Recently the media (both papers and WTIP) have nearly peed their pants over the visit by Governor Plenty-for-the-Rich. His speech was broadcast on WTIP. He was featured in photos with his oh-so-adorable wife and kid.
At the same time there were stories about the local delegates to the Dim and Repug annual love-fests.
Hey, politics is no longer a ball game, if it ever in fact was. Politics is war, at least since the 1980's when a group of Machiavellan plotters later known as "neocons" hatched up a battle plan to take over the US government permanently. Soon they also hooked up with the then-toothless "Moral Majority" and combined the advantages of wealth, power and a supposed channel to God to build a permanent one-party government. A government not of the people, by the people and for the people, but of the rich, by the rich and for the rich.
They have all-but succeeded. They have bought two presidential elections and brought to power a fool who is also a willing tool of his ultra-right, ultra-rich buddies from Yale and Texas oil.
They have decimated the middle class by outsourcing jobs and attacking unions, made college education an unaffordable luxury for many, slashed public school funding, pandered to big corporate interests to the detriment of health and well-being, created new classes of homeless people and near-poor, stacked the courts with their far-right-wing appointees, squandered the future of our children with overwhelming debt for their stupid wars-for-oil while also destroying thousands of young people's lives who idealistically wanted to serve their country after 9/11, made us the most hated people in the world, allowed and even encouraged big corporations to take over the media so the people would never get the real news, condoned torture and spying on all Americans, created a new Big Brother called "Homeland Security" that makes J. Edgar Hoover look like a pussycat, and tried to dismantle Social Security and Medicare.
Perhaps worst of all, these rich-and-powerful morons have probably doomed the earth to unmitigated disaster by denying global warming despite the melting of Artic permafrost, promoting environmental devastation in ever more invasive mining and lifting of regulations to protect air, land and water. This list actually only scratches the surface of the terrible damage done to the world by the neocons and their tame but hateful Religious Right.
This is war, war against the American people, waged by the party that controls the White House, the judiciary and even the Congress despite the 2006 election mandate to throw the suckers out. Pelosi, Reid, and the Blue Dog Dims don't have the stomach or the gumption for the hardball tactics that they COULD employ to bring democracy back to America.
Barack Obama has been voting party-line lately, too, for funding the Iraq war for another year, for giving amnesty to the big telecoms that were spying on our emails and phone calls...
I grew up in a world where the parties jousted and fenced, but had basic respect for the two-party system, the checks & balances of the Constitution, and yes, Truth, Justice and the American Way.
I was a "Nixonette" who later came to love JFK. I went to DFL bean feeds. It was all good fun in those days, until one party started assassinating the charismatic leaders of the other party.
Now it is war. Gov. Plenty has reduced taxes on the rich and replaced them with horrendous fees and sales taxes paid by the poor. He has refused to rebuild our failing infrastructure and bears direct responsibility for the 35W bridge collapse. He is angling for a high place in a McCain administration. He's a snake and also a seller of snake oil and he's looking out for Number One with every photo-op.
-True
Sunday, June 29, 2008
Loose cannon, loaded gun, and Bomb bomb bomb bomb-bomb-Iran
Dear readers,
Please do take the time to read this excellent and as always well-researched article by Seymour Hersh that appeared in today's issue of The New Yorker magazine.
Possibly the forced resignation of Admiral Fallon in March, head of US Central Command in Iraq and Afghanistan, raised your eyebrows as it did mine. Admiral Fallon had expressed misgivings about an attack on Iran.
Hello, folks, it's deja vu Iraq all over again.... the secret shenanigans, the cooked intelligence reports, the public lies, and, voila! a new war, just in time for the 2008 elections.
True wrote to Rep. Oberstar with concerns about the recent resolution in the House (H. Congr. Res. 362) that would facilitate The Unitary Executive's fast track to war by declaring Iran to be a threat to peace and stability in the Middle East. Oberstar wrote to True that he will be thinking hard about whether to vote for it and he also said he is opposed to war with Iran as he was to war with Iraq. So, what's to think about?
On the same page, the Israelis are also making noise about attacking Iran. Now THAT would be a biblical situation so longed for by the end-times folks, would it not? The Israeli right joins the unholy American alliance of the Christian Right with the Big Oil Rich in a new Armageddon? Or Apocalypse? Because we can be sure of one thing: a war with Iran will unleash a world war like nothing we've ever seen.
Oh, the loose cannon? Of course that is King George the Dubya. The loaded gun? You guessed it, Darth Cheney. And Bomb-bomb-bomb Himself? That's the Repug presidential candidate who knows he won't win unless the goofy voters are rallied round the flag again.
-True
Here's the link:
Preparing the BattlefieldThe Bush Administration steps up its secret moves against Iran. - CommonDreams.org
Please do take the time to read this excellent and as always well-researched article by Seymour Hersh that appeared in today's issue of The New Yorker magazine.
Possibly the forced resignation of Admiral Fallon in March, head of US Central Command in Iraq and Afghanistan, raised your eyebrows as it did mine. Admiral Fallon had expressed misgivings about an attack on Iran.
Hello, folks, it's deja vu Iraq all over again.... the secret shenanigans, the cooked intelligence reports, the public lies, and, voila! a new war, just in time for the 2008 elections.
True wrote to Rep. Oberstar with concerns about the recent resolution in the House (H. Congr. Res. 362) that would facilitate The Unitary Executive's fast track to war by declaring Iran to be a threat to peace and stability in the Middle East. Oberstar wrote to True that he will be thinking hard about whether to vote for it and he also said he is opposed to war with Iran as he was to war with Iraq. So, what's to think about?
On the same page, the Israelis are also making noise about attacking Iran. Now THAT would be a biblical situation so longed for by the end-times folks, would it not? The Israeli right joins the unholy American alliance of the Christian Right with the Big Oil Rich in a new Armageddon? Or Apocalypse? Because we can be sure of one thing: a war with Iran will unleash a world war like nothing we've ever seen.
Oh, the loose cannon? Of course that is King George the Dubya. The loaded gun? You guessed it, Darth Cheney. And Bomb-bomb-bomb Himself? That's the Repug presidential candidate who knows he won't win unless the goofy voters are rallied round the flag again.
-True
Here's the link:
Preparing the BattlefieldThe Bush Administration steps up its secret moves against Iran. - CommonDreams.org
Saturday, June 28, 2008
Founding fathers and religious liberty in Cook County
Dear True,
I'm writing to comment on the troubled and sad column by Mitch Dorr in this week's News Herald, "The Death of Faith, Family and Country." I have some sympathy for Mr. Dorr, as I too recall a time in America that I think was better than today, but I'm not willing to blame the changes on "intolerant intellectuals," radical politicians, or Muslims. Also, methinks I have heard the tune he is singing before, on right-wing talk shows and in emails that sometimes come my way--such as naming Barack Obama a Muslim terrorist and other nonsense claiming to be "God's truth."
I know from Mr. Dorr's other writings that he is a good and loving family man and I don't mean to attack him in any way. But I do feel an urgent need to put forth an alternative view of religion and society.
I want to address the parts of Mr. Dorr's column about religion and try to infuse a dose of historical fact-checking. One of my personal regrets about modern society is the dismal failure of our schools to teach history. When I was a child in the 1950's we were rigorously taught to understand the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. We studied the Revolutionary War and we read the speeches by Washington and Jefferson and the other so-called "founding fathers." Back then we had no problem that there were no founding mothers.
The first thing to remember is that the men who devised the Constitution were, yes, mostly Christians (in fact mostly Episcopalians) but they were even more firmly for freedom of religion, the right to worship or NOT worship as anyone may choose. They were best termed "deists" rather than Christians, however, as followers of the "Enlightenment" philosophies of Locke, Rousseau and Voltaire promoting individual liberty and equality. Of course they were referring to the equality of white men, and several were slave owners but in their time they were visionaries.
Several of them spoke quite firmly on the issue of religion and government, for example:
"I believe in one God, Creator of the universe...That the most acceptable service we can render Him is doing good to His other children...As to Jesus..I have some doubts as to his divinity..."
-Benjamin Franklin
"Every man ought to be protected in worshipping the Deity according to the dictates of his own conscience."
-George Washington
"I do not believe in the creed professed by the Jewish church, by the Roman church, by the Greek church, by the Turkish church, by the Protestant church, nor by any church that I know of..."
-Thomas Paine
"Millions of innocent men, women and children, since the introduction of Christianity, have been burnt, tortured, fined, imprisoned, yet we have not advanced one inch towards uniformity. What has been the effect of coercion? To make one half of the world fools and the other half hypocrites. To support roguery and error all over the earth."
-Thomas Jefferson
"That religion, or the duty we owe to our Creator, and the manner of discharging it, can be directed only by reason and conviction, not by force or violence; and therefore all men are equally entitled to the free exercise of religion, according to the dictates of conscience."
-Patrick Henry
"The civil rights of none shall be abridged on account of religious belief or worship, nor shall any national religion be established, nor shall the full and equal rights of conscience be in any manner, or on any pretence, infringed."
-James Madison
(original wording of the First Amendment, 1789)
In short, the founders were clear and adamant about protecting the rights of all to worship as each one chooses. The Religious Right have made an issue of actual non-issues like worship in public schools or government buildings.
