Wednesday, April 07, 2010

Clean And Safe

Twenty-five killed and four missing in West Virginia. Six dead, dozens missing in China. How many more must perish in coal mines before the green lobby ends its opposition to a safer energy source? More than 100 Americans have died in coal mines since 1984. Over that same period, not one American has died in a nuclear energy accident. In fact, no American has ever been killed in an atomic energy accident — and that includes any sailor in a Navy that makes extensive use of nuclear fission to power its fleet. Worldwide, only 56 deaths are directly traceable to a nuclear energy accident. And all of those were the result of the 1986 Chernobyl disaster that has correctly been blamed on poor Soviet engineering and design, not atomic power's inherent risk. When properly harnessed, nuclear power is a clean, steady source of renewable energy. It doesn't sling out ash, generate acid rain or emit mercury or arsenic. It has been safely used for decades in the U.S., Sweden, Switzerland, South Korea, Belgium and France. The last two use nuclear energy to meet more than half of their electricity needs...more

Crapo seeks tax credits for endangered species work

In 2008, U.S. Sen. Mike Crapo accomplished part of his plan to encourage landowners to work with the Endangered Species Act, securing a permanent tax deduction for species expenditures on private land. But that was only half of what Crapo, R-Idaho, set out to do. He’s now trying once more to get Congress to approve similar tax credits, competing with a number of other tax proposals in the wake of the mortgage crisis and recession. The senator on March 24 introduced the Endangered Species Recovery Act of 2010, which would provide credits for both habitat protection easements and restoration work. Co-sponsored by eight other senators both Republican and Democrat — including fellow Idahoan Jim Risch, Sam Brownback of Kansas, Olympia Snowe of Maine and Jon Tester of Montana — it’s been referred to the Senate Finance Committee, where Crapo is a member. The bill is another step in Crapo’s pursuit of piece-by-piece ESA reform. On Friday, he told the Times-News that he believes he has support for the bill’s substance, but is concerned its cost may once again block its passage. The credits would cost nearly $1 billion in the first five years and more than $1 billion in the second five years. “There’s only a certain amount of flexibility in the budget for that sort of” cost, he said...more

Idaho wool growers file lawsuit over bighorns

The Idaho Wool Growers Association and Shirts Brothers Sheep has filed a lawsuit against the Idaho Department of Fish and Game concerning bighorn sheep management. The groups in the lawsuit filed earlier this week contend Fish and Game has not lived up to a 1997 agreement the groups say was designed to protect domestic sheep growers from potential adverse effects to their businesses from bighorn sheep introductions. The groups are asking for unspecified damages "in an amount to be proven at trial." The lawsuit comes several months after the Payette National Forest released a set of proposed updates to its plan to keep domestic sheep from intermingling with wild bighorns, citing disease transmission that kills bighorns. One alternative in the draft calls for reducing domestic grazing by about 60 percent in Hells Canyon and allotments in the Salmon River Canyon...more

Nonprofit Group Will Prod Companies to Report Their Water Use

The Carbon Disclosure Project, an investor-backed nonprofit organization that has persuaded some of the world’s largest corporations to disclose their greenhouse gas emissions, will announce on Wednesday that it is asking 302 global companies to begin issuing detailed reports on their water use. The move begins a campaign to put water consumption on par with carbon emissions as a concern of company shareholders. Scientists predict climate change will aggravate worldwide water shortages in the coming decades. “For investors, it’s a material issue,” Marcus Norton, head of the new project, called C.D.P. Water Disclosure, said in an interview by phone from London. “It matters because long-term investors in particular see that water scarcity is going to impact companies’ operations and supply chains.” Companies increasingly are running into water-related obstacles. Last week, New York State denied a permit for Entergy’s Indian Point nuclear power plant because of its enormous consumption of cooling water. A few days earlier, the Environmental Protection Agency issued new water quality rules that could limit mining company operations. And in California, regulators recently pressured the utility giant FPL Group to use more water-efficient technology in a solar power plant project while denying access to water supplies to other developers...more

Conservative Evangelicals embrace God and green

The cultural revolution of the 1960s and '70s included the birth of the environmental movement. That's when "there was a deep split, and the right stole God and the left stole green," says Jonathan Merritt, a 20-something evangelical Christian who sees himself as a political conservative but also as an environmentalist. "I think God and green go together, and I think they belong together." While many Chris­t­ian denominations enthusiastically support efforts to combat climate change, evangelical Christians, who tend to be both theologically and politically conservative, have been caught up in an internal tussle over the issue in which skeptics seem to hold the upper hand. But a new generation of Evangelicals such as Mr. Mer­ritt – who, he argues, carry less "baggage" from the 20th-century's cultural wars – are making a spirited effort to show that their religious beliefs and their environmental concerns are not only compatible but inextricably linked. "I'm an environmentalist because I'm a Christian and not in spite of that fact," says Merritt, an author and speaker whose book, "Green Like God: Unlocking the Divine Plan for Our Planet," will be published on Earth Day, April 21...more

Flour power

There’s a disconnect somewhere in Montana’s food chain. In a given year, Montana is the third-largest wheat-producing state in the country. At the same time, nearly three in 10 Montanans live in a condition that James Dodge, food resource developer for the Montana Food Bank Network in Missoula, calls “food insecure.” A collaboration between the MFBN and the Montana Grain Growers Association is bringing more of Montana’s amber waves of grain to the state’s dining room tables. Begun in December, the Our Neighbor’s Daily Bread program gives Montana’s wheat farmers a convenient way to donate their product, in the form of milled flour, to the MFBN, which then shares it with some 200 partner hunger relief agencies across the state. “Our guys are trying to help Montanans in need,” said Carl Mattson, conservation and farm program associate for the MGGA. The Great Falls-based association has some 1,200 farmer members representing about half of Montana’s annual wheat crop. Rather than trying to ship flour from all over the state to the MFBN warehouse in Missoula, the growers can, when they deliver grain to their local elevator, specify a dollar amount or bushel equivalent that they’d like to donate to the food bank network. That money is then put into an account that the MFBN can draw on anytime its flour supply runs low. Last week the network took delivery of 7,500 pounds of flour from a mill in Great Falls. So far nearly 60,000 pounds of flour have been donated...more

Animal-Rights Advocates Bare Teeth in a Novel Way

Animal-rights groups are aggressively stepping up legal tactics in an approach that is picking up steam nationally. The latest such instance was heard in a Wisconsin court on Thursday involving sheep that died of decompression sickness. In Madison, prosecutors declined to pursue University of Wisconsin officials and researchers whose test subjects, three sheep, inadvertently died of an illness that befalls deep-sea divers, decompression sickness or the bends, during U.S. Navy-financed experiments aimed at helping submariners. But two animal-rights groups, Alliance for Animals and People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, seized on a little-invoked state law to aid their case. The law allows citizens to petition a judge to order prosecutions when there's probable cause to believe a law has been violated and when a district attorney has refused to issue a complaint. At a hearing Thursday, an attorney for the animal groups asked Dane County Circuit Court Judge Amy R. Smith to order a special prosecutor to file civil charges against the university employees for killing animals using decompression, a condition caused by rapid changes in air pressure that can disrupt blood flow, which is outlawed in the state. The judge said she would issue a ruling later this month. State and local laws vary when it comes to animal-cruelty measures. Some animals, including farmed animals and rodents, have few if any protections. But animal-rights groups are cleverly using existing laws to help protect them. Lawyers in Indiana, Oregon and Washington state have used foreclosure laws to secure liens on horses, dogs and other pets of people charged with abuse to seize the animals. Because pets are considered property, the lawyers, working with local shelters can secure a lien equal to the cost of treating or boarding the abused animals and then auction them off for the price of the lien. The shelters so far have been the only bidders, allowing them to take possession of the animals and then offer up the pets for adoption...more

Song Of The Day #279

Sticking with 1965, #3 is I've Got A Tiger By The Tail by Buck Owens and #12 is Girl On The Billboard by Del Reeves.


