Police in Latin America will be able to track American gun sales in their own language

In a move to crack down on weapons from the U.S. that are funneled to drug cartels, police in Latin America will soon be able to track American gun sales in their own language, despite privacy concerns by gun-rights advocates. The U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives will begin testing this month on a Spanish-language version of eTrace, a computer system that law-enforcement agencies use to request traces of weapons by the ATF. The first users will be national police in Mexico, Guatemala and Costa Rica. The English version of eTrace is already being used in 25 countries, including Mexico, according to the U.S. State Department. To begin the trace, a foreign police officer submits this information into the system. An ATF agent then reviews the request. The United States does not have a national database of all gun owners, so the ATF agent must then call gun dealers and purchasers to track the gun's history. Under U.S. law, such information is private and can be seen only by law-enforcers doing legitimate investigations. "The more information you have in the system, the more effectively you can connect the dots," said Bill Newell, the ATF's special agent in charge for Arizona and New Mexico. However, the National Rifle Association said it is worried that encouraging more users abroad could lead to private information about gun owners being leaked to the public or criminals. "There's always a potential, especially when things are online, for errors to occur," said Andrew Arulanandam, spokesman for the NRA. "All it takes is one person clicking the wrong button and, all of a sudden, a whole of lot information could be made public."...read more

Winter Olympics will highlight new U.S. border requirements

When the 2010 Winter Olympic Games start in Vancouver on Feb. 12, they not only will draw athletes from across the globe but legions of citizens from the USA — all of whom will need to present newly required forms of identification to cross the border. In anticipation of that, and in the face of criticism of the increased documentation requirements and costs for cross-border travel that went into effect last June, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security has launched a $2 million marketing campaign to remind people in the Northwest about identification options for border crossings. The ads, featuring Olympians such as skier Bill Demong, include reminders that identity documentation will be required to return to the USA and direct people to GetYouHome.gov, a Homeland Security travel website, to find out about the various document options, several of which are less expensive than obtaining a passport. The Olympics-centered campaign is part of an ongoing effort by Homeland Security to publicize ways of crossing the border in light of the Western Hemisphere Travel Initiative rules, which since June 1 have required American citizens to have a passport, passport card or enhanced driver's license or to be enrolled in a trusted traveler program such as NEXUS and SENTRI (for frequent travelers to Canada and Mexico respectively) or FAST (for commercial drivers) in order to get back into the USA from Canada or Mexico...read more

Judge tosses out most evidence on Gitmo detainee

A federal judge has tossed out most of the government's evidence against a tarrorism detainee on grounds his confessions were coerced, allegedly by U.S. forces, before he became a prisoner at Guantanamo Bay. In a ruling this week, U.S. District Judge Thomas Hogan also said the government failed to establish that 23 statements the detainee made to interrogators at Guantanamo Bay were untainted by the earlier coerced statements made while he was held under harsh conditions in Afghanistan. However, the judge said statements he made during two military administrative hearings at the U.S. detention center in Cuba, where he was assisted by a personal representative, were reliable and sufficient to justify holding the detainee...read more

Feds reopen case of Forest Service whistleblower

Federal prosecutors who look into the treatment of whistleblowers are reopening the case of an Alaska wildlife biologist who successfully sued the U.S. Forest Service and died of a heart attack days after his job was eliminated. Glen Ith sued the Forest Service in 2006 over road repairs and bridge building in the Tongass National Forest in southeast Alaska — work that was being done before timber sales were approved and environmental impact work conducted. The U.S. Office of Special Counsel, an independent government agency tasked with enforcing the Whistleblower Protection Act, said Friday in a letter that it is taking a second look at Ith's case and whether he was a victim of retaliation. The case was closed in 2008 when the 48-year-old Petersburg man died four days after finding out that he no longer had a job. The Forest Service's Alaska region office declined comment Friday. "This is an active investigation of Forest Service employees and we cannot comment on the investigation," spokesman Ray Massey said...read more

Companies balk at EPA's smog-limit recommendations

Utility companies, refineries and factories may have to spend up to $90 billion to meet new smog standards proposed by the Environmental Protection Agency on Thursday, a cost they say is too high in the current economy. The EPA said those costs will be offset by up to $100 billion in savings in health care as people breathe cleaner air, resulting in fewer cases of asthma, bronchitis and other smog-related symptoms. The EPA proposal would lower the permitted concentration of ground-level ozone, the main ingredient in smog, to a level of between 60 parts per billion to 70 parts per billion. The exact level will be decided by the Obama administration later this year after hearings. The previous standard, adopted in 2008 by President George W. Bush's administration, put the limit at 75 parts per billion...read more