Granted, the founders never specifically forebade worship in public buildings because they never foresaw free public education for all, the great immigrations of many races and creeds that would re-make America in centuries to come, or that one day some people might feel excluded by a government display of one religious viewpoint such as the Ten Commandments. Nonetheless, they foresaw that there would be possibilities they couldn't cover, and so laid down the principle of religious neutrality in the brilliant First Amendment.
But ironically, what has been decreed in the past is subject to change under those same principles laid down by the founders.
And so, a "Unitary Executive" (anathema to the founders), a judicial system stacked to favor the rightest of the right wing, and a gutless Congress have conspired with the right-wing corporations that buy votes, that control our media and that are supported by the Christian right to perpetrate untruths about the role of religion in America.
The right to worship in government buildings and display the Ten Commandments smacks of a state religion. Or, why not the Four Noble Truths of Buddhism instead? Why not face Mecca and chant?
Mr. Dorr, it was not about keeping you from your Christian worship, at home, at church or within the community, but rather about respecting those who are not Christian that the founders had in mind when they decreed there would be no mixing of religion and government. They understood only too well how easily any religious group may drive "unbelievers" to become second-class citizens, refugees, or victims of genocide, as in recent times we were appalled to witness in Nazi Germany.
Genocide, by the way, proceeds unabated today in many parts of our lawless corporate dominated world. Our aid is urgently required and yet the Religious Right is silent.
In Cook County, Christians have many forums of expressions, unlike urban areas. There is a religion page and a column by a minister in both weekly papers and these are exclusively Christian. There are Christmas pageants and activities at school. Perhaps, you say, this does not matter because everybody in Cook County is a Christian? Not so. I am not.
On the other hand I am more than happy to read the thoughts of Christian ministers, SO LONG AS other voices are also heard equally (or at least occasionally). Such as columns about Buddhism, Islam, Judaism, or my own faith of Hinduism which embraces the teaching of the saints and sages of all religions.
And for those who can't bear to make it through the school day without prayer, you can always pray silently, pray with your heart and mind if not your mouth. Pray while taking tests or eating lunch.
The commonality among religious faiths is what tolerance is all about, and tolerance is the very foundation of a free and just society. I don't know how we can co-exist with one another in harmony without it.
If you seriously study Islam you will find its teachings not very different from those of Christianity. The Islamic fundamentalists who believe in jihad or holy war are not all that different from the Christians who slaughtered Muslims during the Crusades.
Any who kill in the name of religion are not practicing the great moral and universal truths of their faiths. The similarities have always been apparent to great religious leaders like the Dalai Lama, Pope John XXIII, Gandhi and Mother Teresa as well as humbler students of comparative religion, like my personal hero, Bill Moyers.
Shortly after reading Mr. Dorr's column, I chanced to read a speech by Moyers made at Union Theological Seminary in 2005 on receipt of the President's Medal, their highest award. Bill is a devout Christian. He begins his speech by, like Mr. Dorr, looking back to happier times when he was growing up but in a very different vein: "At the Central Baptist Church in Marshall, Texas, where I was baptized in the faith, we believed in a free church in a free state. I still do."
Bill goes on to describe the First Amendment as "a remarkable arrangement honoring 'soul freedom'--the inviolate right of each of us to believe and worship as our conscience determines, in a society that honors freedom over conformity." He sees that fundamental right at risk in the rise of a new religious movement that is based in the Republican party, well-funded and organized, and resolved on a "sectarian crusade for state power." "The religious right has become the dominant force in America's governing party," he said, and thereby also complicit in "upholding a system of class and race in which the rich thrive and the poor barely survive."
"This is the crux of the matter: to these believers there is only one legitimate religion and only one particular brand of that religion that is right; all others are immoral or wrong. They believe they alone know what the Bible means."
Bill concludes, "As I look back on the conflicts and clamor of our boisterous past, one lesson about democracy stands above all others: bullies--political bullies, economic bullies and religious bullies--cannot be appeased; they have to be opposed with courage, clarity and conviction. This is never easy. These true believers don't fight fair."
Well, this says it all to me, Mr. Dorr, and it is why I feel obliged to take issue with your view of MY country as a CHRISTIAN country while to me it is still, if precariously, a FREE country.
Sincerely,
Nancye Belding
Grand Marais
"Kindness is my religion."
-The Dalai Lama
I'm writing to comment on the troubled and sad column by Mitch Dorr in this week's News Herald, "The Death of Faith, Family and Country." I have some sympathy for Mr. Dorr, as I too recall a time in America that I think was better than today, but I'm not willing to blame the changes on "intolerant intellectuals," radical politicians, or Muslims. Also, methinks I have heard the tune he is singing before, on right-wing talk shows and in emails that sometimes come my way--such as naming Barack Obama a Muslim terrorist and other nonsense claiming to be "God's truth."
I know from Mr. Dorr's other writings that he is a good and loving family man and I don't mean to attack him in any way. But I do feel an urgent need to put forth an alternative view of religion and society.
I want to address the parts of Mr. Dorr's column about religion and try to infuse a dose of historical fact-checking. One of my personal regrets about modern society is the dismal failure of our schools to teach history. When I was a child in the 1950's we were rigorously taught to understand the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. We studied the Revolutionary War and we read the speeches by Washington and Jefferson and the other so-called "founding fathers." Back then we had no problem that there were no founding mothers.
The first thing to remember is that the men who devised the Constitution were, yes, mostly Christians (in fact mostly Episcopalians) but they were even more firmly for freedom of religion, the right to worship or NOT worship as anyone may choose. They were best termed "deists" rather than Christians, however, as followers of the "Enlightenment" philosophies of Locke, Rousseau and Voltaire promoting individual liberty and equality. Of course they were referring to the equality of white men, and several were slave owners but in their time they were visionaries.
Several of them spoke quite firmly on the issue of religion and government, for example:
"I believe in one God, Creator of the universe...That the most acceptable service we can render Him is doing good to His other children...As to Jesus..I have some doubts as to his divinity..."
-Benjamin Franklin
"Every man ought to be protected in worshipping the Deity according to the dictates of his own conscience."
-George Washington
"I do not believe in the creed professed by the Jewish church, by the Roman church, by the Greek church, by the Turkish church, by the Protestant church, nor by any church that I know of..."
-Thomas Paine
"Millions of innocent men, women and children, since the introduction of Christianity, have been burnt, tortured, fined, imprisoned, yet we have not advanced one inch towards uniformity. What has been the effect of coercion? To make one half of the world fools and the other half hypocrites. To support roguery and error all over the earth."
-Thomas Jefferson
"That religion, or the duty we owe to our Creator, and the manner of discharging it, can be directed only by reason and conviction, not by force or violence; and therefore all men are equally entitled to the free exercise of religion, according to the dictates of conscience."
-Patrick Henry
"The civil rights of none shall be abridged on account of religious belief or worship, nor shall any national religion be established, nor shall the full and equal rights of conscience be in any manner, or on any pretence, infringed."
-James Madison
(original wording of the First Amendment, 1789)
In short, the founders were clear and adamant about protecting the rights of all to worship as each one chooses. The Religious Right have made an issue of actual non-issues like worship in public schools or government buildings.
Granted, the founders never specifically forebade worship in public buildings because they never foresaw free public education for all, the great immigrations of many races and creeds that would re-make America in centuries to come, or that one day some people might feel excluded by a government display of one religious viewpoint such as the Ten Commandments. Nonetheless, they foresaw that there would be possibilities they couldn't cover, and so laid down the principle of religious neutrality in the brilliant First Amendment.
But ironically, what has been decreed in the past is subject to change under those same principles laid down by the founders.
And so, a "Unitary Executive" (anathema to the founders), a judicial system stacked to favor the rightest of the right wing, and a gutless Congress have conspired with the right-wing corporations that buy votes, that control our media and that are supported by the Christian right to perpetrate untruths about the role of religion in America.
The right to worship in government buildings and display the Ten Commandments smacks of a state religion. Or, why not the Four Noble Truths of Buddhism instead? Why not face Mecca and chant?
Mr. Dorr, it was not about keeping you from your Christian worship, at home, at church or within the community, but rather about respecting those who are not Christian that the founders had in mind when they decreed there would be no mixing of religion and government. They understood only too well how easily any religious group may drive "unbelievers" to become second-class citizens, refugees, or victims of genocide, as in recent times we were appalled to witness in Nazi Germany.
Genocide, by the way, proceeds unabated today in many parts of our lawless corporate dominated world. Our aid is urgently required and yet the Religious Right is silent.
In Cook County, Christians have many forums of expressions, unlike urban areas. There is a religion page and a column by a minister in both weekly papers and these are exclusively Christian. There are Christmas pageants and activities at school. Perhaps, you say, this does not matter because everybody in Cook County is a Christian? Not so. I am not.
On the other hand I am more than happy to read the thoughts of Christian ministers, SO LONG AS other voices are also heard equally (or at least occasionally). Such as columns about Buddhism, Islam, Judaism, or my own faith of Hinduism which embraces the teaching of the saints and sages of all religions.
And for those who can't bear to make it through the school day without prayer, you can always pray silently, pray with your heart and mind if not your mouth. Pray while taking tests or eating lunch.
