Dem lawmakers feel the heat on border security

As the White House bolsters security along the U.S.-Mexico border while declaring that the region has never been safer, Democratic lawmakers are demanding further action, saying that they are feeling the heat from dissatisfied voters. Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano this week laid out several new initiatives aimed at strengthening the federal government’s partnership with local law enforcement, and President Barack Obama requested $600 million in emergency border funds from Congress. But Arizona Rep. Ann Kirkpatrick (D) pointed to recent drug cartel threats against local law enforcement officials in her home state as evidence that the ongoing drug cartels are escalating the levels of violence along the border. If the U.S. fails to tighten border security, it could pay the price, said Kirkpatrick -- one of roughly a dozen lawmakers who, over the July Fourth recess, will likely face voters who are not satisfied with the status quo...more

Mexican cops retreat as violence rages on

Police are increasingly fleeing their posts in rural communities in the Mexican border state of Nuevo Leon after the killings of more than 60 officers in the area so far this year. Authorities blame warring drug traffickers for growing violence in the northern state which has registered more than 250 violent deaths so far in 2010, including 61 police officers, according to the Public Security Ministry. Agualeguas Mayor Guadalupe Garcia, said that state police had requested volunteers to be sent for training in Monterrey. "But they're all afraid, no one wants to be a police officer," he said...more

Cowgirl Sass & Savvy

Class reunions -- aging gracefully

by Julie Carter

Summer - when class reunions reign and people travel great distances to reunite with former classmates they hope they recognize after decades.

Not unlike family reunions, alumni gatherings bring together all ages of people from all demographics with one sure thing in common - time spent in a classroom in a land and time far away from present "life" in progress.

This year was my daughter's 20th class reunion and my 40th. The differences are as comical as the similarities are notable.

When my class stepped off the bus at the conclusion of our senior trip in June 1970, we had nothing on our minds except this perfect, exciting, dynamic future ahead of us. We were sure of it.

It didn't even remotely occur to us then that we might never see each other again or at best, rarely. At 18, we had no appreciation for the relationships we'd forged through years of school and related events.

And yet, placed in the same room 40 years later, it all so easily and quickly came flooding back. However, this time, it was through the eyes and emotions of adults who had seen enough of life, good and bad, to know how special each of us is in our own way.

The 20-year "youngsters" at 38 years of age were surprised at their lack of ability to "party like they used to." The 40-year crowd, fast approaching the new decade of 60- years-old, were well aware of their limitations and without mention of it, moved quickly to coffee and ice water after one drink.

The 20-year kids were scrutinizing each others' aging with comments such as "Remember Jan House? Well she fits her name now." Or "Remember how pretty Sissy Ahrens was? Well, she now paints her eyebrows on and in the wrong color, and Missy Little, the homely high school girl, she moved to Texas and came back a beauty queen."

The 40-year "kids" were, first, happy to be alive, and then very proud of how great we all looked. No one thought any differently, and all of us knew we are better now than we will be in 10 more years. So it's all good.

We didn't have to mention that we whitened our teeth, scheduled manicures, sorted through what to wear, got new hair cuts and fresh hair color, plucked chin hairs, and took our medications including ache-and-pain minimizers hoping for at least one good day.

Our class was always a little on the rowdy side with strong personalities and plenty of drive to be the best at whatever we were doing. Our class sponsor told us at the reunion that the reason he took us to Moab, Utah, and the Canyonlands National Park for our senior trip was because it was a place he knew we couldn't tear up.

It was refreshing to see that, even now, we are still a strong and determined group and oh so much fun. We are the same, except better. As one classmate noted, "Now, we are all grown up."

I liked being all grown up and I liked being with my classmates more now than ever. It was my first time to attend a class reunion or alumni event but it certainly won't be my last.

In a gymnasium full of 300 former Custer County High School alumni, I have to say, name tags are an excellent idea. While we are all aging well, we aren't necessarily aging recognizably.

I would like to remind people to use large letters when writing their name, we're old you know. See you next year, one year older.


Julie can be reached for comment at jcarter@tularosa.net

Ridin’, ropin’ and ‘Rithmatic

By Stephen L. Wilmeth

“Well, what did you do out on the range today, Little Buckaroo?” the tourist had asked. “Were you riding and roping and singing along?” The fact of the matter was I really didn’t know what to say because we didn’t use the term “range” in our speech. We used the term “country”. The actual response was probably vague and the dude probably went away thinking that this little kid was a lot like his kin and the rest of this hick community. What I did know was that I didn’t like the feel of it. Somehow my little story was left incomplete.