Agency's push for tougher ozone rules would go beyond big cities

Smog, long the symbol of polluted cities, is about to become a small-town issue. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency proposed new standards for ground-level ozone Thursday that would trigger violations in as many as nine Arizona counties, including some of the state's most rural corners. The rules would force the state, counties and private businesses to spend potentially millions of dollars to reduce ozone emissions and could lead to new controls on power plants and more widespread vehicle smog checks. Efforts to nudge more drivers into less-polluting, more fuel-efficient cars would come as rising gas prices make older models less attractive, but the need to steer people toward mass transit could hit a snag as officials in Maricopa county weigh cutbacks in bus and train service. The new standard could also draw new attention to the problem of regional air quality, Grumbles said. Emissions from power plants, freeways and factories in neighboring counties or states can be carried through the air and turn into ozone far from its source. "We're estimating that six of the counties in Arizona are recipients of ozone from other states and Mexico," he said. "We're looking at an environmental problem that is in need of a regional solution."..read more

Salazar won't run for Colo. governor

Interior Secretary Ken Salazar announced Thursday he won't run for Colorado governor in 2010 and instead threw his support behind Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper for the job. Mr. Salazar, considered the strongest of Colorado's potential Democratic candidates, said he wanted to continue to implement his agenda at Interior, notably his work on public lands and the clean-energy economy. The jostling over the gubernatorial race came a day after Democratic Gov. Bill Ritter Jr. stunned the state's political establishment by announcing he would not seek a second term. Mr. Ritter had no strong primary challengers and had been expected to win the nomination easily...read more

Path From Climate Summit Unclear for Many

When presidents and prime ministers departed the U.N. climate conference in Copenhagen last month, they left behind a vast legal tangle that experts have barely begun to unravel. A half-dozen edicts that world leaders handed down -- dealing with everything from verifying carbon emission cuts to mobilizing billions of dollars for poor nations -- require formal enactment rulings from the parties to the U.N. climate conference. But by the time the global summit came to a close on Dec. 18, nations had made none of the necessary follow-up rulings. Left unsettled and largely unexplained: how and when the leaders' directives laid out in the Copenhagen Accord will become reality. "Nobody knows the answer," said Jonathan Lash, president of the World Resources Institute think tank. He called the logistical unknowns "crucial questions" and said that as of Christmas Eve, even U.S. State Department officials were unsure of the next steps...read more

Enviro Group Plans Senate Call-In on Climate Bill

An environmental group today announced plans to flood Senate offices with calls urging action on climate legislation. 1Sky asked supporters to sign up for the Jan. 12 effort. "Our path forward in 2010 is very clear -- we must show the U.S. Senate that public support exists to pass climate legislation for green jobs, the climate, and our future," 1Sky said on its Web site page regarding the call-in. "Senate action is critical to ensuring that the global community can move forward. We will send a real message to the U.S. Senate on the eve of the 2010 campaign season." 1Sky describes itself as a collaboration of "environmental groups, state and local organizations, business, religious, health, social justice and military leaders, scientists, economists, elected officials, donors, celebrities and citizens nationwide." With the battle over health care legislation mostly over, it is time to turn to climate, said Alex Posorske, 1Sky field and communications manager. "We don't really think the climate can wait," Posorske said...read more

California garbage trucks fueled by ... garbage

Hundreds of trash trucks across California are rumbling down city streets using clean fuel made from a dirty source: garbage. The fuel is derived from rotting refuse that San Francisco and Oakland residents and businesses have been discarding in the Altamont landfill since 1980. Since November, the methane gas created from decaying detritus at the 240-acre landfill has been sucked into tubes and sent into an innovative facility that purifies and transforms it into liquefied natural gas. Almost 500 Waste Management Inc. garbage and recycling trucks run on this new source of environmentally friendly fuel instead of dirty diesel. In a state that has passed the most stringent greenhouse gas reduction goals in the United States, the climate change benefits of this plant are twofold — methane from the trash heap is captured before entering the environment and use of the fuel produces less carbon dioxide than conventional gasoline...read more

Only in the next to last paragraph to you find out:

But to many who may want to use the technology, the cost of purifying the methane into usable liquefied natural gas can be a daunting barrier. The $15.5 million it took to build Altamont's LNG facility is far more than it costs to build a small electrical plant.

Four state agencies contributed grants to build the facility.

May be less carbon dioxide, but it's garbage in - wasteful spending out.

