many of those guys are elk-hunt outfitters, and they're mostly worried about competition.
If you know a hunter (and almost everyone does) ask them what they think about the increase in mountain lion population the the USA. My guess is they'll be happy.
If we on the left can get past the gun control issue - and we SHOULD; Dean was right, we should follow his lead - I think we could find a lot of voters who share our concern for the land.
There are lots of voters who steer clear of the Democrats because they fear we'll take away their right to hunt. If we can remove this one issue, I think we can make a lot of headway among the hunting population. Removing the issue willl take work, but I think it'd be worth it.