Any society that can afford to fret about the fate of nature’s hairy answer to the cockroach — the prairie dog — has to be considered a mite confused.

Not surprisingly, that society would be this one.

Yes, the federal government has agreed to consider the possibility that the white-tailed prairie dog might be an endangered species.

That would be the same prairie dog that you see haunched up in the desert, generally surrounded by fleas.

Not being particularly bright, they also tend to become decorations on Desert Duelers and naturalistic murals on Michelins and Goodyears as they dash onto busy roadways to chomp down on the remains of their erstwhile townies.

More frequently, they, or what’s left of them, end up as chow for hawks, eagles, coyotes, cougars, bobcats and so on.

And, horror of horrors, prairie dogs also tend to spend some of their last moments in the cross hairs of telescopic sights of modern rifles wielded by human sharpshooters.

The last activity, of course, is considered unacceptable by one subset of humanity that simply cannot stand the thought of another subset wandering unregulated about the public lands.

Which brings us to the point at which we are now considering spending hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of dollars, on highly trained technocrats who will devote untold hours to counting prairie dogs in the sagebrush-, piñon- and juniper-studded high country of the Rocky Mountain West.

They will report their findings to bureaucrats and lawyers in Washington, D.C., who then will shred acre upon acre of forest for the paper on which they will write notes, drafts and proposals for the future of the prairie dog.

Some might even note the prairie dog is anything but a dog. Far from being related to such noble creatures, prairie dogs are shirttail relatives of squirrels.

No one is certain, but it is known that fossilized p-dogs have been found in North America. Certainly some of the tiny mammals that survived dinosaurs bore marked resemblances to prairie dogs and their kin.

No doubt that once the smoke clears from the volcano erupting near Chaiten in Chile, the first little creatures to emerge will be relatives of our very own high-range furry roach.

These bite-sized beasties don’t survive by accident. They survive because too many larger species depend on them.

They make rabbits appear strait-laced. They can’t run like hares, and they have few defenses outside their burrows. But they’re the high-desert equivalent of fast food: Predators can eat and run.

If p-dogs were as valuable and as threatened as they’re purported to be, then it would make sense to donate them to the military junta in Burma as a renewable protein source for Burmese who survived the cyclone.

That won’t happen, obviously, but it’s worth noting that while the Burmese struggle to survive, one human subspecies is more concerned with the future of the p-dog than the Burmese.

Which is funny because, like the cockroach, the prairie dog will outlive us.

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E-mail Gary Harmon at gharmon@gjds.com.