Bush on Global Warming: A Big Mistake that Could Have Been Worse President Bush's speech on global warming today lays out a blueprint for slow motion economic decline. It legitimizes global warming alarmism and undermines opposition in Congress to disastrous energy-rationing policies, such as the climate legislation championed by Senators Joseph Lieberman (I-CT) and John Warner (R-VA). “President Bush's global warming proposals could have been worse,” said Competitive Enterprise Institute Director of Energy & Global Warming Policy Myron Ebell. “But it was still a pointless speech that was unnecessary. While the President said that the global warming debate was intensifying, global warming alarmism is collapsing all around the world. With today's proposals, however, the President has managed to re-energize that alarmism.” Thanks to conservative opposition, the President has stepped back from the most damaging proposals being considered, such as supporting a cap-and-trade program for utilities. It's not clear, however, what exactly is left. His emphasis on new technologies is encouraging, although it opens the door to massive and wasteful government subsidies. The vague principles that the President enunciated could end up supporting sensible policies or damaging policies....
The Governator's genius pain-free enviro pitch Last month, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger unceremoniously fired a former mayor of Carmel-by-the-Sea, California, from the State Park and Recreation Commission. Ordinarily, the sacking of a minor official from a state board most Californians have never heard of would not have set off a media frenzy, even in the gossip-crazed Golden State. But, in this case, the ex-mayor just so happened to be Clint Eastwood, a longtime parks advocate who had served on the panel since 2001. Adding fuel to the fire, Schwarzenegger also axed his own brother-in-law Bobby Shriver from the same commission. The governor claims he wanted to give others a chance to serve, but Eastwood, Shriver, and environmentalists see an ulterior motive: The two men opposed a planned 16-mile extension of a toll road that Schwarzenegger had championed, which would cut through the picturesque San Onofre State Beach north of San Diego. The celebrity angle to the story tended to obscure its larger significance. Schwarzenegger is often cited as a model for Republicans--John McCain in particular--who want to build a greener public image. But his firing of Eastwood is yet another episode in a relationship with environmentalists that's been, at times, far rockier and more complicated than his reputation might suggest....
NM governor pledges to fight Gila River diversion Gov. Bill Richardson said Thursday he'll consider proposing a statutory protection for the Gila River in southwestern New Mexico to block the construction of dams or water diversion projects on what he calls the "state's last free-flowing river." The Gila has been named as one of the nation's most endangered rivers by American Rivers, a conservation group. The biggest threat to the river, according to the group, is the potential for a diversion project that would draw water out of the Gila, store it in an off-stream reservoir and transport it over the Continental Divide to provide municipal water supplies for growth and development in the Silver City area or elsewhere. A state water official says no diversion project has been proposed for the river, however. The Gila is New Mexico's only "mainstem" river, such as the Rio Grande, San Juan and Pecos, without a major water development project such as a reservoir. Richardson early in his administration pledged to oppose the construction of dams on the river. He reiterated that policy Thursday in announcing the Gila River's listing as the seventh most endangered river in the nation. Dam projects were proposed for the river in the 1970s and 1980s....
Ashton Ranchers, Sportsmen Want Wolves Out of Idaho A community plagued by wolf activity decides to take a stand tonight. About 100 people from the Ashton area met with outspoken anti-wolf activist Ron Gillette to discuss their options. Gillette is working to collect about 50,000 signatures in an attempt to ban wolves completely from the state, by any means possible. Most of the audience had a wolf story to tell. Many say they've had cattle killed, pets killed or are scared to be outdoors alone. "I'm an outdoorsman, a hunter, an outfitter, we have cattle and we can see that the wolves are serious detriment to all the things I enjoy in this country," Sportsman Richard Beesley said. "It's kind of scary if you go out camping. Like we brought up tonight, you have to bring a gun. In the middle of night, if one comes in or a bear, you wouldn't have much of a chance. So it's kind of a worry," Rancher Brent Harshbarger said. Another major concern is elk population numbers. Outfitters are convinced wolves have crippled our state's elk population....
Proposed federal compensation for wolf kills Montana Senator Jon Tester and Wyoming Senator John Barrasso are teaming up to help livestock owners whose animals are killed by wolves. The Gray Wolf Livestock Loss Mitigation Act would create state trust funds to pay ranchers for those losses. It would also allow federal grants for states to help lower the risk of wolf kills by improving fencing and grazing practices, using guard dogs, and other means. The bi-partisan plan is in response to the federal government's decision in March to remove gray wolves from the Endangered Species Act and turn over wolf management to Montana, Wyoming and Idaho. In 2007 wolves killed 75 head of cattle in Montana, up from 32 in 2006. Sheep losses rose from 4 in 2006 to 27 in 2007. In Wyoming it's estimated that wolves killed 100 adult cattle and 600 calves in 2007. Sheep losses reached 100 ewes and 400 lambs last year.
Manager backs plan to let cattle graze in E. Idaho park The manager of a popular state park in eastern Idaho has proposed letting cattle graze there again, arguing it will make the park more like it was when it was a stop on the Oregon Trail by eliminating invasive plants and allowing native plants to return. Kevin Lynott, manager of Massacre Rocks State Park, said cattle would churn up the ground while also fertilizing it, replicating the effect bison had before they were killed off more than a century ago. "You can't do nothing," he said. "The land can't restore itself to a natural state without intervention. This was a grassland habitat, and a grassland habitat was here because of the natural tendencies that were here." Ryan Walz, right of way supervisor for the Idaho Department of Transportation, opposes the plan. "I was raised on a cattle ranch," he told the Idaho State Journal. "I can't imagine anyone wanting to go camping or hiking where there's been cattle." Lynott said the cattle grazing is in line with the park's mandate of maintaining the land like it was in pioneer days. He said nonnative species such as cheatgrass and knapweed have taken over much of the park, eliminating native perennials such as bunch grass. That results in fires about every five years that burn up the accumulated nonnative plants, he said. Lynott said the cattle would only be in the park during the fall and winter when few of the 70,000 to 100,000 annual visitors are in the park. He also said they would graze a small area intensively for a short time to get the desired result, and grazing wouldn't take place at campgrounds....
Colorado: home of the ‘four-corners chicken tour’ In birding circles, Colorado is known for the “four-corners chicken tour.” Wildlife watchers flock here for a unique opportunity to see a variety of grouse and other ground-dwelling birds. Sharp-tailed grouse and greater sage-grouse are found in the northwest part of the state and Gunnison sage-grouse in the southwest. The southeast is home to lesser prairie chickens and the northeast has greater prairie chickens. Throw in dusky grouse and white-tailed ptarmigan in the mountains, and assorted quail, wild turkeys and exotics such as chukar and ring-necked pheasants, and Colorado has reason to crow when it comes to roosters. A couple of weeks ago I headed to the northeastern sandhills to pay a visit to one of the few publicly accessible greater prairie chicken leks in the state. The Wray Chamber of Commerce, along with local ranchers, has arranged tours on which visitors can see the birds. A basic tour includes a pre-dawn bus ride to a converted trailer that acts as a blind for observers. The expanded package includes the lek visit, plus a tour of the town and museum. A grilled steak dinner (complete with an assortment of pies) and entertainment at the historic Laird school are provided the night before the grouse-gazing, and a ranch-style breakfast comes afterward....
Deal opens up land to some Yellowstone bison Montana and federal officials announced a deal Thursday to let some bison migrate through a private ranch bordering Yellowstone National Park. It would let a small number of the animals avoid slaughter under a disease control program that has claimed more than 3,000 bison since 2000. Gov. Brian Schweitzer and park Superintendent Suzanne Lewis said the ranch's owner, the Church Universal and Triumphant, agreed to sell their grazing rights and initially allow 25 bison to pass through the property. The deal, estimated at $2.8 million, would let the bison access more than 5,000 acres of federal land outside the park. Despite criticism from both the livestock industry and bison advocates, Lewis characterized the deal as breaking an eight-year impasse on one of the National Park Service's most divisive wildlife issues. "Until today, bison were never allowed to use that space," she said. All other bison leaving the park during the winter migration still would be subject to slaughter. Since last fall, a record 1,601 bison have been killed to prevent the spread of the disease brucellosis, which can cause cows to abort their calves. Bison advocates noted that most of the killings would still have occurred even if the deal had been in place, since only a small number of bison would have been allowed through the ranch....How do I join that church?
Can Wolf Hunting Help Conserve the Species? Hunting outfitter Ray Rugg toes a crusted depression in the snow. "Wolf tracks," he says. The tracks crisscross this small meadow past a piece of front leg and scraps of hide, the last remains of a white-tail deer. On this damp early Spring afternoon Rugg's only looking for signs of the six wolves he frequently sees on his ranch in the rugged Bitterroot Mountains west of Superior, Montana. But come September, these predators will become prey. Rugg plans to guide hunters into these mountains on both sides of the Montana-Idaho border when the first legal wolf hunting season in the contiguous United States begins. "I already got a line of clients waiting to put in an application if the hunt goes through," says Rugg, whose family has guided hunters in pursuit of deer, elk, black bear or mountain lion in Montana and Idaho for over sixty years. As the first wolf hunts begin in the Northern Rockies, state and federal wildlife officials hail the transition to state management with public hunting as a major step forward in wolf conservation. They say it will develop greater acceptance and a conservation constituency for the contentious carnivore among hunters like Rugg and the public at large, because citizens will have a hand in management. But critics contend that a more enlightened ethic is unlikely, and the wolf's long-entrenched malevolent symbolism, and the backlash it incites, will persist....
Cloud-seeding program gets little support Armstrong County Commissioner C.M. Bryant Jr. looked around the county judge's office where grime-faced farmers and ranchers had squeezed in and asked who was for the Panhandle Groundwater Conservation District's cloud seeding program. No one raised a hand. Despite an extensive presentation by C.E. Williams, the groundwater district's general manager, and Jennifer Wright, the district's meteorologist, designed to show the benefits of the weather modification program and its cost effectiveness, the Armstrong County commission unanimously passed a resolution opposing the cloud seeding program. Gray County can probably expect pressure soon to pass a similar resolution, according to Jay O'Brien of Amarillo, who has ranching interests in Gray, Armstrong, Potter and Donley Counties, all within the Panhandle Groundwater Conservation District. O'Brien has long been opposed to the cloud seeding program, dismissing the district's data as flawed and review by others as assessments by supporters of weather modification....
Iwo Jima Veterans Blast Time's 'Special Environmental Issue' Cover For only the second time in 85 years, Time magazine abandoned the traditional red border it uses on its cover. The occasion – to push more global warming alarmism. The cover of the April 21 issue of Time took the famous Iwo Jima photograph by Joe Rosenthal of the Marines raising the American flag and replaced the flag with a tree. The cover story by Bryan Walsh calls green “the new red, white and blue.” Donald Mates, an Iwo Jima veteran, told the Business & Media Institute April 17 that using that photograph for that cause was a “disgrace.” “It’s an absolute disgrace,” Mates said. “Whoever did it is going to hell. That’s a mortal sin. God forbid he runs into a Marine that was an Iwo Jima survivor.” Mates also said making the comparison of World War II to global warming was erroneous and disrespectful. “The second world war we knew was there,” Mates said. “There’s a big discussion. Some say there is global warming, some say there isn’t. And to stick a tree in place of a flag on the Iwo Jima picture is just sacrilegious.” According to the American Veterans Center (AVC), Mates served in the 3rd Marine Division and fought in the battle of Iwo Jima, landing on Feb. 24, 1945....
Bill designed to protect animal researchers to undergo review California lawmakers will begin reviewing a draft Thursday of a proposed bill aimed at protecting researchers who conduct animal testing from animal rights activists. The bill, AB 2296, also titled the Animal Enterprise Protection Act, is currently being reviewed by the state Assembly Judiciary Committee. If passed, the law would provide criminal and civil provisions to the current state law regarding any threats, harassment, vandalism and other violent acts intended to interfere with and intimidate animal enterprises and researchers. Modeled after laws that protect reproductive health care workers and elected officials, the bill would form a counterpart to existing federal and state law that prohibits the harassment of individuals dealing with animal research....
Brazil Questions U.S. Regulations On Imports Of Frozen Beef Negotiations between Brazil and the United States for an agreement that would allow Brazilian traders to ship frozen beef to America have been ongoing for 10 years, but in a recent meeting of the World Trade Organization's Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures Agreement Committee, Brazilian officials questioned one of the criteria Washington is considering while determining whether it will liberalize the U.S. market. USDA's Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) is taking into consideration the potential economic impact on U.S. producers due to competition before it begins importing frozen beef from Brazil, which Brazil opposes, an official told Meatingplace.com. "We are proposing that this step be reviewed or suppressed. We understand that only sanitary aspects should be taken into account for a risk analysis. If only that point is considered, certain regions in Brazil are ready to export to the United States," said Márcio Rezende, general coordinator of bilateral and regional agreements for Brazil's Department of Sanitary and Phytosanitary Negotiations of the Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock and Food Supply. In the coming weeks, Brazilian officials will resume negotiations with the United States, including the Brazilian beef-import issue. Brazil never exported frozen beef to the United States, even though it was the first importer of processed beef from the South American country....
Investigation of Canada's 11th Case of BSE Canada’s eleventh case of BSE has been attributed to a less prevalent, atypical strain of BSE which has also been reported in Europe. This is the second case of BSE in Canada that has involved an atypical strain. A common feature of atypical BSE cases is that the affected animals are of an advanced age at the time of diagnosis (for example, both of Canada’s atypical cases involved cattle that were over 13 years of age at the time BSE was confirmed). This is in contrast to Canada’s classical BSE cases where the average age has been approximately 6 years. The identification of these atypical strains of BSE is a reflection of an increased global awareness of the potential for multiple strains of the BSE agent to exist, continuous advancements in diagnostic test methods and is a direct result of the enhanced BSE surveillance activities occurring worldwide....
Montana's sheep industry fading Minutes after a lamb was born, Chuck Dallas scooped up the baby by its back leg and carried it into a small pen, where it could bond with its mother. "Let's see how good a mother this one is," Dallas, 52, said while standing in a muddy corral on his sheep ranch east of Wilsall. "If she's a good mother, she'll follow her lamb in. If not, I'll have to go catch her." While holding the lamb, still slimy and shivering with its umbilical cord attached, Dallas coaxed the ewe into following him by making sheep sounds. The sheep followed her newborn into the pen, where she eventually began nursing it. Dallas is part of a dying breed in Montana's fading sheep industry. He still keeps 300 head on his family ranch and has 250 lambs born every year, but it's more and more difficult for sheep ranchers like him to make a living. They often find other jobs for extra sources of income. After having 370,000 head of sheep in the state eight years ago, just 290,000 head are on ranches this year, the U.S. Department of Agriculture reported. In southwest Montana, the number of sheep has plummeted from 17,000 to 11,100 in the past eight years....
The Cowboys’ Lament Tater Paschal is up at 5 a.m. at his house in south Cleburne, putting the coffee on, then heading out to his barn to feed his horses, getting ready for another day of cowboying. It’s what he’s done for most of 40 years, the trade his father and his grandfather followed, and the only thing he’s ever really wanted to do with his life. On this particular day, Tater, 54, a little thick in the body, with gray hair and mustache and blue eyes, saddles up Lena, an 8-year-old smallish quarter horse mare that Paschal said is really good around cattle. “She’s great at sorting out cattle and in the pens. She’s had it bred into her.” It’s been a rainy spring, so he packs his saddlebags with medicine for pneumonia as well as tools to clean out hoof-rot and iodine to disinfect any areas he might have to cut. “Just your basic cattle-doctoring medicine bag,” as he puts it. On other days, when he’s got to go rope a bull or three, he prefers his much larger 5-year-old black paint-quarter horse cross, Santana. “If I was going to catch a bull, I’d take Santana, because if you’re going to rope something on him, he can hold it.” And he has other horses for other chores. Their horses saddled, Tater’s dad and grandpa would just have opened the gate, most likely, and headed out for their day’s work from the ranchhouse compound – or maybe, from the chuckwagon encampment far from the house, where they’d spent the night before a roundup. But Tater begins his workday by firing up the teal green, four-door Ford F-350 pickup truck and hitching on the horse trailer. In 2008, being a working cowboy or cowgirl in and around Tarrant County usually means day work – doctoring mama cows on a spread near Meridian one day, hunting strays down in Glen Rose the next....
Artifacts belonged to RO ranch owner Panhandle-Plains Historical Society has acquired the ranch records and artifacts of Alfred Rowe , who founded the RO Ranch in 1878 and later died on the Titanic. 'It's a unique story - an Englishman comes and creates one of the most successful ranches in the Panhandle, manages it successfully and then he dies on the Titanic," said Guy C. Vanderpool , director of the Panhandle-Plains Historical Museum. The collection includes ranch business records, personal diaries, photographs, maps, American Indian artifacts and other items. It was procured with an acquisition purchase fund created by Tom and Norma Cambridge. Warren Stricker , director of the PPHM research center, said the RO collection will complement the museum's other ranch holdings, which include records from the XIT and the JA. 'It's just another piece of the puzzle that researchers can use," he said. According to the Texas State Historical Association's Handbook of Texas Online, Alfred Rowe was born Feb. 24, 1853, to wealthy English merchants. He left England in 1878 to invest in western grasslands in the United States. He arrived in Donley County from Colorado in 1878 and spent a few months learning the cattle business before beginning his own venture, the RO Ranch. By 1900, the ranch covered about 100,000 acres. Rowe married Constance Ethel Kingsley in 1901. In 1910, he moved his family permanently to England, but visited his Texas holdings twice a year. According to the handbook, Rowe was aboard the Titanic on its maiden voyage when it sank April 15, 1912. His body was recovered and buried in Liverpool....