I had been standing next to the old time ice box at the Cliff Trading Company with my hat tipped back drinking a grape Nehi when the fellow had asked the question. What a great place that old store was. You had to open the lid of the box and reach down and pick out a pop. It always took a couple of times to make up your mind, and it was always so cold down in there with your hands going through the standing glass bottles. If Mr. Mullison caught you opening the box too many times he would say something, but he was very tolerant of the little cowboys that gathered around that box.

Ridin’ the range, eh? Actually, I had been out with Grandpa Albert checking waters and putting out cotton seed cake. It had to be June. It was hot and dry and the cattle were “falling away”. We were still checking heifers at least two times a day, and there were still a big number of them that needed assistance calving.

There was not yet any understanding of EPD’s or bulls that consistently produced low birth weight calves. School was finally out, though, and the ranch kids would all be available to start branding. By the fourth of July the work would be done and we could all go to the rodeo in Silver City. It was 1957 and the “sky was still 1950 blue and green was the color of the greenback dollar” and local ropers were a heck of a lot more popular than any professional. If the latter came to a Grant County rodeo there was a better than even chance the former would win, too.

Through time, the tune the tourist sounded that day would echo through my mind. It would make me wince. I got the same feeling when, years later, I attended a musical production and the cowboy was made to look too much like a fool. The other characters were pretty well impersonated. The charros, the miners, the loggers, and the town characters were all on target, but the cowboy, well, he wasn’t the cowboy of my world. His hat looked like it had been sat on before the fool took the stage and he pulled it down so far he had look up to see down. A real cowboy wouldn’t do that.

Perhaps I had been around mentors that made the clarity of thought and action more distinct. Perhaps, too, I had seen a world through the interpretation of their eyes. I have become convinced their world was a process of study and work more akin to oriental medicine than western medicine approaches. They would observe results and make decisions without needing to understand the complexities of the process. Their aptitude in a world where they had to be anything and everything they faced was amazing.

But, can I finally come to grips with the unanswered question from 1957? What does a day in the life of a cowboy, a cowman, really mean? Let’s start by saying that my ranching colleagues and I are becoming as much or more interested in genetics of feed conversion than we are in carcass traits in our cattle herds under desert conditions. Milk production in our cows probably needs to be more moderate than we have been trending toward in the last two decades. We probably need to spend more time and effort maximizing our cull cow weights and dropping our average age of cows in the general herd. Although every operation is different, our operation is really showing robust turf growth if we can concentrate our herd and minimize herd presence on the majority of pastures during the monsoons. To duplicate that, though, water supply has to be enhanced in order to support those concentrated herd numbers.

Mature cow size has dramatic impact on the standing feed bank. A 1400 pound cow is always impressive coming down the alley at you, but her 1100 pound counterpart is just more efficient. We will prefer that she is red, but the majority of our colleagues will still take the $.05 to $.08 premium on the black cows’ calves unless a March 15 shipping date can be accommodated and that always increases management demands. A good problem to have is decadence in Tabosa stands while black grama, drop seed, and other summer grasses are still above 60% usage at the time AUMs are depleted, but wouldn’t it be better if those Tabosa stands could be better utilized?

Cow size, as a general rule, will tend to reflect conditions of our “ranges” . . . and there it is at last . . . range! We’ve come full circle to what started this little diddy. The question from 1957 with all of its suggestions and unanswered qualifications is not an easy question to answer. Life on the range is a continuum of constraints, long and short term decisions, and risk. It isn’t just ridin’ and ropin’. It requires a bit of ‘rithmetic, too. Would that dude have understood if I could have answered the question? Would he even care? How about the rest of the world?

Will Oil Drilling Become a Pipe Dream?

