NM Rancher: Fighting dogs slaughter cattle

A Valencia County rancher who lost 15 head of cattle to wild dogs has shot and killed 21 of the wild-running animals but says he's quickly becoming outnumbered. Rancher Peter Córdova said he has lost 11 calves and four full grown cows over the course of 11 days. All had their necks punctured although in one sad case a small calf was left alive with both earns gnawed off. The dogs are pit bulls and Rottweilers, according to Córdova who said none of the dogs are eating the meat. "They are just killing to kill," he told KRQE News 13. The dogs roam along and in packs as large as nine, he added. Córdova said he believes the dogs could be dogs trained to fight and coming from nearby El Cerro Mission and Meadow Lake. "What I understand they fight them and when lose a fight they don't want to kill them so they just turn them loose," Córdova said...KRQE-TV

Here's a video of the TV report. You'll see the damage these dogs can do:

Behind the Cap-and-Trade Curtain

Proponents of a cap-and-trade program to combat global warming face an uphill fight. For all their attempts to spin it as a solely environmental issue about saving the planet from extinction, the reality is that it’s a political question that ultimately comes down to economic tradeoffs. That reality explains why a cap-and-trade proposal similar to the one presently being considered crashed and burned in Washington last year, despite Democratic majorities in both houses of Congress. Voters got a sense that a new regulatory regime to limit carbon-dioxide emissions would impose huge costs across the economy, and they let their representatives know that was unacceptable. The irony is that the Democrats beating the drums for a global-warming bill understand — and even embrace — the economics of carbon-dioxide regulation. In an exceptionally candid interview with the San Francisco Chronicle editorial board last year, then-senator Barack Obama talked about bankrupting the coal industry and said, “Under my plan of a cap and trade system, electricity rates would necessarily skyrocket.” Raise the price of coal- and petroleum-based energy so people use less, or force consumers to employ energy technologies that cost vastly more. Either way, higher prices are inherent to cutting emissions...NRO

Tribes lose Snowbowl battle

Would artificial snow made from purified wastewater defile a mountain Native Americans hold sacred? The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday refused to consider that question, essentially ending a five-year court battle over the future of Arizona Snowbowl on Flagstaff's San Francisco Peaks. The decision lets stand a lower court ruling allowing development and snowmaking at the 70-year-old ski area. Manmade snow could arrive in time for the 2010-11 season. The Navajo, Hopi, Hualapai, Havasupai and Apache tribes hold the peaks to be sacred sites and contend that plans to make artificial snow out of reclaimed wastewater will infringe on their religious freedom. The coalition of Native Americans and environmentalists including the Sierra Club that took Snowbowl's landlord, the U.S. Forest Service, to federal court in 2006, vowed to take other action, including congressional action or a direct appeal to President Barack Obama...ArizonaRepublic

Wash. family to keep endangered turtle

Washington state officials say a family will be allowed to keep their pet, a rare western pond turtle, but the animal will be owned by the state of California. Barry Mason of Ridgefield and his wife Chae Yon said their family adopted the turtle when they encountered it as a baby 21 years ago while camping in Northern California. They said the turtle apparently was taken from their home during a birthday party for their son, Shon, in April, The (Vancouver, Wash.) Columbian reported Monday. The reptile turned up in May at a pet store in Hazel Dell, Wash., but the family ran into an obstacle while reclaiming their beloved Mr. Turtle -- his species is endangered. Washington wildlife officials wrote Mason that it has decided to allow the family to keep the turtle under a few strict conditions: The animal will belong to the state of California, it cannot be transferred to another family without the department's approval, and its final resting spot after its death will be determined by California and Washington wildlife officials...UPI

Bureaucrats will determine the turtle's "final resting spot"? I'm surprised they didn't require the turtle to be tracked by the NAIS.

$50 Tax Bill Leads to Foreclosure for Connecticut Man

A man in Connecticut says he's losing his home because he owes $50 in back taxes. The city of Bridgeport is foreclosing on Jean Castro's home because of the unpaid taxes, which total $51.69. A judge last week approved the foreclosure and ordered the home to be sold in December. Castro says the city sent him a notice that he owed back taxes and he forwarded it to his mortgage company. The mortgage company ended up paying $3,000 in back taxes, leaving the small balance. The city's lawyer says by the time he learned about the payment it was too late, because the foreclosure had started...AP

Build it and they will...take it. Another episode.

They think reading the bills is a joke

Henry Waxman hired a speed-reader in case Republicans demanded that the cap & trade bill be read to the members of the House Energy and Commerce Committee. The Republicans decided not to deploy this "stalling" tactic, so the reader was used only for a couple of minutes, as a joke. Not only are bills never read before a quorum in Congress, they aren't read in committee either. Our supposed representatives think it's a joke to believe they should know what they're inflicting on us. But we don't think it's funny...DownsizeDC

Producers oppose animal-tracking plan

Several southern Missouri livestock farmers voiced concerns Tuesday about a proposed National Animal Identification System at a U.S. Department of Agriculture listening session. Critics said the federal government wants to control the food system and regulate how they raise animals. Many at the hearing expressed anti-government sentiments and said they want to be left alone to live off the land, like generations before them, without bureaucratic meddling. "It is entirely too dangerous to freedom, to the God-given rights that we hold, to have anyone to espouse total control of the food system," said Doreen Hannes, a Mountain Grove livestock farmer. "There is no way I will comply. I will die before I comply." Some dairy farmers use the devices for herd management, Wiemers said. But many producers at Tuesday's forum said they don't want the government to have access to their proprietary information. USDA officials have no exact estimate on the cost to tag and track every animal raised for commercial consumption, but some estimates put it as much as a $65 per newborn calf. Each farm would have to purchase tagging equipment and expensive tracking devices, critics said. "It's going to be a cost greater than any cattleman can bear," said Bill Stancer, 70, a semi-retired rancher from Cabool. "That cost is not going to be recovered at the marketplace." Small producers who often raise 30 to 40 head of cattle and a few other animals to live off of accuse the nation's largest meat companies of pushing for NAIS. They say electronic microchips with biometric technology -- which could track health history of any given animal -- would give producers a financial advantage at the marketplace. It would allow them to pick and choose among a herd based on information from a federal database, potentially lowering the price for some animals, critics say...News-Leader

Veterinary group rethinks fish toss in Seattle

Seattle's famed fishmongers may be tossing rubber fish instead of real ones at a national veterinary association's convention next month following complaints from an animal-rights group. American Veterinary Medical Association chief executive Ron DeHaven said the Schaumburg, Ill.-based organization had thought inviting one of Seattle's top tourist attractions - the fish-throwers at the Pike Place Fish Market - to the event would be a great "team-building experience." But after People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals raised concerns about the ethics of using dead fish as props at a veterinary event, DeHaven said the AVMA would explore other options, including an alternative PETA suggested: using rubber fish...AP

Good. That would match their rubber spines.

Documentary offers troubling view of U.S. food industry

The new documentary "Food, Inc." begins with idyllic scenes of American farmland, panning from golden fields of hay to a solitary cowboy rounding up a herd of cattle. Then the camera zooms in on a grocery cart overflowing with packaged food and rolling down the aisles of a gaudily lit supermarket. Eerie, horror movie-style music swells in the background. It's meant to signal the audience that the pastoral fantasy of agrarian America on everything from packages of breakfast sausage to cereal boxes is not what it seems, that great danger lurks behind the cheery images of 1930s-era red barns and white picket fences. Director Robert Kenner is bent on showing us a far grimmer reality. He tells of dust-choked poultry houses where chickens never see the light of day and are pumped so full of chemicals they produce more meat than their organs can support. Eventually they collapse under the weight of their abnormally large breasts and die before reaching the slaughterhouse. He shows us industrial feed lots where cows are fattened on chemical-enhanced feed and forced to spend their days standing ankle-deep in manure. Kenner relates the heart-wrenching story of Republican-turned-activist Barbara Kowalcyk, who prowls the halls of Congress with her mother to try to force lawmakers to enact food safety legislation that she believes could have saved the life of her 2 1/2-year-old son Kevin, who died of E. coli poisoning 12 days after eating contaminated hamburgers...SouthCoast

Song Of The Day #057

One of the originators of commercial western music was the Sons Of The Pioneers. The group was formed in 1933 and they signed a recording contract with Decca in 1934. The group at that time was Leonard Slye (Roy Rogers), Bob Nolan, Tim Spencer and Hugh Farr (they later added Hugh Farr's brother Karl). Slye, Nolan & Spencer handled vocals and Slye played rhythm guitar, Nolan standup Bass and Farr the fiddle.

I once heard Rogers interviewed on the radio and I remember two stories from it.