The commonality among religious faiths is what tolerance is all about, and tolerance is the very foundation of a free and just society. I don't know how we can co-exist with one another in harmony without it.
If you seriously study Islam you will find its teachings not very different from those of Christianity. The Islamic fundamentalists who believe in jihad or holy war are not all that different from the Christians who slaughtered Muslims during the Crusades.
Any who kill in the name of religion are not practicing the great moral and universal truths of their faiths. The similarities have always been apparent to great religious leaders like the Dalai Lama, Pope John XXIII, Gandhi and Mother Teresa as well as humbler students of comparative religion, like my personal hero, Bill Moyers.
Shortly after reading Mr. Dorr's column, I chanced to read a speech by Moyers made at Union Theological Seminary in 2005 on receipt of the President's Medal, their highest award. Bill is a devout Christian. He begins his speech by, like Mr. Dorr, looking back to happier times when he was growing up but in a very different vein: "At the Central Baptist Church in Marshall, Texas, where I was baptized in the faith, we believed in a free church in a free state. I still do."
Bill goes on to describe the First Amendment as "a remarkable arrangement honoring 'soul freedom'--the inviolate right of each of us to believe and worship as our conscience determines, in a society that honors freedom over conformity." He sees that fundamental right at risk in the rise of a new religious movement that is based in the Republican party, well-funded and organized, and resolved on a "sectarian crusade for state power." "The religious right has become the dominant force in America's governing party," he said, and thereby also complicit in "upholding a system of class and race in which the rich thrive and the poor barely survive."
"This is the crux of the matter: to these believers there is only one legitimate religion and only one particular brand of that religion that is right; all others are immoral or wrong. They believe they alone know what the Bible means."
Bill concludes, "As I look back on the conflicts and clamor of our boisterous past, one lesson about democracy stands above all others: bullies--political bullies, economic bullies and religious bullies--cannot be appeased; they have to be opposed with courage, clarity and conviction. This is never easy. These true believers don't fight fair."
Well, this says it all to me, Mr. Dorr, and it is why I feel obliged to take issue with your view of MY country as a CHRISTIAN country while to me it is still, if precariously, a FREE country.
Sincerely,
Nancye Belding
Grand Marais
"Kindness is my religion."
-The Dalai Lama
Thursday, June 26, 2008
| show details 10:38 AM (9 hours ago) |
|
"the rest of the story" about the sulfide copper-nickel mining industry
being proposed for northeastern Minnesota.
Info for; HR 4292: Superior National Forest Land Adjustment Act of 2007
To: http://www.twoharborsmn.com/
Subject: sulfide mining
Subject: sulfide mining
Lake County Chronicle
An inquisitive group of about 45 Lake and St. Louis County residents gathered last week at the Two Harbors Community Center, anxious to hear "the rest of the story" about the sulfide copper-nickel mining industry being proposed for northeastern Minnesota.
Local mass media has painted a rosy picture of jobs and economic growth coming from this new kind of mining. Not surprisingly absent in the mining propaganda are the grim realities of the toxic pollution problems inherently associated with the mining of sulfide ore bodies and the legacy of public-funded clean up costs to taxpayers, which number in the billions of dollars nationwide. Sulfide mining, also called non-ferrous metallic minerals mining and copper-nickel mining, is "not your father's mining". Its environmental impact greatly exceeds that of the iron and taconite mining we have all grown up with. Sulfide ore bodies, in which trace amounts of valuable metals are embedded, once exposed to air and water, generate sulfuric acid. Once this chemical process (Acid Mine Drainage) starts, it cannot be reversed and will continue for hundreds, and more likely thousands of years. Sulfuric acid runoff from the massive volume of waste rock piles and strip mine pits will leach into our surface waters and groundwater if not effectively controlled and treated. This kind of control has not yet been demonstrated. A metallic sulfide mine has never failed to pollute its watershed.
Our good neighbors in Wisconsin have found an effective control measure for sulfide mining. They have legislatively enacted a moratorium that will permit sulfide mining only after it has been demonstrated that it has been done elsewhere safely for 10 years and that such a mine has been closed for 10 years without any negative aftereffects. So far no company has been able to meet the criteria of this law. Minnesota has not yet adopted this kind of caution to protect our environment.
A new Canadian mining company, PolyMet is presently in the permitting process with Minnesota's DNR, including an environmental impact statement (EIS) which is due out soon, to be followed by a brief period of public input. The proposed mine site is just outside of Babbitt MN, and surrounded by the Partridge River, a Lake Superior tributary. If PolyMet is allowed to proceed, it will set off a ripple effect, with many other mining companies ready to pursue prospects of their own. These new mining prospects will expand mining into new areas of the Arrowhead country, including the Spruce Road area near Birch Lake, less than 1 mile from the BWCA. Settled areas such as the Bassett-Fairbanks community, could be next, with more than 9000 acres of 50-year mineral rights leases recently purchased from the state in that area.
Even though our iron mining industry is healthy, our politicians are anxious to bring even more non-diversified non-sustainable industrial growth to Minnesota's Arrowhead. Rep. James Oberstar has introduced a bill in the House to facilitate the sale of 6,700 acres of Superior National Forest land to PolyMet, without waiting for the results of the EIS, and without possibility of appeal of its authority or provisions. The bill, HR4292, sets a dangerous precedent of sale of such a large parcel of national forest land to a foreign, private industry without public input.
North Shore Watershed Watch and ACTNOW, the groups which organized this meeting, believe that the environmental problems such an industry would bring to our water-rich environment are not being adequately addressed or shared with the public. After viewing the evening's presentation, most of those in attendance, including residents who traveled from Brimson and Ely areas, agreed and were looking for ways to express their anger and frustration.
Other questions coming from the group which should be considered in deciding about the future of this industry in our state were: how long are the jobs generated locally likely to last? Do domestic or foreign companies stand to profit most from extraction of these minerals? Where are the markets for the minerals – we all use them, but would these be used domestically or go to China, India, etc.? What is the rush – the minerals aren't going anywhere are they? There will still be a market for them after however many years it takes to find out if they can be mined safely. Has there been an energy budget proposed for this industry? Given the rising cost and diminishing supply of energy, will it have to compete with the taconite industry for energy? And the taconite industry requires clean water – will they be working at cross purposes on that front too? You mean, I can't run over a cattail with my ATV, but a Canadian mining company can destroy a thousand acres of wetlands? So, this is like a grand experiment with our forests and water resources?
Will the financial benefit to today's generation be at the expense of tomorrow's generation? Only our descendants' will be able to answer that question.
Todd Ronning
Two Harbors MN
Reader wants water skips in harbor to continue
Gmail - Disappointed in City Council decision! - truenorthgm@gmail.com:
I am a citizen of Cook County that has been attending the water skips activities in the Grand Marais harbor during various times of the year. I am greatly disappointed in the city council’s decision to not allow this event any longer. I feel that not enough research and time was spent looking into this topic before a decision was made.
The city may not have known that permission was needed from the Coast Guard to have the water skips, but we did. We have worked with them the previous 2 years to make sure it was a safe event that followed their guidelines. We followed their 30 min rule about retrieving a sunken snowmobile, we followed their rules regarding fire extinguishers and buoys attached to our sleds. We even made sure to stay in the area that was roped off for us and to not get to close to the many people who came to enjoy this event. We will now work to try and get our activity back, and I think that the city council should work with us. There is nothing for anyone over the age of 15 do during Fisherman’s Picnic, and now that the water skips aren’t happening, I have absolutely no reason to go downtown or spend any money. This event not only brought local people into town to watch it, but it also brought new people into Cook County who wanted to partake in this event. It also drew more people than any other event during Fisherman's Picnic down to watch. Let's all work together and get this great asset to Fisherman's Picnic back!!
Amanda Plummer
I am a citizen of Cook County that has been attending the water skips activities in the Grand Marais harbor during various times of the year. I am greatly disappointed in the city council’s decision to not allow this event any longer. I feel that not enough research and time was spent looking into this topic before a decision was made.
The city may not have known that permission was needed from the Coast Guard to have the water skips, but we did. We have worked with them the previous 2 years to make sure it was a safe event that followed their guidelines. We followed their 30 min rule about retrieving a sunken snowmobile, we followed their rules regarding fire extinguishers and buoys attached to our sleds. We even made sure to stay in the area that was roped off for us and to not get to close to the many people who came to enjoy this event. We will now work to try and get our activity back, and I think that the city council should work with us. There is nothing for anyone over the age of 15 do during Fisherman’s Picnic, and now that the water skips aren’t happening, I have absolutely no reason to go downtown or spend any money. This event not only brought local people into town to watch it, but it also brought new people into Cook County who wanted to partake in this event. It also drew more people than any other event during Fisherman's Picnic down to watch. Let's all work together and get this great asset to Fisherman's Picnic back!!
Amanda Plummer
Saturday, June 21, 2008
Oppose Rep. Oberstar's HR 4292 Bill
Oberstar's HR 4292 is a "sellout": Selling Superior Forest land to Polymet for its disastrous proposed copper-nickel-palladium mine near Hoyt Lakes and within the Duluth area watershed:
Please link to this Duluth Tribune story by John Myers, who has written extensively on this issue, and let Rep. Oberstar know this sale of forest land to a private mining company with intent to destroy the environment is unacceptable.
