Former Interior Secretary Udall dies at age 90

Stewart Udall, who sowed the seeds of the modern environmental movement as secretary of the interior during the 1960s and later became a crusader for victims of radiation exposure from the government's Cold War nuclear programs, died Saturday. He was 90. A statement from Udall's family, released through the office of his son, Sen. Tom Udall, D-N.M., said he died of natural causes at his home in Santa Fe, surrounded by his children and their families. Udall, brother of the late 15-term congressman Morris Udall, served six years in Congress as a Democrat from Arizona, and then headed the Interior Department for eight years under Presidents Kennedy and Johnson. His son Tom and nephew Mark also became congressmen, then both were elected to the Senate in 2008. Under Stewart Udall's leadership from 1961 through 1968, the Interior Department aggressively promoted an expansion of public lands and helped win enactment of major environmental laws, including ones to protect endangered species...read more

Condolences to Senator Udall and the entire Udall family.

Pre-Crime Policing

To hear them tell it, the five police agencies who apprehended 39-year-old Oregonian David Pyles early on the morning of March 8 thwarted another lone wolf mass murderer. The police "were able to successfully take a potentially volatile male subject into protective custody for a mental evaluation," announced a press release put out by the Medford, Oregon, police department. The subject had recently been placed on administrative leave from his job, was "very disgruntled," and had recently purchased several firearms. "Local Law Enforcement agencies were extremely concerned that the subject was planning retaliation against his employers," the release said. Fortunately, Pyles "voluntarily" turned himself over to police custody, and the legally purchased firearms "were seized for safekeeping." This voluntary exchange involved two SWAT teams, police officers from Medford and nearby Roseburg, sheriff's deputies from Jackson and Douglas counties, and the Oregon State Police. Oregon State Police Sgt. Jeff Proulx explained to South Oregon's Mail Tribune why the operation was such a success: "Instead of being reactive, we took a proactive approach." There's just one problem: David Pyles hadn't committed any crime, nor was he suspected of having committed one. The police never obtained a warrant for either search or arrest. They never consulted with a judge or mental health professional before sending out the military-style tactical teams to take Pyle in. "They woke me up with a phone call at about 5:50 in the morning," Pyles told me in a phone interview Friday. "I looked out the window and saw the SWAT team pointing their guns at my house. The officer on the phone told me to turn myself in. I told them I would, on three conditions: I would not be handcuffed. I would not be taken off my property. And I would not be forced to get a mental health evaluation. He agreed. The second I stepped outside, they jumped me. Then they handcuffed me, took me off my property, and took me to get a mental health evaluation." By noon the same day, Pyles had already been released from the Rogue Valley Medical Center with a clean bill of mental health. Four days later the Medford Police Department returned Pyle’s guns, despite telling him earlier in the week—falsely—that he'd need to undergo a second background check before he could get them back...read more

Federal Court Strikes Down Gun Rights Protest Restrictions

Late yesterday, in a striking victory for the First Amendment on campus, a federal district court in Texas ruled that a number of restrictions on students' speech at Tarrant County College (TCC) are unconstitutional. In his decision, U.S. District Judge Terry R. Means found that TCC's reliance on a policy prohibiting "disruptive activities" to restrict students Clayton Smith and John Schwertz from holding an "empty holster" protest violated the First Amendment. Smith and Schwertz had turned to the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE) for help. In addition to ruling that students are entitled to protest by wearing empty holsters in classrooms, hallways, and public areas of campus, Judge Means ruled that TCC's sweeping prohibition on "cosponsorship," which forbade students and faculty from holding campus events in association with any "off-campus person or organization," prevented TCC students "from speaking on campus on issues of any social importance" and was therefore "overly broad" and "unconstitutional on its face." Smith's and Schwertz's protest was designed to coincide with the efforts of a national pro-concealed carry organization, Students for Concealed Carry on Campus (SCCC)...read more