Rogers said Nolan was scheduled for an audition and when Rogers opened the door Nolan was standing there barefooted with his shoes in his hand. Nolan had a job as a lifeguard and didn't wear shoes very often, but he had bought a new pair for the audition. He also didn't have enough money to pay for all of the bus ride to the audition site. Nolan rode the bus as far as his money would take him and then had to walk the rest of the way. The new shoes were killing his feet and he had to remove them. That's why he was standing there all dressed up for the audition, but barefooted with his shoes in his hand.

Rogers also said that at a low point in their career they found themselves completely broke and stuck in Roswell, NM. They played on the local radio station and soon learned that if they mentioned their favorite food on the program, the local folks would make sure they got some by delivering it to the radio station.

I guess we can thank the good folks in Chavez County for not letting the boys starve out early in their career.

Today's selection on the Radio Ranch is their 1934 recording Hold Them Down. It can be found on their 5 CD collection Songs of the Prairie.

Pilot Protests Customs 'Check'

Baja Bush Pilots, a group representing pilots who frequently fly to Mexico, is polling members to see if any have had an encounter with Customs and Border Protection agents similar to the experience of Long Beach, Calif. pilot David Perry and his three passengers a couple of weeks ago. In a podcast interview with AVweb, Perry says he was going through his pre-start checklist for a flight to Loreto, Mexico on May 22 when his Cessna 210 was suddenly surrounded by yelling CBP agents and local airport police, weapons drawn (the Customs agents had M-16s) who ordered them out of the airplane. "They were yelling at us to put our hands on our heads," said Perry, a retired military officer who said he makes frequent flights to his second home in Loreto. What followed was almost an hour of interrogation and searches for what was apparently a "random check" according to the senior agent in charge of the operation Perry said. "I couldn't believe I was in the United States," Perry said...Perry said he's since heard from another pilot who told him armed CBP agents in cars and a helicopter surrounded his aircraft on arrival at Long Beach on a flight from Texas. Perry said he's not opposed to security checks but he considered the agents unnecessarily threatening and aggressive for a random check. He also said the drawn weapons, besides terrifying him and his passengers, needlessly put them at risk. After the incident, he was cleared to resume the flight. It seems likely the agents knew when to intercept the flight based on the Electronic Advance Passenger Information System (eAPIS) which, under recently adopted regulations, requires pilots of all cross-border flights to provide detailed information on the flight and the identities of passengers...AVweb

Seventy Percent of Americans Can't Leave the Country, Clinton & Bush Unaware

Do you feel safer today? Let's hope so, since you're certainly less free to travel about the Northern Hemisphere. Beginning just after midnight, every American returning from Canada, Mexico, and various island paradises now have to flash a U.S. passport to get back in the country. For the 70 percent of citizens who don't have passports, that means a minimum four to six weeks waiting time (and probably more, given the new filing rush) to legally escape the national boundaries...Matt Welch

What passport? Rule surprises Bush, Clinton Bill Clinton and George W. Bush admitted yesterday they had no idea the U.S. was implementing a new rule Monday that would require Canadians and Americans to have passports to cross the border. The former presidents were caught off guard during a 90-minute joint appearance in Toronto when moderator Frank McKenna, the former Canadian ambassador to the U.S., spoke about how Canadians feel slighted by the new rule. "I'll be frank with you Frank, I don't know about the passport issue," Bush told the crowd of 6,000. "I thought we were making good progress on using a driver's licence to cross the border. What happened to the E-Z card?" Clinton said he'd only heard about the passport requirement a day earlier, adding that in all likelihood most Americans were completely unaware of it as well...

House curbs 'virtual strip searches' at airports

The Transportation Security Agency's plans to use X-rays to peek under air travelers' clothes may soon be shelved. In a 310-118 vote on Thursday, the U.S. House of Representatives approved legislation that curbs the growing use of what critics call "virtual strip searches" at airport checkpoints. Privacy groups say that the low-energy backscatter X-rays allow "a highly realistic image to be reconstructed... of the traveler's nude form" that's "detailed enough to show genitalia." The TSA, on the other hand, says it has made improvements to its scanning technology including a "privacy algorithm" that will provide the operator with vaguer outlines of body parts. The House vote attached an amendment drafted by Rep. Jason Chaffetz, a Utah Republican, to a broader TSA bill. Chaffetz's amendment says that whole body imaging "may not be used" as the primary method of passenger screening, and that passengers have the right to refuse it and "shall be offered a pat-down search" as an alternative. It also prohibits the storage or transmission of the whole-body images after they're no longer necessary for screening...cnetnews

Obama attacks online poker, freezes accounts

Widespread but previously unverified reports of a Department of Justice-ordered seizure against three bank accounts operated by online poker sites servicing US players have now been confirmed, with the Poker Players Alliance announcing that as much as $33 million in temporarily frozen funds may be involved. The seizure centers on a rumored 24,000 accounts involving customers of Full Tilt, PokerStars and one other site. Three separate banks were involved in the seizure, with the order emanating from the United States District Court of Southern New York. That U.S. district court has been at the focal point of Department of Justice efforts against various online gambling concerns and online-poker sites, which the DoJ maintains are illegal, though no case involving online poker has ever been tried. While the DoJ based its seizures here under the 1961 Wire Act , poker-only sites such as those affected by this latest order have long maintained that online poker is not covered by the cited laws. In fact, the latest seizures represent the first time that the United States' DoJ has attempted an action against entities associated only with online poker, as opposed to sportsbetting or casino gaming concerns...pokernews

Damn, you can't play poker, you can't bury your pet turtle, what's next?

Man Hopes to Cash In On Speed Camera Law

Steven Forage, a software salesman who spends at least five hours a day in his car, juggles a lot on the road: finalizing deals over the phone, sipping coffee, checking e-mail. One thing he no longer worries about, though, is speed cameras. "Fuzz alert," an electronic voice called out from the console of his Cadillac recently as it approached a speed enforcement camera in Montgomery County. At 300 feet, another warning: "Ding, ding. Ding, ding. Fuzz alert." "It helps you conform," Forage said of the warning system. "If you've forgotten where the cameras are, or get distracted, it refocuses you." The system, known as PhantomAlert, feeds the locations of speed cameras and red-light cameras into standard Global Positioning System devices and prompts the devices to warn drivers when they are near one. PhantomAlert has subscribers throughout the nation, including more than 2,000 in the Washington region, said the company's owner, District resident Joseph Scott. Scott said he expects that number to rise because of a new Maryland law that permits cameras, now allowed only in Montgomery, to be installed in work zones and near schools throughout the state. "It's going to be very good for us," he said. Scott said police should be thrilled by PhantomAlert, particularly because officials say speed cameras are designed not to generate money but to slow drivers...WPost

Reckon he'll get any "stimulus" money to expand his business and create jobs?

Justice Department Admits New Mistakes in Evidence Handling

Attorney General Eric Holder asked a court Thursday to release two imprisoned former Alaska state lawmakers after the Justice Department found prosecutors improperly handled evidence in their trials on corruption charges. The move is the second embarrassing retreat for Justice Department prosecutors since the conviction of former Alaska Sen. Ted Stevens was tossed out of court in April. That prompted an internal inquiry into the government lawyers who handled the Stevens case, and officials said Thursday there also would be an investigation of how the cases of the two Alaska state lawmakers were handled. Most of the prosecution team is the same for all three cases.
Now, Holder is asking a federal appeals court to send the cases of former Alaska House Speaker Peter Kott and former state Rep. Victor Kohring back to the trial judge. The attorney general made the request after finding prosecutors had failed to turn over evidence to the defense...AP

Some Colleges Bar Even Talking About Right to Bear Arms, Gun Advocates Say

The First Amendment guarantees Americans the right to free speech. The Second Amendment guarantees the right to possess firearms. Now the first two clauses in the Bill of Rights have come together in an ongoing debate over the right of college students to advocate that they be allowed to carry guns on campus. The bloody massacres at Virginia Tech and Columbine High School, as well as smaller campus shootings across the country in the last decade, have fomented a lively debate over whether citizens should be allowed to carry concealed weapons to defend themselves on campus. But that debate has hit a wall of resistance from school officials in some places, bringing into focus the dual issues of gun rights and free speech. Many gun-rights advocates are arguing that college campuses, which are supposed to be open to diversity of thought, provocative dialogue, politics and protest, are hardly bastions of free speech when it comes to discussing firearms. "The fact is, the topic is so explosive," said Robert Shibley, spokesman for the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE), which tracks discriminatory practices against students involved in conservative issues on campus. They've been dealing with "more and more" complaints about efforts to "squelch gun speech," he said...FoxNews