Tuesday, April 06, 2010

Report: Artifacts source blamed self for suicides

Two days before he killed himself, the undercover informant in a federal sting targeting looted Southwestern artifacts told a friend he felt responsible for the suicides of two defendants, according to police reports released Thursday. Ted Gardiner told the friend he was upset over his involvement in the case and felt like he'd been ``thrown to the curb,'' according to records released by the Unified Police Department at the request of The Associated Press. The sting eventually led to charges against 26 people for allegedly stealing and trafficking in American Indian relics taken illegally from public and tribal lands. Two people, including a prominent southern Utah doctor, committed suicide last June shortly after the indictments were announced...more

Notorious Colorado developer cuts off ski route outside Telluride

Tom Chapman, a controversial southern Colorado real estate broker known for leveraging remote parcels for high returns from governmental agencies fearing development in the state's most pristine high country, is at it again. This time, Chapman's Gold Hill Development Co. is blocking ski passage through the middle of Telluride's treasured Bear Creek drainage, where the local ski-hill operator recently began offering guided backcountry ski trips. In a press release issued this week, Chapman said roughly 103 acres of mining claims he just acquired for $246,000 is now closed to skiing and hiking. Citing a history of avalanche-related deaths and injuries in the expert-only backcountry terrain, the release said Gold Hill Development Co. "has full cause to exclude all parties from its private lands for reasons of liability for injury and/or accidental death." "GHDC intends to enforce its right to exlude people from its private property by using Colorado trespass law if necessary," read the release. Chapman, 59, has a 26-year history in Colorado of finding obscure, seemingly undevelopable mining claims located in the middle of highly valuable land. Threatening to build homes and roads on private islands inside federal wilderness or national parks has netted him millions. In several cases, the federal government has either paid his price or swapped him other parcels of public land in exchange for inholdings he said he planned to develop...more

Feds, horse advocates at odds over pigeon fever outbreak in captured Nevada mustangs

After a new report of disease, wild horse advocates are angered about what they say is poor care of horses in federal custody at a private holding facility in Fallon. Pigeon fever comes from a bacteria in soil that is picked up by flies and transmitted when they bite horses. "The name comes from the large chest abscesses that some horses get, which can look like the large breast of a pigeon," said Heather Emmons of the U.S. Bureau of Land Management. She said the BLM estimated that 2 percent of the wild horses gathered December through February from the Calico Complex north of Reno recently showed "clinical signs of healed abscesses from pigeon fever." "It was not something acquired through the soil at the Indian Lakes Road facility," she said. Ginger Kathrens of the Cloud Foundation wild horse advocacy group disputes that statement...more

Kane road battle turns into fight over records

When the president of a taxpayer group asked for records concerning how much Kane County has spent in seven years on its battle with the federal government over ownership of roads on public lands, he couldn't believe the answer. "They told us it would cost $27,000 and take a few years to get," said Sky Chaney, who heads the 400-member Taxpayer Association of Kane County. "This is ridiculous." For nearly a decade, the Kane County Commission has battled the Bureau of Land Management in federal court over ownership of roads lacing the redrock country of southern Utah. The county has mostly been on the losing end of court rulings, including appeals, except for the latest challenge. The 10th Circuit Court of Appeals initially ruled against the county, but has now decided to rehear several issues. That case centers on the removal of 31 BLM road closure signs on hundreds of roads in the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument and Glen Canyon National Recreation Area in 2003. The court has asked lawyers to file briefs on several issues. Chaney's group wants to know the total amount spent not only on the legal maneuvering, but on activities like those in the 2003 case, when the county replaced the removed signs with new ones...more

A study of the social, economic & environmental costs of drilling moratorium

In recent decades our nation has restricted a significant expanse of federal onshore and offshore Outer Continental Shelf (OCS)1 lands from natural gas and oil exploration and production.2 The federal government estimates these lands may contain 285 Trillion cubic feet (Tcf) of natural gas and 46 Billion barrels of oil (Bbo) of undeveloped energy resources.3 This study: 1) updates4 the nation’s onshore and offshore natural gas and oil resource base in moratoria and non-moratoria areas; and, 2) using the updated resource estimates, assesses the social, economic and environmental impacts to the nation of maintaining the moratoria in the upcoming decades.5 The findings reveal an energy future for the nation that increases the cost and restricts the availability of domestic oil products and natural gas. Primary residual impacts: reduce real consumption levels; decrease gross domestic product (GDP); increase dependence on foreign oil and natural gas imports; increase payments to exporting nations; decrease real industrial shipments; elevate energy costs; decrease employment levels; decrease household income; and, produce a mix of negative and positive environmental effects.6...more

Clifford Hardin, Who Cut Subsidies at Agriculture Dept., Dies at 94

Clifford M. Hardin, who as the first secretary of agriculture in the Nixon administration succeeded in limiting subsidy payments to the nation’s largest farmers, died Sunday at his home in Lincoln, Neb. He was 94. The University of Nebraska, where Mr. Hardin was chancellor from 1954 to 1968, announced the death. In 1970, in delicate, secret negotiations with lawmakers, the soft-spoken Mr. Hardin put together a deal that would limit federal subsidies to any one farm to $55,000 on each of three basic crops: cotton, wheat and feed grains. Critics had long questioned what they considered a disproportion of federal supports going to the biggest farms. The 1970 farm bill also included a “set-aside” plan that Mr. Hardin had proposed. It called for farmers to agree to leave a certain percentage of their land idle to qualify for federal payments and price supports...more

Pioneers would have broken many of today's laws

Let's examine how many of today's laws the early pioneers would have broken if they were settling the west today. First, using ground that is zoned agricultural for a housing development would require many meetings with the planning commission, the city council, and I'm sure would require many additional meetings with attorneys, architects and engineers before final approval to build would be granted. Digging a well without a permit would be a major legal infraction. Don't even think about removing wood, rocks or other building materials from their historic locations without authorization from the BLM. That old worn out old wagon by the side of the house would surely be an eyesore. I am sure it would take the code enforcement people less than a week to ticket the poor pioneering family for that infraction. When a pioneer family was running low on food and went hunting. They did so without a license, which today would result in thousands of dollars in fines and a jail sentence for poaching. Let's not overlook the outhouse. The outhouse today would be considered a major infraction of the sanitation laws and undoubtedly the E.P.A. and Hazmat would have to be called in for a major clean-up. In those days numerous child labor laws were being broken on a daily basis, and you would be hard-pressed to find a pioneering family that wouldn't be under investigation by Child Protective Services today...more

It's All Trew: Louisiana Purchase a great deal

Imagine this, three men, all from different nationalities, each survivors of wars and reigns of terror, mutually suspicious of each other and in addition each was still alive only because they had escaped the gallows or the guillotine in their own countries, all sitting down in a dim-lighted salon in Paris, France, to conduct business. What kind of business? One representing the most powerful man in the world at the moment, would offer to sell a huge tract of land he did not own or know the boundaries, to another man who had little money much less the authority to buy. That tract of land consisted of all the lands the Mississippi River drained including all the lands its tributaries drained, basically all the property north of the Gulf of Mexico and west of the Mississippi River to the Shining Mountains (wherever they were) north to Canada (wherever that was). Now, is that a clear legal description or what? The seller was Napoleon who needed the money to fight his next war. The buyer was Thomas Jefferson a man without an army, navy or hardly any money in his treasury and who was surrounded by hostile neighbors in his new country. Not only that, but in order to buy the land he would have to borrow the purchase money from England, one of his hostile neighbors and also one of the only countries in the world with that much money to loan...more

Song Of The Day #278

This week Ranch Radio will go visiting 1965, the year yours truly graduated from high school.

Today we will feature the #1 and #2 songs for the year: Buck Owens - Before You Go and Roger Miller - King of The Road.


