Gore claims scriptural mandate on environmental issues Protecting the earth from global warming is a mandatory part of following Jesus, former Vice President Al Gore said at a "Stewardship of the Earth" luncheon Jan. 31 during the New Baptist Covenant Celebration in Atlanta. "This is not a political issue," Gore told a crowd of approximately 2,500 paying attendees. "It is a moral issue. It is an ethical issue. It is a spiritual issue." Gore quoted Scripture several times in his speech and repeated his views that increasing amounts of carbon dioxide in the earth's atmosphere are causing a global climate crisis. Gore produced an Academy Award-winning documentary, "An Inconvenient Truth," which also dealt with global climate change and is being shown at the New Baptist Covenant meeting. Gore, citing Luke 12:54-57 for scriptural support, argued that it is dishonest for anyone to claim that global warming is merely a theory rather than a scientific fact. "The evidence is there," he said. "The signal is on the mountain. The trumpet has blown. The scientists are screaming from the rooftops. The ice is melting. The land is parched. The seas are rising. The storms are getting stronger. Why do we not judge what is right?"....
U.S. close to decision on polar bears The Bush administration is nearing a decision that would officially acknowledge the environmental damage of global warming, and name its first potential victim: the polar bear. The Interior Department may act as soon as this week on its year-old proposal to make the polar bear the first species to be listed as threatened with extinction because of melting ice due to a warming planet. Both sides agree that conservationists finally have the poster species they have sought to use the Endangered Species Act as a lever to force federal limits on the greenhouse gases linked to global warming, and possibly to battle smokestack industry projects far from the Arctic. Federal government scientists have presented increasingly compelling evidence that the top predator at the top of the world is doomed if the polar regions get warmer and sea ice continues to melt as forecast. Two-thirds of the population could be gone by mid-century if current trends continue, experts say. Bears are beholden to sea ice, where they perch so they can pounce on unsuspecting seals, their primary food. Meanwhile, opposing forces representing the oil and gas industry, manufacturing and property-rights advocates have begun threatening counter-suits over the potential listing. "This is going to be the mother of all test cases," said Alison Rieser, a lawyer and ocean policy professor at the University of Hawaii. "The legal question is whether the emissions of a proposed power plant can be tied to the cumulative effect of carbon dioxide, which is adversely affecting sea ice -- critical polar bear habitat."....
Nelson says he’d fight to the death to protect ethanol tariff Eliminating the tariff on ethanol imports, an idea that the secretary of the Energy Department hinted this week the administration might push, seems to have as much future as a cornstalk in front of a combine. The combine in this case would be Congress, which would have to approve any effort to end the 54-cent tariff on ethanol prematurely. The tariff would expire at the end of this year unless Congress extends the tariff, which protects the domestic ethanol industry. Midwestern senators repeatedly have said they will resist efforts to attack the tariffs, and Sen. Ben Nelson (D-Neb.) on Wednesday indicated he wasn’t about to entertain a new effort to kill the protection. Eliminating the tariff would be of particular benefit to ethanol producers in Brazil, who produce sugarcane ethanol that is cheaper than the U.S. corn-based variety. Energy experts have argued one easy step policymakers could take to cut dependence on foreign oil and limit greenhouse gas emissions is to eliminate the ethanol tariff, opening the U.S. market to sugarcane ethanol. Domestic ethanol producers, who already benefit from a federal tax break and renewable fuel production mandates, have lobbied aggressively in recent years to maintain the tariff protection as well. But livestock producers and meat processors, who are paying high prices for feed because of the ethanol-fueled bump in crop prices, have lobbied for the tariff to be eliminated....
Feds faulted in Indian trust accounting A federal judge on Wednesday ruled that the Interior Department has "unreasonably delayed" its accounting for billions of dollars owed to Indian landholders. The federal agency "has not, and cannot, remedy the breach" of its responsibilities to account for the Indian money, U.S. District Judge James Robertson said in a 165-page decision in a federal lawsuit claiming mismanagement of Indian trust funds. "Indeed, it is now clear that completion of the required accounting is an impossible task" for the department, Robertson said, adding that he would schedule a hearing next month to discuss ways to solve the problem. He added that his conclusion that Interior is unable to perform an adequate accounting does not mean that the task is hopeless. "It does mean that a remedy must be found for the department's unrepaired, and irreparable, breach of its fiduciary duty over the last century. And it does mean that the time has come to bring this suit to a close," he said....