Tenn. Lawmakers Approve Allowing Guns in Bars

Handguns will soon be allowed in bars and restaurants in Tennessee under a new law passed by state legislators who voted to override the governor's veto. The legislation that takes effect July 14 retains an existing ban on consuming alcohol while carrying a handgun, and restaurant owners can still opt to ban weapons from their establishments. Thirty-seven other states have similar laws. The state Senate voted 21-9 on Thursday against Democratic Gov. Phil Bredesen's veto, a day after the House also voted 69-27 to override...AP

Kentucky pastor holding bring your guns to church day

A Kentucky pastor is inviting his flock to bring guns to church to celebrate Independence Day and the Second Amendment. New Bethel Church is welcoming "responsible handgun owners" to wear their firearms inside the church June 27, a Saturday. An ad says there will be a handgun raffle, patriotic music and information on gun safety. "We're just going to celebrate the upcoming theme of the birth of our nation," Pastor Ken Pagano said. "We're not ashamed to say that there was a strong belief in God and firearms - without that this country wouldn't be here." The guns must be unloaded and private security will check visitors at the door, Mr. Pagano said. Kentucky allows residents to openly carry guns in public with some restrictions. Gun owners carrying concealed weapons must have state-issued permits and can't take them to schools, jails or bars, among other exceptions. Mr. Pagano's Protestant church, which attracts up to 150 people to Sunday services, is a member of the Assemblies of God. The former Marine and handgun instructor said he expected some backlash, but has heard only a "little bit" of criticism of the gun event...AP

'Unabomber' fights plans to auction his possessions

Convicted "Unabomber" Ted Kaczynski, who terrorized the country with a series of mail bombs over nearly two decades, is fighting to stop a public auction of his diaries and other personal possessions. But Kaczynski's five-year legal battle will come to an end soon unless he can convince the U.S. Supreme Court to review the case. "I regard him as the essence of evil. He's evil and amoral. He has no compassion," said Dr. Charles Epstein, who was seriously injured in 1993 when a bomb went off in a piece of mail he opened at his home. The blast destroyed both of Epstein's eardrums, and he lost parts of three of his fingers. Epstein, 75, is a world-renowned geneticist and retired professor at the University of California at San Francisco. He is one of four victims who are owed $15 million in court-ordered restitution from Kaczynski, and he told CNN the auction was important to victims. "Who would think that we would still be sitting, this many years later, still having dealings ... with the man who tried to kill us?" Epstein said...CNN

High-Stakes Quest for Permission to Pollute

During the final days of the drafting of a 946-page climate bill, Rep. Gene Green (D-Tex.) won support for an amendment that deleted a single word and inserted two others. The words could be worth millions of dollars to U.S. oil refiners. The Green amendment deleted the word "sources" and inserted "emission points." In the arcane world of climate legislation, that tiny bit of editing might one day give petroleum refiners valuable rights to emit carbon dioxide when it otherwise might not have been allowed. Refiners could get the extra allowances in return for cutting carbon emissions by 50 percent at a single point of a vast refinery complex instead of slashing emissions by 50 percent for the entire facility. The tweak was just one of many in a complex cap-and-trade bill designed to limit U.S. emissions of greenhouse gases that contribute to climate change. An item inserted at the behest of Rep. John D. Dingell (D-Mich.) would give the auto industry $1.4 billion worth of extra allowances starting in 2012 when the cap-and-trade system takes effect, according to an estimate by the Union of Concerned Scientists. The Center for Public Integrity said its review of Senate disclosure records showed that more than 880 businesses and interest groups have registered to lobby on climate change in the first quarter of 2009..WPost

There was a lot of hype about "change" coming to D.C. This looks like the same old stuff to me.

Conoco’s Mulva: Waxman-Markey ‘Unfair’ to Refiners

ConocoPhillips, unlike some of its peers in the oil patch, tried to play ball and help shape U.S. climate policy. Conoco, a charter member of the U.S. Climate Action Partnership, publicly called for the type of cap-and-trade program Congress has just produced. “It’s important to have a seat at the table,” Conoco chief executive James Mulva said in an interview, defending his company’s decision to lobby for federal action on climate change. The problem is, Mr. Mulva’s not happy with what’s being served. The oil industry and plenty of outside observers figure the Waxman-Markey climate bill gives the electricity industry too much and the transportation sector too little. In other words, for all its 1,000 complicated pages, the bill boils down to a glorified gas tax. That’s got Mr. Mulva and other oil executives steaming. Waxman-Markey would give oil refiners just 2% of the free emissions permits being handed out; the electricity sector, in contrast, would receive 35% of the permits...WSJ

States or Feds: Who gets to regulate hydraulic fracturing?

A controversial process used in natural gas drilling, and crucial to the Barnett Shale’s development, is at the center of a tug-of-war dispute between the energy industry and some legislators over whether hydraulic fracturing should be regulated by the state or the federal government. A recent push by federal legislators to repeal the Energy Policy Act of 2005 could mean companies that employ hydraulic fracturing, a means of stimulating and opening up a well, would have to answer to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s Safe Drinking Water Act about the chemicals they use in the injection process. Legislators and other concerned parties, including environmental groups, are worried the chemicals used – many of which are harmful to humans and other species – could seep into underground water tables and contaminate water supply. The industry argues there haven’t been any instances of contamination to date and federal oversight would impede natural gas and oil development by adding increased permitting requirements and economic burdens...Fort Worth Business Press

GHG lawsuit involving BLM oil and gas leases moves forward

A lawsuit challenging four Bureau of Land Management lease sales in Montana on climate change grounds will go forward after a federal judge last week rejected the agency's arguments that climate impacts should not be considered in leasing decisions. Two environmental groups -- WildEarth Guardians and Earthworks' Oil & Gas Accountability Project -- are challenging BLM's leasing of 40,000 acres of federal lands, saying the agency ignored a 2001 order from then-Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt requiring the agency to examine effects associated with climate. Specifically, the groups say BLM failed to consider releases of methane, a potent greenhouse gas. Although Babbitt's successor, Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne, modified the order during the waning days of the Bush administration, plaintiffs argued that the rule was still in effect when the four Montana leases targeted in the lawsuit were issued in 2008. BLM argued that the 2001 order could not be judicially reviewed or enforced in federal court. But last week, U.S. District Judge Donald Molloy in Montana rejected BLM's motion to dismiss the lawsuit, clearing the way for the lawsuit to proceed...WBR

Big cut in emission credits to farmers and landowners could hinder climate bill

Plans to cut greenhouse gas emissions have been sold to farm groups as a potential cash cow for growers, but new government estimates suggest farmers would make a lot less money than previously believed. Citing changes in farm practices and energy policy, analysts at the Environmental Protection Agency have sharply lowered their estimates of the potential carbon credits for which farmers and landowners would likely qualify. That could make it more difficult than it already is for Democrats and the Obama administration to sell a climate bill to farm-state members of the House and Senate. The bill Democrats are pushing through the House would allow farmers, landowners and others to get payments for up to a billion tons worth of annual reductions of carbon emissions through measures such as planting trees, leaving crop residue in the soil or using manure gas to generate electricity. The credits would be sold to utilities, refiners and others that would be required to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions. However, in an analysis of the bill's impact, the Environmental Protection Agency said the billion-ton cap won't be reached, and that there will be very few emission credits at all for agricultural practices...DesMoinesRegister

Save a Tree Hug a Capitalist

I don’t think there is anything that pisses off eco-socialists more than a free market answer to their problem of climate change. They simply don’t know how to respond. Since capitalism is their true antichrist it certainly can’t be the answer to their ostensible reason for whining. Take for example CEI adjunct scholar Dan Sutter’s proposed plan of action which is both free market and would achieve some of the environmentalists’ stated goals. In his recently released paper, Sutter argues that allowing insurance companies to charge actuarially adequate rates (meaning people pay more for riskier decisions such as living on a beach) will encourage people to make safer choices and discourage development of environmentally sensitive areas like wetlands, riversides, and beachfronts. It would simply cost too much money for people to build there. This would reverse the decades long policy of government “helping” people who choose to live in these areas by subsidizing them and forcing insurers to keep rates low for those people (which ironically means that insurers have to charge everyone else more in order make sure they can pay claims when the time comes). These subsidies and low rates encouraged people to keep putting their homes and families directly in harms way and keep damaging the areas environmentalists claim should remain undeveloped...Open Market