Computer snafu is behind at least 50 'raids' on Brooklyn couple's home

Embarrassed cops on Thursday cited a "computer glitch" as the reason police targeted the home of an elderly, law-abiding couple more than 50 times in futile hunts for bad guys. Apparently, the address of Walter and Rose Martin's Brooklyn home was used to test a department-wide computer system in 2002. What followed was years of cops appearing at the Martins' door looking for murderers, robbers and rapists - as often as three times a week. After the Daily News exclusively reported on the couple's plague of police raids yesterday, apologetic detectives from the NYPD's Identity Theft Squad showed up at their home. The most recent, on Tuesday, left 83-year-old World War II vet Walter Martin woozy from soaring blood pressure. Rose Martin, 82, said they told her Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly ordered them to solve the puzzle - stat. By the end of the day, NYPD Deputy Commissioner Paul Browne said the snafu was traced to a 2002 computer test, though he couldn't explain why the couple's address was used as a test case in the first place...read more

State plan fines feds $2,000 over gun rules

Wyoming has joined a growing list of states with self-declared exemptions from federal gun regulation of weapons made, bought and used inside state borders – but lawmakers in the Cowboy State have taken the issue one step further, adopting significant penalties for federal agents attempting to enforce Washington's rules. According to a law signed into effect yesterday by Democratic Gov. Dave Freudenthal, any agent of the U.S. who "enforces or attempts to enforce" federal gun rules on a "personal firearm" in Wyoming faces a felony conviction and a penalty of up to two years in prison and up to $2,000 in fines. WND reported just days ago when Utah became the third state, joining Montana and Tennessee, to adopt an exemption from federal regulations for weapons built, sold and kept within state borders. A lawsuit is pending over the Montana law, which was the first to go into effect. But Wyoming's law goes further, stating, "Any official, agent or employee of the United States government who enforces or attempts to enforce any act, order, law, statute, rule or regulation of the United States government upon a personal firearm, a firearm accessory or ammunition that is manufactured commercially or privately in Wyoming and that remains exclusively within the borders of Wyoming shall be guilty of a felony and, upon conviction, shall be subject to imprisonment for not more than two (2) years, a fine of not more than two thousand dollars ($2,000.00), or both."...read more

Democrats, White House spar over intelligence bill

House Intelligence Committee Democrats are engaged in a fierce showdown with the White House over lawmakers’ demands for more transparency and oversight of the intelligence community. President Barack Obama has twice threatened to veto the intelligence authorization bill, first in July of last year, when the committee approved it, and again this week. The White House has argued that the legislation’s new requirements would, in some cases, put American lives at risk. Rep. Anna Eshoo (D-Calif.), a senior member of the House Intelligence panel and a key ally of Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), rejected the administration’s claims. Eshoo was referring to provisions in the House and Senate intelligence bills that would give the Government Accountability Office legal authority to review practices and operations throughout the intelligence community. The provisions also would allow any congressional committee with jurisdiction on intelligence matters to request a GAO investigation of that activity. The administration also opposes a provision in the bill establishing an agency inspector general to investigate the anthrax attacks, which the FBI has concluded were planned and committed by the late Dr. Bruce Ivins, acting alone. Possibly even more troubling to the White House are provisions in the bills proposing that interrogations of detainees or prisoners in CIA custody be videotaped, as well as the major changes to the congressional notification system...read more

Senator Graham's Inexplicable Support of National ID

Compromise is catnip in Washington, D.C. That’s my best guess at why Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC) would endorse New York Senator Chuck Schumer’s (D) widely reviled plan to create a mandatory biometric national ID system. Schumer’s national ID plans have no more definition today than when he wrote about them in his 2007 campaign manifesto Postitively American. Among the thin gruel of that book is a two-page lump displaying more ignorance than understanding of how identity systems work and fail. Schumer doesn’t know the difference between an identifier—a characteristic used to distinguish or group people—and an identification card or system, which does the entire task of proving a person’s previously fixed identity. (My thin gruel on the topic is the book Identity Crisis: How Identification is Overused and Misunderstood.) “All the national employment ID card will do is make forgery harder,” says Schumer. No, that’s not all it would do: It would also subject every employment decision to the federal government’s approval. It would make surveillance of law-abiding citizens easier. It would allow the government to control access to health care. It would facilitate gun control. It would cost $100 billion dollars or more. It would draw bribery and corruption into the Social Security Administration. It would promote the development of sophisticated biometric identity fraud. How long should I go on?...read more

Book Review: A New American Tea Party

A New American Tea Party by John M. O’Hara, John Wiley & Sons, 307 pages.