Is Going Green Making You Crazy? It's Time for Eco-Therapy Sarah Edwards worries about the gasoline she burns, the paper towels she throws out, the litter on the beach, water pollution. She worries so much, it literally makes her sick. "Fear, grief, anger, confusion and depression," Edwards says, pointing to the negativity that has manifested itself in real-life symptoms such as neck and shoulder pain, fibromyalgia and fatigue. "I had so much pathos. It's so sad," says Edwards, who moved from California's crowded Santa Monica to a secluded cabin in Los Padres National Forest to help her cope. Now, she says: "We only drive to the grocery store every three weeks. We have our own source of water. We compost and no longer heat every room on the first floor." Edwards suffers from eco-anxiety, the growing angst experienced by those who can't handle the thought that they — or anyone — are in some way contributing to global warming, species extinction and dwindling natural resources. She recently launched a blog called "Eco-Anxiety" because she believes environmental dangers should be taken seriously. "This is severely disturbing," she says. Experts say discussions about the environment — a growing favorite topic in the media — often focus on worst-case scenarios and ever-dwindling resources. So it's no surprise that all that bad news is taking a toll on some psyches. Things have gotten so bad, a new kind of therapy has sprouted up to keep people from going nuts over the environment. It’s called "eco-therapy" or "eco-psychology." The time on the couch isn’t spent delving into a patient's childhood to find the source of misery. Instead, it looks at how much time a person spends in nature, the person's carbon footprint and what the individual is doing to save the planet. And the prescribed treatment may be as simple as a dose of recycling or — you guessed it — hugging a tree. Sound like a joke? Ecopsychology, popularized in the early 1990s by social critic Theodore Roszak, is being taught in colleges and universities across the country, including at Harvard Medical School....