Forest Service cuts grazing

Cattle grazing on Lower Hermosa Creek will have fewer days to fatten up under new rules adopted by the San Juan Public Lands Center. The new adaptive management strategies that restrict cattle grazing - announced May 28 - were not made lightly, said Rowdy Wood, range land management specialist for the Columbine Ranger district. The 122,000-acre area north of Durango includes the Dutch Creek, Elbert Creek and Upper Hermosa grazing allotments. About 900 cattle are permitted to graze on the three allotments annually, Wood said. According to the report, it found the effect of cattle grazing on the landscape hurt the natural resources of the area and was affecting the Canadian lynx habitat and other wildlife. The ranchers who use the land plan to appeal the final decision, said Phil Craig, whose cattle graze in the Dutch Creek area. He said the 25-day cut won't make a difference about how it affects the land, but even a 10-day cut at the beginning of the season hurts the summer hay production. "The reason the permits are there is so we can raise the hay in the summertime," he said. The earlier you start growing, the more production of hay you get for the winter, he said. "If you graze those fields off for a week to 10 days, you really won't get the quantity of hay you need for the winter," Craig said...DurangoHeraldNews

Idaho Court Grazing Decision Adds To Economic Woes, Fails To See Whole Picture

In an ongoing effort to eliminate grazing and other uses of public lands, Western Watersheds Project (WWP) challenged 18 Environmental Impact Statements (EISs) prepared by 18 separate Bureau of Land Management (BLM) offices in six different Western states. The BLM and stakeholders immediately filed a motion to dismiss parts of the complaint and asked that the case be handled separately in U.S. Courts in each of the affected states, rather than as one large lawsuit. In early May, Judge B. Lynn Winmill, Chief U.S. District Judge, ordered that the motion be granted in part and denied in part in a decision that ultimately unfairly favors the original complaint. “The judge looked at this as a decision simply about sage grouse and failed to see the whole picture, that this is a range resource and habitat issue,” said Dan Gralian, President of the Nevada Cattlemen’s Association. “As ranchers, we work with agencies like the BLM to manage our public lands responsibly. Sweeping attacks and generalizations like this case misuse stakeholders’ time, take our agency folks away from their real jobs of managing the land and wastes taxpayers’ money.” “You simply can’t paint 25 million acres of the Western United States with the same broad brush as Judge Winmill has in this case,” said John O’Keeffe, Chair of the Oregon Cattlemen’s Association Public Lands Committee. Making the BLM waste federal resources on paperwork, legal fees and defending their efforts to protect threatened species ultimately does not protect the environment, sage grouse or rangelands.”...cattlenetwork

U.S. wildfire effort faulted for leaving communities unprotected

While more than 1,000 homes across the West burn each year in forest and brush fires, only a fraction of federal efforts to reduce fire danger in the region has been concentrated in the communities at greatest risk, a group of scientists found. The scientists analyzed a database containing the locations of all 44,613 fuel-reduction projects undertaken in Western states by various federal agencies under the National Fire Plan from its start in 2000 through 2008. They found that only 3 percent of those projects were within what is known as the wildland-urban interface -- areas where suburban and rural homes meet forests and rangelands. The National Fire Plan is a program that is intended to reduce the risk of wildfire to communities. The scientists found that 11 percent of those fuel-reduction projects were within an area that includes the wildland-urban interface plus a 1.5-mile buffer strip around it. That is far short of the 50 percent goal set by the Healthy Forests Restoration Act of 2003, which was supposed to help control the $1 billion regularly spent each year fighting wildfires. Wildfires burned 5.3 million acres in the U.S. in 2008...AP

Energy Department Fails its Own Energy Audit

Promoting energy efficiency is atop the Department of Energy’s charge for spending $38.7 billion of stimulus funds. Too bad the department has had trouble promoting energy efficiency within its own walls. The department’s inspector general recently released the results of an audit showing that the DOE has failed to run its own computer systems in an environmentally responsible manner. Apparently, some of the folks at the national labs dreaming up new ways to save energy in the future are really bad at turning off their computer monitors in the present...All told, the auditors estimated that DOE could save more than $1.5 million annually on energy bills if the staff just implemented the government’s own power-saving guidelines. And that’s just at the seven facilities surveyed, the report noted. Department-wide the savings could be greater...WSJ

FAA Official Charged $3,700 Eye Surgery to His Government Credit Card

An employee of the Federal Aviation Administration charged a $3,700 eye surgery on his government credit card, according to a report on government credit card usage completed last month by the Congressional Research Service. This FAA official may have been outdone, however, by a Defense Department official who sought and received reimbursement for thirteen airline tickets worth almost $10,000 that he never purchased, or the State Department official who bought an unauthorized first-class ticket to Hawaii on his government charge card. State Department officials, in fact, have become accustomed to travelling in relative luxury on tickets charged on government credit cards. According to the Congressional Research Service report, almost half of the airline tickets purchased by the State Department, an audit discovered, were for first-class or business-class seats. Government protocol, however, strictly limits when such seats can be legitimately purchased by department personnel...CNSNews

Greening the Herds: A New Diet to Cap Gas

Chewing her cud on a recent sunny morning, Libby, a 1,400-pound Holstein, paused to do her part in the battle against global warming, emitting a fragrant burp. Libby, age 6, and the 74 other dairy cows on Guy Choiniere’s farm here are at the heart of an experiment to determine whether a change in diet will help them belch less methane, a potent heat-trapping gas that has been linked to climate change. Since January, cows at 15 farms across Vermont have had their grain feed adjusted to include more plants like alfalfa and flaxseed — substances that, unlike corn or soy, mimic the spring grasses that the animals evolved long ago to eat. As of the last reading in mid-May, the methane output of Mr. Choiniere’s herd had dropped 18 percent. Meanwhile, milk production has held its own. Sweetening cow breath is a matter of some urgency, climate scientists say. Cows have digestive bacteria in their stomachs that cause them to belch methane, the second-most-significant heat-trapping emission associated with global warming after carbon dioxide. Although it is far less common in the atmosphere than carbon dioxide, it has 20 times the heat-trapping ability. Frank Mitloehner, a University of California, Davis, professor who places cows in air-tight tent enclosures and measures what he calls their “eruptions,” says the average cow expels — through burps mostly, but some flatulence — 200 to 400 pounds of methane a year. More broadly, with worldwide production of milk and beef expected to double in the next 30 years, the United Nations has called livestock one of the most serious near-term threats to the global climate...NYTimes

Denver Post: Put off plan to track U.S. meat

The Obama administration wants to create a federally mandated system of tracking the nation's meat supply, but producers say such a requirement would swell food costs and cut profits. It's an important debate, but we question its timing. The middle of a recession seems a poor time to implement a system that could raise food prices for shoppers and cuts profits and salaries for American ranchers and their employees. Presently, cattle ranchers, sheepherders and hog farmers voluntarily tag their animals and keep track of the animals' immunizations through a unique identification number. The ID number is recorded at the feedlots, slaughterhouses and within the batch numbers of the boxes of steaks, shanks and slabs of bacon sent to market. We think market-savvy ranchers ought to start implementing computer tracking on their own. Growers say the cost of the registration and tracking gear would add $10 to $20 to each head of cattle, according to The Post's Michael Booth. That's huge compared to the $40 to $50 per-cow profit margin growers hope to reap...DenverPost

Pew takes on farm antibiotics with D.C. ads

The twenty- and thirty-somethings who run the legislative branch of government - men and women otherwise known as congressional aides - are being greeted this month with ads attacking the livestock industry’s use of antibiotics. The ads, which are placed in the two Metro stations nearest the U.S. Capitol include messages such as “Who’s hogging our antibiotics?” and “Drug dependent” superimposed over photos of hogs. The ads also will be in Metro subway cars this month. The ads are the work of the Pew Campaign on Human Health and Industrial Farming, and they’re designed to win support for legislation that would phase out the non-therapeutic use in livestock of antibiotics that are important to human health. The campaign reflects concerns in the medical and scientific community that overusing antibiotics both on farms and in human use is leading to bacterial resistance to the drugs. I saw Pew interns handing out flyers to commuters outside the Capitol South Metro station this morning...DesMoinesRegister

New book highlights Ghost Ranch

Editor's Note: Hamilton's book explores the lives of several farmers across the U.S. who are bucking the industrial ag trend. Below is a look at the contributions of one rancher in Abiquiu, N.M. It's the first Saturday in November, and Ghost Ranch is waking up from its summer sleep. That is, the rangeland at Ghost Ranch. The visitor center's busy season is June through August, but the tens of thousands of acres of open land have been vacant since May. Today, the cattle return. In 1967, Ghost Ranch started a program that allowed local stockmen to graze their cattle on the llano for the winter at subsidized rates. The program was a boon for small producers in the region. Nearly everyone grazes their cows on Forest Service land during summer, but those who don't own irrigated land had always had to search for a place for their cattle between October and May. Ghost Ranch quickly became an integral part of their survival as cattlemen. The program has had up to 55 ranchers at a time, but there are fewer people in the business now, especially since the drought. This winter there will be about 40 stockmen in the program, mostly with fewer than 15 animals. For the season, all of their cattle live as one herd of 600...AlterNet

Kansas Horse Positive for Rabies

A horse in Kansas has tested positive for rabies, according to an article from the Clay Center Dispatch that was circulated via Pro-MED, a program of the International Society for Infectious Diseases. The equine case is the second report of rabies in Clay County so far this year. The horse's owners and other people with potential exposure are undergoing rabies vaccination as a precaution. No further information was available. The American Association of Equine Practitioners includes rabies as a core vaccine in its vaccination guidelines. Vaccination of domestic animals, including horses and other livestock, is an important part of preventing human exposure to the virus...TheHorse

Song Of The Day #056

No time to write much this morning. Most should know Patsy Montana who's big hit was I Want To Be A Cowboy's Sweetheart. Today we will feature her singing Cowboy Rhythm, which is available on her 27-songs CD The Original Cowboy's Sweetheart.