-True
On the Internet
Bill sells Superior National Forest land to Polymet
John Myers Duluth News Tribune
Published Friday, June 06, 2008
Legislation in the U.S. House would sell 6,700 acres in the Superior National Forest to the Polymet copper company without an environmental assessment or public input. Link to bill ; http://www.govtrack.us/congress/billtext.xpd?bill=h110-4292 environmental review and environmental protections !
The federal land is precisely where the company hopes to mine for copper, nickel, platinum and palladium as early as next year.
It would be the first major sale of Superior Forest land to a private company.
The bill, HR 4292, introduced by U.S. Rep. Jim Oberstar, D-Minn., has not advanced in any committee.
Without legislation, the Forest Service is prohibited from selling any land to a private party, though exceptions are made for tracts smaller than 10 acres, said Jim Sanders, supervisor of the Superior National Forest.
Instead, the Forest Service usually trades land with property owners. The Forest Service has been negotiating with Polymet for about a year to exchange the land for other land in or near the Superior National Forest, Sanders said. But a land exchange of this size is more cumbersome, forcing Polymet to find multiple willing sellers, bargain over price and acquire purchase agreements.
The legislation would require the Forest Service to use money from the sale to buy private land of equal value in or near the Superior National Forest boundary. The bill exempts the land sale from a separate environmental review, but supporters note that an environmental review of the mining project is under way.
Supporters say the bill simply speeds up the process of trading the mine land for other forested land.
“The legislation gets us to the same end, the same result as a land exchange,” Sanders said. “It’s the same value, the same appraisal process, whether it’s a sale or exchange.”
Selling the land directly to Polymet probably would speed up the process by a year or so because it avoids the environmental assessment required with a land exchange and allows the Forest Service to deal with directly with willing sellers.
“We think it avoids a lot of duplication on the environmental assessment. … And it saves a lot of time and effort for both us and the Forest Service,” said Latisha Gietzen, Polymet vice president of public, environmental and government affairs.
Mineral rights vs. land ownership
Sanders said the Forest Service purchased the land from U.S. Steel in the 1930s but has never owned the mineral rights below the surface. Polymet controls those mineral rights.
Polymet officials say they had been moving ahead with mining plans, assuming their mineral rights “superseded” surface ownership, Gietzen said. Regional U.S. Forest Service officials last year informed the company that they didn’t hold the same legal opinion.
Rather than battle it out, the two sides agreed on the legislation to sell the land, Gietzen said. But if that fails, the company still could try to sue the government to gain access to the minerals.
“We certainly can challenge their opinion. … But nobody wants to go that route,” Gietzen said.
Because the 6,700 acres is surrounded by mining-related activities — a railroad to the south and an active taconite mine to the north — Sanders said it makes sense to sell the land and use the proceeds to buy other, more environmentally sensitive land closer to the heart of the forest.
The forest covers more than 3 million acres; about 2 million of that is owned by the federal government. There are hundreds of tracts of private, state and county-owned land within the forest boundaries.
Sanders said he is eying private land in the Kawishiwi River area, near Trout Lake, the Fernberg corridor and near Mud Lake, where landowners are willing to sell and where “it makes sense to consolidate our holdings.”
But critics of copper mining in the north woods say the legislation seems to offer a special deal to the mining company.
The land in question includes undeveloped forest and 1,200 acres of wetlands, said John Doberstein of Duluth, chairman of the Mining Without Harm committee of the Minnesota Sierra Club. The bill was introduced in December with no announcement.
“Not only does the bill exempt them from doing an Environmental Impact Statement [on the sale], it also sets a dangerous precedent of taking public land and transferring it to a private company for their profit without any public input,” Doberstein said. “This really seems to fast-track the land sale for the convenience of the company, without any regard whether this is the right thing to do with the forest.”
Critics say that copper mines in other areas of the world have almost always brought extreme environmental problems.
John Schadl, an Oberstar spokesman, said the bill was introduced at the request of the Forest Service and Polymet to speed the company toward mining operations.
“It’s an effort to expedite the process but still do it in an environmentally sound way,” Schadl said. “And the bill as it is now [will] not be the same bill that moves. … There will be some changes.”
No Senate version has been introduced yet.
Congressional action to sell national forest land to private parties is not unheard of, Sanders said. About a dozen such bills have been passed in the past decade, he said.
Polymet would be Minnesota’s first copper-nickel mine. But Polymet is only one of several companies eyeing rich deposits of copper, nickel, platinum and palladium under northern Minnesota forests and lakes. The interest is being sparked by record-breaking prices for those minerals and new technology that make it easier to separate copper from other rock.
Polymet is the farthest along toward developing those minerals and has purchased land, processing equipment and buildings from the former LTV Mining site near Hoyt Lakes. The company’s proposed open pit mine on federal property is several miles away toward Babbitt and would be connected by railroad to the processing plant.
http://www.sosbluewaters.org
Alert on HR 4292: Superior National Forest Land Adjustment Act of 2007
This bill would sell Superior National Forest public land to a mining company in order to avoid public
HR 4292 mandates a sale of approximately 6,700 forested/wetland acres of Superior National Forest land near the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness, to PolyMet, Inc., a Canadian company hoping to open the first metallic sulfide copper strip mine in Minnesota. The U.S. Forest Service owns the surface rights to the land, but not the mineral rights. The underlying purpose of this bill would be to benefit the mining company by eluding steps in the standard land exchange process which includes public comment and environmental review.
Progressing with land transfer before completion of the environmental process
According to HR 4292, the U.S. Forest Service would be given required to sell 6,700 acres of public land to PolyMet before completion of an Environmental Impact Statement (EIS). This is contrary to the National Environmental Policy Act (1969) and negates the purpose of the EIS, which is to allow for disclosure of environmental impacts of an action and for public input. There is an existing process for the Forest Service to exchange lands with private companies but exchange takes place after review that is open to the public in the form of an Environmental Impact Statement. This bill would circumvent that existing process.
This bill would also require the U.S. Forest Service to assume the responsibility for wetland replacement credits over a ten year period. The Army Corps of Engineers, in conjunction with the Forest Service, is responsible for assessing impacts and mitigation alternatives for wetlands as part of the PolyMet EIS process. In addition, the Wetland Conservation Act of Minnesota is intended to prevent further loss of wetlands within the State. Thus HR 4292 is contrary to both Federal and State law.
HR 4292 further disregards public input by specifically denying appeal of the outcome.
Special favors for mining companies
The U. S. Forest Service owns less than half of the mineral estate in the Superior National Forest and in the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness. Likewise, the Forest Service lacks mineral rights to many of its lands nationwide. This bill, if passed, could set precedence for the sale of public lands to private mining companies across the country. It would also open the doors for a dozen other mining companies who are currently exploring the Duluth Complex of rocks throughout Minnesota and other sulfide mineral deposits in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. These sulfide-bearing rocks encompass an area that extends underneath the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness and between Voyageurs National Park and Lake Superior, before dipping down into the southern part of the state.
Ignoring potential harm to the environment
At the same time that a bill designed solely to help PolyMet bypass existing environmental and public disclosure law is being circulated through the halls of Congress, PolyMet is downplaying the potential effects of acid mine drainage. Sulfuric acid is a byproduct of metallic sulfide mining and in all previous mines required perpetual treatment of any affected watershed.
PolyMet spokesmen claim their company is "following all of Minnesota's environmental laws." HR 4292 seems contradictory to this statement.
Action requested Concerned citizens need to contact their U.S. representative, and Minnesota senators Amy Klobuchar and Norm Coleman in opposition to HR 4292. More specifically, citizens can request an explanation from Rep. Oberstar regarding the intention of this bill to circumvent current environmental law, to sell public land for private investment, and to ignore opportunity for public input as part of the environmental impact statement process.
Primary Contact;
Senator Amy Klobuchar http://klobuchar.senate.gov/
E-Mail: senator@klobuchar.senate.gov
Toll Free: 1-888-224-9043
302 Hart Senate Office Building
Washington, DC 20510
phone: 202-224-3244
fax: 202-228-2186
1200 Washington Avenue South, Suite 250
Minneapolis, MN 55415
Main Line: 612-727-5220
Main Fax: 612-727-5223
Toll Free: 1-888-224-9043
1134 7th Street NW
Rochester, MN 55901
Main Line: 507-288-5321
Fax: 507-288-2922
121 4th Street South
Moorhead, MN 56560
Main Line: 218-287-2219
Fax: 218-287-2930
Olcott Plaza, Suite 105
820 9th Street North
Virginia, MN 55792
Main Line: 218-741-9690
Fax:218-741-3692
Senator Norm Coleman http://coleman.senate.gov/
E-Mail coleman.senate.gov/index.cfm
Washington Office:
320 Senate Hart Office Building
Washington, DC 20510
Main: 202-224-5641
Fax: 202-224-1152
Scheduling: 202-228-1503
Minnesota Office in St. Paul:
2550 University Ave W, Suite 100N
St. Paul, MN 55114
Main: 651-645-0323
Fax: 651-645-3110
Toll Free: 800-642-6041
Minnesota Office in Mankato:
12 Civic Center Plaza
Suite 2167
Mankato, Minnesota 56001
Main: 507-625-6800
Fax: 507-625-9427
Minnesota Office in Grand Rapids:
200 Northbank Center 206B
Northeast 3rd Street
Grand Rapids, MN 55744
Main: 218-327-9333
Fax: 218-327-8637
Minnesota Office in Moorhead:
810 4th Avenue South
Suite 203
Moorhead, MN 56560
IEN news release
The Sale of Federal Lands to a Mining Company in the 1854 Treaty Area of Minnesota
Representative James Oberstar from Minnesota’s 8th congressional district has introduced HR 4292 in the U.S. House of Representatives. This act, titled - the Superior National Forest Land Adjustment Act of 2007 – would, require the Secretary of Agriculture to sell certain lands in Superior National Forest in Minnesota to Polymet Mining Company within 180 days of enactment. The act requires:
(1) The sale of 6,700 acres of Forest Service lands;
(2) The first offer for the sale of the lands under this Act is to be made to Poly Met Mining, Inc explicitly for the purposes of strip mining;
(3) Elimination of the requirement for public disclosure and environmental review under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA). Compliance under NEPA is usually met by the writing and review of an Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) that informs the Secretary, affected federally recognized Tribes, and the public about possible environmental impacts of a federal land exchange. A major environmental impact will be the mining company dredging or filling with mine waste 1,200 acres of wetlands included in this sale adjacent to the Partridge River, a tributary of the St. Louis River. The St. Louis River flows through the Fond du Lac Indian reservation on it’s way to Lake Superior.