Mexico drug gangs turn weapons on army

Drug traffickers fighting to control northern Mexico have turned their guns and grenades on the Mexican army, authorities said, in an apparent escalation of warfare that played out across multiple cities in two border states. In coordinated attacks, gunmen in armored cars and equipped with grenade launchers fought army troops this week and attempted to trap some of them in two military bases by cutting off access and blocking highways, a new tactic by Mexico's organized criminals. In taking such aggressive action, the traffickers have shown that they are not reluctant to challenge the army head-on and that they possess good intelligence on where the army is, how it moves and when it operates. At least 18 alleged attackers were killed and one soldier wounded in the fighting that erupted Tuesday in half a dozen towns and cities in the states of Tamaulipas and Nuevo Leon, the army said, topping off one of the deadliest months yet in a drug war that has raged for nearly 3 1/2 years...more

2 children killed in Mexico border state shootout

A shootout in northern Mexico between soldiers and suspected drug cartel gunmen killed two children and wounded five of their relatives who were caught in the crossfire, the latest in a string of deaths of bystanders in the nation's drug war. The 5- and 8-year-old brothers were traveling in their family's car when the gunbattle broke out on a highway near the border city of Nuevo Laredo, the Tamaulipas state government said in statement Sunday night. The statement corrected an initial government report that only bystander was killed in the confrontation Saturday night. Two suspected gunmen were also killed. "We ran and tried to hide in the brush, but they kept shooting," said Maria Guadalupe Delgado Castillo, an aunt of the dead children. She sobbed as she waited outside the Nuevo Laredo General Hospital where her relatives were being treated. One family member was shot in the stomach and the other four had less severe injuries. The state government said 11 family members were in the car, which it described as an "all terrain vehicle" similar to the ones in a convoy of drug cartel suspects. The statement did not say which side fired the bullets that struck the family's car...more

Mexican cartels cannot be defeated, drug lord says

Mexico's war on the drug trade is futile even if cartel bosses are caught or killed as millions of people are involved in the illicit business, a senior drug chief said in an interview published on Sunday. Ismael "el Mayo" Zambada, the right hand man of Mexico's most notorious drug lord, Sinaloa cartel boss Joaquin "Shorty" Guzman, blamed the government for surging drug violence and said President Felipe Calderon was being duped by his advisors into thinking he was making progress. "One day I will decide to turn myself in to the government so they can shoot me. ... They will shoot me and euphoria will break out. But at the end of days we'll all know that nothing changed," Zambada told the investigative newsmagazine Proceso. "Millions of people are wrapped up in the narco problem. How can they be overcome? For all the bosses jailed, dead or extradited their replacements are already there." Zambada, 62, one of Mexico's most wanted drug lords, has never been arrested despite a $5 million reward offered in the United States...more

2nd Mexican helicopter sighted in U.S. airspace

The U.S. Department of Defense said it was investigating the second sighting within three weeks of a Mexican military helicopter flying in U.S. airspace over rural Zapata County. “The incident did occur and it's still under investigation,” department spokeswoman Maj. Tanya Bradsher said, confirming that the copter, believed to belong to the Mexican navy, was seen Sunday. Rick Pauza, a U.S. Customs and Border Protection spokesman, earlier in March confirmed a Mexican military helicopter hovered as long as 20 minutes on March 9 over a residential area near Falcon Lake, a reservoir on the Rio Grande. Jason Darling, a U.S. Border Patrol spokesman in Laredo, said Border Patrol agents responded to the scene of “a report originating from the community” within a half-hour of receiving it Sunday but did not see the helicopter themselves. He said the copter was reported near U.S. 83 between Zapata and Laredo. Zapata County Sheriff Sigifredo Gonzalez said Sunday's sighting was the second one confirmed, but several others were reported to him during the past two weeks that he couldn't be sure enough about to forward to the federal government. Gonzalez said the unconfirmed incursions occurred on March 20 and on Monday and Tuesday and were reported to him by a deputy, a local news reporter, and a federal officer who the sheriff said has since been muzzled by higher-ups. “I don't want to get him involved because it sounds like they're going to fire him for saying the truth,” Gonzalez said of the officer. But Gonzalez said he didn't pass along those reports to federal officials because he wasn't sure about them. He said federal officials initially rebuffed his initial reports of the March 9 and Sunday sightings, which he made to the Joint Operations Intelligence Center because he had photos from witnesses and a pretty good idea that they were Mexican military operations. When Gonzalez told the officials he had photos, however, they blamed their lack of knowledge of it on faulty radar, he said. Then other federal officials confirmed the incidents to reporters. “It's becoming more common now every day,” he said. “My problem is we find these things out through our media instead of our government. It goes to show how incompetent I guess our government is.”...more

This would never happen if it was a wilderness area.

You will recall this language from S.1689, Bingaman's wilderness bill:

(e) Military Overflights- Nothing in this section restricts or precludes--
(1) low-level overflights of military aircraft over the wilderness areas designated by subsection (a), including military overflights that can be seen or heard within the wilderness areas;
(2) flight testing and evaluation; or
(3) the designation or creation of new units of special use airspace, or the establishment of military flight training routes, over the wilderness areas.


So you need special legislative dispensation to fly over a wilderness area. Therefore, a wilderness designation would prevent these incursions of Mexican helicopters.

Uh, oh. It just says "military" without specifying the country of origin. Maybe the Mexican navy could fly over the Potrillos after all.

Border Fence Under Renewed Fire After Rancher Killing

Of the 646 miles of barriers currently constructed along the 2,000-mile southern border of the United States, 300 miles are vehicle barriers, according to the Department of Homeland Security. That means they're meant to keep out cars and trucks, but aren't high enough to keep out people crossing the border illegally on foot. Fencing in place just south of the Krentz family ranch in southeastern Arizona is exactly that kind of vehicle barrier, plus there's a sizable gap in the fence nearby. Residents and officials say the security barrier is simply ineffective, and that the killing last month is shining a light on the problem. Rancher Wendy Glenn, Krentz's longtime friend and neighbor who heard the man's last radio transmission to his brother, said she has roughly 4 miles of border fence along Malpai Ranch. The "wildlife-friendly" barrier -- one that allows large animals and determined people to pass through freely -- ranges from large Normandy-style "X" crosses to standard posts and rails, topping off at no more than six feet high, she said. "It doesn't keep any people out," Glenn told FoxNews.com on Monday. "We don't want any more fence here. We want more people on the border. No matter what they put in, they're going to tunnel under, cut through, or use ladders. We don't need that."...more

A Growing Border Crisis Is Opportunity For Terrorists

The beleaguered Border Patrol estimates that several million illegal immigrants cross over the 2,000-mile long southern border every year. Obviously, they're not all staying. The interdiction effort is so overextended that huge numbers are able to cross back and forth on a regular basis. And the traffic in undocumented workers, ruinous as that has been for schools, hospitals and law enforcement throughout the Southwest, is the least of it. The Mexican drug cartels smuggle thousands of tons of heroin, cocaine and methamphetamine across the border every year, the majority of it through Arizona. They use private and commercial vehicles, human "mules," tunnels and light planes to penetrate U.S. territory. The drugs are distributed to around 20,000 street gangs in 2,500 cities across the United States, representing a million gangbangers, who grip their neighborhoods in a reign of terror. Billions of illicit dollars flow back across the border to the cartels, which are growing in power. If millions of pounds of illegal drugs flowing in from Mexico annually doesn't alarm you, what if it were tons of anthrax or high explosives? Don't think for a moment that terrorists somehow have missed the fact that the U.S.-Mexico border is an imaginary line in more ways than one. The time is coming, and doubtless is not far off, when they strike on our soil again. No one should be surprised on that dark day when we learn that the instrument of terror entered the United States across our southern border...more

Armed men storm Mexico border prison to free 13 inmates

Thirteen inmates escaped when armed men arrived in 10 vehicles and stormed a prison in the border city of Reynosa, Mexican officials have said. Three prisoners died during the raid but it was unclear who shot them. Authorities have put 31 prison staff under investigation in connection with the escape. It was the second big jailbreak in a week in Tamaulipas state, which has seen an increase in violence blamed on a split between rival drug gangs. The jailbreak in Reynosa, which lies just across the US-Mexico border from McAllen in Texas, happened on Friday night. The authorities reported the raid and the deaths of the three prisoners but did not give details of the escape until Sunday...more