If President Obama’s Oval Office speech made one thing clear, it is that his administration and the activists who back it view the Gulf oil spill as simply an opportunity to advance their pre-existing agenda—which has nothing to do with cleaning up the Gulf, protecting the fragile coastal environment or fostering the region’s economy. The Obama administration’s May 27 order to stop all deep-water exploratory drilling in U.S. waters of the Gulf of Mexico for six months, pending the report of a commission investigating the causes of BP’s Deepwater Horizon accident, is a case in point. Public and political reaction to the devastating oil release in the Gulf has revitalized a coalition of environmental and anti-energy lobbies that oppose not only deep-water drilling, but all offshore oil production and, in some cases, all use of fossil fuels. As usual, political opportunists have been quick to seize the moment. “You don’t want to let a good crisis get away,” declares Athan Manuel, director of lands protection in the Sierra Club’s legislative office. The organization is urging a permanent moratorium on new offshore drilling. Kieran Suckling, executive director of the Center for Biological Diversity, disputes industry claims that shallow-water drilling is much safer than deep-water drilling. The center wants the existing six-month moratorium extended to all offshore drilling. Such lobbying already has born fruit. On June 8, the administration issued new safety standards for shallow-water drilling. According to Bloomberg Businessweek, “as many as 50 shallow-water drilling rigs that employ about 5,000 workers may need new permits in the next six weeks under the administration’s new review.” According to Vikki Spruill, president and chief executive of the Ocean Conservancy, Mr. Obama’s moratorium is merely the beginning: “the first step needed in broader reform of a broken system.”...more

Song Of The Day #345

Ranch Radio's Gospel tune this Sunday morning is Brand New Man by the bluegrass group 5 For The Gospel.

The tune is on their 14 track CD Working In The Vineyards. Look at that price! This CD has become rare.

Ohio 6-Year-Old Turns Up on Terror Watch List

The father of a 6-year-old Ohio girl who turned up on the U.S. government's terror watch list says the worst thing his daughter has ever done is probably been mean to her sister. But Santhosh Thomas, a doctor from Westlake, Ohio, says he's sure that's not enough to land his 6-year-old Alyssa on the no-fly list of suspected terrorists. "She may have threatened her sister, but I don't think that constitutes Homeland Security triggers," he told CNN. An airline ticket agent informed the family of their predicament when they embarked on recent trip from Cleveland to Minneapolis. The Thomases were allowed to fly that day, but authorities told them to contact the U.S. Department of Homeland Security to clear up the matter. Now they've received a letter from the government addressed to 6-year-old Alyssa, telling her that nothing in her file will be changed. Federal authorities have acknowledged that such a no-fly list exists, but as a matter of national security, they won't comment on whose names are on it nor why."The watch lists are an important layer of security to prevent individuals with known or suspected ties to terrorism from flying," an unnamed spokesman for the Transportation Security Administration told Fox News. "She's been flying since she was two-months old, so that has not been an issue," Alyssa's dad said. "In fact, we had traveled to Mexico in February and there were no issues at that time." That's likely because of a recent change by the Transportation Security Administration, which used to check only international passengers' names against the no-fly list, but since earlier this month has been checking domestic passengers as well...more

Guns Save Lives

Now I know that I was totally wrong about guns. Now I know that more guns means -- hold onto your seat -- less crime. How can that be, when guns kill almost 30,000 Americans a year? Because while we hear about the murders and accidents, we don't often hear about the crimes stopped because would-be victims showed a gun and scared criminals away. Those thwarted crimes and lives saved usually aren't reported to police (sometimes for fear the gun will be confiscated), and when they are reported, the media tend to ignore them. No bang, no news. This state of affairs produces a distorted public impression of guns. If you only hear about the crimes and accidents, and never about lives saved, you might think gun ownership is folly. But, hey, if guns save lives, it logically follows that gun laws cost lives...more

Guns to be allowed onboard Amtrak trains

Under language inserted into a transportation funding bill last year, Amtrak passengers will be allowed to carry firearms in checked luggage beginning in December. Though the provision was thought to expire later this year, the Government Accountability Office recently held that the legislation is permanent law. According to the provision, firearms and ammunition may be transported in secure baggage onboard Amtrak trains under several guidelines including: - Passengers must declare to Amtrak within 24-hours of departure that the firearm will be placed in their checked baggage. - The gun must not be loaded and must also be carried in a hard-sided container. - The hard-sided container must be locked with only the passenger having the combination or key for the container...more