China surpasses US as top carbon polluter China has already surpassed the United States as the world's largest carbon polluter, the authors of a California study said Tuesday. "Our best forecast has Chinas CO2 (carbon dioxide) emissions correctly surpassing the United States in 2006 rather than 2020 as previously anticipated," said the study by researchers at the University of California. The report, written by economic professors Maximilian Aufhammer of UC Berkeley and Richard Carson of UC San Diego, is to be published next month in the Journal of Environmental Economics and Management. Researchers compiled information about the use of fossil fuels in various Chinese provinces and forecast an 11 percent annual growth of carbon emissions from 2004 to 2010. Previous estimates had set the growth rate at 2.5 to five percent. The spike in air pollution by China has largely cancelled out efforts by other countries' attempts to reduce greenhouse gas emmissions in accordance with the Kyoto Protocol, the authors said.
Bush proposes new climate change strategy President Bush called for a halt Wednesday in the growth of greenhouse gases by 2025, acknowledging the need to head off serious climate change. The plan came under fire immediately from environmentalists and congressional Democrats who favor mandatory emission cuts, a position also held by all three presidential contenders. Bush in a Rose Garden address for the first time set a specific target date for U.S. climate pollution reductions and said he was ready to commit to a binding international agreement on long-term reductions as long as other countries such as China do the same. "There is a wrong way and a right way to approach reducing greenhouse gas emissions," Bush said, making clear that he opposes a Senate measure that would impose mandatory limits on greenhouse gases beginning in five years, followed by annual reductions. "Bad legislation would impose tremendous costs on our economy and American families without accomplishing the important climate change goals we share," the president said. He said he envisions a "comprehensive blend of market incentives and regulations" that would encourage clean and efficient energy technologies. And he singled out the electric utility industry, saying power plants need to stabilize carbon dioxide pollution within 15 years and reduce them after that....
The Green Zone It must have seemed a good idea at the time, this attempt to blunt the global warming agenda and head off a regulatory train wreck. But President Bush's announcement Wednesday of a plan to halt growth in U.S. greenhouse gas emissions by 2025, while not embracing all the enviro groups want, legitimizes their argument that global warming is caused by humans and an imminent threat to mankind. As Christopher Horner, author of "The Politically Incorrect Guide to Global Warming," says: "All this accomplished was to legitimize the agenda, wrench the political center of the issue far to the left, and leave some very good men and women out there hanging." It also comes at a time when an increasing number of scientists are giving warming theories a cold shoulder. Timothy Patterson, professor of geology and director of the Ottawa-Carleton Geoscience Centre of Canada's Carleton University, says that "CO2 variations show little correlation with our planet's climate on long, medium and even short-time scales." Rather, he says, "I and the first-class scientists I work with are consistently finding excellent correlations between the regular fluctuations of the sun and earthly climate. This is not surprising. The sun and the stars are the ultimate source of energy on this planet." But it's not nice to blame Mother Nature when you have the Industrial Revolution and the internal combustion engine as convenient scapegoats....
Justices to rule on water cooling The Supreme Court on Monday agreed to hear an environmental case in which utility companies want to revive an industry-friendly regulation put in place by the Bush administration. The dispute with environmental groups revolves around the harm companies cause when they draw water from rivers and lakes to cool electric-generating equipment, then return it to the waterway. The process kills aquatic life. The Environmental Protection Agency allowed the industry to forgo the most expensive solution: installing closed-cycle cooling systems, which would cost billions of dollars at 550 generating units around the country. The rule allowed the companies to decide how to comply with the Clean Water Act by conducting cost-benefit analyses of the available options. The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New York City ruled against the companies. The appeals court called into question the EPA's conclusion that closed-cycle cooling costs could not be reasonably borne by the industry....
Do Colleges Need Green Czars? At a recent gathering in College Park, Md., for the Smart and Sustainable Campuses Conference, business officers joined campus planners and the latest subgroup to make its presence felt: campus sustainability coordinators. Five years earlier, those coordinators would have had little to no representation at such an event. But as colleges commit to reducing their carbon footprints, a growing number are introducing or redefining a staff position to organize the efforts. Julian Dautremont-Smith, associate director of the Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education, estimates that there are as many as 150 college sustainability officers, with more being hired every week....

