FLE
Leading Conservatives Call for Extensive Hearings on NSA Surveillance
Patriots to Restore Checks and Balances (PRCB) today called upon Congress to hold open, substantive oversight hearings examining the President's authorization of the National Security Agency (NSA) to violate domestic surveillance requirements outlined in the Federal Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA). Former U.S. Rep. Bob Barr, chairman of PRCB, was joined by fellow conservatives Grover Norquist, president of Americans for Tax Reform (ATR); David Keene, chairman of the American Conservative Union; Paul Weyrich, chairman and CEO of the Free Congress Foundation and Alan Gottlieb, founder of the Second Amendment Foundation, in urging lawmakers to use NSA hearings to establish a solid foundation for restoring much needed constitutional checks and balances to intelligence law. "When the Patriot Act was passed shortly after 9-11, the federal government was granted expanded access to Americans' private information," said Barr. "However, federal law still clearly states that intelligence agents must have a court order to conduct electronic surveillance of Americans on these shores. Yet the federal government overstepped the protections of the Constitution and the plain language of FISA to eavesdrop on Americans' private communication without any judicial checks and without proof that they are involved in terrorism." The following can be attributed to PRCB members: "I believe that our executive branch cannot continue to operate without the checks of the other branches. However, I stand behind the President in encouraging Congress to operate cautiously during the hearings so that sensitive government intelligence is not given to our enemies." -- Paul Weyrich, chairman and CEO, Free Congress Foundation. "Public hearings on this issue are essential to addressing the serious concerns raised by alarming revelations of NSA electronic eavesdropping." -- Grover Norquist, president, Americans for Tax Reform. "The need to reform surveillance laws and practices adopted since 9/11 is more apparent now than ever. No one would deny the government the power it needs to protect us all, but when that power poses a threat to the basic rights that make our nation unique, its exercise must be carefully monitored by Congress and the courts. This is not a partisan issue; it is an issue of safeguarding the fundamental freedoms of all Americans so that future administrations do not interpret our laws in ways that pose constitutional concerns." -- David Keene, chairman, American Conservative Union. "If the law is not reformed, ordinary Americans' personal information could be swept into all-encompassing federal databases encroaching upon every aspect of their private lives. This is of particular concern to gun owners, whose rights guaranteed under the Second Amendment are currently being infringed upon under the Patriot Act's controversial record search provisions." -- Alan Gottlieb, founder, Second Amendment Foundation....
Congressional Agency Questions Legality of Wiretaps
The Bush administration appears to have violated the National Security Act by limiting its briefings about a warrantless domestic eavesdropping program to congressional leaders, according to a memo from Congress's research arm released yesterday. The Congressional Research Service opinion said that the amended 1947 law requires President Bush to keep all members of the House and Senate intelligence committees "fully and currently informed" of such intelligence activities as the domestic surveillance effort. The memo from national security specialist Alfred Cumming is the second report this month from CRS to question the legality of aspects of Bush's domestic spying program. A Jan. 6 report concluded that the administration's justifications for the program conflicted with current law. Yesterday's analysis was requested by Rep. Jane Harman (Calif.), the ranking Democrat on the House intelligence committee, who wrote in a letter to Bush earlier this month that limiting information about the eavesdropping program violated the law and provided for poor oversight. The White House has said it informed congressional leaders about the NSA program in more than a dozen briefings, but has refused to provide further details. At a minimum, the briefings included the chairmen of the House and Senate intelligence oversight committees and the two ranking Democrats, known collectively as the "Gang of Four," according to various sources....
Strange Bedfellows v. Bush and Cheney
For the last month, civil liberties attorneys have been searching for the picture-perfect plaintiffs to challenge President Bush's warrantless wiretapping program. The dilemma they faced was obvious: The only known targets of the secret spying are suspected or convicted terrorists, hardly the most politically palatable victims of government abuse. On Tuesday, the American Civil Liberties Union revealed its solution to this problem in a spectacular fashion. It filed suit against the National Security Agency with a collection of litigants that reads like the guest list of an Arianna Huffington dinner party. Begin with Vanity Fair columnist Christopher Hitchens, an Iraq war booster who holds the distinction of being the only person to condemn both Mother Teresa as a fraud and Henry Kissinger as a war criminal. Then add Larry Diamond, a Stanford academic who advised the Bush administration on democratization in Iraq, and James Bamford, an Iraq war opponent who has written extensively about the National Security Agency. Tara McKelvey, a writer on military torture for the American Prospect, makes an appearance, as does Barnett Rubin, a New York University professor who advised the United Nations on the formation of a new Afghan government. And for good measure, the litigants also include Greenpeace, the environmental group that has never been accused of any ties to al-Qaida, as well as several other lawyers. The glue that binds this motley crew of pundits, scholars and activists was a legal theory that the ACLU hopes will convince federal courts to declare the wiretap program unconstitutional. In a Tuesday conference call with reporters, the ACLU did not provide any new evidence about who was targeted by the NSA wiretaps. Rather, it argued that the mere disclosure of the hitherto secret program has had a "chilling effect" on the plaintiffs' willingness to communicate openly on international phone and data lines, violating their privacy and First Amendment rights. "Lawyers, journalists and scholars are already changing their behavior," explained Ann Beeson, the ACLU's associate legal director. "We have a lot of evidence of harm."....
Mining for kids: Children can’t “opt out” of Pentagon recruitment database
Parents cannot remove their children’s names from a Pentagon database that includes highly personal information used to attract military recruits, the Vermont Guardian has learned. The Pentagon has spent more than $70.5 million on market research, national advertising, website development, and management of the Joint Advertising Market Research and Studies (JAMRS) database — a storehouse of questionable legality that includes the names and personal details of more than 30 million U.S. children and young people between the ages of 16 and 23. The database is separate from information collected from schools that receive federal education money. The No Child Left Behind Act requires schools to report the names, addresses, and phone numbers of secondary school students to recruiters, but the law also specifies that parents or guardians may write a letter to the school asking that their children’s names not be released. However, many parents have reported being surprised that their children are contacted anyway, according to a San Francisco-based coalition called Leave My Child Alone (LMCA). “We hear from a lot of parents who have often felt quite isolated about it all and haven’t been aware that this is happening all over the country,” said the group’s spokeswoman, Felicity Crush. Parents must contact the Pentagon directly to ask that their children’s information not be released to recruiters, but the data is not removed from the JAMRS database, according to Lt. Col. Ellen Krenke, a Pentagon spokeswoman. Instead, the information is moved to a suppression file, where it is continuously updated with new data from private and government sources and still made available to recruiters, Krenke said. It’s necessary to keep the information in the suppression file so the Pentagon can make sure it’s not being released, she said. Krenke said the database is compiled using information from state motor vehicles departments, the Selective Service, and data-mining firms that collect and organize information from private companies. In addition to names, addresses, Social Security numbers, and phone numbers, the database may include cell phone numbers, e-mail addresses, grade-point averages, ethnicity, and subjects of interest....
Feds want Google search records
The Bush administration on Wednesday asked a federal judge to order Google to turn over a broad range of material from its closely guarded databases. The move is part of a government effort to revive an Internet child protection law struck down two years ago by the U.S. Supreme Court. The law was meant to punish online pornography sites that make their content accessible to minors. The government contends it needs the Google data to determine how often pornography shows up in online searches. In court papers filed in U.S. District Court in San Jose, Justice Department lawyers revealed that Google has refused to comply with a subpoena issued last year for the records, which include a request for one million random Web addresses and records of all Google searches from any one-week period. The Mountain View-based search engine opposes releasing the information on a variety of grounds, saying it would violate the privacy rights of its users and reveal company trade secrets, according to court documents. Nicole Wong, an associate general counsel for Google, said the company will fight the government's effort ``vigorously.''....
FBI Missed Internal Signs of Espionage
By the government's own account, FBI analyst Leandro Aragoncillo was spying in plain sight. He rummaged through FBI computers for intelligence reports unrelated to his work and then e-mailed the classified documents to opposition leaders in the Philippines. He had traveled more than a dozen times to the Asian country on personal business since 2000. And records show he carried debt of at least a half-million dollars — on Marine retirement pay and an entry-level FBI salary. But for at least seven months, the bureau that makes catching spies its No. 2 mission after fighting terrorism missed signs of espionage in its own ranks — again. Safeguards the FBI put in place after it was rocked by the Robert Hanssen spy scandal in 2001 failed to raise red flags about Aragoncillo's activities, according to interviews and court papers reviewed by The Associated Press. It took outside help — U.S. customs officials separately developed suspicions about Aragoncillo — to alert the FBI. The bureau soon discovered he was sending sensitive U.S. intelligence assessments about the Philippines' government to Filipino opposition leaders, court records say....
Indiana Residents Deemed Suspicious Could Be Monitored
Public officials want to create an "intelligence fusion center" to collect data on suspicious Indiana residents. Senator Thomas Wyss of Fort Wayne is sponsoring Senate Bill 247. It would allow a center to collect intelligence information on an individual if the person "reasonably" appears to have knowledge of terrorist or criminal activities. The center would be in the state government complex. Under the governor's direction, law enforcement officers across Indiana would work together and share information. State Homeland Security Director Eric Dietz said the center would be funded through federal grants....
'Decommissioned' Guns Nearly As Good As Confiscations
The Brady group and its congressional supporters are proceeding, and making headway, with a below-radar effort to ban operating firearms from the general public, without having to actually disarm America's 80 million gun owners. The plan is now evolving around an innocent-sounding new legal term. It was tucked deep in a 400,000-word spending bill under president Clinton (law # P.L. 105-277), and it is now spreading throughout federal gun laws. Its latest use, the eighth, is in the frivolous-lawsuit ban just enacted (The Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act, law # P.L. 109-92; S.397). Described at the end of this report, it accents a liability all Americans -- not just gun owners -- are increasingly under, a tightening legal noose few people realize is around their necks. The phrase is "secure gun storage or safety device." It includes almost anything that will keep a gun from working. At its simplest, it's gun locks. This and closely related tactics are sometimes called "decommissioning schemes." Gun-control advocates -- the mainstream ones who seek to disarm the public -- will essentially win their cause if they can require guns to be disabled, disassembled, locked up or turned off by remote control. This approach is already working in National Parks where possession of a working gun subjects you to immediate federal arrest, confiscation of your property, and endless aggravation. No criminal act of any kind is required, just legal possession of personal property -- any firearm. However, a gun in pieces so it cannot be fired, locked in your car trunk is allowed. Interestingly, no statutory authority for this denial of civil rights can be found. And of course, statutory denial of civil rights would be unconstitutional on its face....
Thursday, January 19, 2006
NEWS ROUNDUP
Conservationists, ranchers pack talk on wolf reintroduction The Western Slope, which has some 250,000 elk, could sustain more than 1,000 wolves, conservationist Rob Edward told a standing-room-only crowd in Carbondale on Wednesday. And that, said longtime Carbondale rancher Bill Fales, "scares the hell out of me." Edward, director of carnivore restoration for Sinapu, a nonprofit dedicated to restoring native carnivores to their ancestral lands, presented a slide show at Dos Gringos restaurant on wolf reintroduction. Carbondale-based Wilderness Workshop hosted the event. Whether western Colorado has room for wolves is a central part of a contentious issue, he said....
Alaska aerial hunt of wolves declared illegal A judge declared illegal Alaska’s controversial program of shooting wolves from the air to boost the population of moose and other game, prompting state officials to suspend the policy. Superior Court Judge Sharon Gleason said Tuesday the Alaska Board of Game failed to follow its own requirements when it launched a program allowing private hunters to gun down wolves from an aircraft to remove the animals from the food chain. Since the program started in 2003, licensed hunters have shot and killed hundreds of wolves by tracking the animals and shooting them from above in the face of protests from animal rights groups and the occasional tourism boycott. Gleason ruled that the state failed to adequately address regulatory requirements, calling for proof that aerial wolf control is necessary and would be more effective than other, less-drastic steps to boost game populations....
County commission calls for wolf delisting The Gallatin County Commission gave its support Tuesday to a resolution calling on federal authorities to speed up efforts to remove gray wolves from the endangered species list. Commissioners voted 2-1 in support of the joint resolution, which is being sought by county commissioners in seven counties near Yellowstone National Park. The document isn't legally binding. but is instead a form of protest by those counties concerned about the wolves' reintroduction in Yellowstone. It labels wolves a "predator species" in need of management and requests that the governor of Montana take steps to compensate ranchers for livestock losses. Wolves are here to stay and everyone accepts that, rancher and outfitter Lee Hart told commissioners. But their proper place is inside the park. "I don't think we need to extend Yellowstone Park across the state of Montana," he said....
Army could pay Fort Hood area landowners up to $1,500 an acre to keep land rural The deputy commanding general of Fort Hood said he's willing to give landowners around the base up to $1,500 an acre to maintain their land as a rural buffer zone, but he'll scrap the effort if landowners aren't interested. About 75 landowners gathered in the tiny Flat Community Center on Tuesday as Maj. Gen. James Simmons released the first details of how the voluntary buffer zone plan would work. Controversy has swirled around the buffer zone idea for months, with opponents suggesting it was a stealthy land grab for endangered species habitat or Fort Hood's expansion. Landowners interrogated the general about the incentive program, but most seemed disarmed by his plainspoken answers and willing to consider the incentives. Simmons said he would go forward with the program only with the cooperation of landowners representing at least half the acreage in the proposed buffer zone. Pending approval early this summer by the Department of the Army, agents for Fort Hood could begin signing up landowners for the program this fall. Under the plan, a third-party administrator – mostly likely the Texas Soil and Water Conservation Board – would negotiate contracts with the landowners in the three buffer zone areas. Those areas on the west, northeast and far south side of Fort Hood comprise 91,417 acres....
Kansas Land Trust to create buffer around Fort Riley The military wants to keep making loud noises. Kansas environmentalists want to ensure the tallgrass prairie doesn’t die. The two problems may have one solution. Officials with Fort Riley and the Lawrence-based Kansas Land Trust on Wednesday announced plans to create a “buffer” around the Army base, a 10-year program that would permanently preserve up to 50,000 acres of prairie and farmland. “We’d like to keep that land use the way it is,” said Jeff Keating, a civilian biologist who manages the buffer program for Fort Riley. Fort officials fear that population explosion could trigger a big demand for new residential developments near the base, potentially creating unwanted conflicts between the Army, with its firing ranges and helicopters, and any new neighbors. Fort Riley would work with the Kansas Land Trust to use federal money from the Army Compatible Use Buffer Program to buy conservation easements from neighboring landowners, keeping the land in the hands of its current owners, in use for farming and grazing, but forever off-limits to development....
Ranchers protest proposal for frog habitat designation Ranchland owners packed a meeting room Tuesday for the second time in a week to protest plans to declare 4,400 acres as critical habitat for the red-legged frog. Federal officials insist designating the land northeast of Valley Springs will have no effect on ranching operations and only a minimal effect when ranchers decide to cash out for development. A federal study of the area found protecting frog habitat would eliminate only two or three of the 3,000 homes likely to be built in the area over the next 20 years. Nevertheless, property owners fear the designation alone will devalue their land and possibly prevent them from cashing out....
Christo meeting draws crowd The idea of a temporary work of art that lasts just two weeks like Christo and Jeanne-Claude's "Over the River" proposal is for many a baffling concept. Cook, then 23, heard the rancher's wife at a public meeting just like the one held Tuesday evening in Canon City during which the U.S. Bureau of Land Management got an earful of public comment from more than 150 area residents on the large-scale project which would consist of fabric panels suspended above the Arkansas River. Bulgarian-born artist Christo and his partner-wife Jeanne-Claude, both 70, are New York-based artists who propose to hang about seven miles of translucent fabric panels over eight segments of the Arkansas River between Canon City and Salida. The artwork would hang for 14 days, sometime between mid-July and mid-August probably in 2008 or 2009. Fabric panels would be attached to steel cables stretched across the river, covering the water surface, but not the side slopes and would hang from between 10 and 24 feet above the water. The aluminum-coated fabric has been wind tested and would be porous enough to allow rainwater to seep through....
Is cloud seeding worth it?: Lawmakers to consider funding work Tom Barnes is in the midst of his 15th winter of watching for the perfect storm. When it happens - on those occasions when the wind doesn't blow too hard, temperatures are frigid enough to produce snow and a large amount of precipitation appears eminent - he lights his portable propane burner. He knows his machine is working, and that he's giving Mother Nature a helping hand, when the blue flame turns orange as it reacts with a cocktail intended to coax extra moisture from the sky. Now it appears likely that state lawmakers will consider legislation to do on a larger scale what Barnes and ranchers and farmers in six Southeast Idaho counties have been doing for several years - seed the clouds....
Bison shipments to slaughter go on, along with debate Nearly 50 more bison from Yellowstone National Park were trucked to slaughter Wednesday, as the debate continued over the plan that allows for the animals to be captured due to disease concerns. Over the last week, 524 bison have been captured near the park’s northern border — the most since 1996-97, park spokesman Al Nash said. Most of those animals will be sent to slaughter without being tested for brucellosis, a disease found in the herd and driving force behind the state-federal plan that allows for hazing, capture or slaughter of wandering bison. As of Wednesday, 264 bison had been sent to slaughter houses in Montana and Idaho, leaving 221 still being held at the Stephen’s Creek capture site just inside the park’s northern boundary, officials said. Thirty-eight calves previously were sent to a research project north of Yellowstone after testing negative for brucellosis, and Nash said more might qualify for the so-called quarantine facility, pending testing. One calf died at the capture pen, officials said....
