Extradite Minnesotan Walter James Palmer to face justice in Zimbabwe.

SUCCESS!: 100,000 signatures—the threshold for an official response from the Obama administration. Sign and share it here please!. If you're alive and on the internet today, you may have notice a massive uproar about a lion in Zimbabwe, named Cecil being poached. And unfortunately it has turned out the poacher was an Ugly American, one Walter James Palmer, a dentist in Minneapolis Minnesota.

I was particulary fired up by reading in Deadspin how senseless and stupid and awful and horrible this was.

Cecil was a major tourist attraction in Hwange National Park… Cecil was a source of steady income for the local tourism industry, as tourists paid to stay in the nearby lodge and hired guides to find him for photo-ops; he could have kept on doing that for years just by being permitted to live. He already had generated far more money than the $50,000 or so this porcine Midwestern shit-for-brains paid to kill him, and could have done it many times over had he not been killed for no good reason. The Guardian also reports that Cecil "would have brought millions of dollars worth of tourism to the reserve." Meanwhile conservationists note Cecil's six cubs will probably be killed by rival males now. (I'm going to hope they can be rescued or at least spared.)

The Guardian reports:

“Both the professional hunter and land owner had no permit or quota to justify the offtake of the lion and therefore are liable for the illegal hunt,” it added.

If convicted, the men face up to 15 years in prison. Palmer also faces poaching charges, according to police spokeswoman Charity Charamba. “We arrested two people and now we are looking for Palmer in connection with the same case,” she said.

So, Palmer's two (presumably local) accomplices are in custody and may face prison time. It strikes me as particular gross these two men should face time, while the wealthy American kingpin of the operation walks. Particular as Palmer previously served a year's probation for an illegal bear hunt, and is an all-around terrible human being.

Although Palmer has apparently returned to Minnesota, authorities would like to speak with him as the local Chief of police told Anderson Cooper tonight.

Chief of police in #Zimbabwe says he is searching for #WalterPalmer who killed #CecilTheLion - @McKenzieCNN reports pic.twitter.com/zvfYmZoHtR

— Anderson Cooper 360° (@AC360) July 29, 2015

I was so angry, I quickly tossed up a We The People petition, asking the State Department to cooperate with Zimbabwe government should they seek extradition of this man.

The text reads:

Cecil the Lion, a resident of Zimbabwe's national park, and a national icon was poached and killed this week. Media reports in the Guardian, Wall Street Journal and elsewhere have identified American Walter Palmer, a dentist from Minneapolis, MN as the poacher. He is alleged to have lured Cecil from the safety of the national park to kill him. Two of Palmer's local accomplices are already in custody. Zimbabwe authorities now actively seeking Palmer in connection with this incident.

We urge Secretary Of State John Kerry and Attorney General Loretta Lynch to fully cooperate with the Zimbabwe authorities and to extradite Walter Palmer promptly at the Zimbabwe government's request.

I tweeted it out:

#Petition@StateDept to extradict #WalterPalmer; face Justice for #CecilTheLion@wethepeoplehttps://t.co/...pic.twitter.com/GRlOH4onj5

— Memeographs (@memeographs) July 28, 2015 I just wanted to send a message to Zimbabwe this is not who we are in America. We don't agree with this reckless disgusting act. Palmer has faced a lot of ugly retalition, as the internet mob has descended. I do not want to participate in that. But I do want him to face the music back in Zimbabwe, if authorities there feel his hunt was illegal and violated poaching laws, he must face their justice system.

To my surprise this petition hit 10,000 signatures in just a few short hours.

The reason I picked this site, is the Obama admininstation promises to respond to petitions at a particular threshold. I'd like to hear Sec. Kerry or AG Lynch's thoughts on this story. Regardless, I would like to put it on the admin's radar. Overall, I find the practice of trophy hunting disgusting and can't believe anyone is allowed to hunt these magnificent animals for sport. Lions have seen their natural population dwindle from 250,000 in the 1970s to merely 25,000 today. We just don't have enough beasts to allow these filthy rich pigs to slaughter them for kicks.

Hopefully we can have an international conversation about this barbaric practice of trophy hunting. I have to say, I was not aware that lion hunting was legal anywhere.

I'm inviting you to sign the petition and asking that you share it on your social network.

Extradite Minnesotan Walter James Palmer to face justice in Zimbabwe.

This is how you shoot a lion.  #CecilTheLionpic.twitter.com/0fNA3CKL8n

— eAnn (@eannbardawill) July 28, 2015

UPDATE: Wow! 50K!

50K Tell @StateDept To Extradite #WalterPalmer To Face Justice In #Zimbabwe For #CecilTheLionhttps://t.co/...pic.twitter.com/QwHE5XXwQu

— Memeographs (@memeographs) July 29, 2015

I select this site as the Obama administration promises "official" responses when a threshold is met. I'm pretty interested to hear what the admin will say, if mine reaches the 100k threshold (looking likely! We're halfway there!).

I'm pretty confident regardless what State or Justice say about extraditing Palmer himself, they will have some strong words of condemnation for this despicable and exploitive practice of rich people international poaching local treasures.

Maybe this could be the start of new laws, locally or internationally to stop this from happening again.

Also check out Jimmy Kimmel's monologue from last night. It's pretty amazing. Much respect for Kimmel for this, particularly as he wraps it up with a plea for Wildlife Conservation Research Unit, a positive way to channel anger and frustration into real change.