FLE

Lawmakers Want FBI Access to Data Curbed Bipartisan groups in Congress are pressing to place new controls on the FBI's ability to demand troves of sensitive personal information from telephone providers and credit card companies, over the opposition of agency officials who say they deserve more time to clean up past abuses. Proposals to rein in the use of secret "national security letters" will be discussed over the next week at hearings in both chambers. The hearings stem from disclosures that the FBI had clandestinely gathered telephone, e-mail and financial records "sought for" or "relevant to" terrorism or intelligence activities without following appropriate procedures. The Justice Department's inspector general issued reports in 2007 and earlier this year citing repeated breaches. They included shoddy FBI paperwork, improper claims about nonexistent emergencies and an insufficient link between the data requests and ongoing national security probes. The House bill, sponsored by Nadler, Rep. Bill Delahunt (D-Mass.), Rep. Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) and Rep. Ron Paul (R-Tex.), would tighten the language governing when national security letters could be used, by requiring that they clearly pertain to investigations of a foreign power or an agent instead of just being considered "relevant" to such investigations. The House bill would also force the FBI to destroy information that had been illegally obtained -- something that existing rules do not require -- and it would allow the recipient of a letter to file a civil lawsuit if the missive is found to be illegal or without sufficient factual justification. A Senate bill, sponsored by Russell Feingold (D-Wis.), Richard J. Durbin (D-Ill.), Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) and John E. Sununu (R-N.H.), would require the FBI to track its use of the letters more carefully and would narrow the types of records that can be obtained with a letter, and therefore without judicial approval, to those that are least sensitive....
Documents undermine FBI defense of 'National Security Letters' The use of National Security Letters by the Bush Administration has long been controversial -- allowing the Justice Department and the FBI to demand financial and telephone records, e-mails and conduct surveillance without the supervision of a court. The FBI says these letters are critical to law enforcement, because it allows the agency to act in a more timely manner with regard to terrorist suspects than waiting for a court-issued warrant. But new documents, obtained by the Electronic Frontier Foundation, seem to upend that claim. In the report, EFF used documents obtained through a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request coupled with public information to detail the bizarre turns in the FBI's investigation of a former North Carolina State University student. Over the span of three days in July of 2005, FBI documents show that the bureau first obtained the educational records of the suspect with a grand jury subpoena. However, at the direction of FBI headquarters, agents returned the records and then requested them again through an improper NSL. As expanded by the PATRIOT Act, the FBI can use NSLs to get private records about anyone's domestic phone calls, e-mails and financial transactions without any court approval -- as long as it claims the information could be relevant to a terrorism or espionage investigation. However, NSL authority does not allow the government to seek educational records, and the university refused the request. The FBI finally obtained the documents again through a second grand jury subpoena. Later in July of 2005, FBI Director Robert Mueller used the delay in gathering the records as an example of why the FBI needed administrative subpoena power instead of NSLs so investigations could move faster....
FBI Search Abuses Could Number Thousands The FBI may have committed as many as 6,400 intelligence violations in the course of its use of national security letters, Justice Department Inspector General Glenn Fine told lawmakers Tuesday. Fine also described his office's oversight since it disclosed last year that the FBI had issued more than 140,000 national security letters from 2003 to 2005. Last month, Fine released a follow-up report, which found that the FBI had issued 49,425 national security letters in 2006 alone. The inspector general's reviews prompted the FBI and Justice Department's National Security Division to begin internal audits of how NSLs are used. Under federal law, all intelligence agencies are required to self-report possible violations of the law to the president's Intelligence Oversight Board. A Freedom of Information Act lawsuit by the Electronic Frontier Foundation against the FBI previously disclosed documents that show the FBI overcollected data from entire e-mail servers instead of only the intended suspects' communications....
Democrats blast Mukasey for 9/11 call remarks Attorney General Michael Mukasey's assertion that an unmonitored terrorist phone call before the Sept. 11 attacks showed the need for more government wiretapping authority drew a scathing retort Monday from Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee, who accused him of rewriting history and ducking questions. In a written response to questions from Judiciary Committee leaders, who said such a phone call had never come up in post-Sept. 11 investigations, Mukasey said Thursday that the call hadn't come from Afghanistan, but from another nation he declined to name. But he said the incident still showed that Congress was interfering with efforts to monitor terrorist communications, with catastrophic results. On Monday, committee Chairman John Conyers, D-Mich., and two Democratic colleagues issued a statement saying they wanted "answers, not public relations spin." In an accompanying letter to Mukasey, they said the phone call he now appears to be describing was reviewed in 2003 by congressional intelligence committees, which found that the National Security Agency had intercepted the message but failed to relay it to other intelligence agencies. "The failure to utilize the information in this call had nothing to do with limitations in (the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act), contrary to what your March 27 speech appeared to suggest," the House members said. "Instead, the problem was NSA's narrow interpretation of its authority," a policy that the agency later changed on its own. They also said Mukasey's letter did not answer one of their central questions: whether U.S. intelligence agencies could have monitored the phone call under a provision in the surveillance law that allowed wiretapping without a warrant for up to 48 hours in an emergency. That period has since been increased to 72 hours....
REAL ID side effects If I were a betting man, I would wager most people haven't followed the debate on REAL ID. If you indeed missed it, I would ask you take the time to learn about what I consider the most troubling piece of legislation I've seen come from Washington since I have been governor. REAL ID would surreptitiously require all 50 states to change their driver's licenses to act as de-facto national ID cards. It's outrageous, and not just because it was a backdoor way of doing something proponents in Washington have never been able to pull off in the past. I say "outrageous" because REAL ID was never really debated in Congress; because the cost of its implementation is handed down to states and individuals; and because it is an affront to Americans' privacy concerns. Let's look more closely at a few of those concerns: (1) Steroid use in baseball has now received more congressional attention than has REAL ID. But national policy changes should be debated, not dictated. This was not the case with REAL ID. It never saw committee debate in the House or Senate, and passed as nothing more than a rider, an attachment, to a bill devoted to tsunami relief and military personnel fighting in the Middle East. (2) The cost of REAL ID, and the national ID card system that would come with it, would not be borne by the federal government but handed to the states and individuals. So-called unfunded mandates like these keep the spending trains going in Washington. I find it amazing now that Washington has stacked up $50 trillion in debts, which amount to $450,000 per household, that their idea of keeping those promises rests on handing the bill to others....
Border Patrol targets ex-military as agents The Border Patrol, scrambling to hire thousands of agents by the end of the year, is taking its recruiting efforts overseas to try to enlist military veterans who have fulfilled their tours of duty. Two teams of agency officers just returned from visiting six U.S. military bases in Germany, where they persuaded nearly 100 veterans to apply to join the Homeland Security Department as border agents. "This is a premier law enforcement agency, and we offer an opportunity for service on the front lines of the country," said Joe Arata, a recruiter for Homeland Security's Customs and Border Protection (CBP) division, which includes the Border Patrol. CBP spokeswoman Tara Dunlop said the department plans to do more recruiting overseas. The Homeland Security Department has been trying to drastically increase the number of agents along the nation's open borders. The recruiting drive also comes at a time when law enforcement agencies nationwide, from city and state police departments to the FBI, are competing for hires. In 2001, the Border Patrol had fewer than 10,000 agents covering the northern and southern borders with Canada and Mexico. A buildup in recent years has brought the ranks to 15,500. President Bush has said he wants the size of the agency doubled, to 20,000 agents, by the time he leaves office next January....
In Mexico, War on Drug Cartels Takes Wider Toll Ramírez's ordeal occurred during one of the most volatile moments in Mexico's military campaign against drug cartels, a war that has ranged from the U.S.-Mexican border to Gulf ports to insular rural outposts such as this, and that pits the country's demand for security against its stated commitment to human rights. A village of 3,000 mostly small-plot farmers, Nocupetaro is among a constellation of communities where the military has been dispatched to take on the cartels in one of the largest domestic deployments in Mexican history. President Felipe Calderón has sent more than 25,000 soldiers and federal police across the country over the past 16 months in response to drug-related violence that has killed more than 5,300 people since 2006. According to government figures, major army operations in nine states have led to more than 22,000 arrests and the seizure of 50 tons of cocaine and 40,000 weapons. The operations, government officials say, have shaved $9 billion a year from the cartel's roughly $23 billion drug trade. In an anti-narcotics plan now before Congress, President Bush has proposed sending the Mexican military $205.5 million in equipment in 2008, more than 40 percent of the proposed outlay for the year. The Merida Initiative, as the program is known, designates a portion of Mexico's proposed $950 million package for 2008 and 2009 for human rights training for police, prosecutors and prison officials, though none for the army....
Wal-Mart to film gun sales in bid to fight crime Wal-Mart Stores Inc, the world's largest retailer, unveiled plans on Monday to film its gun sales in the United States and create a computerized log of purchases in a bid to stop guns falling into the wrong hands. Wal-Mart, which is the largest seller of firearms in the United States, agreed a 10-point code, which also includes rigid inventory controls, with a bipartisan coalition of Mayors Against Illegal Guns led by New York's Michael Bloomberg. The retailer said it will develop a first-of-its-kind computerized crime gun trace log that will flag purchases by customers who have previously bought guns later recovered in crimes. "Wal-Mart currently uses a strong point of sale system," said J.P. Suarez, senior vice president and chief compliance officer of Wal-Mart. "This code is a way for us to fine-tune the things we're already doing and further strengthen our standards. We hope other retailers will join us." The Responsible Firearms Retailer Partnership is designed to strengthen the points in the gun purchasing system that criminals have exploited in the past, Wal-Mart and the Mayors Against Illegal Guns said....
Feds to collect DNA from every person they arrest The government plans to begin collecting DNA samples from anyone arrested by a federal law enforcement agency — a move intended to prevent violent crime but which also is raising concerns about the privacy of innocent people. Using authority granted by Congress, the government also plans to collect DNA samples from foreigners who are detained, whether they have been charged or not. The DNA would be collected through a cheek swab, Justice Department spokesman Erik Ablin said Wednesday. That would be a departure from current practice, which limits DNA collection to convicted felons. Expanding the DNA database, known as CODIS, raises civil liberties questions about the potential for misuse of such personal information, such as family ties and genetic conditions. Ablin said the DNA collection would be subject to the same privacy laws applied to current DNA sampling. That means none of it would be used for identifying genetic traits, diseases or disorders. Congress gave the Justice Department the authority to expand DNA collection in two different laws passed in 2005 and 2006. There are dozens of federal law enforcement agencies, ranging from the FBI to the Library of Congress Police. The federal government estimates it makes about 140,000 arrests each year. Justice officials estimate the new collecting requirements would add DNA from an additional 1.2 million people to the database each year....
States expand taking of DNA States are dramatically expanding controversial DNA sampling beyond convicted felons to include tens of thousands of suspects arrested on felony charges before they are tried. Twelve states have laws that permit sampling for some or all felony arrests, up from five in 2006, the National Conference of State Legislatures (NCSL) says. Another 21 are considering such proposals, according to DNAResource.com, which tracks DNA-related laws. Provisions in most of the new laws call for destroying samples if suspects are acquitted or charges are dropped. After a sample is destroyed, the DNA cannot be matched to other crimes in the database. The fast-growing legislation, once applied narrowly to sex offenders and convicted felons, worries civil liberties advocates who believe the testing amounts to a clumsy forensic dragnet. "In our system, you are supposed to be innocent until proven guilty," says Maryland state Sen. Lisa Gladden, a Democrat, who opposed a DNA sampling plan offered by Gov. Martin O'Malley, also a Democrat. Despite such objections, the technique is gaining popularity as a law-enforcement tool. The expansion "is definitely picking up steam," says Donna Lyons, criminal justice director at NCSL....

The truth about the Clean Water Restoration Act Some claims are so outrageous that they must be answered. Like the claim that the misnamed "Clean Water Restoration Act" (HR2421/S1870) simply restores the "original intent" of Congress to regulate all waters in the United States. This claim is belied by the actual text of the Clean Water Act--the best and only indication of congressional intent--that says Congress intends to protect the nation's waters by eliminating the discharge of pollutants into the "navigable waters" while protecting "the primary responsibilities and rights of the states" to eliminate pollution and determine the "development and use ... of land and water resources" locally. Nowhere does the Clean Water Act state that Congress intends to regulate (i.e., federalize) all waters in the U.S. Instead, the act states just the opposite. Another outrageous claim that must be answered is the patently dishonest argument that the implementing agencies have had a consistent interpretation of the Clean Water Act for more than 30 years recognizing congressional intent to regulate all waters in the U.S. In truth, when the act was passed in 1972 (as the Federal Water Pollution Control Act), the Army Corps of Engineers asserted it could only regulate traditional navigable waters and not much else. The corps did not change its tune until 1975-76 when it adopted more expansive regulations. But even these regulations did not purport to cover all waters. They expressly excluded some wetlands and other waters, and still do. By 1986, the corps was only regulating wetlands adjacent to "navigable waters" and specifically excluded man-made drainage ditches. Still later, the corps adopted the infamous "Migratory Bird Rule" which authorized for the first time federal control over any water body that could be used by migrating waterfowl--a rule that would not have been necessary if the corps had already claimed for federal control all waters in the U.S. A 2004 GAO (General Accounting Office) audit revealed the corps did not have a consistent jurisdictional standard and that government officials from the same office could not agree on the reach of the act. And twice the U.S. Supreme Court has chastised the corps for its ever-changing regulatory interpretations. The fact is the agencies have never had a consistent view of federal jurisdiction under the Clean Water Act nor have they ever claimed in a formal rule that the act reaches to all intra- and interstate waters in the nation, as does the proposed "Clean Water Restoration Act."....