In his preface O’Hara lays out the three things he hopes to accomplish with this book:

One, that it will set the historic record straight on what is a critically important grassroots movement…

Second, that it will serve to define and articulate the principles of that movement…

Finally, that it will help to fortify, inspire and guide counter-revolutionaries in the policy battles ahead…

I’m pleased to report that in this well-written, thoroughly researched volume O’Hara accomplishes all three and then some.

I‘ll approach this book by asking how the author answers three questions: Who are these Tea Party folks? What events caused this phenomenon? Where do we go from here?

Let’s see what O’Hara has to say.

He describes and defines Tea Party folks in different places throughout the book. Here are some examples:

They represent the collective wisdom of the people – not populism, not the rule that might makes right – but the collective desire to be true to founding principles – a union of individualism, if you will. (p.35)

While fighting excessive taxation is certainly a noble crusade, this was not the only tenant of the tea parties. Rather, they sought to protest the expansion of government as a whole and reinforce the larger idea that government works for the people, not for itself, not for specific interest groups, not for specific organizations. (p.80)

Tea party participants, like most Americans, reject the idea that individuals are more likely to prosper in a highly controlled nanny state. They instead embrace a state where the government acts a referee, stepping in only when absolutely necessary. (p.207)

They reject the idea that big government – at the hands of liberals or conservatives – should be used to solve problems. They see it as unrealistic and they resent the encroachment on their ability to exercise their intellect and free will. (p.208)

These individuals, on the whole, subscribe to a live and let live philosophy. They believe in free markets and small government. (p.208)

They are hardworking taxpayers who were driven by nothing more than the principles at stake: the protection of a representative democracy that supports the individual right to the pursuit of happiness against egregious, if not unlawful, government intervention. (p.208)

Protestors such as those at the tea parties merely ask to be left alone – whether it is their tax dollars, the cars they drive, the food they eat, their guns, how they educate their children, or their relationship with their doctors. (p. 208).

All are excellent descriptions of the Tea Party folks I know and also explain my involvement with the group. I also emphasize this because of all the distortions by the media and political pundits.

Let’s move on to what caused the Tea Party eruption.

O’Hara walks through the litany, starting with the Community Reinvestment Act. You’ll then be reintroduced to the 1994 “Revolution That Wasn’t”, the “Quasi-Conservative” presidency of George W. Bush, taxes, Federal Reserve policy, Fannie Mae & Freddie Mac, universal health care and the whole list of “Bailouts, Handouts and Corporate Welfare.” He even provides a nine-page timeline, listing the date and a summary of each event.

I found this part of the book tough to read. We all knew these things had happened, but I have never seen it all laid out in one place like this. An unpleasant but necessary reminder for those of us who watched these events unfold, but an eye opener for any newbies and documentation for future historians.

Looking to the future, the author instructs us on winning arguments, honing the message, conducting rallies, publicity, pressuring politicians and utilizing coalitions and social networks. He also recommends looking beyond rallies and offers useful suggestions on taking consistent and principled action. O’Hara further suggests the Tea Parties look to their own state, writing “to enact and sustain real change, pressure needs to be kept at state and local government.” Each state has a conservative or free market think tank, and the author suggests they are an excellent resource for state level activities (In NM, it would be the Rio Grande Foundation).

There is much more to this book than I am reporting here. I thoroughly enjoyed, for instance, how he rips the political class and the media for their reaction to the Tea Party movement, devoting two full chapters to the skewering. You should also enjoy his description of the early days of the movement and his personal involvement in the first D.C. rallies. Also of interest is his presentation of a Tea Party Manifesto.