(4) There can be no administrative appeal of the sale.
(5) The sale must take place within 180 days of the enactment of the act.
This legislation would create a precedent by which the Superior National Forest could sell public lands each time a mine gets close to the permitting phase of development. This act relieves the Forest Service from their responsibilities to protect public lands here in Minnesota. This could become a precedent elsewhere each time a federal land agency chooses to ignore it’s mandated management responsibilities on order to expedite mining operations.
Exchanges of federal land routinely happen all over the country. The Bureau of Land management and U.S. Forest Service conduct approximately three hundred land exchanges annually. There is a process delineated in law (the Federal Land Policy and Management Act of 1976) that describes how this happens for both Bureau of Land Management holdings as well as U.S. Forest Service. There is no need to introduce legislation that circumvents existing law. There is a time tested federal process in place that gives the Secretary of Agriculture, the public, and Federally Recognized Indian tribes input into the land exchange process. While this process does not guarantee that all concerns are addressed, it guarantees that concerns are heard. The proposed legislation would take away the right for all citizens as well as other state, tribal, and federal agencies to have their voices heard on this land exchange.
This sale will have, as yet, undetermined impacts on treaty-reserved rights in the 1854 treaty area. There will be both short-term significant environmental consequences in the form of filling or draining approximately 1,200 acres of wetland and long term environmental and water quality degradation in the form of discharge from large waste rock piles. Loss of wetlands coupled with runoff from the mine waste stored on this site can adversely affect water quality as well as other cultural, and natural resources for miles downstream from the mine site. Chemicals from existing iron mines have already been detected in the St. Louis River where it enters the Fond du Lac Indian Reservation.
Let the Minnesota congressional delegation know that there is no need to sell this Forest Service land as proposed in HR 4292; there is an existing land exchange process that should not be circumvented. Let them know that all U.S. citizens and the tribes in the region have a right to express their views on the fate of this land. Let them know that there is an existing process for this type of transaction and that you favor the use of that process.
The author of H.R. 4292, The Superior National Forest Adjustment Act of 2007, is:
Congressman James L Oberstar
Eighth Congressional District of Minnesota
Duluth Federal Building, Room 231
Duluth, Minnesota 55802
(218) 727-7474
TDD: (218) 727-7474
FAX: (218) 727-8270
or
2365 Rayburn House Office Building
Washington, DC 20515
(202) 225-6211
FAX: (202) 225-0699
http://www.oberstar.org
In the Senate, Amy Klobuchar is considering the introduction of companion legislation:
Senator Amy Klobuchar
1200 Washington Avenue South, Suite 250
Minneapolis, MN 55415
Main Line: 612-727-5220
Main Fax: 612-727-5223
or
302 Hart Senate Office Building
Washington, DC 20510
Phone: 202-224-3244
Fax: 202-228-2186
For additional information, contact Robert Shimek, IEN Mining Projects Coordinator, 218-751-4967
Letter to the Duluth News Tribune-
To the editor:
I am writing to inform readers about H.R. 4292, the Superior National Forest Land Adjustment Act of 2007, which is being sponsored by U.S. Representative James Oberstar. The sole purpose of this bill is to fast track a land sale between the U.S. Forest Service and PolyMet, Inc. in anticipation of the permitting of PolyMet’s proposed metallic sulfide mine near Hoyt Lakes.
The U.S. Forest Service would be given the authority to sell 6,700 acres of public forest land to PolyMet without any environmental review of the sale (which goes against current Federal law) and to assume the responsibility for wetland replacement credits over a ten year period (which goes against current wetland policy). Any administrative appeal would be denied. This bill would specifically help facilitate the permitting process for PolyMet.
The bill, if enacted, would also set a precedent for the selling of public land to private mining companies nationwide, based upon the fact that the U.S. Forest Service does not often hold the mineral rights to its lands.
Considering that PolyMet spokesmen claim they are asking for no favors and are following all of Minnesota’s environmental regulations, it seems a little strange that a bill designed solely for the benefit of PolyMet is currently circulating through the U.S. Congress.
At the same time, PolyMet is downplaying the effects of acid mine drainage, a problem associated with metallic sulfide mines, and which basically requires perpetual treatment. I believe it’s time for area citizens to take a closer look at the effects that the permitting of an entirely new mining industry will have upon the Arrowhead Region, and upon future generations.
Please let your elected officials know that you oppose this bill.
Sincerely,
Elanne Palcich
Chisholm, Minnesota
218-969-9557/218-254-3754
Blog-
6700 acres of Superior National Forest being sold to POLYMET mng, NO EIS, NO hearing
Why is the National Forest Service selling 6700 acres of SUPERIOR NATL FOREST, MN, to Polymet, with no EIS??
There is a bill in Legislature in Minnesota to allow the National Forest Service to sell, directly to Polymet mining, 6700 acres of Superior National Forest, with no public hearing, no Environmental Impact Statement, nothing. that land includes 1200+ acres of wetlands.
My question is: why would the NFS suddenly, with no notice, place a bill to sell DIRECTLY, with NO public input, land to a mining company, land...that is the publics land?
Incidentally, Polymet intends to, within 12 months, have an open pit mining operation in place and active in that land. Have you seen what damage an open pit copper mine DOES to the earth?
WHY ARE WE ALLOWING THIS?
Contact your fellow environmentalists and please, make this an issue of contention. Its important!!!
There is a bill in Legislature in Minnesota to allow the National Forest Service to sell, directly to Polymet mining, 6700 acres of Superior National Forest, with no public hearing, no Environmental Impact Statement, nothing. that land includes 1200+ acres of wetlands.
My question is: why would the NFS suddenly, with no notice, place a bill to sell DIRECTLY, with NO public input, land to a mining company, land...that is the publics land?
Incidentally, Polymet intends to, within 12 months, have an open pit mining operation in place and active in that land. Have you seen what damage an open pit copper mine DOES to the earth?
WHY ARE WE ALLOWING THIS?
Contact your fellow environmentalists and please, make this an issue of contention. Its important!!!
Representative Jim Oberstar http://www.oberstar.house.gov//
| D.C. Office 2365 Rayburn HOB Washington, D.C. 20515 (202) 225-6211 | Duluth Office 231 Federal Building Duluth, MN 55802 (218) 727-7474 | Chisholm Office City Hall, 316 Lake St. Chisholm, MN 55719 (218) 254-5761 | Brainerd Office City Hall, 501 Laurel St. Brainerd, MN 54601 (218) 828-4400 | North Branch Office 38625 14th Ave., Ste. 300B North Branch, MN 55056 (651) 277-1234 |
Contacting Office of the Governor http://www.governor.state.mn
To contact Governor Tim Pawlenty and Lt. Governor Carol Molnau, please write, phone, fax or e-mail.
Mailing Address:
Office of the Governor
130 State Capitol
75 Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd.