Senator Udalls Surface Owners Amendment To Be Voted On Tomorrow in Senator Bingaman's Committee

From: Caren [mailto:nmcga@nmagriculture.org]
Sent: Monday, June 08, 2009 4:19 PM
Subject: Call Senator Bingaman to support amendment to protect surface owners!!! Vote is tomrorrow JUNE 9!

The Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, chaired by New Mexico’s Senior Senator Jeff Bingaman, is scheduled to vote tomorrow, Tuesday, June 9, on an amendment (that)would help protect private landowners who face serious damage to their land when the federal oil and gas beneath their property is leased and drilled by oil and gas companies.

Senator Mark Udall's surface owner protection amendment would:

• Ensure that landowners are notified before the minerals beneath their land are leased.
• Require oil and gas operators to negotiate surface use agreements that minimize damages to the surface, reclaim the site, and compensate landowners for damages - or post bonds to ensure the same.

The Committee is closely divided on this issue, which means that the amendment could pass or fail by a single vote.

Please take just a moment and call or email Senator Bingaman to voice your support for this IMPORTANT amendment.

Senator Jeff Bingaman / http://www.bingaman.senate.gov/contact/types/email-issue.cfm
202.224.5521

If you know folks in other states who have senators on the Committee, please ask them to their senators too!

Here are the Committee Members
________________________________________


Chairman Jeff Bingaman (NM)
Byron L. Dorgan (ND)
Ron Wyden (OR)
Tim Johnson (SD)
Mary L. Landrieu (LA)
Maria Cantwell (WA)
Robert Menendez (NJ)
Blanche Lincoln (AR)
Bernard Sanders (VT)
Evan Bayh (IN)
Debbie Stabenow (MI)
Mark Udall (CO)
Jeanne Shaheen (NH)

Lisa Murkowski (AK)
Richard Burr (NC)
John Barrasso (WY)
Sam Brownback (KS)
James E. Risch (ID)
John McCain (AZ)
Robert Bennett (UT)
Jim Bunning (KY)
Jeff Sessions (AL)
Bob Corker (TN)
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

This is an important issue that Bill Humphries and others have been working on for years. It deserves everyone's support.

Below is the text of the amendment:

AMENDMENT NO.llll Calendar No.lll
Purpose: To require an operator to compensate a surface
owner for damages resulting from the oil and gas operations
of the operator on land affected by the operations.
IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES—111th Cong., 1st Sess.
(no.) lllllll
(title) llllllllllllllllllllllllllllll
lllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllll
Referred to the Committee on llllllllll and
ordered to be printed
Ordered to lie on the table and to be printed
AMENDMENT intended to be proposed by Mr. UDALL of
Colorado
Viz:
1 At the appropriate place, insert the following:
SEC. ll2 . SPLIT ESTATE.
3 (a) IN GENERAL.—Section 17 of the Mineral Leasing
4 Act (30 U.S.C. 226) is amended by adding at the end the
5 following:
6 ‘‘(q) SPLIT ESTATES.—
7 ‘‘(1) DEFINITIONS.—In this subsection:
8 ‘‘(A) COVERED LAND.—The term ‘covered
9 land’ means land with respect to which—
2
O:\END\END09A57.xml S.L.C.
1 ‘‘(i) title to oil and gas resources is
2 held by the United States; but
3 ‘‘(ii) title to the surface estate is not
4 held by the United States.
5 ‘‘(B) LEASE.—The term ‘lease’ means a
6 lease issued by the Secretary under this Act
7 that provides for the development of oil and gas
8 resources (including coalbed methane) on cov9
ered land.
10 ‘‘(C) LESSEE.—The term ‘lessee’ means
11 the holder of a lease for the development of oil
12 and gas resources on covered land.
13 ‘‘(D) OIL AND GAS OPERATIONS.—The
14 term ‘oil and gas operations’ means all activi15
ties affecting the interest of a surface owner in
16 covered land that are associated with explo17
ration, drilling, or production of oil and gas,
18 through final reclamation of the affected sur19
face.
20 ‘‘(E) OPERATOR.—The term ‘operator’
21 means a person with the legal right to conduct
22 oil and gas operations on covered land.
23 ‘‘(F) SECRETARY.—The term ‘Secretary’
24 means the Secretary of the Interior.
3
O:\END\END09A57.xml S.L.C.
1 ‘‘(G) SURFACE OWNER.—The term ‘sur2
face owner’ means a person who holds legal or
3 equitable title, as demonstrated in the records
4 of the applicable county clerk or other local gov5
ernment official, to the surface of the covered
6 land on which the operator has the right to con7
duct oil and gas operations.
8 ‘‘(2) COMPENSATION AND RECLAMATION.—
9 ‘‘(A) IN GENERAL.—An operator shall
10 compensate the surface owner for damages re11
sulting from the oil and gas operations of the
12 operator on land affected by the operations
13 from—
14 ‘‘(i) loss of agricultural production
15 and income;
16 ‘‘(ii) lost land value;
17 ‘‘(iii) lost use of and lost access to the
18 land of the surface owner; and
19 ‘‘(iv) the lost value of improvements.
20 ‘‘(B) RECLAMATION.—An operator shall
21 reclaim the surface affected by the oil and gas
22 operations of the operator.
23 ‘‘(3) NOTICE OF OPERATIONS.—
24 ‘‘(A) PRIOR TO INITIAL ENTRY.—Prior to
25 initial entry for activities that do not disturb
4
O:\END\END09A57.xml S.L.C.
1 the surface, the operator shall make good faith
2 efforts to provide notice to the surface owner.
3 ‘‘(B) OPERATIONS.—Prior to commencing
4 oil and gas operations, the operator shall make
5 good faith efforts to provide not less than 30
6 days notice to the surface owner with sufficient
7 disclosure of the planned operations to enable
8 the surface owner to evaluate the effect of the
9 operations.
10 ‘‘(4) SURFACE USE AGREEMENT.—
11 ‘‘(A) SURFACE USE AGREEMENT.—At the
12 time of providing notice of operations under
13 paragraph (3)(B), the operator shall provide to
14 the surface owner a proposed surface use agree15
ment that—
16 ‘‘(i) to the extent known, specifies—
17 ‘‘(I) facilities, terms of ingress
18 and egress, and proposed reclamation;
19 and
20 ‘‘(II) actions to minimize surface
21 damages to the land; and
22 ‘‘(ii) includes an offer of compensation
23 for damages to the surface affected by oil
24 and gas operations.
25 ‘‘(B) PROCEDURE.—
5
O:\END\END09A57.xml S.L.C.
1 ‘‘(i) IN GENERAL.—Not later than 30
2 days after the date of receipt of the pro3
posed surface use agreement, the surface
4 owner may accept or reject the agreement.
5 ‘‘(ii) FAILURE TO ACCEPT.—Failure
6 to accept the agreement during the 30 day7
period described in clause (i) shall be con8
sidered a rejection of the agreement.
9 ‘‘(C) NEGOTIATIONS.—The surface owner
10 and operator may enter into negotiations re11
garding the surface use agreement.
12 ‘‘(D) AGREEMENT.—The operator and the
13 surface owner may enter into a mutually ac14
ceptable agreement that specifies the rights and
15 obligations of the parties with respect to the
16 surface activities conducted by the operator.
17 ‘‘(5) ENTRY WITHOUT AGREEMENT; BOND.—
18 ‘‘(A) IN GENERAL.—If no surface use
19 agreement has been executed within 30 days
20 after the date on which the surface owner re21
ceives the proposed agreement under paragraph
22 (4)(A), the operator may enter the property of
23 the surface owner and conduct oil and gas oper24
ations as provided in this section.
6
O:\END\END09A57.xml S.L.C.
1 ‘‘(B) FINANCIAL ASSURANCE.—The oper2
ator shall provide an appropriate financial as3
surance, as determined by the Secretary, prior
4 to commencing operations under this para5
graph.
6 ‘‘(C) RELEASE OF FINANCIAL ASSUR7
ANCE.—The Secretary shall provide for the ap8
propriate release of the financial assurance on
9 a determination that—
10 ‘‘(i) the reclamation is complete; and
11 ‘‘(ii) the surface owner has been com12
pensated for any damages.
13 ‘‘(6) NOTICE OF SECRETARIAL ACTION WITH
14 RESPECT TO FEDERAL LEASES.—The Secretary
15 shall make reasonable efforts to provide to each sur16
face owner of affected covered land, and to each per17
mittee or right-of-way holder with the right to use
18 the surface of affected Federal land, written notice
19 of—
20 ‘‘(A) any lease sale for an oil or gas lease
21 under this Act by not later than 30 days before
22 the date of the lease sale; and
23 ‘‘(B) the issuance of a drilling permit by
24 not later than 5 days before the date of
25 issuance.
7
O:\END\END09A57.xml S.L.C.
1 ‘‘(7) RELATIONSHIP TO STATE LAW.—Nothing
2 in this subsection preempts any applicable State
3 law.’’.
4 (b) REGULATIONS.—Not later than 180 days after
5 the date of enactment of this Act, the Secretary of the
6 Interior shall promulgate such regulations as are nec7
essary to carry out the amendment made by subsection
8 (a).