National Elk Refuge begins feeding Artificial feeding of elk on the National Elk Refuge has begun in response to complaints about elk feeding on haystacks and commingling with cattle. The Wyoming Game and Fish Department asked the refuge to begin artificial feeding on Jan. 11 after fielding complaints, according to Game and Fish biologist Doug Brimeyer. There was plenty of natural forage for elk in Jackson Hole until late December, when deep snow began prompting elk to seek easy meals in ranchers' hay. Dan Winder, a resident of the Cache Creek area, reported more than 40 elk around his hayfield recently. He also found about 15 elk in a corral eating his hay and was worried about the safety of an expensive stallion....
Jury to decide if sentencing justified in Hayman Fire case A Teller County judge ruled Tuesday that a jury should decide whether ‘‘aggravated circumstances’’ justify an extended sentence for a former forestry worker who started the worst wildfire in Colorado history. Terry Lynn Barton, 42, pleaded guilty to a state arson charge for the 2002 Hayman Fire, which charred 138,000 acres and destroyed 133 houses. A judge sentenced her to 12 years in prison - twice the normal term. The Colorado Court of Appeals then ordered a new sentencing hearing, saying the judge might have been biased because smoke from the fire forced him out of his home and that he didn’t have the constitutional authority to order an extended sentence. Fourth Judicial District Judge Thomas Kennedy ruled Tuesday that a jury should consider whether ‘‘aggravating circumstances’’ existed to allow for Barton’s extended sentence....
Senseless cattle slayings nothing new to ranchers The $10,000 hunt for the perpetrator of a 10-cow Johnson massacre rages on. While Johnson's losses near Vernon were the largest in recent memory, many ranchers say senseless killing of their livestock is a constant spur in their sides. Elizabeth Mitchell owns a herd not far from the Johnson ranch where 10 pregnant cows were killed at the end of December. Since the fall of 2004, she said two of her cows were killed that were certainly the result of foul play, and two more she suspects were killed senselessly. "Everybody loses some every year," Mitchell said. "I had two for sure [killed] and two others that were suspicious, but we never had anybody dig into the carcasses to verify the cause of death." "It goes on all the time, it's like we live in the Wild West," she said. "It goes on all the time, it's like we live in the Wild West," she said. "You can't hire enough patrol people to drive out here all the time because it's such vast areas and that's why people get away with things like this."....
Lean Cattle Mean Lean Wallets For Ranchers Texas cattle ranchers say without some measurable drought relief soon, they will have to sell off their herds. Some already have begun the painful process of selling parts of their herd for less than they are worth. Monday night at the Fort Worth Stock Show, ranchers said no rain means no grass and vegetation and that means no hay to feed their cattle through the winter. “People can't buy hay. At least you can’t buy it an economical price,” rancher Rodney Roberson said. “They can’t keep these cows through the winter, then it’s time to get rid of them because they can’t afford to feed them sack feed and make it work it economically in the commercial cattle business." Other ranchers said prized cattle are being sold to meat markets. It's either that or have them starve to death....
Recovery slow from mad cow-related losses American cattle producers are still trying to dig out of the hole caused by mad cow disease, even as Japan has reopened its borders to U.S. imports and other countries prepare to follow suit. Financial losses to the beef and cattle industry have been immense. Analysts estimate the U.S. beef industry has lost $6.2 billion from the closing of foreign markets. Financial losses for Colorado, the nation's fourth-largest beef producer, are estimated to have reached about $160 million over the past two years. If there is any saving grace, it's that the export bans occurred during a period of high beef prices and low supplies, helping to buffer the cattle industry from some of the fallout....
The beef over pet food On a recent winter afternoon in San Francisco's well-heeled Marina district, there's blood on the sidewalk. Spilling out of the garage of a neat yellow house, dozens of cardboard boxes overflow with a smorgasbord of frozen raw meat and bones sealed in plastic bags. There's pork and beef from Niman Ranch, and whole quail from Cavendish Game Birds of Vermont. It looks like an upscale butcher has been pillaged by a modern-day Robin Hood, who left the spoils for the taking: lamb, chicken, goat, turkey, rabbit, buffalo -- a veritable Noah's Ark of high-quality protein plunder. It's monthly delivery day for San Francisco Raw Feeders, a buyers group with some 350 human members who strive to feed their animals a diet rich with raw meat -- and not just any meat, but sustainable, antibiotic- and steroid-free meat and bones from cows, pigs and poultry raised and slaughtered on small farms....
A Matter of Numbers But as formidable as these issues are, they're not Ladd's biggest worry. What really has him wrestling the mattress at night, the issue that most immediately threatens his ability to stay in business as a cattleman, is at the moment, right before his eyes. It's the international border fence. Or more accurately, the holes, cuts, washouts and smuggler vehicle run-throughs that turn that fence into Swiss cheese. Ladd, who has 10 1/2 miles of land abutting the Mexican line, is standing at a spot known as Gringo Draw. Floodwaters washed through here last summer, taking out a 100-foot-wide portion of the fence, and that yawning gap is still there. But there are many others. In a one-mile span, we counted 12 fence breaks along Ladd's borderland through which Mexican cattle can wander onto his property, mingling with his own stock. The problem? If these intruder livestock happen to be diseased, they could infect his herd and ruin him. In fact, Ladd believes that disaster will befall him eventually....
Report slams USDA biotech experiments In a report released quietly just before Christmas, the U.S. Department of Agriculture's investigative arm disclosed that the department failed to properly monitor thousands of acres of experimental biotechnology crops. The report by the department's inspector general said USDA didn't thoroughly evaluate applications to grow experimental crops and then didn't ensure the genetically engineered plants were destroyed after experiments. In several cases, the agency didn't even know where so-called field trials were located....
'The Worst Hard Time' nimbly chronicles tragedies of the Dust Bowl The term ''Dust Bowl" often conjures a ''Grapes of Wrath" image of a great migration from worn-out farms in Texas and Oklahoma to green fields in other states. Timothy Egan has focused on the farmers who stayed and who lived through the worst environmental disaster in our nation's history. ''The Worst Hard Time" is a powerful, deeply researched chronicle of the most destructive boom-and-bust cycle in American history: the wheat-growing frenzy in the Great Plains in the 1920s, which became the Dust Bowl of the 1930s. No region in America has ever been harder hit by reckless environmental practices. Egan anchors the story on three towns in Texas, Oklahoma, and Colorado. Year by year, you get to know young couples struggling to keep their children alive, a resolute newspaperman, a cowboy father turned broken rancher, and high school kids barely hanging on to their youth....
Bailey ready to rein it in In a span of three decades, he has ridden the winners of virtually every important race in the United States, been inducted into the Racing Hall of Fame and written a book. The 30,846 horses he has ridden, 5,890 of them winners, have amassed more than $304 million in earnings. He has been ubiquitous on the biggest racing days because they were often his biggest days. But after nearly 32 years as a jockey -- he rode his first winner in 1974 at Sunland Park in New Mexico -- and two decades of unmitigated stardom, Jerry Bailey will ride his last race next week at Gulfstream Park. "I'm sure this is not a surprise to most people," said Bailey, who has contemplated retirement at the ends of each of the last few racing seasons. "It's time," he said, citing a desire to devote more time to his family and another to, "... walk away in one piece. I believe I fulfilled everything I set out to do." Bailey, 48, will join ESPN and ABC Sports as an analyst. He will debut March 18 with ESPN coverage of the Santa Catalina Stakes at Santa Anita Park....
Revering a hero of the West Raconteur, writer and photographer Robert W. Limbert is a folk hero without peer in Idaho. Across America he was once on par with the likes of Wild Bill Hickcock. During the 1920s and '30s, Limbert was singularly responsible for promoting the Gem State. He traveled around the country staging lively shows about the West—presentations that combined adventure storytelling, movies, slides, birdcalls, sleight-of-hand and trick shooting. Pre-arrival publicity often challenged the local sheriff to a shootout, and in Chicago he even called out mobster Al Capone. Though they didn't duel, they apparently got along famously....
Fast on the trigger It’s fast, it’s fun and it’s catching on. “Mounted shooting is the fastest-growing equestrian sport in America today,” said Marlin Kennedy of the Kooskia area. Kennedy should know. He’s been a champion in his class in both the Mounted Shooters of America and Cowboy Mounted Shooting associations, most recently winning the buckle and a world championship title for the Mounted Cowboy Shooters of America Men’s Limited 20 X Extreme. Mounted shooting is the combination of a fast-paced, timed equestrian sport and shooting two .45-caliber single-action revolvers loaded with special ammunition. Competitors ride a variety of courses requiring precision control of the horse....
An American legend heads into the sunset It's hard to imagine John Wayne winning the West without his trusty Winchester by his side. In real life, the Winchester was there for the winning of the West, as much a tool for survival as a weapon. It's Winchester that's kept generation after generation employed in New Haven, Conn., home of the world-renowned rifle. But the end may be near for Winchester. U.S. Repeating Arms Co. Inc. plans to close the New Haven factory that opened in 1866. New Haven residents are trying to save the plant before the March 31 closing date, but if a buyer can't be found, it could mean the end of all commercially produced Winchesters. Winchesters could be found on cattle drives, wagon trains and Army posts during the opening and development of the West. They could be found in the hands of infamous outlaws, but Winchesters also were used by the lawmen who brought them to justice. Ranchers, farmers, cowboys, hunters and explorers used Winchesters every day, as much one of their tools as a saddle and rope. They were a part of the culture, a necessary part....
Conservationists, ranchers pack talk on wolf reintroduction The Western Slope, which has some 250,000 elk, could sustain more than 1,000 wolves, conservationist Rob Edward told a standing-room-only crowd in Carbondale on Wednesday. And that, said longtime Carbondale rancher Bill Fales, "scares the hell out of me." Edward, director of carnivore restoration for Sinapu, a nonprofit dedicated to restoring native carnivores to their ancestral lands, presented a slide show at Dos Gringos restaurant on wolf reintroduction. Carbondale-based Wilderness Workshop hosted the event. Whether western Colorado has room for wolves is a central part of a contentious issue, he said....
Alaska aerial hunt of wolves declared illegal A judge declared illegal Alaska’s controversial program of shooting wolves from the air to boost the population of moose and other game, prompting state officials to suspend the policy. Superior Court Judge Sharon Gleason said Tuesday the Alaska Board of Game failed to follow its own requirements when it launched a program allowing private hunters to gun down wolves from an aircraft to remove the animals from the food chain. Since the program started in 2003, licensed hunters have shot and killed hundreds of wolves by tracking the animals and shooting them from above in the face of protests from animal rights groups and the occasional tourism boycott. Gleason ruled that the state failed to adequately address regulatory requirements, calling for proof that aerial wolf control is necessary and would be more effective than other, less-drastic steps to boost game populations....
County commission calls for wolf delisting The Gallatin County Commission gave its support Tuesday to a resolution calling on federal authorities to speed up efforts to remove gray wolves from the endangered species list. Commissioners voted 2-1 in support of the joint resolution, which is being sought by county commissioners in seven counties near Yellowstone National Park. The document isn't legally binding. but is instead a form of protest by those counties concerned about the wolves' reintroduction in Yellowstone. It labels wolves a "predator species" in need of management and requests that the governor of Montana take steps to compensate ranchers for livestock losses. Wolves are here to stay and everyone accepts that, rancher and outfitter Lee Hart told commissioners. But their proper place is inside the park. "I don't think we need to extend Yellowstone Park across the state of Montana," he said....
Army could pay Fort Hood area landowners up to $1,500 an acre to keep land rural The deputy commanding general of Fort Hood said he's willing to give landowners around the base up to $1,500 an acre to maintain their land as a rural buffer zone, but he'll scrap the effort if landowners aren't interested. About 75 landowners gathered in the tiny Flat Community Center on Tuesday as Maj. Gen. James Simmons released the first details of how the voluntary buffer zone plan would work. Controversy has swirled around the buffer zone idea for months, with opponents suggesting it was a stealthy land grab for endangered species habitat or Fort Hood's expansion. Landowners interrogated the general about the incentive program, but most seemed disarmed by his plainspoken answers and willing to consider the incentives. Simmons said he would go forward with the program only with the cooperation of landowners representing at least half the acreage in the proposed buffer zone. Pending approval early this summer by the Department of the Army, agents for Fort Hood could begin signing up landowners for the program this fall. Under the plan, a third-party administrator – mostly likely the Texas Soil and Water Conservation Board – would negotiate contracts with the landowners in the three buffer zone areas. Those areas on the west, northeast and far south side of Fort Hood comprise 91,417 acres....
Kansas Land Trust to create buffer around Fort Riley The military wants to keep making loud noises. Kansas environmentalists want to ensure the tallgrass prairie doesn’t die. The two problems may have one solution. Officials with Fort Riley and the Lawrence-based Kansas Land Trust on Wednesday announced plans to create a “buffer” around the Army base, a 10-year program that would permanently preserve up to 50,000 acres of prairie and farmland. “We’d like to keep that land use the way it is,” said Jeff Keating, a civilian biologist who manages the buffer program for Fort Riley. Fort officials fear that population explosion could trigger a big demand for new residential developments near the base, potentially creating unwanted conflicts between the Army, with its firing ranges and helicopters, and any new neighbors. Fort Riley would work with the Kansas Land Trust to use federal money from the Army Compatible Use Buffer Program to buy conservation easements from neighboring landowners, keeping the land in the hands of its current owners, in use for farming and grazing, but forever off-limits to development....
Ranchers protest proposal for frog habitat designation Ranchland owners packed a meeting room Tuesday for the second time in a week to protest plans to declare 4,400 acres as critical habitat for the red-legged frog. Federal officials insist designating the land northeast of Valley Springs will have no effect on ranching operations and only a minimal effect when ranchers decide to cash out for development. A federal study of the area found protecting frog habitat would eliminate only two or three of the 3,000 homes likely to be built in the area over the next 20 years. Nevertheless, property owners fear the designation alone will devalue their land and possibly prevent them from cashing out....
Christo meeting draws crowd The idea of a temporary work of art that lasts just two weeks like Christo and Jeanne-Claude's "Over the River" proposal is for many a baffling concept. Cook, then 23, heard the rancher's wife at a public meeting just like the one held Tuesday evening in Canon City during which the U.S. Bureau of Land Management got an earful of public comment from more than 150 area residents on the large-scale project which would consist of fabric panels suspended above the Arkansas River. Bulgarian-born artist Christo and his partner-wife Jeanne-Claude, both 70, are New York-based artists who propose to hang about seven miles of translucent fabric panels over eight segments of the Arkansas River between Canon City and Salida. The artwork would hang for 14 days, sometime between mid-July and mid-August probably in 2008 or 2009. Fabric panels would be attached to steel cables stretched across the river, covering the water surface, but not the side slopes and would hang from between 10 and 24 feet above the water. The aluminum-coated fabric has been wind tested and would be porous enough to allow rainwater to seep through....
Is cloud seeding worth it?: Lawmakers to consider funding work Tom Barnes is in the midst of his 15th winter of watching for the perfect storm. When it happens - on those occasions when the wind doesn't blow too hard, temperatures are frigid enough to produce snow and a large amount of precipitation appears eminent - he lights his portable propane burner. He knows his machine is working, and that he's giving Mother Nature a helping hand, when the blue flame turns orange as it reacts with a cocktail intended to coax extra moisture from the sky. Now it appears likely that state lawmakers will consider legislation to do on a larger scale what Barnes and ranchers and farmers in six Southeast Idaho counties have been doing for several years - seed the clouds....
Bison shipments to slaughter go on, along with debate Nearly 50 more bison from Yellowstone National Park were trucked to slaughter Wednesday, as the debate continued over the plan that allows for the animals to be captured due to disease concerns. Over the last week, 524 bison have been captured near the park’s northern border — the most since 1996-97, park spokesman Al Nash said. Most of those animals will be sent to slaughter without being tested for brucellosis, a disease found in the herd and driving force behind the state-federal plan that allows for hazing, capture or slaughter of wandering bison. As of Wednesday, 264 bison had been sent to slaughter houses in Montana and Idaho, leaving 221 still being held at the Stephen’s Creek capture site just inside the park’s northern boundary, officials said. Thirty-eight calves previously were sent to a research project north of Yellowstone after testing negative for brucellosis, and Nash said more might qualify for the so-called quarantine facility, pending testing. One calf died at the capture pen, officials said....
National Elk Refuge begins feeding Artificial feeding of elk on the National Elk Refuge has begun in response to complaints about elk feeding on haystacks and commingling with cattle. The Wyoming Game and Fish Department asked the refuge to begin artificial feeding on Jan. 11 after fielding complaints, according to Game and Fish biologist Doug Brimeyer. There was plenty of natural forage for elk in Jackson Hole until late December, when deep snow began prompting elk to seek easy meals in ranchers' hay. Dan Winder, a resident of the Cache Creek area, reported more than 40 elk around his hayfield recently. He also found about 15 elk in a corral eating his hay and was worried about the safety of an expensive stallion....
Jury to decide if sentencing justified in Hayman Fire case A Teller County judge ruled Tuesday that a jury should decide whether ‘‘aggravated circumstances’’ justify an extended sentence for a former forestry worker who started the worst wildfire in Colorado history. Terry Lynn Barton, 42, pleaded guilty to a state arson charge for the 2002 Hayman Fire, which charred 138,000 acres and destroyed 133 houses. A judge sentenced her to 12 years in prison - twice the normal term. The Colorado Court of Appeals then ordered a new sentencing hearing, saying the judge might have been biased because smoke from the fire forced him out of his home and that he didn’t have the constitutional authority to order an extended sentence. Fourth Judicial District Judge Thomas Kennedy ruled Tuesday that a jury should consider whether ‘‘aggravating circumstances’’ existed to allow for Barton’s extended sentence....