St. Paul, MN 55155
Other ways to reach our office:
Telephone: (651) 296-3391
Toll Free: (800) 657-3717
Facsimile: (651) 296-2089
E-mail: tim.pawlenty@state.mn.us
First District
Congressman Timothy J Walz(DFL)
| Washington, DC Office: | Manakato Office: | Rochester Office: |
E-Mail:
Web site: http://walz.house.gov
Second District
Congressman John Kline (R)
| 101 E. Burnsville Parkway, Ste 210 Burnsville, MN 55337 952-808-1213 Fax 952-808-1261 | 1429 Longworth House Office Building Washington, DC 20515 202-225-2271 Fax 202-225-2595 |
Internet e-mail: http://www.house.gov/writerep/
Web site: http://www.house.gov/kline/
Third District
Congressman Jim Ramstad (R)
| 1809 Plymouth Rd S, Suite 300 Minnetonka, MN 55305 952-738-8200 Fax: 952-738-9362 | 103 Cannon House Office Bldg Washington DC 20015 202-225-2871 Fax: 202-225-6351 |
E-mail: mn03@mail.house.gov
Web site: http://www.house.gov/ramstad
Fourth District
Congressman Betty McCollum (DFL)
| 165 Western Ave N, Suite 17 St. Paul, Minnesota 55102 651-224-9191 Fax: 651-224-3056 | 1029 Longworth House Office Bldg Washington DC 20515 202-225-6631 Fax: 202-225-1968 |
E-Mail: http://www.mccollum.house.gov
Web site: http://www.house.gov/mccollum/
Fifth District
Congressman Keith Ellison (DFL)
| 2100 Plymouth Avenue North Minneapolis, MN 55411 Phone: (612) 522-1212 Fax: (612) 522-9915 | 1130 Longworth House Office Building Washington, DC 20515 Phone: (202) 225-4755 Fax: (202) 225-4886 |
E-Mail:
Web site: http://ellison.house.gov/index
Sixth District
Congressman Michele Bachmann (R)
| 6043 Hudson Rd | 412 Cannon House Office Building Washington, DC 20515 Phone: (202) 225-2331 |
E-mail:
Web site: http://bachmann.house.gov
Seventh District
Congressman Collin Peterson (DFL)
| 714 Lake Ave Ste 107 Detroit Lakes MN 56501 218-847-5056 Fax: 218-847-5109 | 320 S Fourth St, Centre Point Mall Willmar, MN 56201 320-235-1061 Fax: 320-235-2651 |
| Minnesota Wheat Growers Bldg 2603 Wheat Dr Red Lake Falls MN 56750 218-253-4356 Fax: 218-253-4373 | 2159 Rayburn House Office Bldg Washington DC 20515 202-225-2165 Fax: 202-225-1593 |
E-Mail: tocollin.peterson@mail.house
Web site: http://www.house.gov/collinpete
Copyright 2008 Save Our Sky Blue Waters, All Rights Reserved
Wednesday, June 18, 2008
t r u t h o u t | Bush, Musharraf, Ahmadinejad Least Trusted Leaders
t r u t h o u t | Bush, Musharraf, Ahmadinejad Least Trusted Leaders
True laughed out loud, an uncommon behavior in these precarious latter days of Worst President Ever, who is however SO OVER.
Here's the funny (really, not so funny) news: That a survey of people in 20 countries found Dubya the Decider the 3rd WORST in terms of trust. Who outranked him? Number one, Musharraf, that Pakastani dictator who everybody but Bushco and the neocons love to hate, with only 18 percent trust rate. Number two, that tricky fellow Ahmadinejab of Iran, who DARES to challenge the American Empire and courts nuclear war with his defiance., with an actual 22 percent trust rate (Noted here: the MSM press use "defiant" to undermine a person, as was done by AP today in calling Obama "defiant" because he actually stood up to a McCain attack).
AND THE NUMBER THREE LEAST TRUSTED WORLD LEADER: King George Dubya Bush with the astonishing trust rate of 23 percent! Dig it!
True laughed out loud, an uncommon behavior in these precarious latter days of Worst President Ever, who is however SO OVER.
Here's the funny (really, not so funny) news: That a survey of people in 20 countries found Dubya the Decider the 3rd WORST in terms of trust. Who outranked him? Number one, Musharraf, that Pakastani dictator who everybody but Bushco and the neocons love to hate, with only 18 percent trust rate. Number two, that tricky fellow Ahmadinejab of Iran, who DARES to challenge the American Empire and courts nuclear war with his defiance., with an actual 22 percent trust rate (Noted here: the MSM press use "defiant" to undermine a person, as was done by AP today in calling Obama "defiant" because he actually stood up to a McCain attack).
AND THE NUMBER THREE LEAST TRUSTED WORLD LEADER: King George Dubya Bush with the astonishing trust rate of 23 percent! Dig it!
Saturday, June 14, 2008
The World's Longest ATV Parade is here!
WebEvent: Show Single Event
This link gives you all the skinny on that hoped-for world-record-breaking parade of ATVers gathered in Silver Bay today. That's right folks, today. They're expecting 2,500 people from all over the country, loud and proud, to ride some 50 miles of trails and play lots of fun games and churn up some topsoil and spew some fumes into the air.
It's the 25th anniversary of the All-Terrain Vehicle Association of Minnesota. Reason enough to bring out the storm troopers, last gathered two years ago in Harlan County, Kentucky, that bastion of coal mining greed where moutaintops are getting cut off and thrown down. A little ATV erosion seems but a small thing next to that, n'est-ce pas?
Here's where the rest of the world discovers the newest ATV destination: the North Shore!
This link gives you all the skinny on that hoped-for world-record-breaking parade of ATVers gathered in Silver Bay today. That's right folks, today. They're expecting 2,500 people from all over the country, loud and proud, to ride some 50 miles of trails and play lots of fun games and churn up some topsoil and spew some fumes into the air.
It's the 25th anniversary of the All-Terrain Vehicle Association of Minnesota. Reason enough to bring out the storm troopers, last gathered two years ago in Harlan County, Kentucky, that bastion of coal mining greed where moutaintops are getting cut off and thrown down. A little ATV erosion seems but a small thing next to that, n'est-ce pas?
Here's where the rest of the world discovers the newest ATV destination: the North Shore!
Michael Winship on media reform and the economy
http://www.truthout.org/article/media-reformers-its-economy
This piece, written for Truthout by Michael Winship, and reprinted here, is the second in a series about the amazing National Conference on Media Reform and its implications for True, Cook County and the nation.
-True
Last weekend's National Conference on Media Reform in Minneapolis was a freewheeling, articulate, committed gathering of activists, policy wonks and everyday citizens dedicated to the idea that there can be no real democracy without a media democracy - independent reporting from diverse communities free of the interference and spin of government and big business. Perhaps, nowhere else can you witness an FCC commissioner like Michael Copps get a rock-star-like standing ovation worthy of Mick Jagger, or hear the words, 'Common carrier rules are hot!'
Some 3,500 assembled to participate in panels and hear a range of speakers that included my colleague Bill Moyers, Senator Byron Dorgan, Center for Internet and Society founder Lawrence Lessig, Naomi Klein, Louise Erdrich and Dan Rather. Participants grappled with mobilizing grass roots movements around such hot-button issues as continuing big media consolidation and net neutrality - the latter two words perhaps more elegantly phrased as "Internet freedom" - keeping cyberspace open and accessible to all, regardless of income. As Moyers has pointed out, neutrality sounds too much like Switzerland, and as my colleague Patric Verrone, president of the Writers Guild, West, says, the notion of fighting for neutrality seems oxymoronic. So, "Internet freedom" it is.
Marty Kaplan, director of the University of Southern California's Norman Lear Center, told those gathered they were a crowd that "may not color inside the lines but sure can connect the dots." Yet, as perceptive and informed as attendees were, sadly absent from the weekend's energetic dialogues was any significant discussion of this country's economy, the vast gap between rich and poor, the way gross inequality in such desperate times is being largely ignored by the media, our candidates and the progressive movement.
"The economic crisis is just not that compelling or sexy to the many progressives who are stirred into action by every ugly utterance by Bill O'Reilly," media activist and journalist Danny Schecter writes. "... Cheering on political personalities or mounting one more issue oriented e-mail campaign is certainly easier than confronting the economic and power imbalances caused by the structural conflicts in our economy."
Schecter goes on to quote an executive with the Cincinnati-based Fifth Third Bank, who describes our current situation as, "A CRISIS OF BIBLICAL PROPORTIONS." The exec elaborates: "I'm not talking New Testament biblical; I'm talking Old Testament hellfire and brimstone. This is the worst credit crisis we've ever seen."
Thirty-six and a half million Americans - one in eight Americans, one in six children - that we KNOW of, because there are no good ways to really measure - live below the official federal poverty level, $20,000 a year for a family of four. Half of us - half! - will have gone through a year or more of poverty by the time we turn 60.
In contrast, behold the woeful case of Alan Schwartz, former CEO of the now defunct investment bank Bear Stearns. As that company nosedived last year, with subprime mortgage hedge funds crashing in flames, Schwartz relinquished his usual annual bonus, which meant his total compensation for 2007 and the prior four years was a piddling $141 million. Poor guy had to rent out his 7,800 square-foot house in the New York suburbs and squat at his new, $28 million Manhattan apartment; his seven-acre home in Greenwich, Connecticut; and his Colorado condo. Just a couple of weeks ago, shareholders approved Bear Stearns's merger with JP Morgan, which received $30 billion in taxpayer-funded, federal loan guarantees to take over what little was left.
John McCain says the fundamentals of the economy are strong, but admits it's a subject he doesn't know a lot about. He counts among his economic advisers Carly Fiorina, fired chief executive of Hewlett Packard, where, you'll recall, she was accused of breathtaking mismanagement and street-bully tactics. Of her role in the McCain campaign, Jeffrey Sonnenfeld of the Yale School of Management told The New York Times, "You couldn't pick a worse, non-imprisoned C.E.O. to be your standard-bearer."
Among McCain's other top advisers are John Green and Wayne Berman, who received $720,000 in lobbying fees from Ameriquest Mortgage, one of the noteworthy, predatory lenders in the country's mortgage mess. As The New York Daily News reported this past spring, Ameriquest, which has since been bought out by Citigroup, "was forced to settle suits with 49 states for $325 million. More than 13,680 New York homeowners got taken for a ride by the company, records show."