Otherwise known as political pollution.

Vast protected area proposed for leatherbacks

The battle to save Pacific leatherback turtles from extinction prompted federal biologists Tuesday to propose designating 70,000 square miles of ocean along the West Coast as critical habitat for the giant reptiles. The designation by the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration would mark the first time critical habitat has ever been established in the open ocean for the endangered leatherbacks, which swim 6,000 miles every year to eat jellyfish outside the Golden Gate. If approved, the regulations would restrict projects that harm the turtles or their food. The government would be required to review and, if necessary, regulate agricultural waste, pollution, oil spills, power plants, oil drilling, storm water runoff and liquid natural gas projects along the California coast between Long Beach and Mendocino County and off the Oregon and Washington coasts. Environmentally friendly aquaculture, tidal, wave turbine and desalination projects also would come under scrutiny...read more

California's groundwater shrinking because of agricultural use

New data from satellites show the vast underground pools feeding faucets and irrigation hoses across California are running low, a worrisome trend federal scientists largely attribute to aggressive agricultural pumping. Hundreds of farmers have been drilling wells to irrigate their crops, as three years of drought and environmental restrictions on water supplies have withered crops, jobs and profits throughout the San Joaquin Valley, where roughly half of the nation's fruits, nuts, and vegetables are grown. Developers and cities dependent on the tight supplies also have joined the well-drilling frenzy as the crisis has deepened. The NASA mission represents the first attempt to use space-based technology to measure how much groundwater has been lost in recent years in California and elsewhere in the world...read more

Satellites will control your wells, your cattle will be herded by satellite, and 73 new taxes went into effect Jan. 1st. Happy New Year ag producers!

Oregon Supreme Court deliberates on Dorothy English land use case

The court spent nearly 90 minutes Wednesday listening to oral arguments about the state's longest-running land-use flap. The case began six years ago when Multnomah County would not allow English to divide and develop her property, blossomed into the dueling ballot Measures 37 and 49, and deeply divided the state over the sweeping question of property rights. By the time it reached the Supreme Court, however, English had been dead for more than 18 months and the case hinged on narrower legal questions. When it rules on the case in the weeks to come, some observers say the court is likely to craft a decision that applies singularly to English and does not necessarily set broader precedent. At issue is whether Multnomah County has to pay $1.15 million compensation to English's estate that a court ordered in 2006 and which was upheld on appeal last year. The county maintains -- because of the passage of Measure 49 -- it has the option of waiving property development restrictions instead of paying the judgment. English's attorney says a final judgment is exactly that, and must be paid. Based on the questions they asked and comments they offered during Wednesday's oral argument, it was a tossup which way the justices are leaning...read more

Coyote hunt near Fallon draws controversy

A coyote-hunting tournament has been scheduled this weekend near Fallon to help protect ranch livestock, but critics said such hunts don't control coyote populations. "I understand that there are some people that are upset about it," said Misty McFarlane of Fallon, who registers hunters for the event. "But they haven't ever faced a bill that must be paid because of these predators. "We are ranchers, and many a time, we have come upon a mother giving birth to their calf, and coyotes have torn out their rectums and eyes and left them to die. The ranchers in Northern Nevada are completely overwhelmed with the coyotes." Camilla Fox, a founding director of the national nonprofit Project Coyote based in Northern California and a consultant with the Animal Welfare Institute, urged opponents to contact the Greater Fallon Area Chamber of Commerce...read more

Ag Industry Under Attack—Is Food Manufacturing Next?

While stories critical of the ag industry are nothing new, there has been a recent flurry of coverage related to agricultural production. This time, critics are attacking the technologies that allow farmers to produce food more efficiently. Recently, the movie Food, Inc., Time magazine’s cover story “The Real Cost of Cheap Food,” and the book The Omnivore’s Dilemma have all aimed to cast doubt on the integrity of America’s agri-food system. In November, Good Morning America launched a series, “What’s In Your Food?” The agricultural community is clearly under attack as critics seek to restrict the technologies that allow farmers to produce food more efficiently. The logical question for those of you reading this is: could food processors and manufacturers be next? While some within the food manufacturing community may feel removed from the attacks on agriculture, it seems likely that those opposing technology’s role in agricultural production will continue to advance their efforts to restrict its use in other areas of the food chain, including food processing and manufacturing. Consumers deserve objective, verifiable truths when it comes to information regarding the foods they purchase and consume. It is especially distressing to see popular media claim to reveal “shocking truths” about the nation’s food system and then present factual errors. One is that corporate farms have displaced America’s small farmers. In reality, corporate farms account for only about 3% of U.S. farms, and more than 97% of U.S. cattle farms/ranches are family-owned. Similarly, opponents of technology claim that conventional (modern) farming is destructive to the environment. However, cattle growers today use two-thirds less land to produce a pound of beef as it takes to produce a pound from “all-natural,” grass-fed cattle; and today’s dairy farmers produce 58% more milk with 64% fewer cows than dairy farmers could produce in 1944...read more

