4 Senate Dems urge EPA chief to resign Four Senate Democrats called on EPA chief Stephen Johnson to resign Tuesday, alleging that he gave misleading testimony to Congress and repeatedly bowed to pressure from the White House to avoid regulating greenhouse gases. California Sen. Barbara Boxer, who chairs the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, and three other Democrats on the panel - Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island, Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota and Sen. Frank Lautenberg of New Jersey - also announced they are urging Attorney General Michael Mukasey to investigate whether Johnson made false statements to Congress. Mukasey's office said it was still reviewing the request late Tuesday. The pressure on Johnson is part of an escalating battle between Democrats in Congress and the White House over climate change policy. Democrats are seizing on new evidence that Johnson overrode the opinions of Environmental Protection Agency scientists and reversed two of his own decisions at the request of the White House....
Environmentalists, businesses reach compromise Governmental inaction is prompting environmental groups and big business to cut unprecedented deals to promote energy exploration and other development in return for major conservation initiatives. The agreements preserve large amounts of undeveloped land, impose stricter environmental practices than required by law and generate big investments in alternative energy. The deals also clear the way for oil drilling, new power plants and large residential developments. Experts say the move to private agreements reflects a loss of faith in the government's ability to handle some of the USA's most pressing environmental disputes. "I started off believing in regulation, but government agencies compromise and change rules," San Francisco environmental lawyer Clem Shute says. "These private deals are a pragmatic way to accomplish good things." Steven Hayward, an environmental scholar at the conservative American Enterprise Institute, says the agreements signal an era of "practical environmentalism." He says Congress has been in a stalemate for decades on major environmental legislation, especially on emerging issues such as land conservation, transportation and energy. That has forced businesses and environmental groups to reach out to each other, often after sparring a few rounds in court....
Al Gore's Curiously Cost-Free Plan to Re-Power America On July 17, Nobelist and Academy Award winner Al Gore issued a stirring challenge to our nation to produce 100 percent of our electricity from renewable energy and carbon-free sources within 10 years. Gore asserted, "The quickest, cheapest and best way to start using all this renewable energy is in the production of electricity. In fact, we can start right now using solar power, wind power and geothermal power to make electricity for our homes and businesses." This massive push for no-carbon electricity production would help prevent climate change and cut our dependence on foreign oil. Of course, great-souled visionaries such as Gore do not concern themselves with piddling and mundane issues such as who will pay for this marvelous no-carbon energy future and how much it will cost. Not being burdened with a great soul, I decided to don my green eyeshade and make a preliminary stab at figuring out how much Gore's scheme might cost us. According to the Energy Information Administration, the existing capacity of U.S. coal, gas, and oil generating plants totals around 850,000 megawatts. So how much would it cost to replace those facilities with solar electric power? Let's use the recent announcement of a 280-megawatt thermal solar power plant in Arizona for $1 billion as the starting point for an admittedly rough calculation. Combined with a molten salt heat storage systems, solar thermal might be able to provide base load power. Crunching the numbers (850,000 megawatts/280 megawatts x $1 billion) produces a total capital cost of just over $3 trillion over the next ten years. What about wind power?....
The Reality Revolt Quite a few Democrats are rebelling against their leadership and joining with Republicans to push for more domestic oil drilling. They've gotten an earful from voters who demand real solutions. When the Energy Department on Wednesday reported an unexpected drop in gasoline inventories of more than 3.5 million barrels, the first decline in five weeks, the global price of crude oil proceeded to shoot up more than $4 a barrel, the biggest increase since July 10. That illustrates what the issue of high gas prices is all about — not fat-cat oil execs gouging at the pump (a smear that has been repeatedly disproved), and not the purported need for uncompetitive substitutes like ethanol that cause global food prices to skyrocket, but rather the simple fact of supply and demand. The Democratic leadership in Congress has been trying to distract from that truth and use high gas prices to please the green special interests (and, of course, cripple the Bush presidency). When asked last week why she would not allow a House vote on drilling, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi answered: "What the president would like to do is to have validation for his failed policy."....
It’s a tradition No one living remembers the first Velma Old Settlers Picnic, as it took place before the turn of the 20th century. This year, the event starts today and runs through Saturday in Velma and marks the 118th year that the picnic has been held. Besides being a picnic, it is also known for a traditional ranch rodeo that takes place the first night. Ranch rodeo is different from most rodeos seen today because it encompasses more of the traditional skills that were once requisites on a ranch. “It goes back to the roots of rodeo,” said Terry Sutton, who helped organize this year’s event. Some of the events tonight will be milking wild cows, team doctoring and simulated calf-branding....