Senseless cattle slayings nothing new to ranchers The $10,000 hunt for the perpetrator of a 10-cow Johnson massacre rages on. While Johnson's losses near Vernon were the largest in recent memory, many ranchers say senseless killing of their livestock is a constant spur in their sides. Elizabeth Mitchell owns a herd not far from the Johnson ranch where 10 pregnant cows were killed at the end of December. Since the fall of 2004, she said two of her cows were killed that were certainly the result of foul play, and two more she suspects were killed senselessly. "Everybody loses some every year," Mitchell said. "I had two for sure [killed] and two others that were suspicious, but we never had anybody dig into the carcasses to verify the cause of death." "It goes on all the time, it's like we live in the Wild West," she said. "It goes on all the time, it's like we live in the Wild West," she said. "You can't hire enough patrol people to drive out here all the time because it's such vast areas and that's why people get away with things like this."....
Lean Cattle Mean Lean Wallets For Ranchers Texas cattle ranchers say without some measurable drought relief soon, they will have to sell off their herds. Some already have begun the painful process of selling parts of their herd for less than they are worth. Monday night at the Fort Worth Stock Show, ranchers said no rain means no grass and vegetation and that means no hay to feed their cattle through the winter. “People can't buy hay. At least you can’t buy it an economical price,” rancher Rodney Roberson said. “They can’t keep these cows through the winter, then it’s time to get rid of them because they can’t afford to feed them sack feed and make it work it economically in the commercial cattle business." Other ranchers said prized cattle are being sold to meat markets. It's either that or have them starve to death....
Recovery slow from mad cow-related losses American cattle producers are still trying to dig out of the hole caused by mad cow disease, even as Japan has reopened its borders to U.S. imports and other countries prepare to follow suit. Financial losses to the beef and cattle industry have been immense. Analysts estimate the U.S. beef industry has lost $6.2 billion from the closing of foreign markets. Financial losses for Colorado, the nation's fourth-largest beef producer, are estimated to have reached about $160 million over the past two years. If there is any saving grace, it's that the export bans occurred during a period of high beef prices and low supplies, helping to buffer the cattle industry from some of the fallout....
The beef over pet food On a recent winter afternoon in San Francisco's well-heeled Marina district, there's blood on the sidewalk. Spilling out of the garage of a neat yellow house, dozens of cardboard boxes overflow with a smorgasbord of frozen raw meat and bones sealed in plastic bags. There's pork and beef from Niman Ranch, and whole quail from Cavendish Game Birds of Vermont. It looks like an upscale butcher has been pillaged by a modern-day Robin Hood, who left the spoils for the taking: lamb, chicken, goat, turkey, rabbit, buffalo -- a veritable Noah's Ark of high-quality protein plunder. It's monthly delivery day for San Francisco Raw Feeders, a buyers group with some 350 human members who strive to feed their animals a diet rich with raw meat -- and not just any meat, but sustainable, antibiotic- and steroid-free meat and bones from cows, pigs and poultry raised and slaughtered on small farms....
A Matter of Numbers But as formidable as these issues are, they're not Ladd's biggest worry. What really has him wrestling the mattress at night, the issue that most immediately threatens his ability to stay in business as a cattleman, is at the moment, right before his eyes. It's the international border fence. Or more accurately, the holes, cuts, washouts and smuggler vehicle run-throughs that turn that fence into Swiss cheese. Ladd, who has 10 1/2 miles of land abutting the Mexican line, is standing at a spot known as Gringo Draw. Floodwaters washed through here last summer, taking out a 100-foot-wide portion of the fence, and that yawning gap is still there. But there are many others. In a one-mile span, we counted 12 fence breaks along Ladd's borderland through which Mexican cattle can wander onto his property, mingling with his own stock. The problem? If these intruder livestock happen to be diseased, they could infect his herd and ruin him. In fact, Ladd believes that disaster will befall him eventually....
Report slams USDA biotech experiments In a report released quietly just before Christmas, the U.S. Department of Agriculture's investigative arm disclosed that the department failed to properly monitor thousands of acres of experimental biotechnology crops. The report by the department's inspector general said USDA didn't thoroughly evaluate applications to grow experimental crops and then didn't ensure the genetically engineered plants were destroyed after experiments. In several cases, the agency didn't even know where so-called field trials were located....
'The Worst Hard Time' nimbly chronicles tragedies of the Dust Bowl The term ''Dust Bowl" often conjures a ''Grapes of Wrath" image of a great migration from worn-out farms in Texas and Oklahoma to green fields in other states. Timothy Egan has focused on the farmers who stayed and who lived through the worst environmental disaster in our nation's history. ''The Worst Hard Time" is a powerful, deeply researched chronicle of the most destructive boom-and-bust cycle in American history: the wheat-growing frenzy in the Great Plains in the 1920s, which became the Dust Bowl of the 1930s. No region in America has ever been harder hit by reckless environmental practices. Egan anchors the story on three towns in Texas, Oklahoma, and Colorado. Year by year, you get to know young couples struggling to keep their children alive, a resolute newspaperman, a cowboy father turned broken rancher, and high school kids barely hanging on to their youth....
Bailey ready to rein it in In a span of three decades, he has ridden the winners of virtually every important race in the United States, been inducted into the Racing Hall of Fame and written a book. The 30,846 horses he has ridden, 5,890 of them winners, have amassed more than $304 million in earnings. He has been ubiquitous on the biggest racing days because they were often his biggest days. But after nearly 32 years as a jockey -- he rode his first winner in 1974 at Sunland Park in New Mexico -- and two decades of unmitigated stardom, Jerry Bailey will ride his last race next week at Gulfstream Park. "I'm sure this is not a surprise to most people," said Bailey, who has contemplated retirement at the ends of each of the last few racing seasons. "It's time," he said, citing a desire to devote more time to his family and another to, "... walk away in one piece. I believe I fulfilled everything I set out to do." Bailey, 48, will join ESPN and ABC Sports as an analyst. He will debut March 18 with ESPN coverage of the Santa Catalina Stakes at Santa Anita Park....
Revering a hero of the West Raconteur, writer and photographer Robert W. Limbert is a folk hero without peer in Idaho. Across America he was once on par with the likes of Wild Bill Hickcock. During the 1920s and '30s, Limbert was singularly responsible for promoting the Gem State. He traveled around the country staging lively shows about the West—presentations that combined adventure storytelling, movies, slides, birdcalls, sleight-of-hand and trick shooting. Pre-arrival publicity often challenged the local sheriff to a shootout, and in Chicago he even called out mobster Al Capone. Though they didn't duel, they apparently got along famously....
Fast on the trigger It’s fast, it’s fun and it’s catching on. “Mounted shooting is the fastest-growing equestrian sport in America today,” said Marlin Kennedy of the Kooskia area. Kennedy should know. He’s been a champion in his class in both the Mounted Shooters of America and Cowboy Mounted Shooting associations, most recently winning the buckle and a world championship title for the Mounted Cowboy Shooters of America Men’s Limited 20 X Extreme. Mounted shooting is the combination of a fast-paced, timed equestrian sport and shooting two .45-caliber single-action revolvers loaded with special ammunition. Competitors ride a variety of courses requiring precision control of the horse....
An American legend heads into the sunset It's hard to imagine John Wayne winning the West without his trusty Winchester by his side. In real life, the Winchester was there for the winning of the West, as much a tool for survival as a weapon. It's Winchester that's kept generation after generation employed in New Haven, Conn., home of the world-renowned rifle. But the end may be near for Winchester. U.S. Repeating Arms Co. Inc. plans to close the New Haven factory that opened in 1866. New Haven residents are trying to save the plant before the March 31 closing date, but if a buyer can't be found, it could mean the end of all commercially produced Winchesters. Winchesters could be found on cattle drives, wagon trains and Army posts during the opening and development of the West. They could be found in the hands of infamous outlaws, but Winchesters also were used by the lawmen who brought them to justice. Ranchers, farmers, cowboys, hunters and explorers used Winchesters every day, as much one of their tools as a saddle and rope. They were a part of the culture, a necessary part....
Wednesday, January 18, 2006
GAO
Hazardous Waste: EPA Needs to Clarify the Types of Mercury Waste That Can Be Treated and Disposed of Using the Debris Regulations. GAO-06-99, December 16.
http://www.gao.gov/cgi-bin/getrpt?GAO-06-99
Highlights - http://www.gao.gov/highlights/d0699high.pdf
Hazardous Waste: EPA Needs to Clarify the Types of Mercury Waste That Can Be Treated and Disposed of Using the Debris Regulations. GAO-06-99, December 16.
http://www.gao.gov/cgi-bin/getrpt?GAO-06-99
Highlights - http://www.gao.gov/highlights/d0699high.pdf
Tuesday, January 17, 2006
NEWS ROUNDUP
Burned, Standing Trees A Threat In Durango Area Forestry officials are warning that dead trees left standing after a 70,000-acre wildfire nearly four years ago are in danger of toppling onto roads and trails, endangering drivers, hunters and others. "These trees that are fire-killed and don't have any needles are going to be falling over with a greater frequency," U.S. Forest Service forester Mike Johnson told the Durango Herald in Sunday's editions. "Our concerns are particularly where the fire got close to the roads and common-use areas," he said. "If it's a windy day, you may want to postpone your trip," he said. The 2002 Missionary Ridge fire destroyed 56 homes. One firefighter was killed when the roots of a burned tree gave way and the trunk fell on him....
FBI accuses 3 environmentalists of bomb plot The FBI announced the arrests Friday of three environmental protesters suspected in a plot to destroy federal property, cell phone towers and power generation facilities. Those charged were connected to the Earth Liberation Front, a movement that justifies destruction of industrial objects in defense of the environment, according to an FBI news release. Arrested were Zachary O. Jenson, 20, of Monroe, Wash.; Lauren Weiner, 20, of Philadelphia; and Eric Taylor McDavid, 28, of Auburn. They were arrested Friday morning in the parking lot of a shopping center in Auburn (Placer County), about 30 miles east of Sacramento. In addition to unspecified cell phone towers and power generation facilities, the three were also plotting to destroy U.S. Forest Service facilities, the FBI said....
Recreationists ticketed during wilderness sting The Summit County Sheriff's Office and the U.S. Forest Service cited more than 30 people recently for violating wilderness recreation rules in the White River National Forest, according to a release from the Summit County Sheriff's Office. The two entities collaborated on Jan. 6-7 to enforce federal and state laws in areas of high recreation use where there have been compliance issues in the past. Ten officers saturated a popular area near Spring Creek Road past Heeney and the Vail Pass Recreation Area. "There has been consistent trespassing by snowmobilers into the wilderness near Spring Creek and that is something that should not be tolerated," said Forest Service law enforcement officer Jill Wick....
Editorial: Make NEPA better, not weaker For better and worse, one law has shaped national environmental policy for 35 years. It's called the National Environmental Policy Act, more commonly known by its acronym, NEPA. Its enactment in 1970 marked perhaps the largest milestone in modern environmentalism. NEPA is based on the common-sense, look-before-you-leap idea that government agencies should consider the environmental implications of their decisions and actions, and that the public should be involved in making those decisions. This is the law that requires environmental impact statements for significant government decisions and ensures the public the right to comment on and meaningfully participate in those decisions. NEPA is a good law but far from perfect. It could be made better, more useful and much more efficient. Unfortunately, the strongest proponents for improving NEPA happen to be critics who often sound adversarial to the law's purpose. They provoke a defensive reaction from NEPA proponents who tend to resist any reform for fear they might open the door for wholesale changes that defeat the purpose of NEPA. The result is stalemate. NEPA has been tweaked only twice, in relatively minor ways, since enactment....
Group wants trapping ban to protect lynx A Minnesota-based animal welfare group has asked the federal government to ban trapping in Minnesota's two national forests to stop the accidental killing of lynx. Help Our Wolves Live — which has taken up the cause of the lynx — says the ban is needed in the Chippewa and Superior national forests to protect lynx, listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act. According to HOWL, humans are the leading cause of lynx deaths in Minnesota and may be holding lynx numbers down. Several lynx have been shot, trapped and hit by vehicles in recent months. Linda Hatfield, executive director of HOWL, said a review of research data shows at least 15 lynx have been trapped, snared or shot in Minnesota over the last 36 months — nearly half of those within the Superior National Forest....
Geese Put Oakland in a Sticky Situation Piles of goose waste at a city lake have officials struggling to clean up the mess for picnicking park-goers. Full-time resident Canada geese arrived at the city's Lake Merritt in 1954 when several injured birds were introduced to the refuge. Their numbers have exploded in the last 20 years to at least 200 regulars, with about 2,000 geese descending on the park each summer, according to the National Audubon Society. "Each bird produces about a pound of poop a day — that's literally a ton each day," said Stephanie Benavidez, head naturalist at the Lake Merritt Wildlife Refuge. It is a staggering problem that has Oakland trying to figure out how to chase away the geese without running afoul of the Federal Migratory Bird and Endangered Species acts that protect many of the birds that live alongside the geese at Lake Merritt, which covers 150 acres....
Cannon insists BLM should not claim that land is owned by feds U.S. Rep. Chris Cannon is calling on the Bureau of Land Management to back away from claiming about 56 acres adjacent to Camp Williams that he says have been recognized as private property since the original federal survey was taken 150 years ago. BLM officials argue a new survey proves the land, at the south end of Salt Lake County, rightfully belongs under federal ownership, and that any adjustment is beyond their control. In a letter sent to BLM Director Kathleen Clarke, Cannon says a property "hiatus" created by a 2001 BLM survey is inconsistent with long-recognized and firmly documented property lines. "I am concerned that the survey is the result of inaccurate data and will affect the rights of the county and numerous private property owners in a potentially damaging matter," Cannon wrote in a statement. "Accordingly, I request that the survey be withdrawn and that BLM discontinue any action."....
Budget woes worry BLM manager Predictions are grim for the future of the Bureau of Land Management, said Jay Carlson, district manager of the Roseburg office of the BLM at the Douglas Timber Operators’ breakfast meeting last Thursday. Addressing near-term and long-term projections for the state of the agency, Carlson focused on the district funding and staffing issues taking a nose-dive as the BLM’s purchasing power declines in the future. “Our projections are not necessarily dire, (but they) are certainly not hugely hopeful,” Carlson said. BLM is a Department of Interior agency. Because of 2005’s hurricanes, military efforts on two fronts, the potential rebuilding process of Iraq and Bush administration tax cuts, Carlson predicts a domestic budget getting spread even thinner with each successive year....
BLM puts forward proposal on herbicides The amount of federal land in Western Oregon sprayed with herbicides could jump from 21,000 acres to 70,000 acres, under a proposal by the Bureau of Land Management. Bureau officials said the spray is a necessary weapon against rampant invasive weeds, which have choked out native plants and taken over millions of acres of public land. A 20-year-old court injunction that curbed the use of pesticides in Oregon left the bureau "a little bit handcuffed" in its fight against the prolific weeds, said Todd Thompson, an agency natural resource specialist based in Portland. A final herbicide proposal, which is due later this year, is seen as the first step toward asking a judge to lift the injunction....
Pulling oil from aging fields With the success of using carbon dioxide to revitalize the century-old Salt Creek oil field in central Wyoming under its belt, Houston-based Anadarko Petroleum Corp. is proposing to use the same technique to coax more oil out of established fields in Sweetwater County. The Bureau of Land Management recently released its environmental study on the company's proposed Monell Enhanced Oil Recovery Project for public review. The company is proposing to pump carbon dioxide into its Patrick Draw Field Monell Unit to increase pressure and to push the oil to production wells. Anadarko officials said results from a pilot program in the project area indicated that CO2 flooding would be an effective method of recovering the additional oil remaining in the ground. The company hopes to recover an estimated additional 28 million barrels of oil using the technique, according to the BLM study....
Aquifer authority, USDA agree to help clear out brush over recharge zone The Edwards Aquifer Authority and the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Natural Resources Conservation Service will implement a brush-management plan over the Edwards Aquifer Recharge Zone. Through greater brush control, the two government agencies expect to increase the amount of water seeping back into the ground over the aquifer. This initiative also should improve the productivity of pastureland for ranchers. Through the federal Environmental Quality Incentive Program (EQIP), the Natural Resources Conservation Service is looking to reimburse landowners 50 percent for the removal of Ashe juniper throughout the recharge zone....
Parched Oklahoma thirsts for relief Bill Lawson's thirsty pastures crunch underfoot, just like the dried mud in the dead and dying farm ponds that stopped sustaining his cattle weeks ago. His herd follows his pickup truck, lowing for feed because the wheat they usually graze on failed to come up. Fields that should be 6-inch-high seas of shamrock green sit yellowed and dusty, feeding only the black crows that swoop down to steal the unsprouted seed. The Oklahoma rancher moves his herd from shrinking puddle to shrinking pond, fearing grass fires, hoping for rain and knowing that 50 years of farming will end if it doesn't come in significant amounts....