GOP seeking a single voice on climate issue Senate Republicans began an unusual closed-door debate on climate change Wednesday that may portend a shift toward the position of the party’s presumptive presidential nominee, Sen. John McCain (Ariz.). The meeting of the conference launched GOP efforts to find a common position on global warming, an issue on which Republicans have been sharply divided. The issue has taken on a greater urgency within Republican circles now that all the major presidential candidates, including McCain, support mandatory controls of greenhouse gases. This represents a sharp break with the Bush administration, which has fought such proposals vigorously. Wednesday’s meeting did not produce a consensus and may have ultimately helped solidify GOP opposition to the leading proposal on climate change. Still, several Republican senators said it marked a shift in the debate. Instead of arguing over the science underpinning global warming, the meeting focused almost exclusively on the impact a mandatory system to control greenhouse gases would have on the economy and the environment....

Bush to Endorse 'Intermediate' Emissions Goal President Bush will endorse an "intermediate goal" today for reducing greenhouse gas emissions, but he will not put forward any specific legislation or proposal on how the goal should be met, White House officials said. In an afternoon address in the Rose Garden, Bush will also reiterate his long-standing opposition to mandatory emissions regulations without simultaneous agreements from large developing nations such as India and China, officials said. "The president will announce tomorrow an intermediate goal that will lead to a long-term goal" through ongoing negotiations on global climate change, said White House spokesman Tony Fratto. White House officials declined to release more details yesterday. But Bush's announcement appears unlikely to contain much in the way of new proposals for reducing greenhouse gas emissions, according to environmental advocates and industry representatives. Bush has long made clear that he does not support mandatory reductions without similar cuts in developing nations, and he objects to proposals on Capitol Hill to create a mandatory system for reducing the greenhouse gases that are a major cause of climate change....
Fuel Choices, Food Crises and Finger-Pointing The idea of turning farms into fuel plants seemed, for a time, like one of the answers to high global oil prices and supply worries. That strategy seemed to reach a high point last year when Congress mandated a fivefold increase in the use of biofuels. But now a reaction is building against policies in the United States and Europe to promote ethanol and similar fuels, with political leaders from poor countries contending that these fuels are driving up food prices and starving poor people. Biofuels are fast becoming a new flash point in global diplomacy, putting pressure on Western politicians to reconsider their policies, even as they argue that biofuels are only one factor in the seemingly inexorable rise in food prices. In some countries, the higher prices are leading to riots, political instability and growing worries about feeding the poorest people. Food riots contributed to the dismissal of Haiti’s prime minister last week, and leaders in some other countries are nervously trying to calm anxious consumers. At a weekend conference in Washington, finance ministers and central bankers of seven leading industrial nations called for urgent action to deal with the price spikes, and several of them demanded a reconsideration of biofuel policies adopted recently in the West....
Global warming rage lets global hunger grow We drive, they starve. The mass diversion of the North American grain harvest into ethanol plants for fuel is reaching its political and moral limits. "The reality is that people are dying already," said Jacques Diouf, of the UN's Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). "Naturally people won't be sitting dying of starvation, they will react," he said. The UN says it takes 232kg of corn to fill a 50-litre car tank with ethanol. That is enough to feed a child for a year. Last week, the UN predicted "massacres" unless the biofuel policy is halted. Mr Diouf says world grain stocks have fallen to a quarter-century low of 5m tonnes, rations for eight to 12 weeks. America - the world's food superpower - will divert 18pc of its grain output for ethanol this year, chiefly to break dependency on oil imports. It has a 45pc biofuel target for corn by 2015. Argentina, Canada, and Eastern Europe are joining the race....
Settlement reached in rare butterfly case A settlement reached by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and environmentalists requires the agency to take the first step in determining whether a rare butterfly found only in southern New Mexico deserves protection under the Endangered Species Act. WildEarth Guardians and the Center for Biological Diversity sued the federal government in January in federal court in Washington, D.C., to force the agency to make a decision on the Sacramento Mountains checkerspot butterfly—which the federal government previously proposed as an endangered species. The 2-inch butterfly exists only on about 2,000 acres in high-elevation meadows in the mountains near the Sacramento Mountain village of Cloudcroft. The groups contend the butterfly is being threatened by climate change, insecticides, development, off-roading and livestock grazing. Under the settlement, the Fish and Wildlife Service has until late November to review a petition filed by the groups that seeks listing of the subspecies as either endangered or threatened, said Elizabeth Slown, a spokeswoman for the agency's regional office in Albuquerque. If the agency determines the petition is valid, it will have until August 2009 to study the butterfly and decide whether it should be protected....
Americans Reject Proposed Expansion of Clean Water Act, Poll Shows A majority of Americans oppose the Oberstar/Feingold Clean Water Restoration Act (CWRA), according to a nationwide survey by Wilson Research Strategies for the National Center for Public Policy Research. CWRA will receive a hearing of the full House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee at 11 AM today. In the survey, voters were informed the Congress is considering a measure that would expand the areas covered under the Clean Water Act, including to areas that are only intermittently wet. They were then provided brief arguments both for and against the measure and asked if they favored or opposed the proposal. 54% of those with an opinion opposed the measure, while 46% favor it. Among political independents, opposition was higher -- 56% opposed, 44% in support. "The Clean Water Restoration Act would submit nearly every drop of water in the United States to federal regulation," said David Ridenour, vice president of the National Center for Public Policy Research. "It's not surprising that the American people have great reservations about such a massive increase in federal power." The poll found a majority of Americans from all regions oppose the Clean Water Restoration Act, led by the Mountain States (62%), the Farm Belt (59%), and New England (58%)....
Judge rejects forest plan lawsuit A federal judge has rejected a lawsuit filed by Montanans for Multiple Use over amendments made to the Flathead National Forest plan, saying the group did not appeal each amendment as it was made. The lawsuit, filed five years ago, was largely aimed at the forest's adoption of 23 amendments to its forest plan since 1986. The suit claimed the amendments amounted to a "piecemeal" de facto revision of the forest plan - a major policy change that did not involve adequate review. A March 31 ruling by U.S. District Court Judge Thomas Hogan of Washington, D.C., found that Montanans for Multiple Use did not adequately pursue administrative appeals as the amendments were proposed and adopted. Hogan wrote that the plaintiffs "had either 45 or 90 days to file a notice of appeal from the date specified in the public legal notice, depending on whether they chose to challenge the amendments as advertised ... or as they alleged them to be - de facto revision masquerading as a mere series of non-significant amendments. They did neither."....
Off-roader vows fight for 'rights' He's been found guilty of driving an off-highway vehicle on a government-closed road. Now, he's been fined $300 and placed on six months' probation. But Dan M. Jessop hasn't coughed up a cent - doesn't intend to, either. "I don't think the sentence was fair, based on the merits of the case and the law," Jessop said Monday after being sentenced by federal Magistrate Robert Braithwaite. So the Washington County resident is fighting the fine and has more than $30,000 in donations from sympathetic off-roaders throughout the West to fund his legal battle against the misdemeanor. "I appreciate the support," said Jessop, who has become a symbol in the ATV crowd's fight against off-road restrictions. Jessop's St. George attorney, Michael Shaw, said his client plans to appeal to U.S. District Court in Salt Lake City. And Braithwaite indicated he will stay the sentence once those papers are filed. In May 2006, Jessop was cited for driving an OHV on Sawmill Road in Washington County south of Zion National Park. He argues the road is a county one and that the Bureau of Land Management had no authority to close it. The BLM counters that the closure is valid because the road winds through a wilderness study area on agency property....
Wisconsin sportsmen want to hunt wolves Outdoor enthusiasts at Wisconsin's annual statewide conservation hearings voted to allow hunting wolves now that they have been re-established in the state. And they like the idea in a big way. Hunters, anglers and others who attended the Conservation Congress hearings in all 72 counties voted 4,848 to 772 to develop a hunting season on wolves "to keep the population within management objectives," the state Department of Natural Resources reported Tuesday. Conservation Congress Chairman Ed Harvey said the message is that the state should at least begin planning to allow hunting and trapping of wolves....
Country Legend Teams Up with Mint for Endangered Species What do bald eagles, Dolly Parton and the U.S. Mint have in common? They all came together for a good cause last Thursday, April 10. The Mint and the American Eagle Foundation were met with a little country music flair as legendary singer Dolly Parton joined Gloria C. Eskridge, the mint's associate director for sales and marketing, and Al Cecere, founder and president of the foundation, to release a rescued young eaglet back into the wild. The ceremony took place at Douglas Lake, located in the foothills of the Great Smokey Mountains. The site is not far from Parton's theme park "Dollywood" in Pigeon Forge, Tenn., where the American Eagle Foundation keeps Eagle Mountain Sanctuary. According to Dollywood's Web site, the 30,000-square-foot sanctuary houses the country's largest presentation of non-releasable bald eagles. On January 15, the Mint began selling coins commemorating the 35th anniversary of the Endangered Species Act of 1973. The coin designs feature the bald eagle at various stages of life. Surcharges from the Bald Eagle sales benefit the American Eagle Foundation of Tennessee....
Exhibit gets to the heart of fences Whether they are built with barbed wire, split rails or simple piles of stones, fences are a defining characteristic of the Western landscape that are usually taken for granted. But they take center stage in "Between Fences," a new exhibition on display through May 10 at the Meeteetse Museum. Developed by the Smithsonian Institution as part of its traveling exhibitions program, the display has been seen in Pinedale, Evanston and Sheridan and will end its run this summer in Sundance. " 'Between Fences' looks at the relationship between Americans and the land around them, and how fences have been that element of the built environment that we use to demarcate our own land and claim control over it," said Robbie Davis, a project manager with the Smithsonian. While "Between Fences" includes a look at fences on a small scale, such as between neighbors' backyards, it also looks at fences along the American borders with Canada and Mexico. Some elements of the exhibition deal with issues likely to be familiar to Wyoming residents. "It looks at barbed wire and the range wars in the West, and some of the laws that grew out of that," Davis said. "It also examines what it means to have cattle and other livestock moving back and forth and what impact that has on land and relationships. "It also covers mineral rights, and how you may own the land itself, but you may not own what's underneath it. It specifically looks at methane deposits, and includes an image from Gillette" showing coalbed methane work. "We talk about Wyoming and New Mexico specifically, and how ranchers often own the land, but the federal government owns the minerals beneath," Davis said....