The saddle-making, bronc-breaking grandpa

He's a cowboy grandpa, if ever there was one. In fact, he's one of Alberta's best. By looking at him and hearing him speak, you'd never guess that he came here from the far side of East Germany. For the last 18 years, his home's been a cabin in the Porcupine Hills - surrounded by sheep, of all things. But if you want to meet a guy who knows just about everything that's known about horses, then Heinz Patberg's your man. 55 years ago, he entered Canada as a teenager from a place near the River Warte, in the far west of what's now Poland. It didn't take long before he became known in southern Alberta as "the tough cowboy from the Warte." And did he ever move around! His Canadian life started off with haying for Lundbreck ranchers. After that, he "did no end of stuff" out on the range with cattle and horses. Shoeing the latter was something he'd do for many decades. Lundbreck's Stock Association hired him to ride all the way up the Oldman River to "The Gap," Racehorse Creek and Dutch Creek. Then opportunities to work on the Waldron Ranch opened up, putting him in charge of 3,000 head of cattle. He attended the Calgary Stampede for the first time in 1955 and later "did outriding for chuck-wagon outfits" there...read more

Special Song Of The Day: We The People by Ray Stevens

Interior proposals aim to tighten reins on oil, gas leases

Interior Secretary Ken Salazar on Wednesday unveiled a set of reforms to the federal-lands oil-and-gas leasing program that require "a higher level" of government review of proposed leases and more public input. It also shifts the decision on which parcels should be offered for sale from industry to the U.S. Bureau of Land Management. "The change here is that public lands are no longer the candy store for the oil-and-gas industry to come in and take whatever they want," Salazar said at a news briefing. The set of proposals drew praise from environmental groups. "What they are doing is taking a closer look before leasing to determine what should be leased and what are the trade-offs," said Ann Morgan, the Wilderness Society's vice president for public lands. Requiring additional environmental reviews and public input and reducing the role of industry in nominating parcels are concerns to industry groups. The changes create "a bureaucratic command-and-control system," said Kathleen Sgamma, director of government affairs for the Independent Petroleum Association of Mountain States. Among the proposed changes: • Master leasing and development planning, which would comprehensively analyze proposed areas for drilling, assessing issues such as wildlife, watershed and land-use issues. • A required on-the-ground assessment by bureau staff of all parcels offered for sale. • Environmental reviews of all parcels with public review...read more

Tortoise habitat slows plans for solar energy farm in Mojave Desert

On a strip of California's Mojave Desert, two dozen rare tortoises could stand in the way of a sprawling solar-energy complex in a case that highlights mounting tensions between wilderness conservation and the nation's quest for cleaner power. Oakland-based BrightSource Energy has been pushing for more than two years for permission to erect 400,000 mirrors on the site to gather the sun's energy. It could become the first project of its kind on U.S. Bureau of Land Management property, leaving a footprint for others to follow on vast stretches of public land across the West. The construction would come with a cost: Government scientists have concluded that more than 6 square miles of habitat for the federally threatened desert tortoise would be permanently lost. The Sierra Club and other environmentalists want the complex relocated to preserve what they call a near-pristine home for rare plants and wildlife, including the protected tortoise, the Western burrowing owl and bighorn sheep...read more

BLM plan may keep grouse off endangered list

The Bureau of Land Management's decision Monday to revise its Wyoming sage grouse management plan to more closely align with the state's "core areas" conservation approach will limit some new industrial activities. But it will also give Wyoming the best chance it has to keep the sage grouse from being federally protected under the Endangered Species Act, which could potentially shut down energy development in much of Wyoming and have a huge economic impact on the state, including much-reduced tax revenues to operate state government. Primarily for that reason, it was the right action for the agency to take. We hope energy developers will realize that while they will have to deal with some new restrictions, those are relatively minor compared to what would happen if the sage grouse is fully federally protected. The bird is not on the brink of extinction in this state, even though it is under federal review for protection by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, which is expected to announce its decision later this year. But the sage grouse's habitat overlaps some of the state's best places for development of natural gas and wind energy...read more