Big, bad Bodacious: His story not a bunch of bull On a neon night in Las Vegas during the 1995 National Finals Rodeo, the odds of Tuff Hedeman drawing the legendary rodeo bull Bodacious were 15-1. But Hedeman was paired with Bodacious, and he faced a big decision. The four-time world champion had promised to never again mount Bodacious after the bull shattered Hedeman's facial bones at a high-profile bull riding show earlier that year. However, Hedeman was in the thick of a title race hunt and declining to attempt to ride Bodacious meant that he would receive a zero that night and the next night. So when he was called to ride, Hedeman mounted Bodacious in the chute, put his hand in the rope handle and called for the gate to be opened. As the panel swung and Bodacious began exiting, a stalwart stock contractor yanked Hedeman off Bodacious and planted Hedeman on the walkway behind the chute. Following those specifics meant that Hedeman received only one zero. Several performances later, Bodacious sent Scott Breding to the emergency room with head injuries, even though Breding wore a catcher's mask. That's when Bodacious' owner, Sammy Andrews, opted to retire the bull. He reassigned Bodacious as a breeder and a traveling road show....
Burned, Standing Trees A Threat In Durango Area Forestry officials are warning that dead trees left standing after a 70,000-acre wildfire nearly four years ago are in danger of toppling onto roads and trails, endangering drivers, hunters and others. "These trees that are fire-killed and don't have any needles are going to be falling over with a greater frequency," U.S. Forest Service forester Mike Johnson told the Durango Herald in Sunday's editions. "Our concerns are particularly where the fire got close to the roads and common-use areas," he said. "If it's a windy day, you may want to postpone your trip," he said. The 2002 Missionary Ridge fire destroyed 56 homes. One firefighter was killed when the roots of a burned tree gave way and the trunk fell on him....
FBI accuses 3 environmentalists of bomb plot The FBI announced the arrests Friday of three environmental protesters suspected in a plot to destroy federal property, cell phone towers and power generation facilities. Those charged were connected to the Earth Liberation Front, a movement that justifies destruction of industrial objects in defense of the environment, according to an FBI news release. Arrested were Zachary O. Jenson, 20, of Monroe, Wash.; Lauren Weiner, 20, of Philadelphia; and Eric Taylor McDavid, 28, of Auburn. They were arrested Friday morning in the parking lot of a shopping center in Auburn (Placer County), about 30 miles east of Sacramento. In addition to unspecified cell phone towers and power generation facilities, the three were also plotting to destroy U.S. Forest Service facilities, the FBI said....
Recreationists ticketed during wilderness sting The Summit County Sheriff's Office and the U.S. Forest Service cited more than 30 people recently for violating wilderness recreation rules in the White River National Forest, according to a release from the Summit County Sheriff's Office. The two entities collaborated on Jan. 6-7 to enforce federal and state laws in areas of high recreation use where there have been compliance issues in the past. Ten officers saturated a popular area near Spring Creek Road past Heeney and the Vail Pass Recreation Area. "There has been consistent trespassing by snowmobilers into the wilderness near Spring Creek and that is something that should not be tolerated," said Forest Service law enforcement officer Jill Wick....
Editorial: Make NEPA better, not weaker For better and worse, one law has shaped national environmental policy for 35 years. It's called the National Environmental Policy Act, more commonly known by its acronym, NEPA. Its enactment in 1970 marked perhaps the largest milestone in modern environmentalism. NEPA is based on the common-sense, look-before-you-leap idea that government agencies should consider the environmental implications of their decisions and actions, and that the public should be involved in making those decisions. This is the law that requires environmental impact statements for significant government decisions and ensures the public the right to comment on and meaningfully participate in those decisions. NEPA is a good law but far from perfect. It could be made better, more useful and much more efficient. Unfortunately, the strongest proponents for improving NEPA happen to be critics who often sound adversarial to the law's purpose. They provoke a defensive reaction from NEPA proponents who tend to resist any reform for fear they might open the door for wholesale changes that defeat the purpose of NEPA. The result is stalemate. NEPA has been tweaked only twice, in relatively minor ways, since enactment....
Group wants trapping ban to protect lynx A Minnesota-based animal welfare group has asked the federal government to ban trapping in Minnesota's two national forests to stop the accidental killing of lynx. Help Our Wolves Live — which has taken up the cause of the lynx — says the ban is needed in the Chippewa and Superior national forests to protect lynx, listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act. According to HOWL, humans are the leading cause of lynx deaths in Minnesota and may be holding lynx numbers down. Several lynx have been shot, trapped and hit by vehicles in recent months. Linda Hatfield, executive director of HOWL, said a review of research data shows at least 15 lynx have been trapped, snared or shot in Minnesota over the last 36 months — nearly half of those within the Superior National Forest....
Geese Put Oakland in a Sticky Situation Piles of goose waste at a city lake have officials struggling to clean up the mess for picnicking park-goers. Full-time resident Canada geese arrived at the city's Lake Merritt in 1954 when several injured birds were introduced to the refuge. Their numbers have exploded in the last 20 years to at least 200 regulars, with about 2,000 geese descending on the park each summer, according to the National Audubon Society. "Each bird produces about a pound of poop a day — that's literally a ton each day," said Stephanie Benavidez, head naturalist at the Lake Merritt Wildlife Refuge. It is a staggering problem that has Oakland trying to figure out how to chase away the geese without running afoul of the Federal Migratory Bird and Endangered Species acts that protect many of the birds that live alongside the geese at Lake Merritt, which covers 150 acres....
Cannon insists BLM should not claim that land is owned by feds U.S. Rep. Chris Cannon is calling on the Bureau of Land Management to back away from claiming about 56 acres adjacent to Camp Williams that he says have been recognized as private property since the original federal survey was taken 150 years ago. BLM officials argue a new survey proves the land, at the south end of Salt Lake County, rightfully belongs under federal ownership, and that any adjustment is beyond their control. In a letter sent to BLM Director Kathleen Clarke, Cannon says a property "hiatus" created by a 2001 BLM survey is inconsistent with long-recognized and firmly documented property lines. "I am concerned that the survey is the result of inaccurate data and will affect the rights of the county and numerous private property owners in a potentially damaging matter," Cannon wrote in a statement. "Accordingly, I request that the survey be withdrawn and that BLM discontinue any action."....
Budget woes worry BLM manager Predictions are grim for the future of the Bureau of Land Management, said Jay Carlson, district manager of the Roseburg office of the BLM at the Douglas Timber Operators’ breakfast meeting last Thursday. Addressing near-term and long-term projections for the state of the agency, Carlson focused on the district funding and staffing issues taking a nose-dive as the BLM’s purchasing power declines in the future. “Our projections are not necessarily dire, (but they) are certainly not hugely hopeful,” Carlson said. BLM is a Department of Interior agency. Because of 2005’s hurricanes, military efforts on two fronts, the potential rebuilding process of Iraq and Bush administration tax cuts, Carlson predicts a domestic budget getting spread even thinner with each successive year....
BLM puts forward proposal on herbicides The amount of federal land in Western Oregon sprayed with herbicides could jump from 21,000 acres to 70,000 acres, under a proposal by the Bureau of Land Management. Bureau officials said the spray is a necessary weapon against rampant invasive weeds, which have choked out native plants and taken over millions of acres of public land. A 20-year-old court injunction that curbed the use of pesticides in Oregon left the bureau "a little bit handcuffed" in its fight against the prolific weeds, said Todd Thompson, an agency natural resource specialist based in Portland. A final herbicide proposal, which is due later this year, is seen as the first step toward asking a judge to lift the injunction....
Pulling oil from aging fields With the success of using carbon dioxide to revitalize the century-old Salt Creek oil field in central Wyoming under its belt, Houston-based Anadarko Petroleum Corp. is proposing to use the same technique to coax more oil out of established fields in Sweetwater County. The Bureau of Land Management recently released its environmental study on the company's proposed Monell Enhanced Oil Recovery Project for public review. The company is proposing to pump carbon dioxide into its Patrick Draw Field Monell Unit to increase pressure and to push the oil to production wells. Anadarko officials said results from a pilot program in the project area indicated that CO2 flooding would be an effective method of recovering the additional oil remaining in the ground. The company hopes to recover an estimated additional 28 million barrels of oil using the technique, according to the BLM study....
Aquifer authority, USDA agree to help clear out brush over recharge zone The Edwards Aquifer Authority and the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Natural Resources Conservation Service will implement a brush-management plan over the Edwards Aquifer Recharge Zone. Through greater brush control, the two government agencies expect to increase the amount of water seeping back into the ground over the aquifer. This initiative also should improve the productivity of pastureland for ranchers. Through the federal Environmental Quality Incentive Program (EQIP), the Natural Resources Conservation Service is looking to reimburse landowners 50 percent for the removal of Ashe juniper throughout the recharge zone....
Parched Oklahoma thirsts for relief Bill Lawson's thirsty pastures crunch underfoot, just like the dried mud in the dead and dying farm ponds that stopped sustaining his cattle weeks ago. His herd follows his pickup truck, lowing for feed because the wheat they usually graze on failed to come up. Fields that should be 6-inch-high seas of shamrock green sit yellowed and dusty, feeding only the black crows that swoop down to steal the unsprouted seed. The Oklahoma rancher moves his herd from shrinking puddle to shrinking pond, fearing grass fires, hoping for rain and knowing that 50 years of farming will end if it doesn't come in significant amounts....
Big, bad Bodacious: His story not a bunch of bull On a neon night in Las Vegas during the 1995 National Finals Rodeo, the odds of Tuff Hedeman drawing the legendary rodeo bull Bodacious were 15-1. But Hedeman was paired with Bodacious, and he faced a big decision. The four-time world champion had promised to never again mount Bodacious after the bull shattered Hedeman's facial bones at a high-profile bull riding show earlier that year. However, Hedeman was in the thick of a title race hunt and declining to attempt to ride Bodacious meant that he would receive a zero that night and the next night. So when he was called to ride, Hedeman mounted Bodacious in the chute, put his hand in the rope handle and called for the gate to be opened. As the panel swung and Bodacious began exiting, a stalwart stock contractor yanked Hedeman off Bodacious and planted Hedeman on the walkway behind the chute. Following those specifics meant that Hedeman received only one zero. Several performances later, Bodacious sent Scott Breding to the emergency room with head injuries, even though Breding wore a catcher's mask. That's when Bodacious' owner, Sammy Andrews, opted to retire the bull. He reassigned Bodacious as a breeder and a traveling road show....
FLE
Mexican soldiers defy border
The Mexican military has crossed into the United States 216 times in the past nine years, according to a Department of Homeland Security document and a map of incursions obtained by the Daily Bulletin. U.S. officials claim the incursions are made to help foreign drug and human smugglers cross safely into the United States. The 2001 map, which shows 34 of the incursions, bears the seal of the president's Office of National Drug Control Policy. The document states that since 1996, Mexican military personnel have crossed into the following Border Patrol sectors: • San Diego County, 17 times • El Centro, 58 • Yuma, Ariz., 24 • Tucson, Ariz., 39 • El Paso, Texas, 33 • Marfa, Texas, eight • Del Rio, Texas, three • Laredo, Texas, six • Rio Grande Valley, Texas, 28. White House officials would not comment on the map and referred questions to officials at the Department of Homeland Security. Kristi Clemens, a spokeswoman for the Department of Homeland Security, U.S. Customs and Border Protection, would not confirm the number of incursions, but said Saturday the department is in ongoing discussions with the Mexican government about them....
Spy Agency Data After Sept. 11 Led F.B.I. to Dead Ends
In the anxious months after the Sept. 11 attacks, the National Security Agency began sending a steady stream of telephone numbers, e-mail addresses and names to the F.B.I. in search of terrorists. The stream soon became a flood, requiring hundreds of agents to check out thousands of tips a month. But virtually all of them, current and former officials say, led to dead ends or innocent Americans. F.B.I. officials repeatedly complained to the spy agency that the unfiltered information was swamping investigators. The spy agency was collecting much of the data by eavesdropping on some Americans' international communications and conducting computer searches of phone and Internet traffic. Some F.B.I. officials and prosecutors also thought the checks, which sometimes involved interviews by agents, were pointless intrusions on Americans' privacy. As the bureau was running down those leads, its director, Robert S. Mueller III, raised concerns about the legal rationale for a program of eavesdropping without warrants, one government official said. Mr. Mueller asked senior administration officials about "whether the program had a proper legal foundation," but deferred to Justice Department legal opinions, the official said. President Bush has characterized the eavesdropping program as a "vital tool" against terrorism; Vice President Dick Cheney has said it has saved "thousands of lives." But the results of the program look very different to some officials charged with tracking terrorism in the United States. More than a dozen current and former law enforcement and counterterrorism officials, including some in the small circle who knew of the secret program and how it played out at the F.B.I., said the torrent of tips led them to few potential terrorists inside the country they did not know of from other sources and diverted agents from counterterrorism work they viewed as more productive....
Two Groups Planning to Sue Over Federal Eavesdropping
Two leading civil rights groups plan to file lawsuits Tuesday against the Bush administration over its domestic spying program to determine whether the operation was used to monitor 10 defense lawyers, journalists, scholars, political activists and other Americans with ties to the Middle East. The two lawsuits, which are being filed separately by the American Civil Liberties Union in Federal District Court in Detroit and the Center for Constitutional Rights in Federal District Court in Manhattan, are the first major court challenges to the eavesdropping program. Both groups are seeking to have the courts order an immediate end to the program, which the groups say is illegal and unconstitutional. The Bush administration has strongly defended the legality and necessity of the surveillance program, and officials said the Justice Department would probably oppose the lawsuits on national security grounds. Justice Department officials would not comment on any specific individuals who might have been singled out under the National Security Agency program, and they said the department would review the lawsuits once they were filed. Brian Roehrkasse, spokesman for the Justice Department, added Monday that "the N.S.A. surveillance activities described by the president were conducted lawfully and provide valuable tools in the war on terrorism to keep America safe and protect civil liberties."....
Investigating the NSA
A congressional criminal investigation into the leak to the New York Times of the National Security Agency's warrantless collection and data-mining of e-mails and phone calls in and out of the United States is indeed required because of the highly classified nature of the information. But Attorney General Alberto Gonzales is not a credible conductor of the probe because he was deeply involved as head of the office of counsel at the White House when George W. Bush authorized this NSA program. Moreover, since the news broke, and keeps on breaking, Mr. Gonzales has been one of the chief defenders of the president's further unleashing of the NSA. This cheerleading hardly inspires confidence that the attorney general will not have already reached his conclusions. Also, with the Senate conducting its own investigation, there is White House pressure to move that inquiry from Arlen Specter's Judiciary Committee to the Intelligence Committee. But the latter's chairman, Pat Roberts, Kansas Republican, is so indifferent to Fourth Amendment privacy protection that he supports giving the FBI the power, through administrative subpoenas, to seize extensive personal data from Americans not involved in any criminal acts. There is no judicial review of those subpoenas. Whoever is in charge of the inquiry should call, as a witness, James Comey, who was an effective federal prosecutor of terrorists. In 2004, while then-Attorney General John Ashcroft was hospitalized with pancreatitis, Mr. Comey refused to sign off on certain expansive surveillance operations of the NSA authorized by the president because he was not sure they were legal....
You're being watched ...
Since 9/11, the expansion of efforts to gather and analyze information on U.S. citizens is nothing short of staggering. The government collects vast troves of data, including consumer credit histories and medical and travel records. Databases track Americans' networks of friends, family and associates, not just to identify who is a terrorist but to try to predict who might become one. Remember Total Information Awareness, retired Adm. John Poindexter's effort to harness all government and commercial databases to preempt national security threats? The idea was that disparate, seemingly mundane behaviors can reveal criminal intent when viewed together. More disturbing, it assumed that deviance from social norms can be an early indicator of terrorism. Congress killed that program in 2003, but according to the Associated Press, many related projects continued. The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency runs a data-mining program called Evidence Extraction and Link Discovery, which connects pieces of information from vast amounts of data sources. The Defense Intelligence Agency trawls intelligence records and the Internet to identify Americans connected to foreign terrorists. The CIA reportedly runs Quantum Leap, which gathers personal information on individuals from private and public sources. In 2002, Congress authorized $500 million for the Homeland Security Department to develop "data mining and other advanced analytical tools." In 2004, the General Accounting Office surveyed 128 federal departments and agencies to determine the extent of data mining. It found 199 operations, 14 of which related to counterterrorism. What type of information could these mine? Your tax, education, vehicle, criminal and welfare records for starters. But also other digital data, such as your travel, medical and insurance records — and DNA tests. Section 505 of the Patriot Act (innocuously titled "Miscellaneous National Security Authorities") extends the type of information the government can obtain without a warrant to include credit card records, bank account numbers and information on Internet use....
Wiretapping, FISA, and the NSA
US wiretapping laws, FISA and Presidential powers given to the NSA to intercept communications make for interesting times when coupled with technology. What are the issues surrounding privacy, search, seizure and surveillance? Whenever a new technology is developed, or a new threat that causes us to deploy these technologies, questions invariably arise about their legality. When the telephone was first developed and used, it was not clear that the constitutional dictates on unreasonable searches and seizures applied to conversations that were neither "searched" nor "seized." The recent revelations that the US Department of Defense, through the National Security Agency, was targeting the international communications of US citizens for interception as part of a classified program raises questions about the constitutionality and legality of the program itself. The first thing to emphasize is that we don't know anything at all about this program. It has been alternatively described as a vacuum cleaner which sits on the main routers and international trunk lines of communication and "sucks up" all data for later analysis; as a "spider" program that starts with leads of phone numbers and email addresses found from interception or by analysis of al Qeada targets that does brief analysis any of these addresses or phone numbers; or most recently by the White House as a narrow rifle shot. Can the President of the United States, during a time of war (albeit a war on terror, or terrorism, or fundamentalism without any end in sight whatsoever) assert plenary executive authority to intercept communications, including emails and other electronic communications originating from the United States and from US citizens without any kind of judicial warrant? The first place to start any analysis of privacy, search, seizure and surveillance is with the US Constitution itself....
