Having a fleet wide bycatch cap instead of an individual vessel bycatch cap rewards the trawler who doesn't give a damn and doubles his horsepower and the size of his net and doesn't take time to avoid bycatch vs. the trawler who does short, exploratory set to see what's on the bottom before making long tows. When the season gets shut down the don't give a damn guy has made more than the fisherman who works to avoid bycatch. You are wrong on observer coverage. In the Gulf of Alaska, the area the article refers to, coverage on trawlers is at a 30 low. The "restructured observer system" placed observers on pot and longline vessels as small as 40 ft. while reducing coverage on trawlers down to 15% or less. This has led to more "gaming" the system. Fishing safe unproductive tows while observed and behaving totally different when not observed. I know what majority means and stand by my statement.  But I think you know all of this and are just trying to confuse the public.