O’Hara also writes with a wonderful sense of humor which he sprinkles throughout the book. For instance, he refers to McCain’s suspending his campaign as pulling “a political Ferris Bueller’s Day Off?” and he says bailouts “are like lays potato chips – you can’t just have one.”

Hope there is enough here to stir your interest because this old cowboy thinks this one is worth your time and money.

Global Warming on Trial

Texas has filed two petitions in federal court. The first is a request for review of the endangerment finding, which is intended to examine the science behind global warming. The second is a petition for reconsideration of the finding. These court cases were brought about in the wake of the Climategate scandal. Climategate has revealed that significant portions of the Inter-Governmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)'s Fourth Assessment Report (AR4) were based on fraudulent science. The crux of the matter is that the EPA based the endangerment finding on the now-discredited IPCC report. To date, the IPCC have admitted to two significant erroneous claims. First, they admitted to the fact that the Himalayan glaciers are not melting away, and secondly, they have stated that the claim of the trends of natural disasters attributed to global warming is overstated. Subsequently, the IPCC have been prompted to publicly state that they are reviewing their own quality assurance procedures in light of these admissions. But now all of this is going to be examined in a court of law. It should be noted that the laws of governments and the laws of science differ very significantly. For example, governments can repeal laws, like in the case of prohibition. By contrast, science cannot repeal the law of gravity. It is this kind of cold, hard fact that lawyers typically are not used to dealing with. If the case of Texas versus the EPA is decided on the scientific facts, as it should be, then the EPA will lose...read more

Climate change cited as Mont. leases suspended

A federal judge has approved a first-of-its-kind settlement requiring the government to suspend 38,000 acres of oil and gas leases in Montana so it can gauge how oil field activities contribute to climate change. At issue are the greenhouse gases emitted by drilling machinery and industry practices such as venting natural gas directly into the atmosphere. Environmentalists - who sued when the Montana leases were sold in 2008 - argued the industry has allowed too much waste and uses inefficient technologies that could easily be updated. Under the deal approved Thursday by U.S. District Judge Donald Molloy in Missoula, the Bureau of Land Management will suspend the 61 leases in Montana within 90 days. They will have to go through a new round of environmental reviews before the suspensions can be lifted. A parallel lawsuit challenging 70,000 acres of federal lands leased in New Mexico remains pending. A BLM spokesman, Greg Albright, said reviewing lease sales for climate change would be a first for the agency. How it will be done was still being worked out, and it was unclear if the BLM would adopt such reviews as a standard requirement...read more

COMMENT: If you have a permit from the feds, for anything, it's in jeopardy. Thank George Bush and the polar bear.

Prescribed Burns May Help Reduce US Carbon Footprint

The use of prescribed burns to manage Western forests may help the United States reduce its carbon footprint. A new study finds that such burns, often used by forest managers to reduce underbrush and protect bigger trees, release substantially less carbon dioxide emissions than wildfires of the same size. "It appears that prescribed burns can be an important piece of a climate change strategy," says Christine Wiedinmyer, a scientist with the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) and lead author of the new study. "If we reintroduce fires into our ecosystems, we may be able to protect larger trees and significantly reduce the amount of carbon released into the atmosphere by major wildfires." Drawing on satellite observations and computer models of emissions, the researchers concluded that widespread prescribed burns can reduce fire emissions of carbon dioxide in the West by an average of 18 to 25 percent, and by as much as 60 percent in certain forest systems. Wildfires often destroy large trees that store significant amounts of carbon. Prescribed fires are designed to burn underbrush and small trees, which store less carbon. By clearing out the underbrush, these controlled burns reduce the chances of subsequent high-severity wildfires, thereby protecting large trees and keeping more carbon locked up in the forest...read more

Important: Senator Johanns on NAIS - Video

Frog gets third bid for critical habitat (1.6 million acres)