Global warming solution hurts people more than warming Participants in President Bush's international climate conference this week in Hawaii should know that the "solution" to global warming -- expensive energy -- slows economic growth, at enormous human cost. In fact, evidence suggests that policies to fight global warming are worse for human welfare than rising temperatures. By now it is common knowledge that climate change is caused by the combustion of fossil fuels, which releases heat-trapping greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. But fossil fuels generate 85 percent of the world's energy because they are the cheapest sources of energy on earth. So a move towards green energy is a move away from cheap energy. Not everyone admits the stark economic realities of fighting climate change. Representative from the European Union, for example, seem oblivious to the costs of the policies they propose. During negotiations last December in Bali, Indonesia, EU officials demanded that the world commit to steep reductions in greenhouse gas emissions, with the goal of limiting global warming to 2 degrees Celsius. According to the International Energy Agency, the costs of meeting the EU's proposal are staggering. The IEA says that it would require the construction of 30 new nuclear power plants, 17,000 wind turbines, 400 biomass plants, two hydroelectric dams the size of China's Three Gorges Dam, and 42 coal fired power plants equipped with still-experimental systems to sequester their carbon-dioxide emissions undergroundeach year from 2013 to 2030. Of course, alternative energy sources cost more than conventional generation from fossil fuels -- that's why a green energy future is an expensive energy future....
A ‘Bold’ Step to Capture an Elusive Gas Falters CAPTURING heat-trapping emissions from coal-fired power plants is on nearly every climate expert’s menu for a planet whose inhabitants all want a plugged-in lifestyle. So there was much enthusiasm five years ago when the Bush administration said it would pursue “one of the boldest steps our nation has taken toward a pollution-free energy future” by building a commercial-scale coal-fire plant that would emit no carbon dioxide — the greenhouse gas that makes those plants major contributors to global warming. That bold step forward stumbled last week. With the budget of the so-called FutureGen project having nearly doubled, to $1.8 billion, and the government responsible for more than 70 percent of the eventual bill, the administration completely revamped the project. The Energy Department said it would pay for the gas-capturing technology, but industry would have to build and pay for the commercial plants that use the technology. Plans for the experimental plant were scratched....
Area once devoid of elk has grown rich in wildlife Gary Leppink, 61, said he's seen his neighborhood come full circle in his lifetime. Born and raised in the Two Dot area at the eastern base of the Crazy Mountains, Leppink now works for rancher Mac White. "Now there are hundreds of elk," Leppink said, and he has heard credible accounts of wolf sightings in the area. But when Leppink rode horseback in the area in the early 1960s, he was amazed to see one elk, and nobody believed his account. "The homesteaders shot 'em all out," Leppink said. "That's what they ate. "Now we've come full circle; the elk and the wolves are back." White's mother reportedly shot the last wolf in the area in the 1920s, when she was 16. The wolf had attacked a group of horses, White said. Now the wolf's snarling head is mounted on the Whites' fireplace, a reminder of days gone by....
Let the Managers, Manage The ink isn’t even dry yet on the new rules in the Federal Register to be published this week, regarding how Montana, Idaho and Wyoming can further manage the wolves and already several environmental groups are suing. All of this began back in 1995 when the infamous “buttinsky” from Arizona, Bruce Babbitt, enlisted all his authority as Secretary of the Interior to bring about one of the most contentious and divisive federal mandates the West has endured by reintroducing gray wolves into the Yellowstone National Park ecosystem. Since that day, the wolf has thrived and now numbers more than 200 packs in these three states with a conservative head count of more than 1500. Many in the game management community have hailed this reintroduction program as a success. Even Ed Bangs, wolf recovery coordinator for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, recently called the wolf population in Montana, Idaho and Wyoming, “robust and resilient.” But never mind the experts opinions and their well-worn management plans, the do-gooders in the environmental community are engaging in legal action to thwart what has been a long effort of planning for just this situation....
Roosevelt lawsuit fuels water-rights bill debate All the city of Roosevelt wanted was to give people in town a clean drink of water. Instead, the city is spending tens of thousands of dollars in court to protect water rights that could be lost because it - like most other cities in Utah - hasn't kept up with the letter of state water law. Roosevelt also has become an unwilling poster child for a water-law reform bill now before the Legislature that, if passed, would limit the power of the state Engineer's Office and challenge a basic principle that helped settle the West. Some, especially those who support HB51, say it's about time the notion of "first in time, first in right" loosened its grip on Western water. But others, including Utah Department of Natural Resources, the Utah Farm Bureau, the attorney general's office and the Utah Water Users Association, say the bill would encourage water hoarding and speculation and ensure never-ending court fights. Which is too bad, said Roosevelt City Manager Brad Hancock, because the bill could have included a better solution. For now, though, the city has to defend itself in court, he said, because State Engineer Jerry Olds has threatened the city's future by dangling the nearly unmentionable possibility of water forfeiture....