States of Nature In their long-standing campaign against environmental protections, American conservatives have taken a kitchen sink approach: First they exalted states' rights and attacked the Environmental Protection Agency; later, they reversed course, attacking states' rights and exalting the EPA. The only consistent objective was to thwart regulation, and the only question was which strategy would be most effective in achieving that goal. But their political opportunism may soon come to haunt them. By abandoning their strict states'-rights principles for a broad view of the EPA's authority, conservatives have boxed themselves into a corner. If Congress and the White House are in a more environmental mood after November, conservative anti-environmentalists may find that they have laid the legal groundwork for their ultimate defeat. The debate among conservatives over the best strategy for pro-business environmental policies has been raging for three decades. During the Reagan and first Bush administrations, the states'-rights strategy initially prevailed. In a series of legal challenges, conservatives embraced a pre-New Deal vision of Congress's power to regulate the environment. They insisted that the Clean Air Act, which instructs the EPA to "protect the public health" by regulating ozone and particulate matter, was an unconstitutional delegation of regulatory authority. In a federal appellate opinion in 1999, Judge Douglas Ginsburg of the U.S. Court of Appeals in D.C. embraced this radical argument. (He was the same judge who had called for the resurrection of the "Constitution in Exile"--a reference to judicial limitations on federal authority that had been dormant since the 1930s and that would have called the EPA itself into question.) But, in 2001, in a unanimous opinion written by Justice Antonin Scalia, the Supreme Court disagreed. (In a separate concurrence, only Clarence Thomas indicated that he would be amenable to similarly radical arguments in the future.)....
Drilling The Future America's energy crunch is sadly self-inflicted. While others around the world engage in a mad dash to find more oil reserves, the U.S. seems to think $111-a-barrel oil won't be affected by more supply. A line from the recent film "There Will Be Blood" reminds us of the spirit this country's original oil entrepreneurs once had. "There's a whole ocean of oil beneath our feet," bellows antihero Daniel Plainview. "No one can get at it except for me." Such sentiment these days is in short supply. But not overseas. Take Brazil's Petroleo Brasileiro. On Monday, it announced that its Carioca offshore oil field may hold up to 33 billion barrels — more than the estimated official reserves in all the U.S. This follows Brazil's discovery last December of a huge new oil source, the Tupi field, also thought to hold billions of barrels. Haroldo Lima, head of Brazil's National Oil Agency, estimates that Carioca might be as much as five times the size of Tupi. Why the spate of discoveries off Brazil? Simple: With oil topping $100 a barrel, it's now more economical to prospect for hard-to-get supplies, whether deep in the ocean or in remote regions of dry land. When prices soared, Brazil got busy. This is happening around the world....
Economic Pain Of Carbon Cuts Will Be Global The political debate over climate change has advanced rapidly in recent years, and there is now tremendous pressure to reduce carbon emissions from U.S. industrial activity. Unfortunately, the economic debate over the cost of attempting to achieve such reductions has gotten little attention despite the direct financial impact it will have on all our nation's citizens. As the country teeters on the brink of a recession, it is even more imperative to have a frank conversation on the cost of potential actions set for debate in Congress and who will shoulder the burden. The Senate will soon consider legislation, sponsored by Joseph Lieberman, I-Conn., and John Warner, R-Va., that would institute a cap-and-trade system for emissions of greenhouse gases. This program would set a limit on the amount of carbon dioxide and other emissions from economic activity that many link to climate change. Firms and industries that cut their emissions below a preset level would be able to trade credits to firms or industries that cannot meet their targets. Any economist will tell you that if you want less of something, the best thing to do is tax it. A cap-and-trade program serves as a tax on emissions to reduce them. Make no mistake, that's what the proposed program is: a hidden tax on the use of energy....

Bush prepares global warming initiative President Bush is poised to change course and announce as early as this week that he wants Congress to pass a bill to combat global warming, and will lay out principles for what that should include. Specifics of the policy are still being fiercely debated, but Bush administration officials have told Republicans in Congress that they feel pressure to act now because they fear a coming regulatory nightmare. It would be the first time Mr. Bush has called for statutory authority on the subject. "This is an attempt to move the administration and the party closer to the center on global warming. With these steps, it is hoped that the debate over this is over, and it is time to do something," said an administration source close to the White House who is familiar with the planning and who said to expect an announcement this week. The source requested anonymity to be able to speak on a sensitive matter still under debate. Given the arguments at the White House over the extent of the action to take, it is not clear exactly what Mr. Bush will propose, the adminstration source said. Still, Republican members of Congress who were briefed last week let top administration officials know that they think the White House is making a mistake, according to congressional sources and others familiar with the discussions. Opponents said Mr. Bush could be setting off runaway legislation, particularly with Democrats in control of Congress....
Governors Gathering for Yale Climate Change Conference Governors from across the United States are meeting at Yale University this week to discuss ways of dealing with global climate change. The gathering -- on April 17 and 18 -- will celebrate the centennial of President Theodore Roosevelt's 1908 Conference of Governors, which launched the modern conservation movement, planted the seed for the National Parks System, and inspired significant state efforts to protect land, Yale said in a press release announcing the conference. Participants -- including Govs. Jodi Rell (R-Conn.), Arnold Schwarzenegger (R-Calif.), Jon Corzine (D-N.J.) and Kathleen Sebelius (D-Kan.) -- will "confront the present climate challenge, and set out a vision of a federal-state partnership for future action," Yale announced. Yale said the governors will meet privately for "high-level discussions on climate change," then address the general public during a session on April 18th. They'll "exchange ideas and chart a forward path on state, national, and international action." The governors also are expected to sign a "climate change declaration" on state and federal policy-making. "This is particularly timely as the United States prepares for new leadership at the federal level, Yale said. The three leading presidential hopefuls have pledged to limit greenhouse gas emissions....
Students Urged to Focus on Their 'Carbon Footprints' Attention, class: This is National Environmental Education Week, a time to actively engage K-12th grade students and teachers in "an inspired week of environmental learning" before Earth Day on April 22. The event is organized by the National Environmental Education Foundation, a group chartered by Congress in 1990 to advance environmental knowledge and action. "Our ultimate goal is to activate environmentally responsible behavior in the general public," the group says on its Web site. The theme of this year's Environmental Education Week is "carbon footprints." The lessons and activities are "designed to infuse environmental education into everyday learning." With that goal in mind, the National Environmental Education Foundation is offering an online student carbon calculator to help kids figure out how much carbon dioxide they are emitting in the following categories: travel, what you eat, home, what you use, and what you throw away....