The federal government Tuesday made its third attempt to designate critical habitat for the California red-legged frog. The 1.6 million acres proposed represent the result of a decade of legal battles and scientific study. Previous proposals had been for as much as 4.1 million acres (in 2001) and for as little as 450,000 acres (in 2006). The latest designation includes 4,449 acres in Calaveras County that had been omitted from the 2006 proposal. Noah Greenwald, endangered species program director for the Center for Biological Diversity, said his organization is pleased with the latest designation. "Compared to the 450,000 or so acres that were designated in 2006 under the Bush administration, this is a dramatic improvement," Greenwald said. The 2006 plan would have excluded the Calaveras County area from designation because a property owner there said he would manage his property to benefit the frog and recruit other landowners to do the same. According to discussion in the federal habitat designation rule, no other property owners have come forward since 2006. Also, federal officials said the danger that grazing in the area will damage frog habitat justifies including the Calaveras area in the designation. "We won't know until we see what the agency does to landowners," Blodgett said of the new rule for the red-legged frog. "They have already been issuing threats to landowners on other species."...read more

The “Next West:” Up in the Air

If the current ‘New West’ is inexorably giving way to the ‘Next West,’ as so many ‘New Wests’ have done before, and if the region is in search of a new mission statement as a consequence, then clues to what’s coming might be found among the bright green grass of a small ranch in Marin County. At the very least, it is certainly something new under the sun. It’s called the Marin Carbon Project and its goal is nothing less than reversing global warming. That’s a tall order, of course, especially for one family, a few hundred acres, a small herd of cattle, and a handful of scientists. The idea behind the project is simple: it aims to sequester excess amounts of atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) in the ranch’s soil. This is important because we know that to reverse climate change we need to do two things: (1) reduce emissions of greenhouse gases, especially CO2, by a lot; and (2) increase sequestration so that the level of CO2 in the atmosphere drops from its current level of 389 parts-per-million down to 350 ppm (or lower). While the vast majority of current climate change legislation, regulation, activism, and proposed solutions focus on reducing emissions, the truth is these actions won’t avert a climate calamity by themselves (assuming they actually get implemented). That’s because we’re already over the 350 ppm threshold for CO2. The science is clear: we need to pull CO2 out of the atmosphere as well as reduce emissions. That’s where the Marin Carbon Project comes in...read more

Turkey troubles plague Tucumcari ranchers

When hunting them failed to curb population growth, two area ranchers took their turkey troubles to the New Mexico Department of Game and Fish. “This has been going on for quite a few years,” said Daniel Garcia, a Tucumcari rancher. “Three years ago there was a flock of 300 turkeys running loose around here.” Garcia said game and fish experts removed 75 wild turkeys from his and a neighbor’s property earlier this month March. On several occasions, he said, the turkeys were eating the winter wheat seed almost as fast he could plant what’s usually a money crop. Garcia tried to cull the flock by participating in the NMDGF’s Open Gate program. The program leases private property for public hunting and fishing, according to a state Department of Game and Fish release. Participants receive an annual payment per acre based on available hunting and or fishing opportunities, with additional incentives offered for wildlife habitat enhancements, according to the release. “The program helps a little,” said Garcia, laughing, “but the hunter can only shoot one turkey. They need to let them shoot a few more.”...read more

Stimulus Gatekeepers: Here Come the Cows

Chris Helt is a man of action. The father of three runs a sandblasting operation, Helt Blasting Service, and grows 20 acres of soybeans in his backyard. He hunts, tinkers with his fleet of nine trucks and oversees maintenance on his father-in-law's convenience stores. He was too busy to notice when the whole nation was debating the Recovery Act. The bill's impact on his life, however, couldn't be more concrete. Every morning, it stares him in the face, in the form of the herd of shaggy Angus cows he bought with his stimulus loan. Last year the Department of Agriculture advanced Helt $30,000 to buy his first 24 head of cattle. Now the department hopes the novice cattleman will thrive and spread the wealth through the economy of Cherryvale, Kan.-population 2,200-the former railroad hub he calls home. Helt couldn't get a cheap loan from the banks, and it's easy to see why: He's got a degree in construction engineering, but he'd never owned a cow in his life...read more

COMMENT: Another smart program from our Congress Critters.