Ken Salazar Gets a Kick in the You-Know-What

For all his John Wayne rhetoric on the BP oil spill, President Obama has failed to administer a swift kick to the ample, deserving rump of Interior Secretary Ken Salazar. No matter: Federal judge Martin Feldman has now done the job the White House won’t do. In a scathing ruling issued Tuesday afternoon, New Orleans–based Feldman overturned the administration’s radical six-month moratorium on deepwater drilling — and he singled out Salazar’s central role in jury-rigging a federal panel’s scientific report to bolster flagrantly politicized conclusions. In a sane world, Salazar’s head would roll. In Obama’s world, he gets immunity. The suit challenging Obama’s desperately political ban was filed by Louisiana rig company Hornbeck Offshore Services, which sued on behalf of all the “small people” in the industry whose economic survival is at stake. As the plaintiffs’ lawyer argued in court, the overbroad ban promised to be more devastating to Gulf workers than the spill itself. “This is an unprecedented industry-wide shutdown. Never before has the government done this,” attorney Carl Rosenblum said. Scientists who served on the committee expressed outrage upon discovering earlier this month that Salazar had — unilaterally and without warning — inserted a blanket drilling-ban recommendation into their report. Allow me to be more injudicious: Salazar lied. Salazar committed fraud. Salazar sullied the reputations of the experts involved and abused his authority...more

The Bait-And-Switch On Cap-And-Trade

President Obama's speech to the nation last week about the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico followed a predictable script. Whenever a problem confronts this administration, the president's answer is sure to include one of a trio of his 2008 campaign initiatives: health care reform, action to address climate change or education reform. Obama claimed in 2008, for instance, that these long-term, slowly acting changes were a fix for a temporary downturn in the economy. Now, in an even greater leap of logic, he contends that the 1,427-page Waxman-Markey bill (which addresses climate change) is the proper response to the oil spill. Obama's advocacy of this bill exemplifies the incoherence and dishonesty of our present debate about energy policy. Two distinct problems — those associated with oil imports and those associated with greenhouse gas emissions — are treated as if they were one and the same...more

Top oil-rig regulator plans "SWAT team" to root out agency's corruption

Three days into his new job, the man President Barack Obama chose to clean up the Minerals Management Service announced Wednesday that he would create an investigative "SWAT team" to scour the agency and root out corruption and conflict of interest. Michael Bromwich said he's using a model he developed as inspector general at the Justice Department in the 1990s, creating a team of lawyers and investigators reporting directly to him and who can quickly follow up leads or anonymous tips from within the imploded agency. Bromwich — who will direct the agency's former regulatory functions under the newly christened Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, Regulation and Enforcement — described the team as potentially the most powerful tool to change an agency culture that lawmakers from both major parties blasted Wednesday, with Republican Sen. Susan Collins of Maine calling it "rife with cronyism and corruption."...more

So it goes from the MMS to the BOEMRE...pretty impressive don't ya think? Problem solved I'm sure. Guess this is the last time you will see the MMS logo on this blog.

Montana kills bear that bit man's ear through tent

Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks wardens captured and killed the black bear on Thursday that was suspected of biting a camper in the ear near St. Regis. The wardens also killed the sow's cub of the year after confirming reports the bears had become accustomed to human food. "It's a sad ending," FWP Warden Capt. Jeff Darrah said on Thursday afternoon. "This bear had been seen by several local residents in garbage. Once she was seen chewing a hot-tub pool cover." On Monday, the 170-pound sow bear chewed through the tent of Ellensburg, Wash., resident Rob Holmes. It took 21 stitches to reattach Holmes' earlobe. He and a friend were camped by the Little Joe River about four miles from St. Regis, at a U.S. Forest Service primitive camping site...more

Group: Feds fail to protect Mexican spotted owl

An environmental group is suing the U.S. Forest Service, claiming the agency has violated the Endangered Species Act by failing to uphold protections won more than a decade ago for the Mexican spotted owl in the Southwest. WildEarth Guardian's lawsuit, filed late Wednesday in Tucson, Ariz., asks the court to keep the Forest Service from approving or implementing any permits or projects on national forests in Arizona and New Mexico that would negatively impact the owl until the agency prepares a biological assessment and consults with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. The group claims the federal government has ignored its responsibility to track the owl's numbers throughout the two states and that the Forest Service continues to approve logging, grazing and other activities on the region's 11 forests that could potentially harm the bird...more