Colo. land prices luring Amish

A new road sign cautions drivers to watch for Amish horse-drawn carriages in the valley beneath Colorado's Sangre de Cristo mountains. Highway pull-offs and dedicated horse-and-buggy paths are in the works. Amid the serenity and isolation of southern Colorado, hamlets like Westcliffe, La Jara and Monte Vista are welcoming Amish families who are moving West to escape high land prices and community overcrowding back East in Indiana, Ohio and Pennsylvania. "The reason we moved out West is the farm land is a little bit cheaper and it's not as heavily populated, a little more open space and a little more opportunity for young people to get started with their own farms," said Ben Coblentz, a 47-year-old alfalfa farmer from Indiana. "The general public seems to have a little slower pace of life than what it was back East. Everybody here respects us." Of an estimated 231,000 Amish nationwide, more than 60 percent still live in Ohio, Pennsylvania and Indiana. But from 2002 to 2008, Colorado's Amish population went from zero to more than 400, according to the Young Center for Anabaptist and Pietist Studies at Pennsylvania's Elizabethtown College...Denver Post

NM land grant activists turn to Obama for help

New Mexico land grant activists have sent a letter to President Barack Obama, asking for his help in returning millions of acres of land in the Southwest that Hispanic settlers lost when the United States took over the territory. The letter, sent to the president Wednesday, was signed by Rosita Tijerina, daughter of Reies Lopez Tijerina, who led a 1967 raid on the courthouse in Tierra Amarilla in a land grant dispute, and Andres Valdez, director of the community activist organization, Vecinos United. Their letter said much of the land was taken by the federal government and is now managed by U.S. Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management. Other land, they said, was stolen by "rich white ranchers" from ancestors who could not read or write. AP

Pennsylvania landowners have one week to sell property for 9/11 memorial

The federal government on Friday set a deadline for Pennsylvania landowners who have refused to give up their property so that a memorial to United Airlines Flight 93 can be built. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar told landowners that they have one week to reach sale agreements with the National Park Service before the agency exercises eminent domain to acquire the 500 remaining acres for the memorial, at the site where the hijacked plane crashed on Sept. 11, 2001. On Friday, a delegation that included Salazar and Sen. Arlen Specter (D-Pa.) met with the property owners near Shanksville, a tiny rural town about 80 miles southeast of Pittsburgh. The park service, an agency of the Interior Department, has reached agreements to purchase nearly 1,000 acres from other landowners in the area, but it has failed to persuade the six families that own the rest of the land to sell...LATimes

Those Flight 93 passengers died to protect our freedoms, and as a result of their heroic act their fellow citizens will have their property condemned by the federal government.

What a great way to honor the passengers' bravery. The Politically Superior Ones are wonderful aren't they.

Man Convicted of Littering had Placed Water Jugs On Federal Land for Illegal Immigrants

A Tucson man convicted of littering on federal land said he will continue to leave out water for illegal immigrants walking through the desert, even if that means risking further citations. "We're committed to our humanitarian efforts," said Walt Staton, 27, who was found guilty Wednesday in U.S. District Court of knowingly littering on a national wildlife refuge. Staton, a Web designer and volunteer with the humanitarian group No More Deaths, faces up to one year in prison and a $10,000 fine when he is sentenced Aug. 11 by U.S. District Magistrate Judge Jennifer Guerin. He was cited Dec. 4 for littering when U.S. Border Patrol agents spotted him placing unopened gallon containers of water in the Buenos Aires National Wildlife Refuge southwest of Tucson...ArizonaStar

Whether or not you agree with what Mr. Staton and his group were doing, this case raises some important issues.

First, does the Border Patrol have the authority to cite someone for littering on federal land? Or did they detain Staton until Interior officials arrived? If the Border Patrol has such authority, what other non-immigration federal land law enforcement authority do they have? Can they cite OHVs in the wrong place? Campers? Tressspassing cattle?

Second, what on earth are the priorities of the U.S. Attorney for Arizona? The article says Staton is the second person charged with this infraction and also quotes Staton's attorney as estimating the two-day trial cost the government $50,000 or more. Is this the wisest use of federal dollars and the federal court system?

Are All You Surburbanites Blue?

You may not have noticed, but Hollywood has: you’re miserable. No, really. According to Census Bureau numbers, roughly 75 percent of Americans live in suburbs. And, according to one of last year’s Golden Globe nominees for best picture, that’s eating away at us. “Our whole existence here [in the ’burbs] is based on this great premise that we’re special. That we’re superior to the whole thing,” declares the female lead in the movie “Revolutionary Road.” “But we’re not. We’re just like everyone else. We bought into the same, ridiculous delusion.” That “delusion,” as depicted in the film, is that a couple can be happily married, own a home with some land and raise children together in the suburbs. Indeed, it’s difficult to conceive of such a crazy notion. But never fear, suburbanites. The government will ride to your rescue (if it doesn’t get stuck in heavy traffic on the way). The Department of Transportation and the Department of Housing and Urban Development have teamed up on a new interagency partnership to create what they call “affordable, sustainable communities.” Hint: the communities won’t look like your current cul-de-sac...CNSNews

Rahall eyes oil and gas addition to climate bill but leadership uncertain

House Natural Resources Chairman Nick Rahall (D-W.Va.) hopes to add a major oil and gas title to the Democratic energy and climate bill, but it remains unclear whether he will get the chance as House leaders aim to speed the bill's progress. "I'd prefer to have it attached to the climate bill, because when we're talking about energy, it should be in a comprehensive piece of legislation," Rahall told E&E yesterday. "Now is the time to do it, in a nonpolitical season without the emotions attached there to and at a time when the price of the pump is relatively low compared to where it was when we heard 'drill baby drill'" he added. But the path forward for the proposal is uncertain. The bill has not yet been formally introduced, and Rahall said it is being prepared so that "if asked to include it as part of climate change, we'll be ready rather than go through a crammed session to get it ready." House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) yesterday said she wants committees to act by June 19, and floor debate could begin by the end of this month...NYTimes

Buried Code

THE RUNNING joke in Washington is that nobody has read the 900-plus-page energy bill sponsored by Reps. Henry A. Waxman (D-Calif.) and Edward J. Markey (D-Mass.), which the House will consider in coming weeks. What you hear from its backers is that its cap-and-trade provisions would create a market-based program to reduce greenhouse gas emissions -- which should mean that a simple, systemwide incentive encourages polluters to make the easiest reductions in greenhouse gases first, keeping the costs of fighting global warming to a minimum. In fact, the bill also contains regulations on everything from light bulb standards to the specs on hot tubs, and it will reshape America's economy in dozens of ways that many don't realize. Here is just one: The bill would give the federal government power over local building codes. It requires that by 2012 codes must require that new buildings be 30 percent more efficient than they would have been under current regulations. By 2016, that figure rises to 50 percent, with increases scheduled for years after that. With those targets in mind, the bill expects organizations that develop model codes for states and localities to fill in the details, creating a national code. If they don't, the bill commands the Energy Department to draft a national code itself. States, meanwhile, would have to adopt the national code or one that achieves the same efficiency targets. Those that refuse will see their codes overwritten automatically, and they will be docked federal funds and carbon "allowances" -- valuable securities created elsewhere in the bill that give the holder the right to pollute and can be sold. The Energy Department also could enforce its code itself. Among other things, the policy would demonstrate the new leverage of allocation of allowances as a sort of carbon currency -- leverage this bill would be giving to Congress to direct state behavior...WPost