The UN & EPA are Pursuing Culture Change – Not Climate Change, Says a Texas Cattlewoman

A Texas Cattlewoman’s review of the FAO’s, “Livestock’s Long Shadow”, reveals the socialistic intent of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations' indictment of the Livestock Industry...Livestock do not contribute more greenhouse gas emissions than transport, says Jimmie West, who runs a small cattle ranch in Southeast Texas where she raises rare British White Cattle, the ancient polled Park cattle of the British Isles. Her cattle graze on a mix of improved and native pastures, which the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) considers substandard feed, and an “unproductive use of dietary energy” for the belching cow. The FAO is relentlessly advocating adding grain to a cow’s diet to alter the emissions they belch and to alter the emissions of their manure as well, and preferably on as small a spot of land as physically possible. Ms. West says this is a bogus “mitigating” policy of the FAO’s that is not even supportable by their own data on methane and nitrous oxide emissions from the belch and from the manure of cattle...read more

'Davy Crockett' star Fess Parker dies

Fess Parker, the thesp who became famous for playing frontier legends Davy Crockett and Daniel Boone and went on to become a successful real estate developer, died Thursday at his home near Los Olivos, Calif. He was 85. Parker played the rugged folk hero in Disney's "Davy Crockett" series, which aired in the mid-1950s as part of the "Disneyland" anthology series on ABC. Parker's portrayal of the coonskin cap-wearing Western hero became an overnight sensation after the first installment, "Davy Crockett, Indian Fighter," aired in December 1954. Disney cashed in on robust sales of Crockett-themed merchandise, while Parker had a pop hit with his recording of the program's theme song, "The Ballad of Davy Crockett." Crockett's image and memorabilia remain a prominent feature of the Frontierland area of the Disneyland theme park. Born in Fort Worth, Texas, Parker was discovered while at the U. of Texas where he studied drama and played football. His first film was an uncredited role in 1950's "Harvey." He moved to Los Angeles in the early 1950s to study drama at USC. He made his stage debut in an local production of "Mister Roberts" in 1951. Walt Disney picked Parker to play Davy Crockett after seeing him in sci-fi pic "Them!"...read more

Here's the theme song from the show. If you are in my age bracket you will easily remember the words.

The sad story behind 'Nebraska Stories'

A former St. Louis-area professor who recently published a book about a cast of characters from the Nebraska Sandhills now finds himself accused of plagiarism. A dispute over who really wrote three of the 23 chapters in "Nebraska Stories" prompted legal threats from Stuart Jenkins, the Nebraska native who inspired the book. And it led Craig Savoye, a former staff writer with the Christian Science Monitor, to pay a monetary settlement and agree to remove the disputed chapters from future editions of his self-published book. The showdown over a collection of whimsical character sketches represents the latest personal conflict between Savoye and Jenkins, who now works as an executive with a national footwear company in Denver...read more

Pioneer Woman's 'Black Heels to Tractor Wheels' will be a movie

Ree Drummond, best known as the Pioneer Woman, confirmed via Twitter that her story has been optioned. The entertainment blog Deadline reported that Columbia Pictures is in talks with Reese Witherspoon to play the Pioneer Woman. On Thursday, Drummond tweeted to her fans: “Think Green Acres meets Harlequin Romance meets Forest Gump.” Ree Drummond’s story of growing up on a country club golf course in Bartlesville, moving to the bright lights and big city of Los Angeles and then meeting the unexpected love of her life, the Marlboro Man, has Hollywood written all over it. Drummond wrote that it’s her book “Black Heels to Tractor Wheels” that’s been optioned, not the blog itself. Drummond’s story of her courtship with the Marlboro Man, cattle rancher Ladd Drummond, has captured the thousands of fans on her site The Pioneer Woman...read more