Mexican army sending four helicopters to border

The Mexican Army is sending four military helicopters to help fight organized crime in the embattled border states of Tamaulipas and Nuevo Leon. Mexico’s Ministry of Defense made the announcement on Easter Sunday. The Mexican army reported two Bell 212 and two MI-17 helicopters are being sent for reconnaissance work and to provide support for troops engaging in gun fights with drug cartels. The MI-17 helicopters are able to carry up to four tons and will be used to deploy troops and equipment. Since late February, Tamaulipas and Nuevo Leon have seen round after round of armed clashes between rival drug cartels as well as shootouts between drug traffickers and the Mexican Army...more

Fleeing violence, more Mexicans seek U.S. asylum

Jose Jimenez, a mechanic, is now doing odd jobs in an American town after escaping a violent city in northern Mexico where drug traffickers threatened to kill him when he refused to build secret compartments in tractor-trailers to hide U.S.-bound drug shipments. He's hoping the U.S. immigration system can keep him alive — and he's not alone. He is one of a growing number of Mexicans receiving asylum in the United States, where until recently most Mexican immigrants had sought work permits. But the escalating drug violence south of the border over the past four years has prompted immigration judges and federal asylum officers to approve more asylum petitions...more

Jose Jimenez? You've got to be kidding.

Perhaps you remember these comedy routines by Bill Dana...as Jose Jimenez.



Monday, April 05, 2010

The Same Old Drill

Too little, too late, too clever and for the wrong reasons. That's a good way to describe President Obama's decision to allow a little offshore drilling. Of course, most of the environmentalist base of the Democratic Party sees it the other way around: too much, too soon (since "never" is their preferred timeline), too dumb but for the right reasons. Obama justified his decision to allow drilling in the eastern Gulf of Mexico, the southern Atlantic and some coastal regions of northern Alaska on the grounds that it would create jobs and serve as a "bridge" to the carbon-free Brigadoon we've long been promised. The reality is that his decision was entirely political. Aiming to win vital Republican support in the Senate for some kind of bipartisan cap-and-trade legislation, he lifted the ban where the polling was in favor of doing so. Sound science, energy policy and economics were the last things on his mind. On that, there's widespread consensus...more

Oil and Water: Obama supports another already subsidized industry

But what we champions of the market often fail to realize is the extent to which the current oil based economy is subsidized by governments. Oil, when it was plentiful and easy to get at built its own market fairly quickly 100 years ago. In the decades since however oil has been subsidized and competitors regulated away by the government. So it is unfair to characterize the current debate over fuel sources as one where oil is the good, free market choice and “alternative energy” as simply an example of another government sponsored boondoggle. Over the years the oil industry has been one of the great beneficiaries of government largess. It is estimated that worldwide the oil industry will enjoy nearly $500,000,000,000 in government subsidies from various countries in 2010 alone. How can alternative energy compete in a marketplace where the main competitor is subsidized to this extent? President Obama has now opened up much of America’s coastline to oil drilling much to the surprise of many on the left. Many of Obama’s traditional opponents have applauded the move. But really this is just an example of the bizarre things that happen in markets that are warped by government intervention. Conservatives and libertarians should be aware of this. The opening up of our coastlines to oil exploration is not a “freeing” of an otherwise freely operating market, it is just an example of the ongoing manipulation of a market that has been anything but “free” for many, many decades...more

Big Bird Learns It’s Not Easy Being Green - Video

This is not a post about Sesame Street or the Childrens Television Workshop. No, this is about a literal big bird, a griffon vulture, and its unfortunate failure to maintain separation from a large power-generating windmill in Crete. Renewable energy proponents want to portray an image of their technology being “free” and “green” and “non-impacting”. The realists among us point out that any technology of sufficient scope and power to meet our country’s energy demands has some downside, too. It’s been my experience in the U.S. that the Fish and Wildlife Service levies heavy fines for migratory waterfowl accidentally killed because of industrial mishaps. For endangered and protected species (condors, pelicans, all raptors), the fine per bird can also run to many thousands of dollars...more

Here's a video of the bird's demise:

Utah Passes Law to Seize Federal Land - Video Report

From the Glenn Beck show, Judge Napolitano hosting.

Everglades deal in jeopardy after judge's ruling

Gov. Charlie Crist's grand plan to revive the dying Florida Everglades by buying back the land is in jeopardy after a federal judge Wednesday ordered the state to resume construction on a multimillion-dollar restoration project. Work on the 25-square-mile reservoir - the largest of its kind in the world - was halted in 2008 after water managers said a lawsuit from environmentalists could hinder their ability to complete the project. The decision to stop work came just a month before Crist announced a plan to spend $1.75 billion to buy all of U.S. Sugar Corp.'s 180,000 acres and assets in the Everglades. Crist's plan has since been scaled down, because of the economy, to $536 million for 73,000 acres from U.S. Sugar, the nation's largest cane sugar producer. U.S District Judge Federico Moreno's ruling on Wednesday could now end it all. Moreno granted a motion from the Miccosukee Indians, who live in the Everglades, to force the South Florida Water Management District to resume construction of the massive reservoir with an estimated cost of up to $800 million. The district oversees the state's Everglades restoration efforts and has said previously it likely couldn't afford both the U.S. Sugar deal and the reservoir...more

HSUS Targeting 4-H Kids Through ‘Humane Teens’ Campaign

Just like Carrie Underwood appealed to kids about becoming a vegetarian on PBS Kids a few years ago, I was told that Humane Society of the U.S. (HSUS) was recently given the chance to push their political agenda on teens at the 2010 National 4-H Conference on March 20-25, 2010. 4-H is an organization based on integrity, hard work, service to others and a passion for agriculture, yet, it certainly seems like nothing is sacred anymore. HSUS went directly to the future food producers of America to advance their mission to abolish animal agriculture and eliminate meat and dairy products from our diets. After reading their handout for kids at the conference, “Mission: Humane Action Guide” for teens, it’s quite obvious they are trying to convert wholesome farm kids to campaigning, lobbying HSUS activists. Keep reading; you won’t believe the propaganda they are pushing on today’s youth. The propaganda passed out during one of the workshops at the conference showed kids how to write letters to the editor, start a club, appeal to legislators, influence others and push for vegan meals in their school cafeterias. HSUS has 11 million followers, and in 2009, they trained 2,100 activists, and it looks like they are aiming to pull in our youth, as well. Wayne Pacelle (CEO of HSUS) is clearly willing to do anything and everything these days to advance his agendas...more

Be sure and read her updates.

Special Song - Video

"You Picked A Fine Time To Lead Us, Barack"

Looks like a coupla guys, sitting around in their dorm room and having fun. They took Kenny Rogers' You Picked A Fine Time To Leave Me Lucille, added some creative lyrics and uploaded the thing to You Tube two weeks ago.

As of this morning, it's had 683,000 views.

No need to worry about the younger generation...at least not these guys.


Song Of The Day #277

Ranch Radio likes the flatpicked guitar. To get your heart rate up this Monday morning we offer Dakota Dave Hull with an acoustic, bluegrassy and swinging version of Steel Guitar Rag. At about 2:20 of the cut you'll hear my favorite flatpicker, Doc Watson, take a break.

The tune is available on Hull's 13 track CD Hull's Victory.