Californians' power bills to bankroll climate institute Are you willing to pay 12 to 30 cents more a month on your utility bill for an institute coordinating energy and climate change technology research across the state? Actually, you don't have a choice. The California Public Utilities Commission on Thursday unanimously approved the $600 million California Institute for Climate Solutions, which will be paid for by money from ratepayers' monthly electric bills, to the tune of $60 million a year. The institute aims to speed up research into cutting greenhouse gas emissions, such as auto exhaust, that contribute to pollution. This work is already under way at laboratories as well as universities such as University of California, Berkeley, and Stanford. The idea is that the institute will help the various entities work together. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger applauded the decision, saying it was another important step toward battling global warming and "will bring together the state's pre-eminent colleges, universities and laboratories to fight climate change." Commission representatives Thursday estimated the additional charge to utility customers at 12 to 30 cents a month. "Electric bills are becoming blank checks," said Mark Toney, executive director of San Francisco-based consumer advocacy group The Utility Reform Network. Toney decried the decision to fund the institute via utility bills, while lauding the goal of reducing global warming....
Panel: EPA smog rule fails to protect young, old An advisory panel of scientists told the Environmental Protection Agency that its new air quality standard for smog fails to protect public health as required by law and should be strengthened. In a stern letter to EPA Administrator Stephen Johnson, the advisers expressed frustration that their unanimous recommendation for a more stringent standard was ignored when Johnson set the new smog requirements last month. Johnson on March 12 lowered the amount of ozone that should be allowed in the air for it to be considered healthy from 80 parts per billion to 75 parts per billion. That meant 345 additional counties nationwide are in violation of the federal air quality standards for ozone, commonly known as smog, and must find ways to reduce the pollution. While business lobbyists wanted the smog requirement unchanged, most health experts had argued that even stronger measures were needed. The Clean Air Scientific Advisory Committee, created by Congress to advise the EPA, had urged the EPA to set a standard for ozone of between 60 parts per billion and 70 parts per billion....I'm sure these scientists are very smart, but I have to wonder why they don't understand the meaning of "advisory".
The Biofuel Brew Ha-Ha In Germany, they call it "liquid bread." Here in the U.S., frat boys and hipsters cultivating an ironic air call them brewskies. Most of us just refer to it as "beer." But whatever your name for the stuff, there's little point in denying that people in both countries love their beer. The difference right now, however, is that while we Americans can continue to toss 'em back as we always have, German beer prices are skyrocketing. Who or what is the culprit? Corporate greed, perhaps, or an alcohol tax designed to push German beer drinkers to kick their six-pack habit? It's something far less spectacular, but potentially more insidious: biofuel subsidies that are pushing more farmers to ditch their barley crops—which are necessary to make beer*—in favor of crops that earn them lucrative subsidies from regulators trying to fight global warming. Topping the list of these subsidized crops are rapeseed and corn, ingredient which are used in the creation of biodiesel and ethanol-gasoline fuel blends which supposedly reduce the greenhouse gasses that cause global warming. Thanks to these crop shifts, the price of barley has doubled in the past two years, an increase that eventually gets passed along to consumers. Some brewers have raised their prices already, and many others are planning on raising them soon....
Owyhee Canyonlands protections back before Congress Sen. Mike Crapo on Thursday introduced a new version of his bill to protect wilderness, wild rivers and ranchers in the Owyhee Canyonlands. The bill includes new ways to compensate ranchers and removes provisions Senate Democrats had said would prevent them from supporting it. A hearing is scheduled for April 22. "Without this hearing, we would not be able to move the Owyhee Initiative legislation this year," said Crapo, R-Idaho. The original bill was first shaped by a panel of environmentalists, ranchers, outfitters, local officials, motorcyclists and snowmobilers brought together by Owyhee County commissioners. Crapo has been working with the county on the bill since 2002. Grant, a longtime champion of ranchers' rights, acknowledged he had to make painful compromises to get Democrats on board. But he still thinks the bill is good for ranchers and Owyhee County. "I'm satisfied (that) the way this bill is now can make the Owyhee Initiative agreement work," he said. The Owyhee Public Land Management Act of 2008 would still protect 517,000 acres of prime sagebrush habitat as wilderness, where motorized use is not allowed. It also would designate 315 miles of Wild and Scenic Rivers that run through the desolate area's deep, verdant canyons, which are carved into spires, benches and colorful chasms. The bill would release more than 200,000 acres of wilderness study areas back to multiple-use management. Like the 2006 version, the latest bill offers compensation for ranchers who would give up their rights to graze on the protected lands....
Wolf de-listing: A look at both sides of the issue Montana wildlife officials welcomed the official removal of the Rocky Mountain gray wolf from the federal list of threatened and endangered species. Wolf conservation and management in Montana is now officially the responsibility of the state. "Montana's wolf population is healthy, growing and firmly established in Montana," said Jeff Hagener, director of Montana Fish, Wildlife & Parks. "Montanans have shown patience and cooperation with this recovery effort. FWP supports wolf delisting and we're proud of the role the people of Montana have played in the recovery." With delisting now official, the line separating Montana into the northern Endangered Area and the southern Experimental Area no longer exists. FWP will move to reclassify wolves throughout Montana as a species in need of management under state law, which also offers wolves legal protection much like other managed wildlife. "It's important to understand that wolves are now an official part of the Montana wildlife environment," Hagener said. "The wolf will be managed like Montana's other wildlife species." For instance, wolves can only be purposely killed legally during an official hunting or trapping season; when a wolf is killing, attacking or harassing livestock; and to protect human life, Hagener said....
In the West, a Fierce Battle Over Wolves Gray wolves have entered the spin cycle. Since March 28, when the wolf was taken off the list of federally protected species in Idaho, Montana and Wyoming, a fierce battle of perceptions and posturing has unfolded on the Web and in the news media as pro-wolf and anti-wolf forces stake out sometimes hyperbolic positions concerning where in the West animals and humans should exist. The backdrop is a running time clock and a lawsuit. On April 28, a coalition of environmental groups has said it will to go federal court challenging the decision to lift protections. Until then, the court of public opinion is in session, as cases are built for how the new system of state management is working or not. One wolf lover in California, in a forum posting on the Web site Yellowstone.net, proposed that tourists boycott Wyoming to protest the policies in a state where at least 10 wolves were shot in the first week after the rule change, according to state figures. Some Wyoming residents responded that such an action would be just fine by them, especially if more Californians stayed home. Some ranchers and hunters urge caution in killing wolves unnecessarily, to avoid inflaming emotions that could haunt the legal process later on. Pro-wolf forces, meanwhile, say that wolf killers may have created a martyr. On the first day protections were lifted, a partly crippled and much photographed radio-collared wolf named 253M was legally shot near the town of Daniel in western Wyoming. The killing made headlines as far away as Utah, where 253M had wandered in 2002, before being transported back to Wyoming. A story in The Salt Lake Tribune quoted a woman as saying she had wept at the news of the animal’s death....
Mountain lions spotted in Tucson It's the time of year when wild animals start moving out of the mountains and into the city. People who live in the foothills of the Catalina Mountains report seeing mountain lions in their yards. Tina Baba, who lives on the far east side off of Redington Road, says she's seen mountain lions twice. Baba says the first time was in her yard. "I was looking out that window and I saw it calmly walk across there. Then it just went across to my neighbors." The second time she was walking with her young daughters and dog on Redington Road. "It was just like 20 feet away from me. That did scare me a bit and I panicked because I had my two girls in the stroller." In the past two months, Arizona Game and Fish confirmed five mountain lion sightings at homes next to the Coronado National Forest. Aninna Thornburg, Game and Fish Public Information Officer, says, "The five sightings have been between Pima Canyon and Redington Road. This is not odd. This is not unusual. It's starting to get dry. The lions are coming in looking for quick food, water out of people's pools..."....
Fremont rancher says mountain lions killed sheep Just two days ago, Bob Garcia was almost positive that dogs had invaded his property and killed four of his sheep — a reasonable conclusion, given his 30-year history of raising the animals. But after coming within 10 feet of a fierce mountain lion early Thursday, Garcia is changing his tune. He's now positive that mountain lions are responsible for the most recent killings. "I'm 100 percent certain," he said. Garcia, 55, spotted a mountain lion on his Morrison Canyon property just after midnight, and authorities now are alerting the public about the sighting — and reminding them to be aware of their surroundings. The rancher said he was in his home watching the end of "The Tonight Show" when his dog, Tamika, began barking. "It was like she was telling me, 'Come, come,'" he said. Moments later, Garcia said, he was looking right at a mountain lion in his pepper tree. "I'm looking at it, and it was looking at me. We were face-to-face. I could see his eyelashes," Garcia said. "It was amazing, like something out of National Geographic." Garcia then retreated to his home and called authorities. But by the time he went back to the tree with police, the cat was gone....
Study begins on coal-bed methane water More than a year after the deadline, federal officials are starting work on a study exploring some of the effects of the Rockies' energy boom on water. A panel of the National Academy of Sciences met Tuesday in Denver with state and federal regulators to review what's known about the effects of coal-bed methane drilling on surface and groundwater and determine what needs to be studied further. The 2005 federal energy bill said the study should be completed within a year. Three environmental groups sued the Interior Department in February to force some action. "The (Environmental Protection Agency) has looked at the issue somewhat several years ago, but their analysis was very incomplete," said Robert Ukeiley of WildEarth Guardians, one of the groups that sued. The U.S. Bureau of Land Management, which oversees mineral development on federal lands, asked the National Research Council of the National Academy of Sciences to review information about coal-bed methane's effects on water and determine the need and scope for further analysis. he study would focus on coal-bed methane production in Montana, Wyoming, Colorado, New Mexico, Utah and North Dakota. The report is supposed to analyze what companies are doing to minimize the impacts on water and recommend any changes. Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, sent a letter last October to Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne, urging him to comply with the law and commission the National Academy of Sciences to write an analysis....
Ozone: 'A significant concern' Gov. Dave Freudenthal says the state must be involved in any independent investigation into the health effects of increased natural gas drilling in southwest Wyoming. In addition, the process must be driven by the local community, he said in a written response this week to a petition by more than 40 citizens in Sublette County calling for an independent agency to assess plans to expand gas drilling in the Pinedale Anticline. The state Department of Environmental Quality issued a series of ozone warnings for the Pinedale area this winter and spring. Health officials blamed the intense oil and gas activity. "From the data that has been collected, there is little doubt that ozone is a significant concern," Freudenthal wrote in a letter to the petitioners. The Bureau of Land Management has proposed allowing 4,400 additional natural gas wells to be drilled in the Pinedale Anticline. Some county residents say the BLM plan doesn't adequately address potential health consequences of more drilling activity. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency also has voiced concerns about elevated ozone levels, groundwater contamination and decreased visibility from the proposed new drilling....
Lt. Governor talks energy: Denish puts oil and gas high on priority list Pending action on the pit rules that regulate oil and natural gas producers during the drilling process, and a possible moratorium on new drilling in Río Arriba County are high on Lt. Gov. Diane Denish's radar screen. Denish visited San Juan County Friday for separate meetings with the San Juan Leadership Council and ConocoPhillips. "People are looking at responsible drilling," Denish said. "The real issue of the pit rules is whether real proof exists that harm has been done." The Commission is scheduled to meet April 16 in Santa Fe and may announce its recommendation then. Local producers claim the pit rules would add millions in extra expenses that are not necessary. Sticking to her statement that New Mexicans want to see responsible drilling, Denish raised the possibility they might drill directionally rather than create separate well pads and roads to them for each site. "I think a lot of this is spurred by the Galisteo Basin moratorium and the realization that a county can put on additional standards," she said regarding the seemingly new focus on where drilling is allowed, and to what regulations it should adhere. At issue in Río Arriba County is Fort Worth, Texas-based Approach Resources' plan to drill for oil in an 8- by 10-mile area east of Tierra Amarilla. The company is leasing 90,000 acres of mineral rights in Río Arriba County....
Ugly black buzzards finding Texas buffet in young stock Maybe if they were pretty, the ubiquitous buzzards that soar over Texas and elsewhere before landing to dine on some carcass wouldn't be viewed with such repugnance or considered a nuisance. "Unquestionably, they're as ugly as sin," says Ian Tizard, a Texas A&M University professor of immunology and director of the school's Schubot Exotic Bird Center. The birds range over much of the United States, and their March return to Hinckley, Ohio, for instance, is welcomed annually as a sure sign of spring. But their proliferation as pests is making them unwelcome from high-rises in Florida to ranches in Texas, denying the misnamed buzzards — they're really vultures, and either turkey or black vultures — the respect as Mother Nature's vacuum cleaners that they might deserve. Ranchers all around Texas increasingly are telling wildlife authorities that black vultures in particular, considered the more aggressive version of the bird and can reach 25 inches in length and have a wingspan of 5 feet, are responsible for killing young cows, sheep and goats. "They're prospering," Tizard said. "Clearly if they're killing cows that otherwise would live, that indeed is a cause for some significant concern. In Madisonville, about 100 miles north of Houston, city commissioners gave their blessing in January to shoot vultures blamed for destroying property as long as folks obtained the proper federal permits. Vultures, like virtually all birds, are federally protected. Just last month, officials in Barstow, Fla., moved to include them in their Noxious Birds Ordinance of 2008, removing them from protection on a bird sanctuary island....
The Sheep Incident It was half past midnight on March 17th, 1968. Keith Smart, the director of epidemiology and ecology at Utah's Dugway Proving Grounds, was awakened by the ringing of a phone. On the other end was Dr. Bode, a professor at the University of Utah, and the director of the school's contract with Dugway. There was a problem. Calls had been coming in. About 27 miles outside of the base, in the aptly-named Skull Valley, thousands of sheep had suddenly died. There were some survivors among the flocks, but it was clear that their hours were numbered. Veterinarians were dispatched to euthanize the few remaining animals. Army officials began drafting their official denial. A few days earlier, one of their planes had flown high over the Utah desert at Dugway with a bellyful of nerve agent. The plane's mission was simple: using a specially rigged delivery system, it was to fly to a specific set of coordinates and spray its payload over a remote section of the Utah desert. This test was a small part of the ongoing chemical and biological weapons research at Dugway, and it was one of three tests held that particular day. The flight would soon prove to be far more important than anyone could have guessed at the time. On March 13th, Dugway ran a series of three tests using VX. The tests were routine, like any of the thousands of weapons tests that were conducted there over the previous twenty years. In the first test, an artillery shell packed with VX was fired onto the range; and in the second, 160 gallons of the compound were burned in an open pit. Both tests were completed without incident. The third test involved delivery via airplane, with over a ton of a special VX mixture sprayed over the desert. Unbeknownst to the pilot, the spray nozzle that controlled the flow of the chemical had broken. As he climbed to a higher altitude, the chemical continued to seep from the plane. Winds that day were blowing between 5-20 mph, with gusts reaching 35 mph. These strong easterly winds carried the VX straight to Skull Valley. The next day, the sheep grazing in the area began to die, and within days thousands of them had perished. The government and local numbers differ, but anywhere between 3,483 and 6,400 sheep died in the aftermath of the test....
Giddy up for westerns by women The West may have been won by men, but women played a vital role in the settlement of the frontier and the lives of the men they loved. Westerns written by women give a bold, new slant to the American West that will appeal to female and male readers. Set in 1854 in Texas Hill Country, "Texas Rain" by Jodi Thomas, is a historical western. Texas Ranger Travis McMurray has to deal with ambush, horse thievery and an arranged marriage. A must-read for the committed western enthusiast. The "Hearts of Horses" by Molly Gloss tells all there is to know about the rigors of ranching, broncos and the colorful characters of the plains and mountains of the great American West, circa World War I. The story revolves around a 19-year-old "horse whisperer," Martha Lessen, a strong-willed woman working in a field that, until then, was the exclusive realm of men. Gloss brings the West to life with unforgettable characters from bygone times....
Cowboys, gals find their calling at Pasco gathering Rough-hewn poetry, and a whole lot of strumming and singing, filled the Pavilion at TRAC in Pasco on Saturday during the fifth annual Columbia River Cowboy Gathering. "The good Lord's tugging on my lead rope, and I soon will be heading home," sang Rod Erickson of Spirit Lake, Idaho, while hundreds of people smiled back. Some were eating hamburgers and hot dogs, while others were savoring the songs and the one-liners. "You can be a rancher's wife if your husband opens the door for the dog and drops the tailgate for you. You're a rancher's wife if you have to fight the dog to sit next to your husband at the drive-in movie," quipped Sam Deleeuw, a real rancher's wife and standup cowboy comic from Utah. Erickson and Deleeuw were two of 25 entertainment acts booked for the three-day gathering that began Friday, and ends later today after the conclusion of a Cowboy Church service.