Farm dog sparked career Miles Allen knows first-hand what a good border collie can do for a person’s spirits. Seven years ago, while he was going through devastating treatments for Hepatitis C, a friend gave him a female collie. Allen, now 59, had gone from a strapping, robust 200 pounds to 140 pounds as he struggled to rally from his illness. Doctors gave him a 50 percent chance of surviving the ordeal. “That dog got me up and going,” he said during a recent visit to his place in Williamson County where he lives with his wife Peggy, his father-in-law, about 40 border collies and a sampling of his trophy rams. As the son of an itinerant ranch hand, Allen grew up all over the state, working the ranches with his father and attending a different school every year. “I enjoyed it,” he said. “All my family was ranchers. We ranched in Coleman County, and I still go up there and help my uncle. We run about 100 rams there in Santa Anna.” Allen was familiar with border collies before he got the dog that got him up and going. But after his illness, he settled in to raising dogs along with the trophy rams. He also worked as a truck driver, first for a local Charolais ranch then as a long-haul truck driver. He always had a border collie with him when he was hauling cattle and used them when he worked on ranches. In 2003, Allen’s female collie won first place at a trial in Odessa. He bought a male dog, developed a breeding plan and put a certain number of the offspring up for sale. The results have given him at least a break-even living along with a lot of happy customers....
Cattle take to really slow lane A stretch of Interstate 84 is the really, really slow lane once a year. A Morgan County family drives its cattle from one ranch to another annually and there is no getting around the freeway, which the cattle trod for about half a day as the ranchers control traffic. The Utah Department of Transportation doesn't like it, and neither does the Pentz family, but they say there are few other options. “First of all, it's a way to get our cattle from point A to point B, but it's also kind of a historical thing for us,” rancher Lane Pentz said. “We have been doing it for three generations, before the highway even came through here, but it gets tougher and tougher every year.” The Pentzes have been driving cattle through northern Utah since the area was open range. They still managed through fences and other developments, but are stuck by I-84. With 400 head of beef cattle, the family doesn't want to truck the herd the 14 miles between ranches....
Wagon Train Headed To Deadwood It's history dating back a century but people from around the country are reliving it today. Wagon trains used to travel a trail through western South Dakota to get to the Black Hills. The trail was a busy path at one time, but it hasn't been used since 1908. Now more than 300 people are on the trail again, heading west the old way. They travel at three and a half miles an hour… "I'm doing it because I enjoy it," Wagon Master Gerald Kessler said. Two hundred miles from Fort Pierre to Deadwood. "Well I get to ride with my cousins and get to meet friends," Gerald’s grandson Lane Kessler said. Travelers on the trail were once motivated by gold sitting at the other end. Reasons for taking the trip today are too many to count. There's Kylie Kessler. "My mule's nice," she said. Kylie is one of four big reasons Wagon Master Gerald Kessler calls the trip across the prairie worth it....
'Smithing was once a necessity For a town to survive in the pioneer days of Clay County, it need three things — a doctor, a general store and, for what one couldn’t cure and the other didn’t sell, a blacksmith shop. Blacksmiths, the forerunners of today’s welders and fabricaters, were relied on by farmers and ranchers for repair work and the building of new parts for anything steel, including wagon and plow parts, branding irons and just about everything else. The tradition of the blacksmith, his trade and tools, forge and anvil, were commonplace in communities across the county, and the world, well into the 1940s said Homer Calvin Kelton from his modest south Henrietta home Sunday. Kelton, 85, was the last in a long line of Clay County blacksmiths. The Kelton shop records and a board on which Calvin tested branding irons have been displayed at the Clay County Historical Society’s 1890 Jail Museum. “Blacksmithing had been going strong since Bible times,” said Kelton. “But, after World War II, the world began to change — and change fast.”....
Shaken Berry-Pickers Report Sasquatch Sighting in Ontario, Canada, Woods A mother and daughter on a berry-picking excursion in northwestern Ontario, Canada, claim the giant, black, hulking figure they saw last week might be the legendary sasquatch, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation reported Monday. Helen Pahpasay and her mother say they were scared stiff when they saw the mysterious creature spot them in their truck and then run into the woods near Grassy Narrows, Ont., about 140 miles east of Winnipeg, Manitoba. "It was black, about eight feet long and all black, and the way it walked was upright, human-like, but more — I don't know how to describe it — more of a husky walk, I guess," Pahpasay told CBC News. “It didn’t look normal.” The women considered chasing the figure to get a better look, but were so shaken they abandoned berry picking altogether and returned home. Pahpasay claims others later found a large, six-toed footprint in the area. “What do I think it was? Right now I'm not even sure what it was. But it really scared both of us,” she said. “There's been talk of Bigfoot, sasquatch. And I'm still not sure what it was, but I've never seen anything like it."....