Badlands Journal

Having observed and commented on the corruption of local, state and federal environmental law in this region for nearly a decade, the recent hoopla surrounding Julia MacDonald, the deputy assistant secretary for fish, wildlife and parks in the Department of Interior, is not news. We met MacDonald shortly after her appointment as aide to Judge Craig Manson, the assistant secretary of fish, wildlife and parks, in 2002. She urged us to get in touch. We think we have her card somewhere.

Locally, we see it as being within the general context of another spring offensive by finance, insurance, real estate and the Bush regime against the San Joaquin Valley. We are going into a drought, Bush is losing his war, and the local speculative housing boom is collapsing, generating skyrocketing foreclosure rates and some class-action suits on building defects. However, as we have said since they stole the Florida election in 2000, these people crossed their Rubicon and have had nowhere to go since but straight into the public's face.
The Badlands editorial staff honestly admits that MacDonald's corruptions would be quite beyond our scope if any of Interior's Inspector General's report were news to us. But we've covered most of it when her meddling and bullying first appeared. It's all back there in the archives somewhere and we will dig it out at the appropriate times. Meanwhile, she's a certifiable California "waterperson." She went after Klamath Bull Trout to help Rove do his stunt in the Klamath basin before the 2004 election; she went after the San Joaquin Delta Smelt, when heavy pumping caused by Interior's brokered Colorado River Agreement meant Southern California would have to get more water from the Delta; she went after seasonal wetlands and vernal pools and California Tiger Salamanders, all local issues here in the Pombozastan. We reported it all as it was happening.

However, that said, we were titillated by MacDonald's intimate relations with the California Farm Bureau and Pacific Legal Foundation, on the same ideological page: private property's right to public water.

On the other hand, the changes proposed by Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne to the Endangered Species Act, a story that appeared a day earlier, is news. A story of human sacrifice, particularly of a woman, is cool, but the dry, bureaucratic language of the proposed ESA changes are meanwhile concealed. Yet, these proposals capture the worst aspects of the Pomboza bill to gut the ESA in the last session, which aroused so much anger in the environmental community that, with help from former Rep. Pete McCloskey, they defeated Pombo at the polls. Furthermore, they would turn over many key ESA decisions to governors. In California, where the governor and the Legislature is actually owned by finance, insurance and real estate special interests, you could kiss some species goodbye if this proposal passes judicial review. As a recently retired Fish and Wildlife Service endangered species specialist put it, the reason we have federal protections for endangered species is because the states will not protect them.

The Bush regime is consistent, if nothing else, and that consistency has fallen heavily on the San Joaquin Valley. The other federal proposal-of-the-month of special impact is the idea of privatizing the heavy-metal laden water of the San Joaquin Valley west side, including giving the water districts partial ownership of the San Luis Reservoir. This is the Bush regime solution to upcoming review of the selenium situation around Kesterson.

Of course, there is a connection between this story and the MacDonald Affair. She's a genuine California water girl.

But, our question is: was she any worse than the Cowgirl Chancellor of UC Merced, who built the first phase of the beloved boondoggle without the required federal permits, quit her job (along with a number of other of her starting team), and dropped a regulatory mess in her successors' laps and a bigger mess in the community's lap. If MacDonald was in the air in Washington, the Cowgirl was right here on the ground, building that anchor tenant for one of the greatest, most destructive speculative real estate booms in the nation. Nor has the attempt by UC to corrupt environmental law and regulation at every level of government by its lobbyists, administrators, lawyers, politicians like Dennis Cardoza, Shrimp Slayer-Merced and the regional finance, insurance and real estate special interests stopped. These interests will destroy California's fragile water-delivery system in order to save their profits. A key step in that is to get public attention off endangered species that in any way appear to interfere with delivery of paper water through the Delta pumps via crumbling levees. The collapsing housing bubble only encourages them.

There is a rough equivalence between the endangered species menaced by MacDonald's policies and the misery of students at UC Merced, which is today a sort of developer's model home of a university, with decorative students in residence (not all of them expiring in the shrubbery). However, like the endangered species, about which the Cowgirl's rhetoric was just fine, the students are not there for display; they want a life, too.

Nope. We admit the corruption of the federal government and the University of California, in full color, is too much for our humble descriptive abilities. We'll leave the job to the mainstream press. Its reporters are well-rested after seven years on a vacation from reality. Let them "investigate" and give each other prizes.

Meanwhile we will ask why Judge Manson was rewarded for his crimes against Nature with an appointment to McGeorge Law School. McGeorge needs some looking into, actually. Its dean is a former general counsel for the CIA. What's going on there? Why did UC Boalt Hall hire John Yoo, author of the torture-justifying memo during his years as counsel to the president?

And, isn't the timing of the MacDonald story and the ESA changes interesting? How much do top Fish and Wildlife Service officials support the Bush proposals? FWS Director Dale Hale appears, in the Inspector General's report, to be the epitome of a guardian of pure biology in the MacDonald Affair stories, while simultaneously trying to squelch any news about the new ESA rules. Are we headed for a "show hearing" at the House Natural Resources Committee in May on MacDonald, while the ESA changes wend their unnoticed way through the Bush regime "process"?

Will the next proposal for rule changes coming from the Interior and Fish and Wildlife Service be to privatize all the wildlife refuges in the nation?