Barrel Racers – the arena darlings
Cowgirl Sass & Savvy

Julie Carter

A horse race of a different kind. That's barrel racing.

The event that was once open only to the ladies has found its own place in the major leagues beyond rodeo in co-ed futurities and other series events.

Through the ages, barrel racing, the clover-leaf pattern around three barrels, was heralded as the "beauty event" of rodeo.

While indeed the competitors represent the prettier side of the sport, they are no less committed to their event than those that pay big-buck entry fees to throw their rope in the dirt or have their head stuck in the same by a bull or bronc.

What appears to be hard-lined independence in these women is actually, more accurately, necessary capability. It takes a fair measure of intimidating grit to maintain the pace to keep self, horse and rodeo rig ready for the road.

While young boys were riding stick horses and wearing pot-metal pistols planning to be the Lone Ranger, girls in braces and braids dreamed of being a barrel racer. That included pretty clothes, fast horses and a cheering crowd as she raced through her pattern, riding hard to be the champion.

That dream grew to the reality that included a drained checking account, a four-legged sorrel standing in the corral eating a hole in her wallet with feed bills, vet bills and assorted expenses such as tack, a horseshoer and, of course, entry fees.

It has never been a secret to any barrel racer that barrel horses plot 24/7 to find a way to ruin your day. Winning the world in the practice pen on Friday can become dashed hopes the next day when that prize equine comes completely untrained to the rodeo.

When the champ runs by the first barrel like he doesn't see it, all there is left to do is begin with the rodeo queen wave as you loop the arena before making an exit out the gate.

Even though it is a highly frustrating sport because so much of the ability lies with the horse, barrel racing has done nothing but grow in numbers and popularity.

That happened in great proportions when a place for them to compete as a stand-alone sport was created. Barrel racers have never had the reputation of playing well with others.

Veterinarians and farriers are privy to the most demanding side of "can chasers." Vets will attest to the need for a degree in equine pediatrics as there isn't a horse in the world that gets babied more than barrel horse.

Paranoia lives at the same address as every barrel racer. She can spot a limp, a cough, a twitch or a belly rumble in her horse before it even happens. And she lives in constant fear it will - just before she's supposed to be at a "big one" 500 miles away.

Ask any shoer who has put iron on a barrel horse how much "retraining" he received from the owner. When things go wrong in the arena, the shoer is at top of the list to get the blame, and the first phone call.

Every barrel racer carries with her on the road a complete veterinary pharmacy to ward off any possible ache, pain or ailment in her steed.

To find where she parked at the rodeo, one needs only to smell the air for a whiff of an assortment of liniments and secret concoctions surely cooked up in a cauldron.

On a more serious side, decades ago, Chris LeDoux recorded a song about barrel racers called "Round and round she goes." In it he said, "Silver buckle dreams don't leave time for standing still."

The chorus summed up the spinning world of a down-the-road barrel racer.

Round and round and round she goes
Where she stops nobody knows.
The miles are getting' longer,
The nights they never end.
Old rodeos and livestock shows
Keep the lady on the go.
Lord, she loves to run those barrels,
And it's the only life she knows.

There isn't a die-hard can chaser anywhere that doesn't identify with the truth in the song, or with the final lines:

As she drove into the morning
It slowly dawned on me
How hard it is to tell a dream goodbye.

And so it is.

Julie is a recovering can-chaser in a 12-step program. Visit her Web site a www.julie-carter.com