Levy on international air travel could fund climate change fight

Britain and other rich countries will be asked to accept a compulsory levy on international flight tickets and shipping fuel to raise billions of dollars to help the world's poorest countries adapt to combat climate change. The suggestions come at the start of the second week in the latest round of UN climate talks in Bonn, where 192 countries are starting to negotiate a global agreement to limit and then reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The issue of funding for adaptation is critical to success but the hardest to agree. The aviation levy, which is expected to increase the price of long-haul fares by less than 1%, would raise $10bn (£6.25bn) a year, it is said. It has been proposed by the world's 50 least developed countries. It could be matched by a compulsory surcharge on all international shipping fuel, said Connie Hedegaard, the Danish environment and energy minister who will host the final UN climate summit in December...Guardian

Think twice about 'green' transport, say scientists

You worry a lot about the environment and do everything you can to reduce your carbon footprint -- the emissions of greenhouse gases that drive dangerous climate change. So you always prefer to take the train or the bus rather than a plane, and avoid using a car whenever you can, faithful to the belief that this inflicts less harm to the planet. Well, there could be a nasty surprise in store for you, for taking public transport may not be as green as you automatically think, says a new US study. Its authors point out an array of factors that are often unknown to the public. These are hidden or displaced emissions that ramp up the simple "tailpipe" tally, which is based on how much carbon is spewed out by the fossil fuels used to make a trip. Environmental engineers Mikhail Chester and Arpad Horvath at the University of California at Davis say that when these costs are included, a more complex and challenging picture emerges. In some circumstances, for instance, it could be more eco-friendly to drive into a city -- even in an SUV, the bete noire of green groups -- rather than take a suburban train. It depends on seat occupancy and the underlying carbon cost of the mode of transport...AFP

Northwest's biofuel boom goes bust

In two short years, the Northwest has gone from biofuels boom to biofuels bust. The boom began in August 2007, when Imperium Renewables opened a 100 million-gallon-a-year biodiesel plant near Grays Harbor, Wash. A month later, Pacific Ethanol opened a 40 million-gallon corn ethanol plant in Boardman. In June 2008, Cascade Grain opened a 113 million-gallon corn ethanol plant in Clatskanie. Encouraged by tax breaks and Oregon and Washington standards designed to require biofuels' use, the companies promised environmental benefits on an industrial scale, a quantum leap from smaller-scale producers making fuel from cooking grease and Northwest crops. Nearly 30 more projects were under discussion. Then came this year. In January, Cascade Grain filed for bankruptcy six months after it opened, idling its plant and putting a $20 million loan from the state of Oregon in jeopardy. Imperium, whose grand opening was attended by both Washington senators, idled its Grays Harbor plant indefinitely, laying off 24 workers in March. And Pacific Ethanol, which received $14.6 million in Oregon tax credits for its plant, filed for bankruptcy for five of its subsidiaries last month, including the subsidiary that owns its Boardman plant. It warned that it has enough money to continue operations only through June...Oregonian

University of Idaho had evidence of bighorn disease link, group says

Environmentalists aiming to close the West's public lands to grazing contend a University of Idaho research center had evidence for more than a decade that bighorn sheep can contract deadly diseases from domestic sheep on the open range, despite its coordinator's insistence to the contrary. The UI Caine Veterinary Teaching and Research Center's Marie Bulgin, a ranching advocate who has long denied evidence of open-range transmission, said she didn't know about the studies, though they were conducted by her own scientists starting in 1994. This is a sore subject in Idaho, with U.S. Forest Service managers now considering closing grazing allotments near Hell's Canyon to protect bighorns. Jon Marvel, of Western Watersheds Project, says Bulgin should have known about the evidence, even as she was testifying in federal court and at the Idaho Legislature that no open-range transmission had been documented. AP

Hundreds of farmers face BLM in lawsuit over herbicide, lost crops

When his beets came in patchy, pushing through the soil with misshapen and discolored leaves, Perry Van Tassell did what most farmers would do. He watered more. And more. And more. "They looked like they were thirsty," Van Tassell said. "They looked like they were in a frozen state." It was 2001, and Van Tassell, like most farmers, had hundreds of thousands of dollars invested in his crops. His corn fields stood shorter than his toddler son when they should have been stretching 12 feet high. He came to believe his land had been tainted with Oust, a potent herbicide that kills plants by attacking their roots and leaves. The herbicide had been spread across more than 100,000 acres of nearby public land at the direction of the Bureau of Land Management, which was hoping to prevent the spread of invasive weeds on land that had been scorched by wildfire. But no rains came to melt the herbicide into the soil. The wind picked up. And Van Tassell and more than 130 other farmers claim the powdery herbicide blew across their crops, leaving them with warped plants, barren soil and millions of dollars of debt...AP

23-Year-Old SD Rancher Claims $232.1 Powerball Win

A 23-year-old rancher whose family has fallen behind in their taxes and recently had a mobile home repossessed has claimed a $232.1 million Powerball jackpot. Neal Wanless, who lives on his family's 320-acre ranch near Mission, S.D., bought the winning ticket in the nearby town of Winner late last month during a trip to buy livestock feed. He will take home $88.5 million in a lump sum payment after taxes are deducted. Wanless says his family has been helped by their community and that he "intends to repay that help many times over." He said in a statement issued Friday that he plans to continue ranching, albeit on a larger ranch. He says he recently told his horse, Eleanor, that "It'd be nice if we go for a longer ride than usual on a bigger ranch of our own." AP

Cow-Pooling: Buying Beef in Mega-Bulk

If you prefer to keep the image of meat — say, a juicy hamburger — safely separated from the image of an actual animal — say, a 1,200-lb. castrated bull — then cow-pooling is not for you. Jean Edwards is clearly not squeamish about knowing precisely where her steaks come from. In 2007, she and her husband James, a corrections officer in Vermont, went in with another family to buy a side of grass-fed beef directly from a farmer. The Edwardses wanted naturally raised meat but couldn't afford natural-food-store prices. Not only did cow-pooling prove to be cost-effective but also the meat from Mike Bowen's 900-acre North Hollow Farms, in central Vermont, was so tasty — compared with beef raised on corn in an industrial feedlot — that in the years since, Edwards has purchased an entire side just for her family. On a recent evening, the 43-year-old mother of five loaded her minivan with 250 lb. of beef, butchered and vacuum-packed to her specifications. "Not only am I buying a freezerful of meat, which gives me a kind of secure feeling," she says, "I'm dealing directly with the farmer, which is almost inspirational." At a time when many family incomes are falling, the pressure is on to give up expensive foods like organic produce and grass-fed beef. But thanks to the Internet, cow-pooling is an increasingly popular way to get high-quality non-factory-farm meat without paying about $16 per lb. for a strip steak — the usual price at the Whole Foods Markets of the world...Time

I know a bunch of you are grinnin'. A side of beef is mega-bulk?

500-plus Yellowstone bison hazed, none killed

Roughly 500 to 600 bison that migrated out of Yellowstone National Park last winter are back on their summer feeding grounds, after being hazed into the park by state and federal personnel. Only one migrating bison was killed this winter, by a Montana hunter. The prior winter 1,601 bison were killed, most of them captured and slaughtered to prevent the spread of the disease brucellosis to cattle. The disease causes pregnant cattle, elk and bison to miscarry. About half of Yellowstone bison carry the disease, but there have been no recorded bison to cattle transmissions in the wild. With Yellowstone’s bison population down sharply - about 3,000 now versus 4,700 two years ago - this winter’s migration in search of food at lower elevations was smaller than in recent years. Christian Mackay, the head of the Montana Department of Livestock, said the hazing program lasted about 10 days and pushed the bison into an area about 15 miles inside the park in northeastern Wyoming...AP

You can call it buffalo-pooling, or better yet, mega-hazing...