Barack Obama believes our current economic crisis is "the logical conclusion of a tired and misguided philosophy that has dominated Washington for far too long." Nonetheless, his economic policy director, Jason Furman, has been a defender of Wal-Mart and was director of former Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin's Hamilton Project at the Brookings Institution, a group of Wall Street Democrats committed to continuing Bill Clinton's economic doctrine - i.e., growth based on deficit reduction and free trade.
Until his resignation Wednesday, Obama's team also included Jim Johnson, ex-Mondale chief of staff and former CEO of Fannie Mae, the government-sanctioned banker that buys and resells loans from other banks and lenders. According to The Wall Street Journal, Johnson, who was leading the search for Obama's running mate, was given preferential treatment when he received $2 million in personal loans from one of Fannie Mae's biggest customers, subprime lender Countrywide Financial Services.
A front page story in Wednesday's Washington Post added that Johnson was also "the beneficiary of accounting in which Fannie Mae's earnings were manipulated so that executives could earn larger bonuses. The accounting manipulation for 1998 resulted in the maximum payouts to Fannie Mae's senior executives - $1.9 million in Johnson's case - when the company's performance that year would have otherwise resulted in no bonuses at all, according to reports in 2004 and 2006 by the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight."
Both candidates need economic advisers untainted by association with corporate interests, folks who know what it's like to have to live on macaroni instead of meat, to spend sleepless nights in subways or shelters, to let diseases like cancer and diabetes gnaw away at a person's insides because they can't afford medicine and doctors. And the media need to tell their stories, not only to make the rest of us aware and stir us to action, but also to validate and empower with web space, column inches and airtime the plight of those so afflicted, to bring dignity and gravitas to their predicament. Attention must be paid.
This piece, written for Truthout by Michael Winship, and reprinted here, is the second in a series about the amazing National Conference on Media Reform and its implications for True, Cook County and the nation.
-True
Last weekend's National Conference on Media Reform in Minneapolis was a freewheeling, articulate, committed gathering of activists, policy wonks and everyday citizens dedicated to the idea that there can be no real democracy without a media democracy - independent reporting from diverse communities free of the interference and spin of government and big business. Perhaps, nowhere else can you witness an FCC commissioner like Michael Copps get a rock-star-like standing ovation worthy of Mick Jagger, or hear the words, 'Common carrier rules are hot!'
Some 3,500 assembled to participate in panels and hear a range of speakers that included my colleague Bill Moyers, Senator Byron Dorgan, Center for Internet and Society founder Lawrence Lessig, Naomi Klein, Louise Erdrich and Dan Rather. Participants grappled with mobilizing grass roots movements around such hot-button issues as continuing big media consolidation and net neutrality - the latter two words perhaps more elegantly phrased as "Internet freedom" - keeping cyberspace open and accessible to all, regardless of income. As Moyers has pointed out, neutrality sounds too much like Switzerland, and as my colleague Patric Verrone, president of the Writers Guild, West, says, the notion of fighting for neutrality seems oxymoronic. So, "Internet freedom" it is.
Marty Kaplan, director of the University of Southern California's Norman Lear Center, told those gathered they were a crowd that "may not color inside the lines but sure can connect the dots." Yet, as perceptive and informed as attendees were, sadly absent from the weekend's energetic dialogues was any significant discussion of this country's economy, the vast gap between rich and poor, the way gross inequality in such desperate times is being largely ignored by the media, our candidates and the progressive movement.
"The economic crisis is just not that compelling or sexy to the many progressives who are stirred into action by every ugly utterance by Bill O'Reilly," media activist and journalist Danny Schecter writes. "... Cheering on political personalities or mounting one more issue oriented e-mail campaign is certainly easier than confronting the economic and power imbalances caused by the structural conflicts in our economy."
Schecter goes on to quote an executive with the Cincinnati-based Fifth Third Bank, who describes our current situation as, "A CRISIS OF BIBLICAL PROPORTIONS." The exec elaborates: "I'm not talking New Testament biblical; I'm talking Old Testament hellfire and brimstone. This is the worst credit crisis we've ever seen."
Thirty-six and a half million Americans - one in eight Americans, one in six children - that we KNOW of, because there are no good ways to really measure - live below the official federal poverty level, $20,000 a year for a family of four. Half of us - half! - will have gone through a year or more of poverty by the time we turn 60.
In contrast, behold the woeful case of Alan Schwartz, former CEO of the now defunct investment bank Bear Stearns. As that company nosedived last year, with subprime mortgage hedge funds crashing in flames, Schwartz relinquished his usual annual bonus, which meant his total compensation for 2007 and the prior four years was a piddling $141 million. Poor guy had to rent out his 7,800 square-foot house in the New York suburbs and squat at his new, $28 million Manhattan apartment; his seven-acre home in Greenwich, Connecticut; and his Colorado condo. Just a couple of weeks ago, shareholders approved Bear Stearns's merger with JP Morgan, which received $30 billion in taxpayer-funded, federal loan guarantees to take over what little was left.
John McCain says the fundamentals of the economy are strong, but admits it's a subject he doesn't know a lot about. He counts among his economic advisers Carly Fiorina, fired chief executive of Hewlett Packard, where, you'll recall, she was accused of breathtaking mismanagement and street-bully tactics. Of her role in the McCain campaign, Jeffrey Sonnenfeld of the Yale School of Management told The New York Times, "You couldn't pick a worse, non-imprisoned C.E.O. to be your standard-bearer."
Among McCain's other top advisers are John Green and Wayne Berman, who received $720,000 in lobbying fees from Ameriquest Mortgage, one of the noteworthy, predatory lenders in the country's mortgage mess. As The New York Daily News reported this past spring, Ameriquest, which has since been bought out by Citigroup, "was forced to settle suits with 49 states for $325 million. More than 13,680 New York homeowners got taken for a ride by the company, records show."
Barack Obama believes our current economic crisis is "the logical conclusion of a tired and misguided philosophy that has dominated Washington for far too long." Nonetheless, his economic policy director, Jason Furman, has been a defender of Wal-Mart and was director of former Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin's Hamilton Project at the Brookings Institution, a group of Wall Street Democrats committed to continuing Bill Clinton's economic doctrine - i.e., growth based on deficit reduction and free trade.
Until his resignation Wednesday, Obama's team also included Jim Johnson, ex-Mondale chief of staff and former CEO of Fannie Mae, the government-sanctioned banker that buys and resells loans from other banks and lenders. According to The Wall Street Journal, Johnson, who was leading the search for Obama's running mate, was given preferential treatment when he received $2 million in personal loans from one of Fannie Mae's biggest customers, subprime lender Countrywide Financial Services.
A front page story in Wednesday's Washington Post added that Johnson was also "the beneficiary of accounting in which Fannie Mae's earnings were manipulated so that executives could earn larger bonuses. The accounting manipulation for 1998 resulted in the maximum payouts to Fannie Mae's senior executives - $1.9 million in Johnson's case - when the company's performance that year would have otherwise resulted in no bonuses at all, according to reports in 2004 and 2006 by the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight."
Both candidates need economic advisers untainted by association with corporate interests, folks who know what it's like to have to live on macaroni instead of meat, to spend sleepless nights in subways or shelters, to let diseases like cancer and diabetes gnaw away at a person's insides because they can't afford medicine and doctors. And the media need to tell their stories, not only to make the rest of us aware and stir us to action, but also to validate and empower with web space, column inches and airtime the plight of those so afflicted, to bring dignity and gravitas to their predicament. Attention must be paid.
Tuesday, June 10, 2008
It's our turn now
“I gotta tell you, these people are crazy…the furthest left people in the face of America,” Bill O’Reilly told his loyal fanatics about the 3,500 illustrious journalists and activists who attended the National Conference on Media Reform in Minneapolis last weekend. He was trashing people like press legends Bill Moyers and Dan Rather, Sen. Byron Dorgan, FCC member Jonathan Adelstein, Minnesota Rep. Keith Ellison, Nation editor Katrina van den Heuvel, award-winning blogger Ariana Huffington, Stanford genius prof Larry Lessig, novelist Louise Erdrich, True, and lots of other very, very smart people. All of them are dedicated to a free and independent press, guaranteed in our Constitution but decimated by corporate media owners and their hate-mongering shills. Thanks to Murdoch-style media consolidation, 2,400 senior journalists took buyouts last year. Now these folks don’t have to be censored by their bosses any more and they are making the most of it.
For once BillO didn’t have the last word. He made the fatal mistake of sending a reporter to videotape the conference, and Noah Kunin from The Uptake followed this Foxy guy around. There was a stellar scene when Bill Moyers called O’Reilly a pugilist and a blowhard, but not a journalist. The time of hate media is so over. True is so overjoyed. You can catch this magic moment on YouTube. Find the link at http://www.freepress.net.
Scripture tells us that the Last shall be First. And so, I’ll begin this story about the conference at its end. The charismatic closing speaker Van Jones told the wowed crowd, “It’s our turn now. It’s 40 years ago this weekend that we lost Bobby Kennedy and Martin Luther King, Jr.”
