Will you vote FOR pollution?

Congressman Gibbons recently decided that mercury was no longer a poison. His report to congress stated, more or less, that one hundred years of scientific studies and health damage observed were actually wrong – and that mercury is relatively safe. His buddies in the oil, coal power and gold mining industry, of course, had nothing to do with his report... of course.

Gibbons was also involved with the Mojave Generating Station – one of the dirtiest coal fired power plants in the US. (scroll down the Jan 11, 2006 blog entry "Reveiw Journal wants to poison Ely kids with mercury" Although the companies involved (including Sierra Pacific) promised to clean up the plant in 1999, the plant was eventually shut down – because they wouldn't install the equipment that would have reduced “air” pollution.

Oh yeah, Gibbons supported the give away to the fossil fuel and nuclear industries by supporting the 2005 Energy Bill

Gibbon's opponnent, however, claims to be against pollution. Dina Titus' website states that “Dina Titus will appoint a Public Utilities Commission that enforces Nevada’s law requiring electric utilities to provide 20 percent of their power from the clean, renewable energy sources of geothermal, solar and wind power by the year 2015”

I believe that:

Religious texts should be appreciated more for their beauty than their authority.

Historical reviews should be appreciated more for their present relevency than their patriotic expediency.

Corporate publications should be appreciated more for their hidden motivations than their dubious "facts."

And political speeches should be ignored... Don't watch the lips, watch the hands.
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A Vote For Real Democracy

This is not a Democrat or a Republican thing. This is not a conservative or a liberal thing. That's the spin. That's how they keep us arguing amongst ourselves.

No, this time it's literally about the integrity of our democracy. This time it's about fairness. This time it's about true freedom and justice. This time it's about what America really stands for.

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. wrote an article, titled Was The 2004 Election Stolen?, published in the June 15, 2006 issue of Rolling Stone. In the article, he wrote of Nevada; “Sproul & Associates, a GOP-paid consultancy, shredded Democratic voter registrations... Electronic voting machines in the state's two most populous, Democratic-leaning counties recorded no presidential vote on 10,000 ballots.” Exit polls in Nevada showed Kerry leading by 7.5%, yet Bush won Nevada by 2.6%. This is statistically unheard of – and it happened in a number of States.

Your side may have won the election in 2004. But, if they had to cheat to win; no one really wins. Would you be willing to lose your Democracy for your side to win? If you are; remember, someday the tables will turn on you. Majority rule (with strong minority rights) is a flawed and imperfect way to govern – but, minority rule (with few majority rights) is much worse.

The Secretary of State Project states: “Katherine Harris. Ken Blackwell... these two Secretaries of State,” (of Florida and Ohio) “each chair of Mr. Bush's presidential campaigns in their respective States, made damaging partisan decisions about purging voter rolls, registration of new voters, voting machine security, the location of the precincts, the allocation of the voting machines, and dozens of other critical matters”

“In recent pivotal elections, Republicans have relied upon their control of the Secretary of State position to dramatically influence voting and to block implementation of voter-verified paper trails. The results have been catastrophic for the nation.”

The Secretary of State Project recommends Ross Miller for Secretary of State in Nevada. Click here to read why.

Shall We Let Desperation or Hope Be Our Motivation?

In the past two days, I have been to two upscale restaurant openings, and a meeting with the candidates for the local elections. The food was great, and the restaurants' atmosphere was better than I had ever enjoyed in the town of Ely. However, at the meeting with the candidates, I felt that some of the incumbent candidates still felt that they were living in the old Ely.

Like many old Western mining towns, Ely has had to live with the desperation of the local mine closing. When times were bad, it wouldn't have been difficult to wonder if Ely would end up another Nevada ghost town. But it didn't happen. Although the local economy is still heavily dependent upon the mine, money is coming in from tourism and growth of the retirement community.

I have been predicting for the past five years that Ely was on the verge of an economic renaissance. It didn't take a crystal ball. The town is about as far away from the big city as you can get in the United States. There are no freeways. There is no Wal Mart. There is no smog. People recognize you when you walk down the street – and you're not afraid to walk down the street. Millions of city people would love to live like this. It was just a matter of time before people started moving here.

As a relatively new resident myself, I recognize some things that the locals may not see. This place is beautiful. And unlike most of the rest of the country, so much of this vast area is so pristine.

The town is growing, ever faster – because it is such a nice place to be. The infrastructure to support a tourism industry is developing too. Just stop by Maggie's for a meal, and you'll see what I mean. So, why cripple what we have, and what we can create; for dangerous, antiquated coal fired power plants – that we don't even need?