Study: Elk, cattle could share land For years, ranchers, hunters and other Elkhorn Mountain users debated whether the 300,000-acre mountain range south of Helena could adequately support both elk and cattle. In recent drought years, ranchers were told to pull their cattle off public lands early, or take them up later than normal, to ensure elk had enough forage for the winter. That meant ranchers had to feed hay to the cattle or use private grazing grounds longer, which cuts into profits in a business with a slim margin anyway. As part of an effort to move the conversation forward, the Elkhorn Working Group, composed of ranchers, state and federal officials and others, asked the Ecosystem Research Group to study grazing, grass and the overlap of use between cattle and elk. “The Elkhorns are a wildlife management unit, which includes elk but also livestock use,” noted Denise Pengroth, the Elkhorns coordinator for the Helena National Forest. “After two years of discussion by the Elkhorn Working Group — which was borne as a result of the conflict between elk use in the Elkhorns and livestock — we felt we needed to understand the distribution of elk and cattle and where they overlap.” What the study found, according to ERG scientists Mike Hollis and Greg Kennett, is that while both cattle and elk use similar grounds at times, there also are areas where they don’t compete and there seems to be enough forage overall to support them both. “We have a whole series of specific recommendations that are kind of technical, but the major findings were that you can still manage for those terrific elk herds and accommodate cattle grazing, and not impact the elk herds,” Kennett said....
Fire retardant could promote noxious weed growth, study finds Retardant commonly dropped from aircraft may help slow a wildfire's progress, but it also could promote the growth of noxious weeds across Montana's native grasslands, according to a new study. The study is being conducted by Salish Kootenai College student Levi Besaw and Giles Thelan, a research specialist at the University of Montana's plant ecology laboratory. They found that the slurry could ultimately worsen grassland fires by promoting the growth of weeds. "By no means does this suggest that retardant should be eliminated as a method for fire control, only that there may be an environmental cost" to native grasslands, said Besaw, the study's lead researcher. The pair are studying the effects on annual and perennial plants from 13,000 gallons of fire retardant that was dropped on Missoula's Mount Jumbo during a July 4, 2006 fire. Preliminary results show the retardant's fertilizer-like nutrients have significantly helped cheatgrass and tumbleweed mustard, both exotic annual species, to replace native perennial grasses on the mountainside. The weeds benefit from the jolt of nitrogen and phosphorous in the slurry, which native and exotic perennials ignore because they are accustomed to nutrient-poor soils, Besaw said....
Cyclists weigh wilderness proposal im Kral reflected the concerns of many mountain bikers to a U.S. Forest Service proposal to recommend wilderness designation for the Hermosa Creek area. "I think we'd like to see protection," Kral said. "But we don't want to be excluded." The meeting came in reaction to the Dec. 14 release of a major update to the forest plan for the San Juan National Forest. The draft plan recommends designating Hermosa Creek as a wilderness area, a distinction that allows hiking, camping, skiing, horseback riding and myriad other activities - but not mountain biking. The Wilderness Act of 1964 bans "mechanical transport" on wilderness areas. That is typically interpreted to prohibit mountain biking, said Mark Stiles, forest supervisor for the San Juan National Forest. The law predates modern mountain biking. What makes mountain bikers nervous, they say, is that the Hermosa Creek area happens to be a mountain-biking paradise. It reaches miles into the Colorado Trail and includes such favorite trails as Bear Creek, Indian Ridge, Corral Draw and Shark's Tooth. Van Abel and others want an alternative designation that would protect the area while allowing mountain biking....
Agency rejects landowner's proposed land swap The Forest Service has rejected a new proposal by Two Dot landowner Mac White that would have granted the public walk-in access to national forest lands near Big Elk Canyon on the east side of the Crazy Mountains. White's most recent proposal involved a series of land trades that swapped state, private and forest lands to consolidate some holdings and, in the process, get him access to his inholdings in the Lewis and Clark National Forest. In return, he'd allow the public to walk across a mile section of his land to access Big Elk Canyon. "I can't get to my own property right now," White said. White's talks with the Forest Service have spanned about seven years. The last chapter took place in 2006, when then-Sen. Conrad Burns attached a rider to a Department of Interior bill that would have granted White access to his inholdings in exchange for the Forest Service gaining "administrative access" to Big Elk Canyon. Administrative access allows only the Forest Service access to manage its lands, not public access. Burns' office later said the measure was only a way to pressure the parties to negotiate a deal. But the Forest Service wasn't interested in the proposal, saying that by law the agency is required to demand reciprocity, or access to its land, in exchange for allowing White access to his property....