Brewer asks Obama for Arizona border plan details

Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer is telling President Barack Obama she's anxious for details on how his administration's plans to tighten border security will apply to Arizona. Brewer tells Obama in a letter released Thursday that she'd like specifics on National Guard deployments and other steps to be taken in Arizona before a planned Monday visit to Phoenix by Obama administration officials to discuss his plans. The meeting is an outgrowth of Brewer's June 3 visit to the White House, where she and Obama discussed border security and immigration...more

FBI reviews complaint about BLM wild horse roundup

The FBI is reviewing a Las Vegas woman's claim that U.S. land managers broke a federal law protecting wild horses when they removed nearly 2,000 mustangs from public rangeland in Nevada about six months ago. FBI Special Agent Joseph Dickey confirmed Wednesday they received a formal request for an investigation earlier this week from Cindy MacDonald, a horse protection advocate who has challenged roundups before. She claims the Bureau of Land Management gathered far more horses than allowed during the roundup in the Calico mountains about 200 miles north of Reno. Dickey says the FBI takes all complaints seriously. He tells The Associated Press they are evaluating her claims and should make a decision in the coming days on whether to open a formal investigation. AP

BLM to Impound 175 Stray Wild Horses Near Nevada-Utah Line

State and federal officials have announced plans this weekend to impound about 175 horses near the Nevada-Utah line that are believed to be strays or descendants of horses abandoned by private owners over the years. Officials for the U.S. Bureau of Land Management say the herd north of West Wendover has grown in size and is causing considerable impacts to BLM-managed public land resources. State officials will try to establish legal ownership and offer the horses back to the lawful owner. Those without owners will become state property. The estray horses are separate from and not subject to the federal protections afforded wild roaming horses and burros. The roundup begins Friday and is expected to last three or four days. AP

Loss Of Faith

It's an awful thing in a country when its people no longer believe the government protects them and their rights. Yet, a new poll shows that's exactly where Americans are headed right now. In a Rasmussen poll of 1,000 adults taken last Friday and Saturday, nearly half, or 48%, said they see government today as a threat to their rights. Just 37% disagreed. The poll also found that only one in five (21%) believe current government has the consent of the governed. In other words, people think much of what our government does today is illegitimate — possibly even illegal. For a democratic republic such as our own, this is extraordinarily dangerous. The Declaration of Independence and the Constitution were created explicitly to protect Americans' rights by limiting the scope, reach and power of the federal government. The Declaration promises "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness," and goes on to say that "to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed." In short, our government was designed to protect our rights — not to serve as an all-embracing nanny state that slowly, silently strips us of our ability to act as free individuals...more

On the topic of faith in government, I've been an avowed atheist for many years.

Polling data like Rasmussen's does have positive benefits, such as this:

Senate defeats federal jobs bill Republicans on Thursday defeated the Democrats' showcase election-year jobs bill, including an extension of weekly unemployment benefits for people out of work more than six months. The 57-41 vote fell three votes short of the 60 required to crack a GOP filibuster, delivering a major blow to President Obama and Democrats facing big losses of House and Senate seats in the fall election. The rejected bill would have provided $16 billion in new aid to states, preserving the jobs of thousands of state and local government workers and providing what White House officials called an insurance policy against a double-dip recession. It also included dozens of tax breaks sought by business lobbyists, and tax increases on domestically produced oil and on investment fund managers.

Portales auction owner charged with embezzlement

The owner of the closed Portales Livestock Auction has been charged with embezzling nearly half a million dollars from a customer. Randy Bouldin, 39, was arrested June 2 on a charge of embezzlement over $20,000, court records show. He was released on a $10,000 bond the same day. Bouldin is accused of keeping more than $450,000 for 1,000 head of cattle he sold for a Portales dairy in December 2008, according to a press release from the 9th Judicial District Attorney’s office. The dairy owners told investigators with the district attorney’s office Bouldin wrote them a worthless check for $478,669 and when the check did not clear, they were unable to collect their money from him, according to the release. A telephone listing in Bouldin’s name was not a working number. Bouldin’s attorney Wesley Pool declined to comment on the case. An investigation by Senior Agent Dan Blair with the district attorney’s office indicated Bouldin deposited the money he received for selling the cattle into his account and spent it for personal uses, the release said...more

Song Of The Day #344

Ranch Radio brings you Tommy Collins performing What'cha Gonna Do Now and hopes everyone has a great weekend.