Think about it. In just a few years, we will stop building coal fired power plants. Face it, they're dirty. Their effluents are poisonous. Clean coal is an oxymoron. This attempt to shove through over a hundred coal fired power plants onto America, is a last ditch, desperate attempt to force consumers into a dependency on coal. America will eventually catch on. Hopefully, White Pine County will catch on before our homeland is despoiled.

Yes, coal fired power plants will bring in a few hundred jobs (most of them temporary). But a beautiful and healthy homeland will eventually attract thousands of new residents and hundreds of thousands of tourists.

Ely is on the verge of becoming a major stop on a tour of the West. Think of it; San Francisco to Lake Tahoe, to Ely, to Moab, and on to either Crested Butte, Durango, Santa Fe, or the Grand Circle, and maybe Vegas. I'm not speculating. This is already happening.

So, how do we want to perceive our situation? Do we want to see our community through the eyes of the desperation of our past... or hope for our future?

White Pine County doesn't need coal fired power plants to be prosperous. But, if we have the sludge ponds and the smog, and no water, what will make us unique from the rest of the country? If we lose what makes this place special, people will stop coming here. Nevada is not a wasteland... unless we permit it to become one.

The Owens Valley Water Grab

You've probably heard of the Owens Valley water grab. Where, for the last century, Los Angeles has been taking water from what was once a beautiful, fertile valley. It looks like Las Vegas read their playbook - and intends to do the same with Rural Nevada.

Here is the attorney for Owens Valley, Greg James, to explain breifly the history of the Owens Valley water grab, and what we may be able to do to keep the worst from happening.


Click here to the see the video.

Big Coals' Dollars at Work

On my google search of “coal” today I came across two news stories. In my opinion:

This is the story.

This is the spin.

Neither news story lies. But the first story is breaking, and tells of likely corruption of the system that we trust to oversee our energy, economic, and environmental future – while the other story is a general overview that lacks critical inquiry to the statements of those interviewed.

As an example in the second story: A coal industry rep. was quoted saying; “The coal plant of today is so much cleaner... it can be a good viable resource without really harming the environment.” There was no challenge to this statement – when even basic chemistry (the conservation of matter) states that they can't make those bad chemicals and elements disappear. Most of what doesn't go into the air will just end up concentrated in sludge ponds. And of course, nothing in the second story mentions the $132,000 in campaign donations to the Texas candidate for governor.

I warned you... in the last entry.

Now, Thank the nice Saudis for the temporary price cuts

Aren't you glad that gas prices are down? Good.
Aren't you suspicious that they're down just before the U.S. Elections? Maybe you should be.

The New York Times reports that “OPEC did away with its quotas last year when its members pumped at maximum capacity”... this was “the highest level in more than 25 years.”

Thanks OPEC... I think.
Everybody in the oil businesses made a killing last year. I guess I can't blame you for selling as much oil as could at that price. Yet, by producing as much oil as you did, oil prices eventually did come down. Which means that we should only expect that you cut production now.

OPEC has agreed to cut production by 1million barrels a day. But, the details still need to be worked out. The actual production cuts will likely take effect some time after the U.S. midterm elections.

How convenient...

Now, some of you might see this as some kind of conspiracy to keep Bush's friends in office. Well, it is true that the Bush family and the House of Saud go way back, and that Saudi investment in Bush businesses have been very helpful. Also, the Saudis do pretty much control the direction of OPEC. But that does not mean that the Saudis want to influence American politics.

So, just relax. Have a beer. Check to see what's on cable.... It was all a coincidence that our oil inventories are up just before our elections. It was just a coincidence that gas prices will be at their lowest just before our elections. If you turn on a channel and see Bob Woodward (you know, that boring guy who broke the Watergate story way back in prehistoric times), change the channel. He's just going to irritate you with some lame story about the Saudi ambassador promising George Bush Jr. (way, way back in 2004) that Saudi Arabia would cut oil prices before the November elections.
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I usually don't write about foreign affairs on this blog. But I feel it is important that we realize that the domestic coal companies will try to influence our government too... if they can get away with it. Sure, the price of coal is cheap now. But don't expect it to be cheap once we have committed our power generation facilities to decades of buying coal. Suppliers will charge as much as they can. That's just capitalism. And, like in some convoluted game of (create your own rules) Monopoly; they will play us for all they can get. To them, that's just effective business tactics.

And Remember: If we now had the alternative energy infrastructure that President Jimmy Carter had tried to build; by now, thirty years later, it's likely we wouldn't care about the price of oil. Someone didn't want that to happen. Someone wanted us to be dependent upon oil. Someone now wants us to be dependent upon coal.