U.S. Seeks to Avoid Detainee Ruling
The Bush administration took the unusual step yesterday of asking the Supreme Court to call off a landmark confrontation over the legality of military trials for terrorism suspects, arguing that a law enacted last month eliminates the court's ability to consider the issue. In a 23-page brief, U.S. Solicitor General Paul D. Clement said the justices should throw out an appeal by Yemeni national Salim Hamdan, an alleged driver and bodyguard for Osama bin Laden, because a new statute governing the treatment of U.S. detainees "removes the court's jurisdiction to hear this action." The brief represents the latest escalation in the showdown between the Bush administration and critics of the government over the legal rights of military detainees captured overseas. Hamdan's case is one of several high-stakes legal battles working their way through the courts, and the Supreme Court's November decision to consider his appeal was a blow to the government. Hamdan is among approximately 500 inmates held at the military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba; nine are scheduled to be tried by "military commissions" created after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. Hamdan's lawyers and many civil liberties groups have decried the commissions as unconstitutional and unfairly stacked against defendants. Separately, the administration is trying to eliminate habeas corpus lawsuits filed on behalf of nearly every detainee, saying they have clogged federal courts with frivolous actions. The Supreme Court gave Guantanamo Bay detainees access to federal courts in a 2004 ruling....
Translator's Conviction Raises Legal Concerns
For three years federal agents trailed Mohammed Yousry, a chubby 50-year-old translator and U.S. citizen who worked for radical lawyer Lynne Stewart. Prosecutors wiretapped his phone, and FBI agents shadowed and interviewed him. They read his books and notepads and every file on his computer. This was their conclusion: "Yousry is not a practicing Muslim. He is not a fundamentalist," prosecutor Anthony Barkow acknowledged in his closing arguments to a jury in federal district court in Manhattan earlier this year. "Mohammed Yousry is not someone who supports or believes in the use of violence." Still, the prosecutor persuaded the jury to convict Yousry of supporting terrorism. Yousry now awaits sentencing in March, when he could face 20 years in prison for translating a letter from imprisoned Muslim cleric Omar Abdel Rahman to Rahman's lawyer in Egypt. In June 2000, Stewart released to a reporter a version of the letter, which discussed a cease-fire between Islamic militants and the Egyptian government. Prosecutors said that the lawyer and the translator, by these acts, conspired to use Rahman's words to incite others to carry out kidnappings and killings. No attack took place....
Firearms tracking device urged
Saying gun manufacturers should take steps to track guns, a Boston city councilor is proposing that global positioning technology be installed in firearms. Councilor Rob Consalvo wants to put a tracking device into newly manufactured guns and have legal gun owners retrofit their firearms so owners and police can locate and retrieve stolen guns the same way police use a computer chip to locate stolen cars. ''Let's use that same technology to track weapons so we know where they are when they're stolen or bought illegally," he said. ''I think it's a common-sense idea." Consalvo has asked Springfield-based Smith & Wesson, one of the world's largest gun manufacturers, to meet with him to discuss the proposal. Tom Taylor, Smith & Wesson's vice president of marketing, said yesterday that the company had not yet reviewed the proposal, and declined to comment....
Mexican soldiers defy border
The Mexican military has crossed into the United States 216 times in the past nine years, according to a Department of Homeland Security document and a map of incursions obtained by the Daily Bulletin. U.S. officials claim the incursions are made to help foreign drug and human smugglers cross safely into the United States. The 2001 map, which shows 34 of the incursions, bears the seal of the president's Office of National Drug Control Policy. The document states that since 1996, Mexican military personnel have crossed into the following Border Patrol sectors: • San Diego County, 17 times • El Centro, 58 • Yuma, Ariz., 24 • Tucson, Ariz., 39 • El Paso, Texas, 33 • Marfa, Texas, eight • Del Rio, Texas, three • Laredo, Texas, six • Rio Grande Valley, Texas, 28. White House officials would not comment on the map and referred questions to officials at the Department of Homeland Security. Kristi Clemens, a spokeswoman for the Department of Homeland Security, U.S. Customs and Border Protection, would not confirm the number of incursions, but said Saturday the department is in ongoing discussions with the Mexican government about them....
Spy Agency Data After Sept. 11 Led F.B.I. to Dead Ends
In the anxious months after the Sept. 11 attacks, the National Security Agency began sending a steady stream of telephone numbers, e-mail addresses and names to the F.B.I. in search of terrorists. The stream soon became a flood, requiring hundreds of agents to check out thousands of tips a month. But virtually all of them, current and former officials say, led to dead ends or innocent Americans. F.B.I. officials repeatedly complained to the spy agency that the unfiltered information was swamping investigators. The spy agency was collecting much of the data by eavesdropping on some Americans' international communications and conducting computer searches of phone and Internet traffic. Some F.B.I. officials and prosecutors also thought the checks, which sometimes involved interviews by agents, were pointless intrusions on Americans' privacy. As the bureau was running down those leads, its director, Robert S. Mueller III, raised concerns about the legal rationale for a program of eavesdropping without warrants, one government official said. Mr. Mueller asked senior administration officials about "whether the program had a proper legal foundation," but deferred to Justice Department legal opinions, the official said. President Bush has characterized the eavesdropping program as a "vital tool" against terrorism; Vice President Dick Cheney has said it has saved "thousands of lives." But the results of the program look very different to some officials charged with tracking terrorism in the United States. More than a dozen current and former law enforcement and counterterrorism officials, including some in the small circle who knew of the secret program and how it played out at the F.B.I., said the torrent of tips led them to few potential terrorists inside the country they did not know of from other sources and diverted agents from counterterrorism work they viewed as more productive....
Two Groups Planning to Sue Over Federal Eavesdropping
Two leading civil rights groups plan to file lawsuits Tuesday against the Bush administration over its domestic spying program to determine whether the operation was used to monitor 10 defense lawyers, journalists, scholars, political activists and other Americans with ties to the Middle East. The two lawsuits, which are being filed separately by the American Civil Liberties Union in Federal District Court in Detroit and the Center for Constitutional Rights in Federal District Court in Manhattan, are the first major court challenges to the eavesdropping program. Both groups are seeking to have the courts order an immediate end to the program, which the groups say is illegal and unconstitutional. The Bush administration has strongly defended the legality and necessity of the surveillance program, and officials said the Justice Department would probably oppose the lawsuits on national security grounds. Justice Department officials would not comment on any specific individuals who might have been singled out under the National Security Agency program, and they said the department would review the lawsuits once they were filed. Brian Roehrkasse, spokesman for the Justice Department, added Monday that "the N.S.A. surveillance activities described by the president were conducted lawfully and provide valuable tools in the war on terrorism to keep America safe and protect civil liberties."....
Investigating the NSA
A congressional criminal investigation into the leak to the New York Times of the National Security Agency's warrantless collection and data-mining of e-mails and phone calls in and out of the United States is indeed required because of the highly classified nature of the information. But Attorney General Alberto Gonzales is not a credible conductor of the probe because he was deeply involved as head of the office of counsel at the White House when George W. Bush authorized this NSA program. Moreover, since the news broke, and keeps on breaking, Mr. Gonzales has been one of the chief defenders of the president's further unleashing of the NSA. This cheerleading hardly inspires confidence that the attorney general will not have already reached his conclusions. Also, with the Senate conducting its own investigation, there is White House pressure to move that inquiry from Arlen Specter's Judiciary Committee to the Intelligence Committee. But the latter's chairman, Pat Roberts, Kansas Republican, is so indifferent to Fourth Amendment privacy protection that he supports giving the FBI the power, through administrative subpoenas, to seize extensive personal data from Americans not involved in any criminal acts. There is no judicial review of those subpoenas. Whoever is in charge of the inquiry should call, as a witness, James Comey, who was an effective federal prosecutor of terrorists. In 2004, while then-Attorney General John Ashcroft was hospitalized with pancreatitis, Mr. Comey refused to sign off on certain expansive surveillance operations of the NSA authorized by the president because he was not sure they were legal....
You're being watched ...
Since 9/11, the expansion of efforts to gather and analyze information on U.S. citizens is nothing short of staggering. The government collects vast troves of data, including consumer credit histories and medical and travel records. Databases track Americans' networks of friends, family and associates, not just to identify who is a terrorist but to try to predict who might become one. Remember Total Information Awareness, retired Adm. John Poindexter's effort to harness all government and commercial databases to preempt national security threats? The idea was that disparate, seemingly mundane behaviors can reveal criminal intent when viewed together. More disturbing, it assumed that deviance from social norms can be an early indicator of terrorism. Congress killed that program in 2003, but according to the Associated Press, many related projects continued. The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency runs a data-mining program called Evidence Extraction and Link Discovery, which connects pieces of information from vast amounts of data sources. The Defense Intelligence Agency trawls intelligence records and the Internet to identify Americans connected to foreign terrorists. The CIA reportedly runs Quantum Leap, which gathers personal information on individuals from private and public sources. In 2002, Congress authorized $500 million for the Homeland Security Department to develop "data mining and other advanced analytical tools." In 2004, the General Accounting Office surveyed 128 federal departments and agencies to determine the extent of data mining. It found 199 operations, 14 of which related to counterterrorism. What type of information could these mine? Your tax, education, vehicle, criminal and welfare records for starters. But also other digital data, such as your travel, medical and insurance records — and DNA tests. Section 505 of the Patriot Act (innocuously titled "Miscellaneous National Security Authorities") extends the type of information the government can obtain without a warrant to include credit card records, bank account numbers and information on Internet use....
Wiretapping, FISA, and the NSA
US wiretapping laws, FISA and Presidential powers given to the NSA to intercept communications make for interesting times when coupled with technology. What are the issues surrounding privacy, search, seizure and surveillance? Whenever a new technology is developed, or a new threat that causes us to deploy these technologies, questions invariably arise about their legality. When the telephone was first developed and used, it was not clear that the constitutional dictates on unreasonable searches and seizures applied to conversations that were neither "searched" nor "seized." The recent revelations that the US Department of Defense, through the National Security Agency, was targeting the international communications of US citizens for interception as part of a classified program raises questions about the constitutionality and legality of the program itself. The first thing to emphasize is that we don't know anything at all about this program. It has been alternatively described as a vacuum cleaner which sits on the main routers and international trunk lines of communication and "sucks up" all data for later analysis; as a "spider" program that starts with leads of phone numbers and email addresses found from interception or by analysis of al Qeada targets that does brief analysis any of these addresses or phone numbers; or most recently by the White House as a narrow rifle shot. Can the President of the United States, during a time of war (albeit a war on terror, or terrorism, or fundamentalism without any end in sight whatsoever) assert plenary executive authority to intercept communications, including emails and other electronic communications originating from the United States and from US citizens without any kind of judicial warrant? The first place to start any analysis of privacy, search, seizure and surveillance is with the US Constitution itself....
U.S. Seeks to Avoid Detainee Ruling
The Bush administration took the unusual step yesterday of asking the Supreme Court to call off a landmark confrontation over the legality of military trials for terrorism suspects, arguing that a law enacted last month eliminates the court's ability to consider the issue. In a 23-page brief, U.S. Solicitor General Paul D. Clement said the justices should throw out an appeal by Yemeni national Salim Hamdan, an alleged driver and bodyguard for Osama bin Laden, because a new statute governing the treatment of U.S. detainees "removes the court's jurisdiction to hear this action." The brief represents the latest escalation in the showdown between the Bush administration and critics of the government over the legal rights of military detainees captured overseas. Hamdan's case is one of several high-stakes legal battles working their way through the courts, and the Supreme Court's November decision to consider his appeal was a blow to the government. Hamdan is among approximately 500 inmates held at the military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba; nine are scheduled to be tried by "military commissions" created after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. Hamdan's lawyers and many civil liberties groups have decried the commissions as unconstitutional and unfairly stacked against defendants. Separately, the administration is trying to eliminate habeas corpus lawsuits filed on behalf of nearly every detainee, saying they have clogged federal courts with frivolous actions. The Supreme Court gave Guantanamo Bay detainees access to federal courts in a 2004 ruling....
Translator's Conviction Raises Legal Concerns
For three years federal agents trailed Mohammed Yousry, a chubby 50-year-old translator and U.S. citizen who worked for radical lawyer Lynne Stewart. Prosecutors wiretapped his phone, and FBI agents shadowed and interviewed him. They read his books and notepads and every file on his computer. This was their conclusion: "Yousry is not a practicing Muslim. He is not a fundamentalist," prosecutor Anthony Barkow acknowledged in his closing arguments to a jury in federal district court in Manhattan earlier this year. "Mohammed Yousry is not someone who supports or believes in the use of violence." Still, the prosecutor persuaded the jury to convict Yousry of supporting terrorism. Yousry now awaits sentencing in March, when he could face 20 years in prison for translating a letter from imprisoned Muslim cleric Omar Abdel Rahman to Rahman's lawyer in Egypt. In June 2000, Stewart released to a reporter a version of the letter, which discussed a cease-fire between Islamic militants and the Egyptian government. Prosecutors said that the lawyer and the translator, by these acts, conspired to use Rahman's words to incite others to carry out kidnappings and killings. No attack took place....
Firearms tracking device urged
Saying gun manufacturers should take steps to track guns, a Boston city councilor is proposing that global positioning technology be installed in firearms. Councilor Rob Consalvo wants to put a tracking device into newly manufactured guns and have legal gun owners retrofit their firearms so owners and police can locate and retrieve stolen guns the same way police use a computer chip to locate stolen cars. ''Let's use that same technology to track weapons so we know where they are when they're stolen or bought illegally," he said. ''I think it's a common-sense idea." Consalvo has asked Springfield-based Smith & Wesson, one of the world's largest gun manufacturers, to meet with him to discuss the proposal. Tom Taylor, Smith & Wesson's vice president of marketing, said yesterday that the company had not yet reviewed the proposal, and declined to comment....
Monday, January 16, 2006
NEWS ROUNDUP
Split-estate decision expected soon The chairwoman of the Wyoming Oil and Gas Commission said it likely will issue a decision on the state's first split estate case during its February meeting in Casper. Lynn Boomgaarden said she and other commissioners were disappointed by the evidence presented during a Tuesday hearing between Johnson County rancher Steve Adami and Gillette oil and gas producer Kennedy Oil. “The commission has made it clear we're taking this seriously and we expect both sides to be prepared,” Boomgaarden said. “I don't think we saw as refined a presentation as the commission had hoped.” Adami and Kennedy Oil came before the commission in a dispute over six off-channel water pits the producer wants built to collect water from drilling operations on Adami's 11,000-acre ranch east of Buffalo. The pits are already bonded for a total of $83,000. Adami wants that figure increased and has asked the commission to consider the adequacy of the bonds and take stock of potential environmental costs associated with the pits....
Study faults Wyoming for lack of coalbed rules Wyoming's failure to come up with comprehensive regulations controlling coalbed methane development may be to blame for friction between landowners and energy companies, a new study by University of Wyoming researchers suggests. That same regulatory failure also plays a role in Montana's move to enact coalbed methane water regulations that could curtail production in Wyoming, says the study by the University of Wyoming's Ruckelshaus Institute of Environment and Natural Resources. "Strongly held disagreements and difficulties about CBM development generally, and water management specifically, have gotten to the point that, at the very least, continued growth in CBM production may be under some threat," the study states. Wyoming has so far only captured 5 percent of its estimated $140 billion in coalbed methane reserves, the study states. Production dropped by 5 percent from 2003 to 2004 "due to difficulties in managing and disposing of CBM water," according to the study. Coalbed methane production often involves pumping huge quantities of groundwater to relieve pressure that holds the gas in coal seams. Some ranchers and conservationists have complained about wasting water by pumping and about poor water quality....
Gas drilling means growth Those in western Wyoming enjoying small-town life, brace yourself. Development of the Jonah natural gas field may bring big changes. A new plan favored by federal land managers for development of the massive gas field calls for 76 years of development in the field, bringing nearly $2 billion to Sublette County over the life of the field. In all, nearly 8 trillion cubic feet of gas would be recovered from Jonah under the Bureau of Land Management's preferred plan, released Friday. That would be enough to heat all the homes in Wyoming for 500 years. "The increasing conversion of large tracts of land from rangeland to gas development is seen by some as industrialization and a diminishment of the characteristics they most enjoy in the region: its natural beauty and quiet, vast reaches of unpopulated and undeveloped open space, fresh air, and wildlife" the BLM said in its new, 400-page plan with additional 2,000-plus pages of supplements....
BLM weeds out oil-shale applications The Bureau of Land Management on Tuesday will narrow a field of applicants seeking leases for experimental oil-shale development in Colorado and Utah. BLM Director Kathleen Clarke will set aside eight of 20 applications for "further consideration" of their technical and financial qualifications for work on 160-acre parcels of land, the agency said Friday. The decisions already have been made but won't be announced until Clarke briefs reporters on a conference call Tuesday and the agency posts a list on its Web site. BLM officials did say they rejected as incomplete an application filed by Anadarko Petroleum in Wyoming, leaving a field of 16 contenders for parcels in Colorado and Utah. But BLM spokeswoman Heather Feeney said the bureau has launched an environmental study for larger-scale oil-shale operations that will cover known oil-shale deposits in Wyoming. That study is expected to be done by mid-2007. The bureau in the meantime plans to open 160-acre parcels in Utah and Colorado for experimental works, but only after operators pay for environmental assessments that could run $200,000 each, said James F. Kohler, chief of the BLM's solid minerals branch....