Ranchers Alarmed by Killing Near Border - NY Times

Sooner or later, they all feared, one of them would be killed. The ranchers, retirees and others who prefer to live off the grid in the vast desert near the Mexican border regularly confront the desperate and dehydrated illegal border crossers, who knock on their doors for directions and water, and lately more of the less innocent, who scurry across their land or lie low in the brush, stooped with marijuana and other drugs bundled on their backs. Now, according to the leading police theory, the inevitable has occurred, whipping up a political storm and sending a shiver through a community not easily shaken. “You never know who you’re dealing with out here because you get all kinds of traffic through here,” said William McDonald, a fellow rancher on the vast mesquite scrubland pocked with canyons and scattered mountain ranges floating on the horizon like islands. Mr. McDonald and other residents said that in the last year or two the traffic had taken a more sinister turn, with larger numbers of drug smugglers, many clad in black and led by armed scouts. “It was only a matter of time,” he said. “Everything was in place for something like this to happen.” Residents said they believed that the completion of a segment of the border wall near Douglas shifted smuggling traffic farther east in the last couple of years to more remote, rugged areas along the New Mexico border. The area is guarded by two divisions of the Border Patrol who use different types of radios and have had trouble communicating with each other, officials at the agency have acknowledged. In addition, ranchers said, many of the agents are newly hired and unfamiliar with the area, slowing response times. While some believe that the border wall completed in the last few years has slowed down large groups, many others have little faith in it. By all accounts, Mr. Krentz never got caught up in border politics. A bear of a man with a reserved nature, he could seem imposing at first glance but almost always rendered help to those who needed it, friends and family said. “He was a typical ranch kid,” said Wendy Glenn, a neighbor and longtime friend who said she heard Mr. Krentz’s last transmission on her radio. Now, like others, Ms. Glenn said she planned to be more cautious. “Usually if somebody needs help, you walk up to them and help them,” she said. “We won’t just walk up and offer help anymore.”...more

See the NY Times Slideshow.

Sunday, April 04, 2010

Cowgirl Sass & Savvy

One more day in the saddle

by Julie Carter

His thickened, aged hands held a pencil poised over a small notebook as his thoughts took him back where his heart still was. As his mind traveled back, he could clearly see the moment.

It was a crisp fall morning and the smoky smell of a cedar fire from the bunkhouse stove was held low to the ground by the cold air. He pulled the cinch on the bronc he'd just roped from the remuda, knowing that he was tightening his saddle down on a thousand pounds of buck that was about to commence.

At 20, he was not only ready to do battle with the bronc, but knew he'd win.
And by the end of a long day and many miles, the colt would be a better horse and the makings of a good friend.

True to his knowledge, when he snubbed the colt up close and stepped up in the stirrup, quickly throwing his leg over the saddle to take a deep seat before the explosion, as predicted, the bronc came apart with a grunt and a snort.

The other cowboys stood around the corral watching, laughing and taking bets. After a few short minutes of squeals and explosive effort from the horse as he did his best to unseat the cowboy, the bronc pulled up into a short gaited lope around the pen. The cowboys on the ground threw open the gate, waved their hats in the air and the show was over as the cowboy and the bronc followed the breaking daylight to the horizon.

The old cowboy's mind returned to the task at hand, energized with the recall of the happiness he had felt in those days when he could top any bronc in the pen, spend from dusk to dawn in the saddle, and be anxious to do it again the next day.

A humble cowboy, he knew he was just one of many that lived in an era that was now relegated to stories and memories.

His memories were unique only to him and the need to share them with someone was pressing on his heart with each passing year.

Inside his gnarled, knotted body, crippled by too many occupational wrecks, lived a soul that longed for the freedom of his youth. Reality allowed that it would soon soar, but only to that great roundup in the sky where he hoped most of his compadres waited for him.

A tear slowly formed at the corner of his eye as he wrestled with the burden to write down his lifetime of cowboying from California to Texas. Through the years, he'd drifted from one state to another and the names of ranches, men and horses, each with their own detailed story, ran through his mind as his shaky hand formed the words.

He didn't recognize the legendary life for what it was while he was living it. He wasn't even quite sure now why it seemed better looking back at it than it did living it.

He did know that the words he put to paper would be all that was left of who he was when he was gone.

But his intent was not for himself, but to tell those that knew him that he remembered, that it mattered.

What he knew was that he'd give all that he had, which wasn't much, to turn back the clock far enough to do it all again, just one more time, one more day in the saddle.

It's all that ever mattered in his life. One more day in the saddle.

Julie can be reached for comment at jcarter@tularosa.net. Visit her website at www.julie-carter.com

Song Of The Day #276

Ranch Radio wishes everyone a wonderful Easter.

Here is the bluegrass group IIIrd Tyme Out with It's Not What You Know (It's Who You Know) from their 12 track CD Singing on Streets of Gold.


Krentz family statement

On March 27th, our Husband, Father, Grandfather, Brother and Uncle was murdered in cold blood by a suspected illegal alien on the Ranch.

This senseless act took the life of a man, a humanitarian, who bore no ill will towards anyone. Rob loved his family instilling in them the importance of honesty, fair dealing and skill managing all aspects of a large 100 year old ranching operation producing food to make our Country strong and healthy.

He was known for his concern and kindness helping neighbors, friends and even trespassers on his ranch with compassionate assistance in their time of need.

We hold no malice towards the Mexican people for this senseless act but do hold the political forces in this country and Mexico accountable for what has happened. Their disregard of our repeated pleas and warnings of impending violence towards our community fell on deaf ears shrouded in political correctness. As a result, we have paid the ultimate price for their negligence in credibly securing our Borderlands.

In honor of everything Rob stood for, we ask everyone to work peacefully towards bringing credible law and order to our Border and provide Border Patrol and County Law Enforcement with sufficient financial resources and manpower to stop this invasion of our country.

We urge the President of the United States to step forward and immediately order deployment of the active U.S. military to the Arizona, New Mexico Border

Thank you for all for honoring Rob. We want the truth known.

Feds have fiddled too long as border security failed

The killing of rancher Robert Krentz in Cochise County has put a microscope on the situation along the U.S.-Mexico border that has been simmering dangerously for a long time. It's far too little to say "I told you so" to the federal government - but Arizonans who must live with the destructive effects of a dysfunctional immigration policy and a porous border knew that this kind of violence could, and in a matter of time would, happen. After such a tragedy, it's common to hear laments of "it didn't have to happen." This killing brings into stark relief the security failures that have persisted along the border for years, despite warning signs and plain common sense. Law enforcement officials suspect Krentz was murdered by a smuggler who then crossed back into Mexico. The area is well-known as a drug-smuggling route and immigrants who cross the border illegally into Arizona also traverse through the ranch land. It's unconscionable that problems ranchers and others who live and work along the border have warned of for years have been allowed to persist - problems that are fixable and within the federal government's control. The federal government has thrown millions upon millions of dollars at the border, but still law enforcement agencies - or even different groups within the same agency - cannot communicate easily via radio because they use different systems...more

Why the silence from Janet Napolitano about putting troops on the border?

Eight days ago, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano announced “significant progress” in securing the border in the year since President Barack Obama launched his Southwest Border Initiative. Words like “decisive action”, “sustained security efforts” and “major progress” were employed. One day later, Rob Krentz was dead, shot to death just 20 miles from the border on land his family has ranched since before Arizona became a state. Investigators tracked a set of footprints from the scene of the shooting to the border and it's widely believed that he was killed by a drug smuggler. Krentz's death prompted Republican Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer to renew her 13-month-old call for the feds to send National Guard troops to the border, a call echoed by Republican Sen. John McCain and Democratic Rep. Gabrielle Giffords. Democratic New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson flat out ordered the New Mexico National Guard to the border on Wednesday, saying “I want residents in southern New Mexico to know we are taking this border violence very seriously.” Meanwhile in Washington, we saw the sort of bold, decisive action we've long come to expect from the feds when it comes to the border. Napolitano offered a $25,000 reward for information leading to the arrest of Krentz's killer. This, from a woman who two years ago pleaded with her predecessor for troops at the border. Napolitano's press aides didn't return a call to explain this week's curious lack of response from the official now responsible for the security of the homeland – presumably including the open back door here in her own home state...more

Ariz. AG: Rancher's slaying the work of cartels

Arizona's attorney general says the killing of a southern Arizona rancher appears to be the work of a scout working for a drug cartel. Robert Krentz was found shot to death Saturday on his ranch near Douglas. Attorney General Terry Goddard said Friday that evidence at the scene appears consistent with the known behavior of drug runners working for cartels based in Mexico. In an interview with The Associated Press, Goddard disputed a media report that he had said the murder was committed by a professional hit man working for a cartel. Goddard says there is no evidence that a professional killer was involved. Goddard says cartels often place scouts in remote areas to monitor and coordinate the flow of drugs across the border, but he says the scouts aren't necessarily trained killers. AP