Van predicted that Barack Obama will win in November but will not necessarily win a second term unless the deep, deep crises of poverty, energy, war, media consolidation, and the devastating and rapacious corruption of the “Dragons on the Right” are addressed in his first term. Van says FDR’s New Deal has to be the model for change that addresses our 21st century problems of poverty and global warming: put people to work providing green energy solutions like the New Deal put people to work rebuilding America’s infrastructure.
Van asked his joyous and energized closing audience to do five things in the service of a pro-democracy movement to save the First Amendment. “We need to unleash the best in the country. The stakes are high, high.”
One: Hold the new President accountable, but HOLD him too.”
Two: Move from agitation to education; there is no longer only one right (PC) way. Meaning that the movement needs to embrace all people of good will and not only the ones who name everybody else as sellouts.
Three: Keep us united. We need each other, need ALL the Democratic leaders. The Clintons and the Edwards and the Kennedys, we all can work together.
Four: Don’t give up on your ideals in the face of challenges and setbacks. Tell the naysayers, “We have plenty of money—strip it out of the Pentagon budget, take it from the jailers.”
Five: Remember how it was after 9/11 when people turned the flag into a war flag, how lonely it was; remember the sick Reality TV of Hurricane Katrina. Remember when we didn’t have any power. Remember when homophobes divided our families and created shattered young suicides in the name of Family Values.
“Those days are over now. Everybody in the Family has Value. We get to be the people now:
Big now.
Wise now.
Proud now.
“We will finally, 40 years later, be the generation NOT to ‘Take America Back,’ but that takes America forward.”
And to cheers and tears and shouts and hugs and promises and hope, the fifth National Conference for Media Reform came to a close.
For once BillO didn’t have the last word. He made the fatal mistake of sending a reporter to videotape the conference, and Noah Kunin from The Uptake followed this Foxy guy around. There was a stellar scene when Bill Moyers called O’Reilly a pugilist and a blowhard, but not a journalist. The time of hate media is so over. True is so overjoyed. You can catch this magic moment on YouTube. Find the link at http://www.freepress.net.
Scripture tells us that the Last shall be First. And so, I’ll begin this story about the conference at its end. The charismatic closing speaker Van Jones told the wowed crowd, “It’s our turn now. It’s 40 years ago this weekend that we lost Bobby Kennedy and Martin Luther King, Jr.”
Van predicted that Barack Obama will win in November but will not necessarily win a second term unless the deep, deep crises of poverty, energy, war, media consolidation, and the devastating and rapacious corruption of the “Dragons on the Right” are addressed in his first term. Van says FDR’s New Deal has to be the model for change that addresses our 21st century problems of poverty and global warming: put people to work providing green energy solutions like the New Deal put people to work rebuilding America’s infrastructure.
Van asked his joyous and energized closing audience to do five things in the service of a pro-democracy movement to save the First Amendment. “We need to unleash the best in the country. The stakes are high, high.”
One: Hold the new President accountable, but HOLD him too.”
Two: Move from agitation to education; there is no longer only one right (PC) way. Meaning that the movement needs to embrace all people of good will and not only the ones who name everybody else as sellouts.
Three: Keep us united. We need each other, need ALL the Democratic leaders. The Clintons and the Edwards and the Kennedys, we all can work together.
Four: Don’t give up on your ideals in the face of challenges and setbacks. Tell the naysayers, “We have plenty of money—strip it out of the Pentagon budget, take it from the jailers.”
Five: Remember how it was after 9/11 when people turned the flag into a war flag, how lonely it was; remember the sick Reality TV of Hurricane Katrina. Remember when we didn’t have any power. Remember when homophobes divided our families and created shattered young suicides in the name of Family Values.
“Those days are over now. Everybody in the Family has Value. We get to be the people now:
Big now.
Wise now.
Proud now.
“We will finally, 40 years later, be the generation NOT to ‘Take America Back,’ but that takes America forward.”
And to cheers and tears and shouts and hugs and promises and hope, the fifth National Conference for Media Reform came to a close.
Wednesday, June 04, 2008
Obama! The world rejoices, the nutcakes rant
Though you might not know it from reading the MSM, the whole world is rejoicing with the nomination of Barack Obama. Of course as progressives and people of good will we also are happy, but do we really know HOW happy we should be? Consider these awesome words: "America, this is our moment. This is our time:"
America, this is our moment. This is our time. Our time to turn the page on the policies of the past. Our time to bring new energy and new ideas to the challenges we face. Our time to offer a new direction for the country we love.
The journey will be difficult. The road will be long. I face this challenge with profound humility, and knowledge of my own limitations. But I also face it with limitless faith in the capacity of the American people. Because if we are willing to work for it, and fight for it, and believe in it, then I am absolutely certain that generations from now, we will be able to look back and tell our children that this was the moment when we began to provide care for the sick and good jobs to the jobless; this was the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow and our planet began to heal; this was the moment when we ended a war and secured our nation and restored our image as the last, best hope on earth. This was the moment — this was the time — when we came together to remake this great nation so that it may always reflect our very best selves and our highest ideals. Thank you, God bless you, and may God bless the United States of America. -Barack Obama on claiming the 2008 Dem presidential nomination.
AND NOW.... look at the craziness making the rounds on the Internet. Again you won't see THIS in the MSM or even in the progressive media! Honestly, sometimes True thinks his friends have their heads up their.... er, I mean, in the sand. If you don't think McCain, a Bushie clone, can possibly win because of the 68 percent against failed policies, think again. This kind of Swift-boating stuff is pure poison, the more so because all those folks who send it on saying, "This is interesting" are just dumb enough to believe it. Come on, read it, don't say you don't want to spoil your happy day. Know your enemy:
http://snopes.com confirms this is factual. Check for yourself. Look in the box on the left side of the screen and click on Barack Obama - what they say wil chill you to the core!
IF THIS IS TRUE NOTHING WE CAN DO ABOUT IT. WHAT IS IN THE BIBLE WILL TAKE PLACE .
A man will come from the east...
MAY WE ALL PRAY FOR WISDOM AND DISCERNMENT
AND PRAY FOR EACH OTHER AS WE MAKE THIS DECISION
OF A LIFETIME! OUR LIVES, CHILDREN AND GRANDCHILDREN'S
LIVES WILL BE CHANGED FOREVER BECAUSE OF OUR CHOICE
THIS ELECTION. MAY GOD BE WITH US ALL!
God help us if this man is elected!! But it is all stated in the Bible
and it will happen sooner or later. This is from Darlene Millican,
wife of the pastor of Trinity Baptist Church here in Sun City I have felt
for sometime now that Obama is the one person that 'Frightens Me'.
I believe the Bible has warned us that 'A man will come from the East
that will be charismatic in nature and have proposed solutions for all our
problems and his rhetoric will attract many supporters!' When will our
pathetic Nation quit turning their back on God and understand that this
man is 'A Muslim'... First, Last and always... and we are AT WAR with
the Muslim Nation, whether our bleeding-heart, secular, Liberal friends
believe it or not. This man fits every description from the Bible of the
'Anti-Christ'! I'm just glad to know that there are others that are frightened
by this man! Who is Barack Obama? Very interesting and something that
should be considered in your choice. If you do not ever forward anything else,
please forward this to all your contacts... this is very scary to think of what lies
ahead of us here in our own United States ... better heed this and pray about it
and share it.
Who is Barack Obama?
Probable U. S. presidential candidate, Barack Hussein Obama was born in Honolulu ,
Hawaii, to Barack Hussein Obama, Sr., a black MUSLIM from Nyangoma-Kogel,
Kenya and Ann Dunham, a white ATHEIST from Wichita , Kansas Obama's parents
met at the University of Hawaii . When Obama was two years old, his parents divorced.
His father returned to Kenya . His mother then married Lolo Soetoro, a RADICAL
Muslim from Indonesia . When Obama was 6 years old, the family relocated to
Indonesia Obama attended a MUSLIM school in Jakarta . He also spent two
years in a Catholic school. Obama takes great care to conceal the fact that
he is a Muslim. He is quick to point out that, 'He was once a Muslim, but that
he also attended Catholic school.' Obama's political handlers are attempting to
make it appear that that he is not a radical. Obama's introduction to Islam came
via his father, and that this influence was temporary at best. In reality, the senior
Obama returned to Kenya soon after the divorce, and never again had any direct
influence over his son's education. Lolo Soetoro, the second husband of Obama's
mother, Ann Dunham, introduced his stepson to Islam. Obama was enrolled in a
Wahabi school in Jakarta . Wahabism is the RADICAL teaching that is followed
by the Muslim terrorists who are now waging Jihad against the western world.
Since it is politically expedient to be a CHRISTIAN when seeking major
public office in the United States , Barack Hussein Obama has joined the
United Church of Christ in an attempt to downplay his Muslim background.
Barack Hussein Obama will NOT recite the Pledge of Allegiance nor will he
show any reverence for our flag. While others place their hands over their hearts,
Obama turns his back to the flag and slouches. Do you want someone like this
as your PRESIDENT? Let us all remain alert concerning Obama's expected
Presidential candidacy. The Muslims have said they plan on destroying the
US from the inside out, what better way to start than at the highest level -
through the President of the United States , one of their own! The Bible says
'He will come from among you!'
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