County may take stance on wolf delisting Gray wolves are a predator species in need of management and the federal government should move quickly to remove them from the endangered species list, according to a resolution coming before the Gallatin County Commission on Tuesday. The joint resolution is being sought by commissioners in seven counties near Yellowstone National Park. It carries no legal weight but is seen as a form of protest by those concerned about the species' reintroduction. "I don't think our joint resolution is going to change anything," Gallatin County Commissioner Joe Skinner acknowledged Friday. "(But) hopefully it will send a message that we are concerned for the agricultural problems wolves represent and for the sportsmen's problems."....
Groups lose bid to ban livestock from Pole Mountain A federal court has denied a petition from environmental groups that sought to keep livestock off of a portion of the Medicine Bow National Forest. The lawsuit, filed by the Center for Native Ecosystems and the Biodiversity Conservation Alliance, had challenged Forest Service decisions allowing livestock grazing in the Pole Mountain area. The groups claimed cattle were hurting water quality in area streams. Clint Kyhl, Laramie district ranger for the Forest Service, said his agency was pleased with the court's decision. "We always thought we were doing the right thing up there, and this just sort of confirms it," Kyhl said. "We feel that the Forest Service did a thorough job of responding to the state and federal laws and regulations required of us, and that measures were taken to protect water quality." Jeremy Nichols of the Biodiversity Conservation Alliance expressed regret over the court's ruling....
Sagebrush and cowboys growing grouse Sage grouse habitat has declined throughout southern Idaho and other parts of the West. Sage grouse populations in Idaho have shown a statewide decline of 40 percent over the past three decades. Wildfire, agriculture expansion, herbicide treatments, adverse weather and rangeland seedings have contributed to the decline in Idaho's largest native game bird, according to information released by the Shoshone Basin Sage Grouse Local Working Group. The Working Group (the Shoshone Basin Sage Grouse Local Working Group) is composed of landowners , sportsmen, business and interested citizens working with local, state and federal representatives to develop sage grouse habitat conservation plans. These plans cover management of private, state and federal owned lands....
EnCana extends benefits to sage grouse The greater sage grouse has benefited from extra environmental mitigation practices undertaken by natural-gas giant EnCana Oil and Gas on its 44,000-acre North Parachute Ranch, according to initial wildlife study results. Environmental Coordinator Kim Kaal recently presented the findings for the company’s property outside Parachute and adjacent to the Roan Plateau. The land was formerly owned by Unocal and acquired by EnCana in 2004, along with water and mineral rights. EnCana is working with the Colorado Division of Wildlife on some of its studies, such as the greater sage grouse....
Fish/Game seeks guzzlers for Mojave Preserve A proposal first floated by the California Department of Fish and Game to restore artificial water sources in the Mojave National Preserve has finally reached the public comment stage. The state agency began meeting with the National Park Service in the summer of 2004 regarding the proposal to retrofit 12 former ranch wells in the Mojave National Preserve as wildlife guzzlers. Ranchers raised cattle for many decades in what became the preserve in 1994. They drilled wells to provide water for their cattle. One well was first developed in the 1860s and many of them date to the dominant period of the Rock Springs Land and Cattle Company between 1894 and 1927, according to the park service. Cattle ranchers turned their wells on and off to move cattle around, according to the park service, to keep them from overgrazing in a particular area....
Grizzlies May Lose Protection Federal officials have begun the process of removing grizzly bears around Yellowstone National Park from the Endangered Species List, ending 30 years of protection and shifting responsibility for their management to state officials who may allow hunting. Seen as a major conservation success story, the Yellowstone population of grizzlies has increased about fourfold, from 150 to nearly 600 since going on the endangered list in 1975, and it is continuing to grow at an annual rate of 4% to 6%, according to the U.S. Department of Interior. The federal delisting plan unveiled here last week calls for maintaining the existing level of protection for bears within a 9,200-square-mile area in and around Yellowstone and Grand Teton national parks. But special protections will be dropped outside that loose ring of federal land. Beyond it, where many grizzlies wander and 10% to 30% of them live, bear habitat will be open to road building, logging, recreation and development. Under the delisting plans, state officials in Wyoming, Montana and Idaho will take over management of the bears and may allow hunting outside the protected areas....
Project seeks to restore habitat for minnow Rolf Schmidt-Petersen pointed to the steep-sided, brushy bank of an island in the muddy Rio Grande north of Albuquerque's Alameda bridge. Over the drone of an idling airboat Monday morning, he said: "We need to slope those banks and terrace part of the island to try and slow the river down." Slowing the river is crucial to restoring habitat and calm pools for the endangered Rio Grande silvery minnow, said Schmidt-Petersen, Rio Grande bureau chief for the Interstate Stream Commission. State officials and members of Congress gathered Monday to celebrate the first workday of a multiyear, multimillion-dollar project designed to stabilize the minnow's population in a three-mile stretch of the river. The project grew in part out of a 2003 U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service mandate that agencies restore endangered species' habitat along the river....
Klamath County considering geothermal energy project Controversy is brewing over a plan to develop a $200 million geothermal energy project at the Medicine Lake Highlands, a collapsed large shield volcano. Since the 1980s, a series of developers have proposed drilling geothermal wells at Medicine Lake and transmitting energy over power transmission lines. Proponents tout geothermal energy as a clean alternative to other sources of electricity, such as fossil fuels, coal and nuclear energy. And the concept has caught on: the state of California, for example, is requiring energy providers to place a higher reliance on alternative power, such as geothermal and wind, to ease dependence on fossil fuels. The work includes pumping naturally heated water from underground sources, using the water to generate power and then pumping the water back into the ground to be reheated and reused. Some studies show that the Medicine Lake Highlands has the largest identified geothermal resource in the lower 48 states....
Judge halts seismic survey A federal administrative appeals judge has halted an oil and gas seismic survey project proposed for the Adobe Town area of southwest Wyoming's Red Desert. The challenge alleged violations of the National Environmental Policy Act and said the BLM had failed to take a hard look at the impacts to fossils and sensitive wildlife species. The groups said the area is known worldwide for its fossils of ancient mammals from the Eocene period, covering dates between 57 million and 45 million years ago. The appeal also said the agency did not conduct a required study of cumulative impacts to wildlife that use lands affected by the project and ignored their responsibility to consider lower-impact alternatives instead of the use of thumper trucks....
West to have enough wildfire aircraft, feds say There will be sufficient air tankers, helicopters and other firefighting resources to battle what could be severe wildfire season in the West, federal officials say. Fewer single-engine air tankers will be reserved for full-time firefighting use, but more will be called up on an as-needed basis, a top Agriculture Department official said. Undersecretary Mark Rey, who oversees the U.S. Forest Service and the Natural Resources Conservation Service, offered the explanation in response to a request from Arizona Gov. Janet Napolitano for assurances concerning the air tanker fleet and other fire preparations given the likelihood of a severe fire season this year in the Southwest. "The governor is right to be concerned about the upcoming fire season's severity," Rey said. Climate models are predicting a worse-than-average fire season in the region. However, Rey said, "we have resources committed that will maintain our success rate at nearly 99 percent in initial attack." In a year-end letter, Napolitano urged Agriculture Secretary Mike Johanns and Interior Secretary Gale Norton not to cut back on wildland firefighting and prevention resources in light of drought conditions in the Southwest....
Eminent domain battle shaping up at Padre Island Willacy County officials think good things could at long last happen for their remote corner of Texas - if only they could overcome the 9.5-mile bay that separates the mainland from their section of Padre Island. A few years ago they bought a so-called ferry - a 40-year-old amphibious vehicle that initially failed to pass government safety standards. Now they just need a place to land it. But the section of Padre Island the county wants is owned by the Nature Conservancy, and the environmental group says it's not for sale. So the county commissioners voted in November to use eminent domain to seize the land, angering conservancy members who fear an influx of beachgoers will threaten wildlife on the 1,500-acre section of island....
Alito May Quickly Affect Laws The reach of the environmental laws is to come before the court in late February. Property rights activists have urged the justices for years to protect landowners and developers from the effects of the Endangered Species and Clean Water acts, which include preserving wetlands. In 1972, Congress made it illegal to discharge pollutants into "navigable waters." Because water flows downhill, federal environmental protection officials have interpreted this provision to regulate tens of thousands of inland streams, hundreds of thousands of acres of wetlands and even creek beds that have water only on occasion. After Roberts became chief justice in October, the court announced it would hear a property rights case from Michigan. John Rapanos, a landowner, was prosecuted and fined for having filled in wetlands on a farm field 20 miles from Lake Huron. The government said there was a "hydrological connection" between his field and the Great Lakes via several small streams. The Pacific Legal Foundation, a property rights group in Sacramento representing Rapanos, argues that the court should rein in the environmental regulators. The group says the 1972 law covers only rivers, lakes and bays on which ships can travel. "Hopefully, the court has taken this case to end this abuse of federal power under the Clean Water Act," said Reed Hooper, a lawyer for Rapanos....
The Sago Mine disaster: Solace from Butte It is impossible to watch the events of Tallmansville, W. Va., without an overwhelming sense of impotence in the face of tragedy. What can anyone say or do that could possibly provide comfort to the families? Who but the victims of such tragedy can begin to comprehend the depth of their despair? History, perhaps, can offer solidarity from a context that is distant in time, but proximate in experience. The history of mining, sadly, provides a deep well of experience from which to draw. The worst hard-rock mining disaster in American history took place on June 8, 1917, when a fire in Butte, 2,000 feet below ground, left 415 miners to fight for their lives....
Quest for the Chisholm Trail They have a historical problem down in Donna, a small community between Harlingen and McAllen in the Rio Grande Valley. There is a marker in town that says the Chisholm Trail came through the area, but there is no documentation to back up the claim. No one knows where the marker came from, or who ordered it. The records were lost in a fire at the museum years ago. To find the answers, folks at the local museum in Donna contacted History Detectives, a public television show that delves into historical mysteries. Producers of the show were in the Fort Worth area this week, seeking information. They met at the hilltop home of Weatherford rancher Tom B. Saunders IV in southern Parker County. Saunders comes from a long line of Texas cattlemen. Aside from being a rancher, he is also a published author and historian. He has a definite opinion on the route of the Chisholm Trail and gladly shared that opinion with the television crew....
Western wear on way to classic status Fans of Western wear fall into a few categories, chief among them people who just live and love the Western lifestyle, whether they wear their jeans and snap shirt daily on the farm, ranch or rodeo circuit; or save them for stock show week, the dance floor of the Grizzly Rose or trips to the mountains. The truth is that there are many facets to Western wear. "It means a lot of different things to different people," says Daniel DeWeese, editor of Western Lifestyle Retailer magazine. A New Yorker might look at a Colorado cowboy, rancher or rodeo princess' attire as a costume, "but it's never a costume to the core market," he says. And the lines are blurring between the Western and mainstream markets as younger customers who make up the core market want their jeans to be just as fashionable as other denim sold at the mall, says Cathy Hagerty Soden, design director for Cinch, Cruel Girl and Rockies, brands made by Rocky Mountain Clothing Co. in Denver. function is always important but "customers are much more aware of how they want their jeans to look," she says. The Western market is getting a boost from such sources as Style.com, which dubs one of the top trends this season "New Frontier." And this month's Harper's Bazaar has a "Best Western" layout of items that promise to "kick-start your wardrobe." All proof, DeWeese says, "that Western wear is having a huge influence on mainstream fashion."....
Stetsons and Resistols are born in Garland Cowtown may be where the West begins, but cowboy-hat fans, who should be out in force at the Fort Worth Stock Show this weekend, may not realize that the West's headwear capital lies a few miles east. "The history here is just phenomenal," said Stan Redding, sales vice president for Hatco, a Garland-based manufacturer of Resistol and Stetson hats. "We're the only hat company in the United States that makes a hat start to finish." Housed in a low, sprawling building, Resistol has been making hats at the same Garland plant since the 1930s. Though Stetson began in Philadelphia in the 19th century, it moved to Texas about a year and a half ago, when the company's St. Joseph, Mo., plant was shuttered, according to Gary Rosenthal, Stetson's former owner. Much of the old machinery from St. Joseph rests in two Quonset huts beside the Garland facility. "It's not for sale," Redding said. "We wouldn't let any hat maker get his hands on it." That's because times and tastes have changed but hat-making materials and equipment haven't. "We're using the same machinery that we used 60, 70, 80 years ago" and have had to build a machine shop to make parts for the old gear, Rosenthal said. "We can't even buy the parts."....
On the Edge of Common Sense: Calf was within reach, if only she'd looked first It is the bad dream of the rancher's wife during calving season. Not as bad as a blizzard or machinery wreck, but worse than having to go to Kingfisher for parts. Hubby's been gone overnight so Shirla saddles up to go check the new calves in the calving lot. It's cold enough to freeze the muddy spots, but it's a sunny morning. She spots a heifer on her side, her abdomen is tight and she's straining. Dismounting, Shirla approaches the beast for a closer look. No feet sticking out. A call on her cell phone to father-in-law down the road proves fruitless, no one answers. So back to the house she rides to get her teenage daughter. "I'm gonna need yer help," Mom says....
Split-estate decision expected soon The chairwoman of the Wyoming Oil and Gas Commission said it likely will issue a decision on the state's first split estate case during its February meeting in Casper. Lynn Boomgaarden said she and other commissioners were disappointed by the evidence presented during a Tuesday hearing between Johnson County rancher Steve Adami and Gillette oil and gas producer Kennedy Oil. “The commission has made it clear we're taking this seriously and we expect both sides to be prepared,” Boomgaarden said. “I don't think we saw as refined a presentation as the commission had hoped.” Adami and Kennedy Oil came before the commission in a dispute over six off-channel water pits the producer wants built to collect water from drilling operations on Adami's 11,000-acre ranch east of Buffalo. The pits are already bonded for a total of $83,000. Adami wants that figure increased and has asked the commission to consider the adequacy of the bonds and take stock of potential environmental costs associated with the pits....
Study faults Wyoming for lack of coalbed rules Wyoming's failure to come up with comprehensive regulations controlling coalbed methane development may be to blame for friction between landowners and energy companies, a new study by University of Wyoming researchers suggests. That same regulatory failure also plays a role in Montana's move to enact coalbed methane water regulations that could curtail production in Wyoming, says the study by the University of Wyoming's Ruckelshaus Institute of Environment and Natural Resources. "Strongly held disagreements and difficulties about CBM development generally, and water management specifically, have gotten to the point that, at the very least, continued growth in CBM production may be under some threat," the study states. Wyoming has so far only captured 5 percent of its estimated $140 billion in coalbed methane reserves, the study states. Production dropped by 5 percent from 2003 to 2004 "due to difficulties in managing and disposing of CBM water," according to the study. Coalbed methane production often involves pumping huge quantities of groundwater to relieve pressure that holds the gas in coal seams. Some ranchers and conservationists have complained about wasting water by pumping and about poor water quality....
Gas drilling means growth Those in western Wyoming enjoying small-town life, brace yourself. Development of the Jonah natural gas field may bring big changes. A new plan favored by federal land managers for development of the massive gas field calls for 76 years of development in the field, bringing nearly $2 billion to Sublette County over the life of the field. In all, nearly 8 trillion cubic feet of gas would be recovered from Jonah under the Bureau of Land Management's preferred plan, released Friday. That would be enough to heat all the homes in Wyoming for 500 years. "The increasing conversion of large tracts of land from rangeland to gas development is seen by some as industrialization and a diminishment of the characteristics they most enjoy in the region: its natural beauty and quiet, vast reaches of unpopulated and undeveloped open space, fresh air, and wildlife" the BLM said in its new, 400-page plan with additional 2,000-plus pages of supplements....
BLM weeds out oil-shale applications The Bureau of Land Management on Tuesday will narrow a field of applicants seeking leases for experimental oil-shale development in Colorado and Utah. BLM Director Kathleen Clarke will set aside eight of 20 applications for "further consideration" of their technical and financial qualifications for work on 160-acre parcels of land, the agency said Friday. The decisions already have been made but won't be announced until Clarke briefs reporters on a conference call Tuesday and the agency posts a list on its Web site. BLM officials did say they rejected as incomplete an application filed by Anadarko Petroleum in Wyoming, leaving a field of 16 contenders for parcels in Colorado and Utah. But BLM spokeswoman Heather Feeney said the bureau has launched an environmental study for larger-scale oil-shale operations that will cover known oil-shale deposits in Wyoming. That study is expected to be done by mid-2007. The bureau in the meantime plans to open 160-acre parcels in Utah and Colorado for experimental works, but only after operators pay for environmental assessments that could run $200,000 each, said James F. Kohler, chief of the BLM's solid minerals branch....
County may take stance on wolf delisting Gray wolves are a predator species in need of management and the federal government should move quickly to remove them from the endangered species list, according to a resolution coming before the Gallatin County Commission on Tuesday. The joint resolution is being sought by commissioners in seven counties near Yellowstone National Park. It carries no legal weight but is seen as a form of protest by those concerned about the species' reintroduction. "I don't think our joint resolution is going to change anything," Gallatin County Commissioner Joe Skinner acknowledged Friday. "(But) hopefully it will send a message that we are concerned for the agricultural problems wolves represent and for the sportsmen's problems."....