‘Over the River’ proposal now available online The controversial “Over the River” project by artists Christo and Jeanne-Claude is back in the news, with the duo’s official design proposal now available online. The 2,000-page proposal details a plan to drape seven miles of the Arkansas River with shimmering fabric during the summer of 2012. The artists are working their way through a maze of approvals before the project can begin. Christo and Jeanne-Claude already have worked on the project for more than a decade. After extensive searching throughout the United States, the artists said they found the perfect site for the project in Bighorn Canyon to the west of Cañon City. Over the River would involve installing cables, anchors and fabric, which would be removed after the exhibit ends. Project supporters say the venture could attract up to 250,000 people and be a major boost to the economy. On the other hand, an opposition group — Rags Over the Arkansas River Inc. — has organized with the arguments traffic congestion could drive away wildlife and hurt businesses that depend on the Arkansas River canyon. Public safety during the installation, duration and removal of the project also has been questioned....
Marvel strikes back at state Fish and Game department If environmentalist Jon Marvel never shoved a Fish and Game commissioner after a meeting in December, he certainly shoved back Friday. Marvel fired off his own response Friday to an Idaho Department of Fish and Game memo sent this week to employees statewide telling them to avoid telephone communications with the renowned activist. The response was sent to Fish and Game Director Cal Groen and Fish and Game Commissioner Cam Wheeler. In it, Marvel requests the directive be withdrawn and demands the agency apologize for making an "inflammatory charge" that he "assaulted" Commissioner Wayne Wright at a Dec. 17 wolf management hearing in Hailey, and for saying "that I have a history of making threats to IDFG employees." Marvel, who leads the environmental group Western Watersheds Project, said the department acted as a "judge, jury and figurative executioner" with a "star chamber-like proceeding without any due process" for him on the matter. Fish and Game Deputy Director Virgil Moore issued the memo after the Dec. 17 meeting about the federal delisting of wolves. After the meeting, Wright and Marvel had a confrontation, and Wright said that Marvel shoved him. Moore, who witnessed the Dec. 17 confrontation, said Wright's account, and a Fish and Game officer's description of an argumentative Marvel phone call from a previous occasion, prompted the memo....
Park Police Rebuked For Weak Security The U.S. Park Police have failed to adequately protect such national landmarks as the Statue of Liberty, the Lincoln Memorial and the Washington Monument and are plagued by low morale, poor leadership and bad organization, according to a new government report. The force is understaffed, insufficiently trained and woefully equipped, the report by the Interior Department's inspector general concludes. Hallowed sites on the Mall are weakly guarded and vulnerable to terrorist attack, the inspector general's office found. The report includes a photograph of what it says is an officer apparently sleeping in a patrol vehicle at the Jefferson Memorial. It describes a Park Police officer doing a crossword puzzle. And it recounts someone leaving a suitcase against the south wall of the Washington Monument, where it sat unattended for five minutes until its owner reclaimed it....
GM unveils hybrid pickups General Motors Corp. will introduce a new hybrid full-size pickup and a concept hybrid truck this week at the Chicago Auto Show, betting that pickup drivers have been itching to jump on the hybrid bandwagon. GM says the 2009 GMC Sierra hybrid gets a 25 percent improvement in fuel economy without compromising performance, while its GMC Denali XT concept _ a low-slung, muscular utility vehicle _ gets 50 percent better fuel economy than a comparable small pickup. The Sierra is the next large GM vehicle to get the company's new two-mode hybrid system, which has also been introduced on the Chevrolet Tahoe and GMC Yukon sport utility vehicles and the Chevrolet Silverado pickup. The SUVs are expected to go on sale early this year, while the Silverado and Sierra are scheduled to hit the market at the end of 2008. The two-mode system got a lot of buzz late last year at the Los Angeles Auto Show, where the hybrid Chevrolet Tahoe was named the 2008 Green Car of the Year by the Green Car Journal....