Rancher Robert Krentz didn't deserve to die on his own land in the USA

Robert Krentz was a good man. People who knew him say he was a humanitarian and a Good Samaritan. He didn’t deserve to die in the dirt - on his own land - at what law enforcement investigators believe was the gunpoint of an illegal border crosser. His family didn’t deserve to lose him. The nearby Cochise County communities of Douglas and Portal didn’t deserve to lose him. But all did some time on March 27. And why? There’s plenty of blame to go around. Let’s allocate some of that blame. Maybe it will become obvious what we have to do to make sure we don’t lose more good people in this fashion. Most of the blame falls on the Mexican drug cartels. They are willing to do anything for money. The Mexican government has been unsuccessful in curbing their reign of terror. It is almost as though the cartels are fighting it out to prove one or more of them is the government. Next, blame goes to the United States government. Notwithstanding many requests, federal officials have failed and refused to militarize the border which desperately needs military control. When Janet Napolitano was governor of Arizona, she seemed to understand the problem, not that she ever did anything about it. Now that she is in Washington, she serves only her beltway masters. No Army troops for the border. Not even National Guard troops are allowed...more

Border security debate intensifies in Arizona

The murder of a prominent Arizona rancher has intensified an election-year debate about border security, with Republicans stepping up calls for National Guard deployments. Facing a tough primary contest, Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) has been drawn into the fight, with his conservative opponent J.D. Hayworth accusing him of “28 years of inaction” on border security. Smack in the middle of it all is Napolitano, who in 2006, as governor of Arizona, persuaded President George W. Bush to send in the Guard to bolster border patrol forces fighting illegal immigration. Now she’s on the other side, the head of the agency in charge of Customs and Border Patrol and securing the nation’s borders. The administration, however, hasn’t yielded to the requests that came in a year ago from the governors of Arizona, California, New Mexico and Texas for a National Guard presence on the border. It maintains that security along the border has improved...more

Mexican border town on High Alert as Mexican Drug Cartels threaten to start killing children

Most residents of Mexican border towns feel they are under siege by the powerful and rich Mexican Drug Cartels (MDC'S) who seem to be operating with immunity. Partly as a result American cities along the U.S. Mexican border are on high alert and preparing for a surge of illegal immigrants should that threat to start killing the children be carried out. Mexican citizens have told this reporter that they believe the MDC's do pretty much as they want because the Mexican Army has been bought off just as the politicians, police and judges have. According to the El Paso Times officials of the Texas border town of Fort Hancock, report that they consider the situation serious. “We just got word that the cartel has threatened to kill children in schools across the border unless parents paid $5000 pesos,” said Mike Doyle, chief deputy sheriff of Hudspeth County. And that time might come sooner than later. Schools Superintendent Jose Franco said word has spread that everyone in the Mexican town must stay indoors while members of rival cartels prepare for a shootout.
“I may not be working in school that day. I may be working as a medic,” said Franco, who moonlights as an ambulance paramedic. Franco also confirmed the ransom demand for students across the border, adding that some of his students had already paid the money to be left alone. Mexican Drug Cartels have reached across the international border into the United States to kill people including Americans and their reach extends North, East and West across our nation. MDC'S have ordered the killings of drug dealers, American gang members, U.S. Consulate employees, a Detention Officer with the El Paso County Sheriff's Office, DEA agent, ICE informant and U.S. Military personal. MDC'S are also responsible for many kidnapping's of Americans on American soil and have taken Americans to Mexico to be tortured, maimed and murdered, without any retaliation from the U.S. Government...more

Journals of Texas Students Reveal Horrors Across the Border

The journals of second-grade students in a tiny Texas border town reveal the very real horrors just across the Rio Grande River, a teacher told FoxNews.com. Duvy Torres, a teacher at Benito Martinez Elementary in Fort Hancock, Texas, said her students "constantly" recount tales of murder, fear and intimidation suffered by their relatives in El Porvenir, Mexico, a town of roughly 10,000 just across the border. One student recently recalled a murdered relative who was buried in a shallow grave, she said. Other journal entries vividly describe burned homes in El Porvenir and orders from the drug cartel operating in the area that residents leave the town by Sunday or face kidnapping or death. "They draw the pictures and they're so graphic," Torres told FoxNews.com on Saturday. "These are 7-year-old kids talking like this. I'm at the point where the less I know, the better off I am." Torres said three new students were enrolled in the school's second grade just last week alone. Their relatives came into Fort Hancock seeking asylum and refuge from the ongoing drug cartel-related in the Mexican town...more

Border Security: What is the appropriate response?

Progreso interim Police Chief Alberto Rodriguez would like to have a few more guns. Inside the Progreso Police Department, one half of a small building on FM 1015, there’s a copy machine, a dry erase board for recording arrests (just one entry on April 1 for public intoxication), and a few computers. Rodriguez has nine other officers on his police force, and he worries about the home invasions, kidnappings, and drug trafficking that have been seeping into the 4,851 person town in the past year from Mexico, just across the river. But more than a fancy office, or guns, or even fast cars, Rodriguez says this stretch of borderland would benefit from more tactical specialists, who are able to connect the dots between cartels and gangs on this side of the border. The violence in Progreso is clandestine and retaliation is feared. Rodriguez learns of home invasions and kidnappings through gossip rather than police reports. Whether spillover violence is the term used to describe the recent kidnapping of a man from a McAllen Starbucks, or a shooting in a Wal-Mart parking lot, politicians, law enforcement, and intelligence specialists agree with Rodriguez: There has been an increase in certain kinds of drug-related violence along the U.S. side of the border, and the trend is of concern. The question is, what is the appropriate response?...more

Border drug war: Violence wears on Valley of JuƔrez residents

El Porvenir is about 40 miles east of JuƔrez in a sparsely populated part of Mexico. Fewer than 18,000 people live in the low-income communities between El Porvenir and JuƔrez, but the area has become a place of rampant death threats and murders. In March, more than 50 people died violently in the Valley of JuƔrez. About 180 homicides occurred in JuƔrez during that time. Morales said it has become increasingly difficult to run his store, La Ferreteria Y Carpinteria, because about half of his customers have fled the town. Across the border from the valley are Texas towns stretching from San Elizario to Fort Hancock. Hudspeth County Sheriff Arvin West recently said that Mexicans crossing into the U.S. were abandoning El Porvenir because criminal organizations had posted notices near the center of the colonia, ordering the residents to get out. The notices said people had 30 days to vacate or their families would be kidnapped or killed...more

Friday, April 02, 2010

Feds halt fast-track drilling

The U.S. Department of the Interior moved to halt fast-track approvals for drilling across the Rocky Mountains in a legal settlement reached just hours before President Barack Obama's announcement Wednesday that his administration will open offshore oil and gas reserves to development. That suit was brought in Salt Lake City federal court in 2008 by the Wilderness Society and other conservation groups that challenged the Bush administration's interpretation of the Energy Policy Act of 2005, which allowed federal land managers in some cases to issue fast-track drilling permits without a full environmental review. The U.S. attorney's office in Salt Lake City confirmed Wednesday that the settlement all but closes the loophole that approved nearly 7,000 oil and gas development projects from 2006 to 2008. Most of the fast-tracked projects were approved in Wyoming, New Mexico and Utah. Bruce Pendery, an attorney for the Wyoming Outdoor Council, said that under the settlement, the Interior Department has agreed not to use fast-track permitting in areas with "extraordinary circumstances," such as places considered ecologically significant. In addition, the federal Bureau of Land Management will halt use of so-called categorical exclusions to approve oil and gas projects pending the release of new guidelines, said Melodie Rydalch, a spokeswoman for the U.S. attorney's office in Salt Lake City...more

Since the feds settled, the enviros will get their attorneys fees and go sue someplace else.