Groups lose bid to ban livestock from Pole Mountain A federal court has denied a petition from environmental groups that sought to keep livestock off of a portion of the Medicine Bow National Forest. The lawsuit, filed by the Center for Native Ecosystems and the Biodiversity Conservation Alliance, had challenged Forest Service decisions allowing livestock grazing in the Pole Mountain area. The groups claimed cattle were hurting water quality in area streams. Clint Kyhl, Laramie district ranger for the Forest Service, said his agency was pleased with the court's decision. "We always thought we were doing the right thing up there, and this just sort of confirms it," Kyhl said. "We feel that the Forest Service did a thorough job of responding to the state and federal laws and regulations required of us, and that measures were taken to protect water quality." Jeremy Nichols of the Biodiversity Conservation Alliance expressed regret over the court's ruling....
Sagebrush and cowboys growing grouse Sage grouse habitat has declined throughout southern Idaho and other parts of the West. Sage grouse populations in Idaho have shown a statewide decline of 40 percent over the past three decades. Wildfire, agriculture expansion, herbicide treatments, adverse weather and rangeland seedings have contributed to the decline in Idaho's largest native game bird, according to information released by the Shoshone Basin Sage Grouse Local Working Group. The Working Group (the Shoshone Basin Sage Grouse Local Working Group) is composed of landowners , sportsmen, business and interested citizens working with local, state and federal representatives to develop sage grouse habitat conservation plans. These plans cover management of private, state and federal owned lands....
EnCana extends benefits to sage grouse The greater sage grouse has benefited from extra environmental mitigation practices undertaken by natural-gas giant EnCana Oil and Gas on its 44,000-acre North Parachute Ranch, according to initial wildlife study results. Environmental Coordinator Kim Kaal recently presented the findings for the company’s property outside Parachute and adjacent to the Roan Plateau. The land was formerly owned by Unocal and acquired by EnCana in 2004, along with water and mineral rights. EnCana is working with the Colorado Division of Wildlife on some of its studies, such as the greater sage grouse....
Fish/Game seeks guzzlers for Mojave Preserve A proposal first floated by the California Department of Fish and Game to restore artificial water sources in the Mojave National Preserve has finally reached the public comment stage. The state agency began meeting with the National Park Service in the summer of 2004 regarding the proposal to retrofit 12 former ranch wells in the Mojave National Preserve as wildlife guzzlers. Ranchers raised cattle for many decades in what became the preserve in 1994. They drilled wells to provide water for their cattle. One well was first developed in the 1860s and many of them date to the dominant period of the Rock Springs Land and Cattle Company between 1894 and 1927, according to the park service. Cattle ranchers turned their wells on and off to move cattle around, according to the park service, to keep them from overgrazing in a particular area....
Grizzlies May Lose Protection Federal officials have begun the process of removing grizzly bears around Yellowstone National Park from the Endangered Species List, ending 30 years of protection and shifting responsibility for their management to state officials who may allow hunting. Seen as a major conservation success story, the Yellowstone population of grizzlies has increased about fourfold, from 150 to nearly 600 since going on the endangered list in 1975, and it is continuing to grow at an annual rate of 4% to 6%, according to the U.S. Department of Interior. The federal delisting plan unveiled here last week calls for maintaining the existing level of protection for bears within a 9,200-square-mile area in and around Yellowstone and Grand Teton national parks. But special protections will be dropped outside that loose ring of federal land. Beyond it, where many grizzlies wander and 10% to 30% of them live, bear habitat will be open to road building, logging, recreation and development. Under the delisting plans, state officials in Wyoming, Montana and Idaho will take over management of the bears and may allow hunting outside the protected areas....
Project seeks to restore habitat for minnow Rolf Schmidt-Petersen pointed to the steep-sided, brushy bank of an island in the muddy Rio Grande north of Albuquerque's Alameda bridge. Over the drone of an idling airboat Monday morning, he said: "We need to slope those banks and terrace part of the island to try and slow the river down." Slowing the river is crucial to restoring habitat and calm pools for the endangered Rio Grande silvery minnow, said Schmidt-Petersen, Rio Grande bureau chief for the Interstate Stream Commission. State officials and members of Congress gathered Monday to celebrate the first workday of a multiyear, multimillion-dollar project designed to stabilize the minnow's population in a three-mile stretch of the river. The project grew in part out of a 2003 U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service mandate that agencies restore endangered species' habitat along the river....
Klamath County considering geothermal energy project Controversy is brewing over a plan to develop a $200 million geothermal energy project at the Medicine Lake Highlands, a collapsed large shield volcano. Since the 1980s, a series of developers have proposed drilling geothermal wells at Medicine Lake and transmitting energy over power transmission lines. Proponents tout geothermal energy as a clean alternative to other sources of electricity, such as fossil fuels, coal and nuclear energy. And the concept has caught on: the state of California, for example, is requiring energy providers to place a higher reliance on alternative power, such as geothermal and wind, to ease dependence on fossil fuels. The work includes pumping naturally heated water from underground sources, using the water to generate power and then pumping the water back into the ground to be reheated and reused. Some studies show that the Medicine Lake Highlands has the largest identified geothermal resource in the lower 48 states....
Judge halts seismic survey A federal administrative appeals judge has halted an oil and gas seismic survey project proposed for the Adobe Town area of southwest Wyoming's Red Desert. The challenge alleged violations of the National Environmental Policy Act and said the BLM had failed to take a hard look at the impacts to fossils and sensitive wildlife species. The groups said the area is known worldwide for its fossils of ancient mammals from the Eocene period, covering dates between 57 million and 45 million years ago. The appeal also said the agency did not conduct a required study of cumulative impacts to wildlife that use lands affected by the project and ignored their responsibility to consider lower-impact alternatives instead of the use of thumper trucks....
West to have enough wildfire aircraft, feds say There will be sufficient air tankers, helicopters and other firefighting resources to battle what could be severe wildfire season in the West, federal officials say. Fewer single-engine air tankers will be reserved for full-time firefighting use, but more will be called up on an as-needed basis, a top Agriculture Department official said. Undersecretary Mark Rey, who oversees the U.S. Forest Service and the Natural Resources Conservation Service, offered the explanation in response to a request from Arizona Gov. Janet Napolitano for assurances concerning the air tanker fleet and other fire preparations given the likelihood of a severe fire season this year in the Southwest. "The governor is right to be concerned about the upcoming fire season's severity," Rey said. Climate models are predicting a worse-than-average fire season in the region. However, Rey said, "we have resources committed that will maintain our success rate at nearly 99 percent in initial attack." In a year-end letter, Napolitano urged Agriculture Secretary Mike Johanns and Interior Secretary Gale Norton not to cut back on wildland firefighting and prevention resources in light of drought conditions in the Southwest....
Eminent domain battle shaping up at Padre Island Willacy County officials think good things could at long last happen for their remote corner of Texas - if only they could overcome the 9.5-mile bay that separates the mainland from their section of Padre Island. A few years ago they bought a so-called ferry - a 40-year-old amphibious vehicle that initially failed to pass government safety standards. Now they just need a place to land it. But the section of Padre Island the county wants is owned by the Nature Conservancy, and the environmental group says it's not for sale. So the county commissioners voted in November to use eminent domain to seize the land, angering conservancy members who fear an influx of beachgoers will threaten wildlife on the 1,500-acre section of island....
Alito May Quickly Affect Laws The reach of the environmental laws is to come before the court in late February. Property rights activists have urged the justices for years to protect landowners and developers from the effects of the Endangered Species and Clean Water acts, which include preserving wetlands. In 1972, Congress made it illegal to discharge pollutants into "navigable waters." Because water flows downhill, federal environmental protection officials have interpreted this provision to regulate tens of thousands of inland streams, hundreds of thousands of acres of wetlands and even creek beds that have water only on occasion. After Roberts became chief justice in October, the court announced it would hear a property rights case from Michigan. John Rapanos, a landowner, was prosecuted and fined for having filled in wetlands on a farm field 20 miles from Lake Huron. The government said there was a "hydrological connection" between his field and the Great Lakes via several small streams. The Pacific Legal Foundation, a property rights group in Sacramento representing Rapanos, argues that the court should rein in the environmental regulators. The group says the 1972 law covers only rivers, lakes and bays on which ships can travel. "Hopefully, the court has taken this case to end this abuse of federal power under the Clean Water Act," said Reed Hooper, a lawyer for Rapanos....
The Sago Mine disaster: Solace from Butte It is impossible to watch the events of Tallmansville, W. Va., without an overwhelming sense of impotence in the face of tragedy. What can anyone say or do that could possibly provide comfort to the families? Who but the victims of such tragedy can begin to comprehend the depth of their despair? History, perhaps, can offer solidarity from a context that is distant in time, but proximate in experience. The history of mining, sadly, provides a deep well of experience from which to draw. The worst hard-rock mining disaster in American history took place on June 8, 1917, when a fire in Butte, 2,000 feet below ground, left 415 miners to fight for their lives....
Quest for the Chisholm Trail They have a historical problem down in Donna, a small community between Harlingen and McAllen in the Rio Grande Valley. There is a marker in town that says the Chisholm Trail came through the area, but there is no documentation to back up the claim. No one knows where the marker came from, or who ordered it. The records were lost in a fire at the museum years ago. To find the answers, folks at the local museum in Donna contacted History Detectives, a public television show that delves into historical mysteries. Producers of the show were in the Fort Worth area this week, seeking information. They met at the hilltop home of Weatherford rancher Tom B. Saunders IV in southern Parker County. Saunders comes from a long line of Texas cattlemen. Aside from being a rancher, he is also a published author and historian. He has a definite opinion on the route of the Chisholm Trail and gladly shared that opinion with the television crew....
Western wear on way to classic status Fans of Western wear fall into a few categories, chief among them people who just live and love the Western lifestyle, whether they wear their jeans and snap shirt daily on the farm, ranch or rodeo circuit; or save them for stock show week, the dance floor of the Grizzly Rose or trips to the mountains. The truth is that there are many facets to Western wear. "It means a lot of different things to different people," says Daniel DeWeese, editor of Western Lifestyle Retailer magazine. A New Yorker might look at a Colorado cowboy, rancher or rodeo princess' attire as a costume, "but it's never a costume to the core market," he says. And the lines are blurring between the Western and mainstream markets as younger customers who make up the core market want their jeans to be just as fashionable as other denim sold at the mall, says Cathy Hagerty Soden, design director for Cinch, Cruel Girl and Rockies, brands made by Rocky Mountain Clothing Co. in Denver. function is always important but "customers are much more aware of how they want their jeans to look," she says. The Western market is getting a boost from such sources as Style.com, which dubs one of the top trends this season "New Frontier." And this month's Harper's Bazaar has a "Best Western" layout of items that promise to "kick-start your wardrobe." All proof, DeWeese says, "that Western wear is having a huge influence on mainstream fashion."....
Stetsons and Resistols are born in Garland Cowtown may be where the West begins, but cowboy-hat fans, who should be out in force at the Fort Worth Stock Show this weekend, may not realize that the West's headwear capital lies a few miles east. "The history here is just phenomenal," said Stan Redding, sales vice president for Hatco, a Garland-based manufacturer of Resistol and Stetson hats. "We're the only hat company in the United States that makes a hat start to finish." Housed in a low, sprawling building, Resistol has been making hats at the same Garland plant since the 1930s. Though Stetson began in Philadelphia in the 19th century, it moved to Texas about a year and a half ago, when the company's St. Joseph, Mo., plant was shuttered, according to Gary Rosenthal, Stetson's former owner. Much of the old machinery from St. Joseph rests in two Quonset huts beside the Garland facility. "It's not for sale," Redding said. "We wouldn't let any hat maker get his hands on it." That's because times and tastes have changed but hat-making materials and equipment haven't. "We're using the same machinery that we used 60, 70, 80 years ago" and have had to build a machine shop to make parts for the old gear, Rosenthal said. "We can't even buy the parts."....
On the Edge of Common Sense: Calf was within reach, if only she'd looked first It is the bad dream of the rancher's wife during calving season. Not as bad as a blizzard or machinery wreck, but worse than having to go to Kingfisher for parts. Hubby's been gone overnight so Shirla saddles up to go check the new calves in the calving lot. It's cold enough to freeze the muddy spots, but it's a sunny morning. She spots a heifer on her side, her abdomen is tight and she's straining. Dismounting, Shirla approaches the beast for a closer look. No feet sticking out. A call on her cell phone to father-in-law down the road proves fruitless, no one answers. So back to the house she rides to get her teenage daughter. "I'm gonna need yer help," Mom says....
Sunday, January 15, 2006
Vocabulary of a horse trader
By Julie Carter
There is an entire dictionary's worth of phrases, sayings and quotes you can pin to the horse trading business.
The best advice for the buyer is to carefully discern the words they hear and look for what they may actually signify. Hidden meaning is a trademark of a seasoned horse trader.
For example, when the trader tells you, "This horse will let you do all the thinking," it really means he is big, dumb and heavy footed. If he says, "For this one you just need to start a little sooner or cut across," he means the horse has two speeds, slow and slower.
When the trader tells you "he'll watch a cow" he could mean that he'll actually have the instincts to keep his eye on the cattle and have some quick responsive action. But it could also mean he'll stand in the gate and watch them go by.
And a buyer should always look beyond the obvious. "This horse doesn't let much get past him," usually doesn't mean he is alert and attentive. It more likely means the horse will booger at a shadow or a bird flying overhead at a thousand feet. Riding uneventfully through rolling tumbleweeds and blowing dust will never be an option.
The horse described as having "a nice little cowboy lope" is one that is so rough to ride he will loosen your teeth fillings at a trot and if you can ever get him in a lope, he'll jar your hemorrhoids up to your tonsils.This type of horse can be described as having the ability to give a woodpecker a headache. I know because I own one of these.
The age of a horse is often disputed, especially if the horse has no registration papers for proof of age or origin. The ability to "mouth a horse" and read their age by the stage and condition of their teeth is a real benefit to the buyer. But the die hard trader will always justify a smooth-mouthed old horse with the line, "He's been in a sandy pasture and his teeth may look a little older from that sand grinding at his teeth."
Buyers beware when you hear things like "He doesn't buck very often." My suggestion would be that even if you don't mind an occasional bucker, if the trader can't tell you exactly when he does buck, keep shopping.
Other things to listen for are the brilliant statements like "When his nose quits running and his eyes clear up he'll be just fine," or "I usually don't have to hobble him to saddle him but he just looks better when I do." In a moment of trying to dump a real mess of a horse, they actually will say things that desperate, even to people who know better.
Horse traders come in all sizes, shapes and classes much like used car salesmen. Some you can't trust and others you shouldn't trust.
Having a horse for sale and being called a horse trader is much like be a writer and being labeled a journalist. It is just not all that flattering.
© Julie Carter 2006
Johnny Appleseed
by Larry Gabriel
John Chapman (Johnny Appleseed) never made it as far west as Douglas County, South Dakota. That is a good thing. He might have needed a permit before planting a tree in that county.
According to recent news reports, the county claims Gordon Heber must have a permit to plant trees on his own land. They have denied him a permit, and he has taken them to court.
Attacks on the rights of property owners are not new in this country. Congress has been doing it for years.
This is different. This is an assault on property rights by the local government. What are we saying when the government says a man can't plant a tree on his own land?
How can planting a tree threaten public health? (It if carries a disease it might.) Is it a threat to public safety? (If it blocks the view at an intersection it might be.) Does it harm the general welfare? (If it is a noxious weed it might.)
Generally our government encourages tree planting on the theory that doing so promotes the general welfare.
Somewhere we have crossed the line between regulating to protect the basic rights of others, and regulating for the sake of regulation.
Do we really want a society without fundamental freedoms? Free speech, freedom of religion, family and protected private property in the hands of the average citizen are the building blocks of our nation.
An attack on these fundamental freedom and values is an attack on society itself. Are we ready to self destruct? Not if South Dakotans have anything to say about it.
Here is the problem, and it comes up more often than you think in local zoning issues: everyone gets lost in arguments over tangents. Somebody's feelings got hurt. Somebody got angry. Somebody was rude. Somebody doesn't like newcomers changing things.
None of those things have anything to do with the real question, which always should be, "What is the government's proper role here?"
This landowner wants to plant trees near a waterway. The waterway is either federal or state. There is no other kind. Both federal and state agencies have approved the project.
What is the proper role of a county in such matters? That is the question local voters and county commissioners need to debate among themselves. If we become lost in a web of tangents, a judge will decide after much delay and expense.
We waste much when we lose sight of the real issues. At such times, we need to remember people like Johnny Appleseed, whose father was one of the original Minutemen at Concord.
Preserve the fundamentals foremost, and all else that is worthy will be preserved.
Larry Gabriel is the South Dakota Secretary of Agriculture
By Julie Carter
There is an entire dictionary's worth of phrases, sayings and quotes you can pin to the horse trading business.
The best advice for the buyer is to carefully discern the words they hear and look for what they may actually signify. Hidden meaning is a trademark of a seasoned horse trader.
For example, when the trader tells you, "This horse will let you do all the thinking," it really means he is big, dumb and heavy footed. If he says, "For this one you just need to start a little sooner or cut across," he means the horse has two speeds, slow and slower.
When the trader tells you "he'll watch a cow" he could mean that he'll actually have the instincts to keep his eye on the cattle and have some quick responsive action. But it could also mean he'll stand in the gate and watch them go by.
And a buyer should always look beyond the obvious. "This horse doesn't let much get past him," usually doesn't mean he is alert and attentive. It more likely means the horse will booger at a shadow or a bird flying overhead at a thousand feet. Riding uneventfully through rolling tumbleweeds and blowing dust will never be an option.
The horse described as having "a nice little cowboy lope" is one that is so rough to ride he will loosen your teeth fillings at a trot and if you can ever get him in a lope, he'll jar your hemorrhoids up to your tonsils.This type of horse can be described as having the ability to give a woodpecker a headache. I know because I own one of these.