Inhaling Pig Brains May Be Cause of New Illness A new disease has surfaced in 12 people among the 1,300 employees at the factory run by Quality Pork Processors about 100 miles south of Minneapolis. The ailment is characterized by sensations of burning, numbness and weakness in the arms and legs. For most, this is unpleasant but not disabling. For a few, however, the ailment has made walking difficult and work impossible. The symptoms have slowly lessened in severity, but in none of the sufferers has it disappeared completely. The packing house, in Austin, Minn. (pop. 23,000), slaughters 1,900 pigs a day, working two meat-cutting shifts and one clean-up shift. Virtually everything is used, including ears, entrails and bone. The 12 sufferers of the neurological illness -- most are Hispanic immigrants -- all work at or near the "head table" where the animals' severed heads are processed. One of the steps in that part of the operation involves removing the pigs' brains with compressed air forced into the skull through the hole where the spinal cord enters. The brains are then packed and sent to markets in Korea and China as food....
Earl Butz, Ex-U.S. Agriculture Secretary, Dies at 98 Earl Butz, the U.S. secretary of agriculture who was forced to resign after telling an obscenity- laced racist joke in 1976, died yesterday in Washington. He was 98 and the oldest living former Cabinet member. Butz, who died in his sleep, had been in failing health for the past couple of weeks, said Randy Woodson, dean of Purdue University's College of Agriculture. He had flown to Washington from his home in a retirement community in Indiana on Jan. 30 to visit his son's family, Woodson said. Butz was named to head the Department of Agriculture in 1971 by President Richard Nixon. He remained in the Cabinet under President Gerald Ford after Nixon resigned in 1974 amid the Watergate scandal. Butz encouraged farm production and promoted exports of surpluses. He exhorted farmers to ``plant fence row to fence row'' to meet global demand, helping to drive down surging food costs....
Schoolkids learn they’re all cowboys To poet Bunny Dryden, everyone is a cowboy, if even just a little bit. Third-, fourth- and fifth-grade students at Carmichael Elementary School got a lesson in cowboy culture Friday from Dryden and musicians Rena Randall and the Due West Trio, Tim O’Connor, Dave Bertoglio and Dave Gibson. Other poets and musicians of the 2008 Cochise Cowboy Poetry and Music Gathering performed at schools across the county to start the 16th annual event, which goes on today and Sunday. While outfitted in her cowboy hat, chaps and boots, Dryden spoke about the purpose of cowboy’s “duds.” Although spurs may look intimidating, they’re used to guide the horse, not hurt it, she said. Dryden helped explain some common cowboy vocabulary, too. Lariat is another word for rope, and dogies is the cowboy term for calves, she said. And “cowboy” stands for pride and responsibility, no matter if that cowboy is a boy or girl, she said. That idea inspired her poem “There ain’t no gender in ‘Cowboy.’ ” Dryden, a rancher’s wife from Thatcher, began writing poetry to document ranch history and life. Now she enjoys sharing it with children to honor that heritage. “We wouldn’t have this beautiful valley if it wasn’t for those who came before us,” she said....
Is an Old Man With Pig Spleens More Accurate than Doppler Radar? In today’s world of high technology and focus on the future, every once in a while it’s refreshing to take a deep breath and return to the more natural ways of our ancestors. That’s why I’m advocating that the National Weather Service be replaced by an old Ukranian man and several pig spleens. And if the man’s claims are to be believed, we’d actually get more accurate weather forecasts. Paul Smokov, an 84 year old cattle rancher from Steele, N.D., claims that he has forecasted the weather with 85% accuracy by observing the shape of pig spleens. The National Weather Service, with their millions in high tech equipment, is about 60% accurate. Smokov may be the last pig spleen weather forecaster left in North America. The editor of the Old Farmer’s Almanac said the only other spleen reader she had come in contact with had died in Saskatchewan, Canada last year. Smokov learned the subtle art of spleen reading from his parents, Ukranian immigrants who arrived in the US in the early 20th century. With weather being so important to farmers, and a decades long lack of electricity at the family ranch denying radio forecasts, the family kept the practice of spleen forecasting alive....
Bootman: 'I just wanted to give people something to look at' Boots, of every color, every size, every style, follow the county road along the Bohlender farm south of here. Dale Bohlender, 81, is living in the house in La Salle -- the same house he was born in -- and a few years ago, he started putting boots on his fence posts. Now there are more than 200 boots on more than 200 posts along Weld County Road 39 and on other parts of Bohlender's property. "I just wanted to give people something to look at as they drove by," Bohlender said. "Then people started adding their own boots and shoes, and it just grew." There are other boot fences, and legend has grown that farmers and ranchers put boots on the fence top so the human scent will keep away destructive wildlife such as coyotes and raccoons....