India clones second buffalo in three months

Indian scientists on Saturday said they have cloned the world's second buffalo just three months after the first one died of pneumonia within a week of its birth. The buffalo calf, named Garima, was born at 11 am at the National Dairy Research Institute (NDRI), Karnal, and weighs about 43 kg, the institute's Director A K Srivastava told PTI. "Garima is absolutely healthy and we are fully optimistic about her survival. A two-member veterinary doctors' team has arrived from the Haryana Agricultural University. Them apart, our own veterinary doctors, led by KPS Tomar, are also looking after her and we are taking all precautions to avoid any mishap," Mr. Srivastava said. The scientists adopted a more advanced technique than that used in producing Dolly -- the sheep that became the first mammal to be cloned. The 'hand-guided cloning technique', perfected by the NDRI scientists, would allow production of calves of a desired sex...HinduNews

It's all Trew: Parade honoring mothers-in-law drew thousands

After more than 500 weekly columns my faithful readers are aware that some articles are true and others may have a Trew twist and a bit of tongue-in-cheek humor. So help me, the following is true, taken from the book, "Amarillo - The Story Of A Western Town." I credit Paul H. Carlson with the story and all is based on published facts. The story begins in the hard, dry, financially troubled year of 1934 when Gene Howe, editor and publisher of the Amarillo Globe-News Corporation and his "Tactless Texan" newspaper column somehow offended his mother-in-law Nellie Donald. She and other mothers-in-law rebelled in retaliation causing such a ruckus that Howe, in humble retreat, announced that on March 5, 1934, Mother-In-Law Day would be celebrated along with the Amarillo Fat Stock Show celebration. First intended as a small local event to placate the offended, the celebration drew national attention when Will Rogers mentioned the upcoming celebration on his national radio show. Hollywood paid attention and sent camera crews down to record the unusual festivities. Mothers-in-law from across the nation including first lady Eleanor Roosevelt sent greetings of varied nature. On the appointed days the celebration filled the hotels as mothers-in-law arrived in droves. A parade down Polk Street drew an estimated 6,000 viewers...Amarillo Globe-News

Song Of The Day #055

This will be western week on our Ranch Radio, and we'll start with Gene Autry. Many may know that during Autry's first years of recording he was a total copy of Jimmie Rodgers, adopting Rodgers blue yodel style of singing. Those recordings are available on the 9 CD Box set That Silver Haired Daddy Of Mine. In today's selection Autry has moved over to western or cowboy music, albeit with a Rodgers-type yodel. Enjoy Autry singing I'll Go Riding Down That Old Texas Trail, available on his Columbia Historic Edition.

Also, for you late-comers, or for those who just want to play these songs again, the entire collection is available on The Westerner. Just stroll down the right column till you see Labels, and there you will find the songs in numerical order.

Cowgirl Sass & Savvy

Grandma's kitchen

Julie Carter

It had been more than 35 years since I first saw it and yet when I looked through the doorway, I could see that nothing of consequence had changed.

The kitchen, lit by a single window over the old single basin sink, stood exactly as it had when I took my first baby girl to spend the day with her grandma.

The same as when, a couple of decades later, that baby girl took her baby to spend the day with his great-grandma.

Look around your life and see what, if anything, has not changed in appearance in 35 years and you can honestly say, "It looks exactly the same."

I absolutely cannot look in the mirror and say that. Sure can't point to the pickup and say that. I have owned about, oh, six or seven since then.

The house - I can't even begin there because I've moved at least a dozen times. Good horses and dogs have come and gone. So have the bad ones.

Fresh paint, a new curtain and new floor tile. That was all that was different in her kitchen. Except, in the interim, they invented microwaves so there was one of those and the old wall rotary dial phone was gone.

The table sat where it always was and the center of it, as before, was filled with napkins, condiments, a silverware holder and an assortment of other things deemed important enough to just stay there.

The old bright white wood cabinets filled the east wall broken only by the sink in the middle. The sink with it's signature Rubbermaid dishpan inside and no cabinet below it, so a curtain covered up those things you put under a sink.

The cabinets went up the wall all the way to meet the 10-foot ceiling and the top row of cupboards could be accessed only by standing on a stool. The very limited counter space was always full of canisters, a bread box, dish drainer, percolator coffee pot and assorted packages of cookies and crackers.

Knick knacks, a corkboard full of keys, a big calendar and grandma-kind of decorations filled the walls.

In any kitchen except Grandma's, it would have been clutter. In her's, it was personality, warmth and comfort.

It was her favorite room and she liked it the very best when it was filled full with family members of all ages and generations laughing, talking and telling stories. Stories like the one about how the refrigerator got a bullet hole in it.

As each generation of grandmas passes on, the matriarchal crown moves a little closer to home.

My mom is a wonderful grandma who has many special things she has shared with her grandchildren. They will each have a little different piece of her in their hearts forever.

When the rolling pin passes, it makes us all put on life's brakes, look around and reflect.

We take just a moment to ponder what legacy we are leaving for those coming behind in our tracks.

Aprons, cookies, hugs and plenty of sympathy. Good smells from the stovetop, bushels of apples to be made into jam, jars of canned fruits and vegetables.

Perhaps mine, or yours, may not look and smell the same as the generations before us.

However, there is something about grandmas that makes each one special to those who love them.

Thank God for grandmas. They keep us grounded in what really counts. Pass the cookies, please.

Julie can be reached for comment at www.julie-carter.com

New Zealand may go bust over Global Warming

Dennis Avery

No country in the world would risk as much for “global warming” as New Zealand if it goes ahead with the cap-and-trade energy taxation installed by Helen Clarke’s now-departed Labour Government.

New Zealand’s economy is almost completely dependent on its farm exports: lamb, dairy products, beef and high-end white wines. Half of New Zealand’s carbon emissions come from cattle and sheep. If New Zealand taxes its cows and sheep hundreds of dollars per animal for methane emissions and manure handling fees, Argentina would almost immediately displace New Zealand’s farm exports. Argentina has more grass, more cattle, the potential for more lambs, a surging wine industry—and no Kyoto obligations.

Based on U.S. and Australian “discussions,” a 500-cow dairy might have to pay $250,000 per year for cattle emissions and manure handling permits, plus a hefty increase in its costs for low-carbon electricity and diesel. An Argentine dairy would pay none of these increased costs—and every dollar of cost differential would be a further incentive for Argentine dairymen to expand their exports at the expense of New Zealand.

That would leave Kiwi cities like Auckland and Christchurch without visible means of support.

I said this recently to several New Zealand government ministers and business leaders at a private dinner in Wellington. My message was not welcomed. John Key’s new government seems to understand that New Zealand’s economy would be at terrible risk from carbon taxes—but its voters apparently don’t realize it.

The Clark government told New Zealand voters that the cost of “leading the world” with a carbon tax would be about $150 per year. That figure is laughably low. The British government now admits its new carbon tax law could cost as much as $27,000 per UK family.

The Key government has temporarily suspended the cap-and-trade, but has not dared repeal it. Meanwhile, Australia’s Prime Minister Kevin Rudd is installing his own cap-and-trade, and playing footsie with President Obama on “solidarity” with a U.S. carbon tax. If Australia and the U.S. agreed on some benchmark carbon tax, most New Zealanders would expect their country to join in.

Never mind that the earth’s global warming stopped after 1998 because the sun has gone into a startling quiet period. That’s why New Zealand’s many glaciers have been growing recently instead of receding. Never mind that even full member compliance with Kyoto would “avoid” only about 0.05 degree C of warming over the next 50 years—by the alarmists’ own math.

The urbanites in New Zealand don’t really appreciate the sophisticated management that juggles pastures and feed crops that produce milk, cheese and Merino wool. They love the wine, but don’t understand the massive per-acre investments needed to turn their grapes into award-winning vintages.

Meanwhile, Obama’s U.S. government has just punished New Zealand with trade-distorting dairy export subsidies--because our corn ethanol program has pushed our cost of dairy feed too high. World corn prices have doubled in real terms, and may go higher as our ethanol mandates keep rising. That jacks up the U.S. cost of “alternative fuels” even further--while New Zealand will have to file a well-justified case against America under the World Trade Organization rules.

Ah, what a tangled web we’re weaving, rather than admit the Emperor of Global Warming has no clothes.

Canadian Free Press

Century-old St. Vrain post office closes

The 102-year-old St. Vrain Post Office has closed. Bonnie Robinson of Melrose, who ran the post office for the past seven months, said her last day of sales was Tuesday. Customers began receiving their mail in a cluster box across St. Vrain’s Main Street on Monday. “We’re all sad that it’s closing,” Robinson said. “That’s a long time, 102 years.” Even so, Robinson said thus far, using the cluster box has worked well. “The Post Office has been going through tough financial times lately, just like everyone else,” she said. Robinson said St. Vrain is one of a number of small post offices with low revenues that has been closed, and the community’s postmaster retired last year, leaving more of an opportunity for closure. The building, which the post office was leasing, will revert back to the control of the owner, and the rest area it is in will remain open, she said. A few times during her short tenure, Robinson said, people dropped by specifically for a postmark from St. Vrain. Tuesday, a man from Colorado came in for stamps and decided to mail postcards from the office when he learned it was closing...PortalesNews-Tribune

Song Of The Day #054

Today's gospel song is Singing An Old Hymn by the Buchanan Brothers, released in 1946. It's availabe on the Bronco Buster 9018 CD titled Atomic Power.