The age of a horse is often disputed, especially if the horse has no registration papers for proof of age or origin. The ability to "mouth a horse" and read their age by the stage and condition of their teeth is a real benefit to the buyer. But the die hard trader will always justify a smooth-mouthed old horse with the line, "He's been in a sandy pasture and his teeth may look a little older from that sand grinding at his teeth."
Buyers beware when you hear things like "He doesn't buck very often." My suggestion would be that even if you don't mind an occasional bucker, if the trader can't tell you exactly when he does buck, keep shopping.
Other things to listen for are the brilliant statements like "When his nose quits running and his eyes clear up he'll be just fine," or "I usually don't have to hobble him to saddle him but he just looks better when I do." In a moment of trying to dump a real mess of a horse, they actually will say things that desperate, even to people who know better.
Horse traders come in all sizes, shapes and classes much like used car salesmen. Some you can't trust and others you shouldn't trust.
Having a horse for sale and being called a horse trader is much like be a writer and being labeled a journalist. It is just not all that flattering.
© Julie Carter 2006
Johnny Appleseed
by Larry Gabriel
John Chapman (Johnny Appleseed) never made it as far west as Douglas County, South Dakota. That is a good thing. He might have needed a permit before planting a tree in that county.
According to recent news reports, the county claims Gordon Heber must have a permit to plant trees on his own land. They have denied him a permit, and he has taken them to court.
Attacks on the rights of property owners are not new in this country. Congress has been doing it for years.
This is different. This is an assault on property rights by the local government. What are we saying when the government says a man can't plant a tree on his own land?
How can planting a tree threaten public health? (It if carries a disease it might.) Is it a threat to public safety? (If it blocks the view at an intersection it might be.) Does it harm the general welfare? (If it is a noxious weed it might.)
Generally our government encourages tree planting on the theory that doing so promotes the general welfare.
Somewhere we have crossed the line between regulating to protect the basic rights of others, and regulating for the sake of regulation.
Do we really want a society without fundamental freedoms? Free speech, freedom of religion, family and protected private property in the hands of the average citizen are the building blocks of our nation.
An attack on these fundamental freedom and values is an attack on society itself. Are we ready to self destruct? Not if South Dakotans have anything to say about it.
Here is the problem, and it comes up more often than you think in local zoning issues: everyone gets lost in arguments over tangents. Somebody's feelings got hurt. Somebody got angry. Somebody was rude. Somebody doesn't like newcomers changing things.
None of those things have anything to do with the real question, which always should be, "What is the government's proper role here?"
This landowner wants to plant trees near a waterway. The waterway is either federal or state. There is no other kind. Both federal and state agencies have approved the project.
What is the proper role of a county in such matters? That is the question local voters and county commissioners need to debate among themselves. If we become lost in a web of tangents, a judge will decide after much delay and expense.
We waste much when we lose sight of the real issues. At such times, we need to remember people like Johnny Appleseed, whose father was one of the original Minutemen at Concord.
Preserve the fundamentals foremost, and all else that is worthy will be preserved.
Larry Gabriel is the South Dakota Secretary of Agriculture
OPINION/COMMENTARY
A Tragic Reminder
The coal mine explosion in Tallmansville, West Virginia, killing 12 miners, is a tragic reminder of the means by which America has been condemned to produce more than half its electrical energy. To be exact, 53 percent of the electricity generated in the United States comes from coal-fired plants. Studies at Ohio State University, conducted by Gordon J. Aubrecht, Department of Physics, determined that the amount of coal burned annually to produce electricity in America releases nearly 1,500 tons of cancer-causing uranium and over 3,500 tons of cancer-causing thorium, resulting in 50 fatalities, 120,000 cases of respiratory ailments, tens of millions of dollars in property damage, plus the emission of nitrous oxide equivalent to 40,000 cars per year. Coal unquestionably is the highest producer of pollutants and greenhouse gases of all fossil energy resources. The most powerful nation in the world kneels at the feet of a vociferous minority that has dominated its energy policies for the past 30-plus years. This vociferous minority uses the major media, print and broadcast, of the nation to promote its destructive agenda. In turn, the media, through its blackouts of important segments of the news, its distortions and in some cases outright prevarications, has misled and confused the American public to such an extent that actual science and truth are not recognized when presented. The use of atomic energy to produce America's electricity is a good example....
WOW, IT’S SUCCESSFUL!
For more than ten years now wolves have been forcibly increased and spread throughout the northern Rocky Mountain States, the desert southwest, and the Great Lakes States. The mongrel (wolf/coyote/dog) hybrids called red wolves have been introduced into North Carolina and some pups just had their picture taken in the caring arms of the ubiquitous young female uniformed government employee on Saint Vincent Island National Wildlife Refuge in the Florida panhandle where they are now being raised. Why a judge has even told the Federal government to get busy and force timber wolves into the New England States. One is forced to ask, “How is it going?” State fish and wildlife agencies (with one exception where they still work for the Governor) have lined up behind Federal mandates for wolf futures. What was always heretofore been a state matter was Federalized by the Endangered Species Act. Only a few disgruntled rural bumpkins are known to still reject the government-ordered Brave New World that wolves are helping to create. Most newspapers report immediately any warm and fuzzy or beneficial wolf-related tidbit while assiduously avoiding or ridiculing those who question or object to what is happening. The former Director of the US Fish and Wildlife Service when it stole millions of dollars from the State fish and wildlife agencies and the hunters and fishermen now directs the Defenders of Wildlife. The Defenders of Wildlife (an anti-hunting/trapping organization) was given a primary “partnership” role in the wolf program during that Director’s tenure. It is the Defenders of Wildlife that allegedly “compensates” cattle and sheep owners for stock lost to wolves, but that is a lie that is never questioned when newspapers parrot US Fish and Wildlife Service/Defenders news releases. Elk and deer populations are decreasing steadily where the wolves are spreading. Guard dogs, hunting dogs, and pet dogs are dying at steep but unreported rates where wolves now occur. Centuries-old reports (churches, papers, archives, writings, etc.) of high rates of human life loss to wolves in Europe, Asia, and North America are ignored, demeaned, and rejected by bureaucrat biologists and all their “partners” in Universities and the media....
Media Jump On Study Showing Frogs Dying Off From Climate Change
It may be January, but it seems it’s never too cold for the media to re-heat hype on global warming. ABC and The Washington Post did just that in their reports on one study in the science journal Nature. Both stories, however, left out any criticism of the study. “Disease is the bullet killing frogs, but climate change is pulling the trigger,” the Post quoted study author J. Alan Pounds. But while there are climate experts who say that Pounds’s conclusions are half-baked, neither the Post’s Eilperin nor ABC’s Blakemore feature any dissenting experts. One such critic is Pat Michaels, of the University of Virginia, who pointed out some flaws in the study on his WorldClimateReport.com Web site. “The title of the manuscript, ‘Widespread Amphibian Extinctions from Epidemic Disease Driven by Global Warming,’” wrote Michaels, “implies that the authors have proven a pervasive link between a large number of toad and frog extinctions and warming climate. They have done nothing of the sort.” Michaels cast doubt on the connection by pointing to a 2003 Diversity and Distribution journal article. That article showed the disease afflicting the harlequin frog was caused by chytrid fungus, which “was most likely introduced by humans, possibly by ecotourists and/or field researchers.”....
Plants Bad for the Environment? Celebrities Causing Frogs to Croak?
Could it be that celebrities are planting the forests that are causing the global warming that is growing the bacteria that are wiping out the frogs? Global warming alarmists may be compelled to consider that chain of causation this week thanks to two new studies just published in the Jan. 12 issue of the journal Nature. In the first study, Max Planck Institute researchers reported their discovery that living plants emit into the atmosphere methane (natural gas), the third most important greenhouse gas behind water vapor and carbon dioxide. Until this discovery, scientists thought the methane in the atmosphere was largely produced by bacterial processes not involving oxygen. But the Max Planck researchers report that living plants -- two-thirds of which are in tropical rainforest regions -- produce 10 to 30 percent of annual global methane production. The implications of this study are stunning. Previously, it was thought that the net effect of growing plants was to remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and, therefore, to reduce global warming. But in the words of New Zealand climate researcher David Lowe, “We now have the specter that new forests might increase greenhouse warming through methane emissions rather than decrease it by being sinks for carbon dioxide.” The discovery also implies that deforestation -- that is, cutting down trees -- slows methane accumulation in the atmosphere and, as a consequence, reduces global warming....
The Politically Incorrect Guide to Science
Throw out your textbooks and forget everything you have learned about science. They didn’t teach you this stuff in college. The media generally follows the “if it bleeds, it leads” philosophy: Stories detailing devastation garner front-page status while stories lacking prophetic dramatic climax wind up on page B-17. As Tom Bethell writes in The Politically Incorrect Guide to Science, this can be universally applied to science. Such an understanding has been grasped by high-powered special interest groups who use the media to further their causes by predicting the most ominous disasters that man will ever see. Many entities, from the media to politicians, are all too willing to help these special interests along in their causes—the media by promoting the panic, and the government by funding it. As a result, declarations of destruction caused by supposed man-made global warming dominate headlines while opposing viewpoints, though equal in number, are left without the megaphone of major newspapers, scientific journals, nightly newscasts, and congressional hearings....
Interview: Endangered species
Charley Dewberry, author of Saving Science: A Critique of Science and its Role in Salmon Recovery (2004), is the academic dean of Gutenberg College in Eugene, Ore. He has a Ph.D. from the University of Oregon but ranges far beyond academic walls: He is one of the most experienced field workers in the Pacific Northwest and has for many years examined problems of salmon restoration. That may seem like a narrow topic, but Mr. Dewberry's analysis of salmon research shows why there's something fishy in much of science these days. He shows how scientists examining issues involving fish catches or endangered species typically look at statistics developed by other scientists but don't interview fishermen or use historical methods to get a better sense of change over time. He questions whether scientists who spend little time in the field really understand their subject. Mr. Dewberry praises physicists who know the specific physical laws necessary for riding a bicycle, and then asks: "What if a particular physicist who can articulate these laws cannot ride a bicycle? Does this physicist have a greater understanding of bicycle riding than the boy who, with personal knowledge, just rides the bike?" He's not impressed by scientists who venture into the field only to instruct technicians or to put on "dog-and-pony shows" for the benefit of journalists and financial backers....
A Tragic Reminder
The coal mine explosion in Tallmansville, West Virginia, killing 12 miners, is a tragic reminder of the means by which America has been condemned to produce more than half its electrical energy. To be exact, 53 percent of the electricity generated in the United States comes from coal-fired plants. Studies at Ohio State University, conducted by Gordon J. Aubrecht, Department of Physics, determined that the amount of coal burned annually to produce electricity in America releases nearly 1,500 tons of cancer-causing uranium and over 3,500 tons of cancer-causing thorium, resulting in 50 fatalities, 120,000 cases of respiratory ailments, tens of millions of dollars in property damage, plus the emission of nitrous oxide equivalent to 40,000 cars per year. Coal unquestionably is the highest producer of pollutants and greenhouse gases of all fossil energy resources. The most powerful nation in the world kneels at the feet of a vociferous minority that has dominated its energy policies for the past 30-plus years. This vociferous minority uses the major media, print and broadcast, of the nation to promote its destructive agenda. In turn, the media, through its blackouts of important segments of the news, its distortions and in some cases outright prevarications, has misled and confused the American public to such an extent that actual science and truth are not recognized when presented. The use of atomic energy to produce America's electricity is a good example....
WOW, IT’S SUCCESSFUL!
For more than ten years now wolves have been forcibly increased and spread throughout the northern Rocky Mountain States, the desert southwest, and the Great Lakes States. The mongrel (wolf/coyote/dog) hybrids called red wolves have been introduced into North Carolina and some pups just had their picture taken in the caring arms of the ubiquitous young female uniformed government employee on Saint Vincent Island National Wildlife Refuge in the Florida panhandle where they are now being raised. Why a judge has even told the Federal government to get busy and force timber wolves into the New England States. One is forced to ask, “How is it going?” State fish and wildlife agencies (with one exception where they still work for the Governor) have lined up behind Federal mandates for wolf futures. What was always heretofore been a state matter was Federalized by the Endangered Species Act. Only a few disgruntled rural bumpkins are known to still reject the government-ordered Brave New World that wolves are helping to create. Most newspapers report immediately any warm and fuzzy or beneficial wolf-related tidbit while assiduously avoiding or ridiculing those who question or object to what is happening. The former Director of the US Fish and Wildlife Service when it stole millions of dollars from the State fish and wildlife agencies and the hunters and fishermen now directs the Defenders of Wildlife. The Defenders of Wildlife (an anti-hunting/trapping organization) was given a primary “partnership” role in the wolf program during that Director’s tenure. It is the Defenders of Wildlife that allegedly “compensates” cattle and sheep owners for stock lost to wolves, but that is a lie that is never questioned when newspapers parrot US Fish and Wildlife Service/Defenders news releases. Elk and deer populations are decreasing steadily where the wolves are spreading. Guard dogs, hunting dogs, and pet dogs are dying at steep but unreported rates where wolves now occur. Centuries-old reports (churches, papers, archives, writings, etc.) of high rates of human life loss to wolves in Europe, Asia, and North America are ignored, demeaned, and rejected by bureaucrat biologists and all their “partners” in Universities and the media....
Media Jump On Study Showing Frogs Dying Off From Climate Change
It may be January, but it seems it’s never too cold for the media to re-heat hype on global warming. ABC and The Washington Post did just that in their reports on one study in the science journal Nature. Both stories, however, left out any criticism of the study. “Disease is the bullet killing frogs, but climate change is pulling the trigger,” the Post quoted study author J. Alan Pounds. But while there are climate experts who say that Pounds’s conclusions are half-baked, neither the Post’s Eilperin nor ABC’s Blakemore feature any dissenting experts. One such critic is Pat Michaels, of the University of Virginia, who pointed out some flaws in the study on his WorldClimateReport.com Web site. “The title of the manuscript, ‘Widespread Amphibian Extinctions from Epidemic Disease Driven by Global Warming,’” wrote Michaels, “implies that the authors have proven a pervasive link between a large number of toad and frog extinctions and warming climate. They have done nothing of the sort.” Michaels cast doubt on the connection by pointing to a 2003 Diversity and Distribution journal article. That article showed the disease afflicting the harlequin frog was caused by chytrid fungus, which “was most likely introduced by humans, possibly by ecotourists and/or field researchers.”....
Plants Bad for the Environment? Celebrities Causing Frogs to Croak?
Could it be that celebrities are planting the forests that are causing the global warming that is growing the bacteria that are wiping out the frogs? Global warming alarmists may be compelled to consider that chain of causation this week thanks to two new studies just published in the Jan. 12 issue of the journal Nature. In the first study, Max Planck Institute researchers reported their discovery that living plants emit into the atmosphere methane (natural gas), the third most important greenhouse gas behind water vapor and carbon dioxide. Until this discovery, scientists thought the methane in the atmosphere was largely produced by bacterial processes not involving oxygen. But the Max Planck researchers report that living plants -- two-thirds of which are in tropical rainforest regions -- produce 10 to 30 percent of annual global methane production. The implications of this study are stunning. Previously, it was thought that the net effect of growing plants was to remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and, therefore, to reduce global warming. But in the words of New Zealand climate researcher David Lowe, “We now have the specter that new forests might increase greenhouse warming through methane emissions rather than decrease it by being sinks for carbon dioxide.” The discovery also implies that deforestation -- that is, cutting down trees -- slows methane accumulation in the atmosphere and, as a consequence, reduces global warming....
The Politically Incorrect Guide to Science
Throw out your textbooks and forget everything you have learned about science. They didn’t teach you this stuff in college. The media generally follows the “if it bleeds, it leads” philosophy: Stories detailing devastation garner front-page status while stories lacking prophetic dramatic climax wind up on page B-17. As Tom Bethell writes in The Politically Incorrect Guide to Science, this can be universally applied to science. Such an understanding has been grasped by high-powered special interest groups who use the media to further their causes by predicting the most ominous disasters that man will ever see. Many entities, from the media to politicians, are all too willing to help these special interests along in their causes—the media by promoting the panic, and the government by funding it. As a result, declarations of destruction caused by supposed man-made global warming dominate headlines while opposing viewpoints, though equal in number, are left without the megaphone of major newspapers, scientific journals, nightly newscasts, and congressional hearings....
Interview: Endangered species
Charley Dewberry, author of Saving Science: A Critique of Science and its Role in Salmon Recovery (2004), is the academic dean of Gutenberg College in Eugene, Ore. He has a Ph.D. from the University of Oregon but ranges far beyond academic walls: He is one of the most experienced field workers in the Pacific Northwest and has for many years examined problems of salmon restoration. That may seem like a narrow topic, but Mr. Dewberry's analysis of salmon research shows why there's something fishy in much of science these days. He shows how scientists examining issues involving fish catches or endangered species typically look at statistics developed by other scientists but don't interview fishermen or use historical methods to get a better sense of change over time. He questions whether scientists who spend little time in the field really understand their subject. Mr. Dewberry praises physicists who know the specific physical laws necessary for riding a bicycle, and then asks: "What if a particular physicist who can articulate these laws cannot ride a bicycle? Does this physicist have a greater understanding of bicycle riding than the boy who, with personal knowledge, just rides the bike?" He's not impressed by scientists who venture into the field only to instruct technicians or to put on "dog-and-pony shows" for the benefit of journalists and financial backers....
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