Official asks for review of Forest Service's ban on nighttime helicopter water drops

Local Rep. Adam Schiff is calling for a congressional subcommittee to review the U.S. Forest Service's ban on using nighttime helicopter flights to fight wildfires. On Thursday, Los Angeles County Supervisor Michael Antonovich praised Schiff's efforts while strongly criticizing the Forest Service's decision last August to keep helicopters grounded during the first hours of the Station Fire. "This issue is vital, absolutely vital for the people who live near the borders with the mountains and forest," Tony Bell, Antonovich's spokesman, said, adding the ban on night flights contributed to the Station Fire spreading to over 160,000 acres. Two firefighters died while fighting the Station Fire. Hillsides denuded by the fire triggered repeated mud slides this past winter that destroyed or damaged about 100 homes. And the county has spent more than $50 million on mudslide cleanup and storm preparations, Bell noted. Schiff, D-Pasadena, said in a news release Tuesday questions about the Forest Service's decision to keep helicopters on the ground as the Station Fire burned prompted him to call for the policy review. He asked the House Appropriations Subcommittee on the Interior, Environment and Related Agencies to include the review as part of its bill that includes funding for the Forest Service for 2011. Specifically, Schiff wants the subcommittee to look at whether the policy banning night flights should be repealed and how...more

Idaho wolf hunt draws to close

As the nation's first regulated public wolf hunt in decades drew to a close, Idaho wildlife managers credited sportsmen for helping stabilize a species that was growing rapidly across the Northern Rockies and lived up to its billing as an elusive, cunning target. Idaho's seven-month season ended at dusk Wednesday, with the tally showing hunters bagged 185 wolves, short of the 220-wolf limit set by the state last year. Already, wildlife officials in Idaho and Montana are making plans to expand quotas for next season and give hunters more advantages for tracking and killing a species that has been growing in Idaho by an average of 20 percent a year. Idaho officials praised the hunt Wednesday, claiming the way it was managed and the goals it achieved demonstrate that states can effectively and responsibly manage a species the federal government spent millions of dollars over the last 15 years restoring in Idaho, Montana and Wyoming...read more

Arguments heard over liability in bear attack which kills boy

An attorney for the family of a Utah boy killed by a black bear told the state Supreme Court on Wednesday that wildlife officials didn't do enough to warn them to steer clear of an area where the troublesome bear had been seen earlier. In a special session of the Utah Supreme Court at the University of Utah, state officials argued immunity on several fronts, including that the bears are a "natural condition" on public land, a distinction that shields the state from liability. A state judge last year dismissed a negligence suit filed against the Utah Division of Wildlife Resources by the family of Samuel Ives, the 11-year-old who was pulled out of his tent by a black bear in American Fork Canyon in 2007. The bear had caused problems in the same area earlier that day. The Utah Division of Wildlife Resources called it a "level 3" nuisance bear -- considered the most dangerous -- and crews set out to find it and kill it. They weren't immediately successful but did clear the camp site of anything that might attract the bear again, state officials said. Ives' family arrived at the camp site later that day. The attack happened that night. Attorney Jonah Orlofsky, representing the family, told the court on Wednesday the state should have put up some kind of a warning there was a problem bear in the area. He also said the state should have asked the U.S. Forest Service, which owns the land, to close the site...more

Lone wild horse on Wildhorse Island gets company

He has - or at least had - a name, the last wild horse on Wildhorse Island, though no one remembers it. He also had ribs, and they were visible through his hide. It wasn't due to lack of food. "He's getting up there in years," explains Jerry Sawyer, who manages the seven state parks located around Flathead Lake for Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks. But it was a mild winter in northwestern Montana. The horse may have survived, Sawyer says. If he did, he's got a partner, a wild mustang transplanted to the island in December, and three to four more on the way later this spring. What's an island called Wildhorse, after all, without wild horses? The last horse standing on Flathead's largest island was the final surviving member of a group transplanted to the primitive state park in 1993...more

Song Of The Day #275

Ranch Radio is in need of a spelling lesson this morning, and none other than Ernest Tubb will provide it with his 1950 recording G-I-R-L Spells Trouble.

Tubb's stuff is widely available as you can see here.


The Krentz Tragedy - Murder on the Border

Note: Rancher and author Wilmeth attended Wednesday's meeting, and I asked him to share his observations and thoughts.

By Stephen L. Wilmeth

Apache, Arizona: On a wind swept flat outside of the two room school house at Apache, Arizona, more than 500 people gathered last night to discuss the consequences of the death of local rancher, Rob Krentz. Rob was murdered sometime before noon on Saturday, March 27, in a pasture on his ranch. The perpetrator was thought to be connected to one of the drug cartels who have found the Mexican border too easy to cross.

The Krentz family has been in the ranching business on the New Mexico/Arizona border in the southern Rodeo Valley for more than 100 years. Rob was remembered by friends who referred to him as Mr. Community and the man who would always be objective and fair minded in all matters and in all situations.

As area and national news crews videoed the proceedings, a panel of 10 speakers made recommendations to Gabrielle Gifford (D-Az) so that this murder is the last rather than the first of a series of such tragedies as drug related violence spreads onto American soil.

As Representative Gifford took notes, the remoteness of the place had to make an impression on those gathered. The Boot Heel of New Mexico and the adjacent mountains of southeastern Arizona have become a funnel for illegal activities. While the incidence of human smuggling has diminished, drug related smuggling has escalated. In this corridor in particular, drug related activity has increased dramatically. The rugged terrain and the north south orientation of the valleys extending south into Mexico have made this area one of the most heavily accessed routes of entry along the entire border.

"For the first time in their lives, they look at the immensity and grandeur of their surroundings with fear rather than hope."

Along with that activity, the threat of violence has increased. With Rob Krentz’ murder, the threat to the local community has been elevated to an entirely new level. Residents cheered as requests were made to give Border Patrol agents law enforcement authority rather than observation and interdiction authority only. Similar responses occurred when requests were made to introduce a United States military presence on the border. To those present, there was an undeniable concern that something terrible was amiss. Rob Krentz’ murder was not just the cartel intrusion into their lives, but a more insidious disconnect between the American government and the people it was elected to serve.

Ranchers Edward Elbrock and Bill McDonald both shared that they now question their insistence that their families remain on the land and in the business of ranching. The danger of the surroundings and the diminishment of the freedom to act and manage their businesses have affected their expectations for the future. For the first time in their lives, they look at the immensity and grandeur of their surroundings with fear rather than hope.

Rodeo business owner, Nancy Klute, made a decision not to attend the meeting. Her rationale was that the words had already been spoken too many times already. “This country is the only country in the world that can’t come to the decision to close its borders to protect its citizens when such protection is so desperately needed,” she said.

Following the death of Mr. Krentz it was hours before officials allowed the tracks of the murderer to be followed. When the trail was finally followed, local rancher and outfitter Warner Glenn assisted in the tracking. The trail went south 20 miles before the sign was so corrupted by other tracks of illegal aliens that it was lost within mere feet of the border itself. “The culprit was obviously no stranger to the art of accessing American territory,” Mr. Glenn said. He had elected to access the San Bernardino National Wildlife Refuge for his escape back to Mexico.

He took full advantage of administrative obstacles that federal land agencies continue to place on the Border Patrol. The public comments at the gathering did not exempt the Border Patrol administration from blame, but the Border Patrol continues to be hamstrung by Department of Agriculture and Interior land management actions and internal policies. In various 2009 letters from USFW Regional Director, Benjamin Tuggle, the Border Patrol’s Tucson Sector Chief was served notice that the Border Patrol henceforth would be given only conditional motorized access to the all important border access corridor that the San Bernardino National Wildlife Refuge south from the Krentz Ranch provides. Dr. Tuggle informed the Border Patrol that they would only be allowed motorized access if the immediate threat of life, health, and safety of humans was imminent and then only on administrative roads. Furthermore, each six months the necessary submittal of reports by the Border Patrol would be evaluated, and, if the actions of the Border Patrol did not comply with the order, USFW would suspend all motorized access by the Border Patrol.

Dr. Tuggle, with the stroke of a pen, imposed on the Border Patrol the full limitation and restriction of access that federally designated Wilderness imposes without any Congressional authority of Wilderness legislation. Such administrative action recklessly puts American citizenry at risk at all points north from areas like San Bernardino National Wildlife Refuge. Innocent Americans like Rob Krentz have and will continue to pay the price for it.

Arizona Senatorial candidate, J.D. Hayworth, made it his priority to attend the Apache function. In closing the presentation portion of the public gathering, Mr. Hayworth reminded all that were gathered that the Constitution promises the American people their government would control their borders and protect them from a foreign invasion. The Constitution, however, is silent on the threat of a foreign invasion manifested by that same government. “It is time,” he said, “to make sure that the “First Defenders” are made the priority rather than the emphasis placed on the promotion of the “First Responders”.

By the time the first responders arrive it is too late. Rob Krentz is a victim of that growing American tragedy. Friends and colleagues can only hope that his death is the factor that will change the direction of the American government’s actions on the border. If his death doesn’t become that sign post, however, American freedom will be further diminished.

Giffords holds ranchers' meeting

"Listen to us. Take action. Don't turn away." Former rancher Pam DiPeso, of Pearce, said the feeling that it would take the death of someone before Washington showed any interest in curbing the tide of illegal border crossers and drug runners has haunted the folks living in the San Bernadino Valley and eastern edge of Cochise County all the way up to San Simon. "These people know what they're talking about. They deserve to be heard," DiPeso added. It was evident that these people were not going to let this death be glossed over or forgotten. Instead, they want to make his tragedy a jumping off point for a better and safer border policy that protects U.S. citizens on the front lines of the war no one talks about. One family was afraid to give their names. The fear of drug cartel retribution is paramount in their minds. One young woman holding her four-month old baby girl told of just such a circumstance. Her neighbor called the Border Patrol on drug runners and his horses were stolen. A local veterinarian who offers services in Mexico said he had found the stud horse that he had tended to over the years in a Sonoran pasture. But how do you serve such a vast area with limited resources? The community's answer was: Send down the National Guard with ammo in their guns. Keep the Border Patrol on the border not 20 miles away sitting on the side of the road. Install operating stations on the border. Put up communication towers. Add patrols by county deputies. Make the ranches and homes safe enough to raise a family...more

Luna Co. Sheriff calls meeting on border security

A meeting Wednesday on increasing border security included getting cell phone service in less-populated areas such as Southwest New Mexico. Luna County Sheriff Raymond Cobos called the meeting, held at the Mimbres Valley Learning Center to accommodate the 75 or so who attended, in response to the shooting death last Saturday of Arizona Rancher Robert Krentz, 58, on his ranch between Douglas and Apache. "We need cell phones," said James Johnson, "whose family farms in Southern Luna County. "We need to look at this as an issue of national security. We need to be able to cut through the bureaucratic red tape and get something done." The meeting was attended by area and regional law enforcement, government agency reps and ranchers and farmers. Xochitl Torres, of Sen. Tom Udall's office; Jake Rollow, of Sen. Jeff Bingman's office; and Ginette Magaƶa, of Rep. Harry Teague's office, attended. They are aware of the cell phone absence, they said. "We've been looking at Broadband," Torres said of one option. Johnson raised the cell phone issue years ago, as ranchers, farmers and others met with area officials in a Border Security Task Force. Radios were supplied to help ranchers in outlying areas with emergency contacts. Those phones, some said Thursday, no longer work. Law enforcement personnel told ranchers and farmers to be vigilant, report what seems out of place, be aware of surroundings and, if possible, not to work alone outside in remote areas...more

Yes, I know what you're thinking about ranchers not working alone in remote areas.

The article quotes John Wheeler, New Mexico's Secretary of Homeland Security, as saying "In addition to the operation, one of the keys is the amount of dissemination of information. Knowledge is power." How profound. Of course, they had just requested cell towers so they could provide and receive information. I'm sure these poor Luna Co. locals didn't realize what a powerful tool that was until Secretary Wheeler told them. After all, they didn't use the word "dissemination".

Border Patrol Agent Urges Calm as Fears in Texas Town Rise

As Mexican drug cartels continue to frighten residents along both sides of the Rio Grande River, one Border Patrol Agent says a tiny Texas town can sleep easy. Border Patrol Agent Joe Romero was among several local law enforcement officials at a town hall meeting on Wednesday in Fort Hancock, a town of 1,700 roughly 50 miles southeast Ciudad Juarez, the epicenter of Mexico’s violent drug war. Romero said the meeting was held following the request of Hudspeth County Sheriff Arvin West to quell rising fears stemming from the possibility that violence in Mexico, particularly from El Sorvenir just across the Rio Grande, could enter the United States at any moment. “The residents are concerned,” Romero told FoxNews.com. “They want to know what’s happening.” Despite those assurances, other Fort Hancock officials say the situation is worsening. Mike Doyle, chief deputy sheriff of Hudspeth County, has said he’s received word that drug cartels have threatened to kill children in U.S. schools unless 5,000-peso ransoms are paid. And Fort Hancock Schools Superintendent Jose Franco has recently increased security and patrols around schools...more

GOP Lawmaker Calls for Hearing Into Border Security After Rancher's Murder

A Republican lawmaker is calling for a hearing into border security following the murder of a prominent Arizona rancher by an assailant authorities believe was an illegal immigrant. Rep. Kay Granger of Texas, the top Republican on the House Foreign Operations subcommittee, told Fox News on Thursday that she would like to have a hearing as soon as Congress returns from its Easter recess to help border states whose pleas for federal assistance have so far gone unmet. Granger said the border fence that was under construction in the Southwest was not helpful. "What we need is sensors, we need more equipment to see who's coming across the border," she said. "We need more roads so that border control can stop them. We need more commitment frankly. We need commitment to make sure that our borders are safe and they're not right now with what's going on in Mexico."...more

Mexicans Facing Drug War Violence Could Seek Political Asylum in U.S.

The spreading violence of the drug wars along the Mexican border may have one unintended consequence. It could upend efforts to curb illegal immigrants by giving Mexican border-crossers a tool they never had before: a valid claim for political asylum. For decades, immigrants coming from Mexico were denied asylum because Mexico was a stable and relatively peaceful democracy. But that is changing now. Last week, at least 30 Mexicans from the town of El Porvenir walked to the border crossing post at Fort Hancock, Texas, and asked for political asylum. Ordinarily, their claim would be denied as groundless, and they would be turned back. Instead, they were taken to El Paso, where they expect to have their cases heard. No one doubts that they have a strong claim. Their town on the Mexican side of the border is under siege by one or more drug cartels battling for control of the key border crossing...more

Mexico asks more US cooperation on border violence

Mexican officials are responding to the decision of New Mexico's governor to send more National Guard troops to the border by calling for more cooperation with the U.S. on border violence. The Foreign Relations Department says Mexico respects the right of U.S. authorities to determine how to provide security along their side of the border, but adds that increased cooperation is the answer. The department's Thursday statement says U.S. officials should step up efforts to curb smuggling of weapons and cash into Mexico...more

I'm sure we'll do as good a job on weapons and cash as they've done on drugs and illegals.

Janet Napolitano Lied

The Monday before Rob Krentz was killed, Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano, a former Arizona governor, made a speech claiming “significant progress” in controlling violence along the border. It was a lie. Ranchers in this remote area of the U.S.-Mexican border are few and far between, but they still maintain the Old West courtesies and respect for hard work and self reliance. But after 2000, the isolation turned the area into a favorite crossing for smugglers from the South. The smugglers are bold and well armed. They steal vehicles, invade ranch houses, trash the countryside, set fires, and bring all manner of contraband into the U.S. Ranch buildings that had been unlocked for generations were locked. Ranchers herding cattle went armed for the first time in 100 years. Repeated appeals to the state and federal government to do something to protect the area fell on deaf ears. Today, a new lawlessness has spread in the area...more