We might also ask -- from the ground here in UC/Great Valley Center/Pombozastan, home of a state "blueprint" for growth along the lines indicated by Pombo Family Real Estate Farms -- how soon will UC give up on UC Merced and move it to Tracy, which wants a college, where it can be absorbed by Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory's Level-4 Biowarfare Lab and the Tsakopoulos family's Hellenic studies programs? Our nation needs genetic technologists who can create the biological weapons of the future (and, of course, their antidotes) while simultaneously learning to conjugate irregular Greek verbs and reading a bit of Jaeger's Paideia. Don't it? Ain't that the kind of "shared experience" we need?

How long will it be before the next Peripheral Canal proposal surfaces to convey paper water in a drought to Southern California? Before or after the next levee break?

It is the very bravest of new worlds possible, my dear Calaban. How's the asthma?

Bill Hatch
----------------------------

3-28-07
New York Times
Proposed changes would shift duties in protecting species...Felicity Barringer
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/28/washington/28habitat.html?_r=1&oref=slogin
The Fish and Wildlife Service is considering limiting the ability of federal wildlife protection agencies to intervene on behalf of endangered species that may be harmed by federal actions...would also increase the role of state governments in administering some of the species protections that are now the responsibility of the Fish and Wildlife Service and the National Marine Fisheries Service. H. Dale Hall...said Tuesday that the draft proposal detailing the changes was “really a beginning of a process.” "It had all options on the table,” Mr. Hall said. “It really doesn’t represent anything that we support or don’t support.” Jan Hasselman, a lawyer with the Seattle office of Earthjustice, an environmental group, said that he had obtained a copy of the draft proposal from a federal official, and that it was created in June but had been edited as recently as a month ago. “I certainly don’t think that anyone ever contemplated a wholesale delegation of fundamental duties” to the states, Mr. Hasselman said. Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne proposed legislation amending the act when he was a senator from Idaho, and more drastic changes were proposed in the last Congress in an unsuccessful bill.

3-27-07
Salon
Inside the secretive plan to gut the Endangered Species Act
Proposed regulatory changes, obtained by Salon, would destroy the "safety net for animals and plants on the brink of extinction," say environmentalists.
By Rebecca Clarren

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is maneuvering to fundamentally weaken the Endangered Species Act, its strategy laid out in an internal 117-page draft proposal obtained by Salon. The proposed changes limit the number of species that can be protected and curtail the acres of wildlife habitat to be preserved. It shifts authority to enforce the act from the federal government to the states, and it dilutes legal barriers that protect habitat from sprawl, logging or mining.

"The proposed changes fundamentally gut the intent of the Endangered Species Act," says Jan Hasselman, a Seattle attorney with Earthjustice, an environmental law firm, who helped Salon interpret the proposal. "This is a no-holds-barred end run around one of America's most popular environmental protections. If these regulations stand up, the act will no longer provide a safety net for animals and plants on the brink of extinction."

In recent months, the Fish and Wildlife Service has gone to extraordinary efforts to keep drafts of regulatory changes from the public. All copies of the working document were given a number corresponding to a person, so that leaked copies could be traced to that individual. An e-mail sent in March from an assistant regional director at the Fish and Wildlife Service to agency staff, asking for comments on and corrections to the first draft, underscored the concern with secrecy: "Please Keep close hold for now. Dale [Hall, director of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service] does not want this stuff leaking out to stir up discontent based on speculation."

Many Fish and Wildlife Service employees believe the draft is not based on "defensible science," says a federal employee who asked to remain anonymous. Yet "there is genuine fear of retaliation for communicating that to the media. People are afraid for their jobs."

Chris Tollefson, a spokesperson for the service, says that while it's accurate to
characterize the agency as trying to keep the draft under wraps, the agency has every intention of communicating with the public about the proposed changes; the draft just hasn't been ready. And, he adds, it could still be changed as part of a forthcoming formal review process.

Administration critics characterize the secrecy as a way to maintain spin control, says Kieran Suckling, policy director of the Center for Biological Diversity, a national environmental group. "This administration will often release a 300-page-long document at a press conference for a newspaper story that will go to press in two hours, giving the media or public no opportunity to digest it and figure out what's going on," Suckling says. "[Interior Secretary Dirk] Kempthorne will give a feel-good quote about how the new regulations are good for the environment, and they can win the public relations war."

In some ways, the proposed changes to the Endangered Species Act should come as no surprise. President Bush has hardly been one of its fans. Under his reign, the administration has granted 57 species endangered status, the action in each case being prompted by a lawsuit. That's fewer than in any other administration in history -- and far fewer than were listed during the administrations of Reagan (253), Clinton (521) or Bush I (234). Furthermore, during this administration, nearly half of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service employees who work with endangered species reported that they had been directed by their superiors to ignore scientific evidence that would result in recommendations for the protection of species, according to a 2005 survey of more than 1,400 service biologists, ecologists and botanists conducted by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, a nonprofit organization.

"We are not allowed to be honest and forthright, we are expected to rubber stamp
everything," wrote a Fish and Wildlife Service biologist as part of the survey. "I have 20 years of federal service in this and this is the worst it has ever been."

The agency has long seen a need to improve the act, says Tollefson. "This is a look at what's possible," he says. "Too much of our time as an agency is spent responding to litigation rather than working on recovering the species that are most in need. The current way the act is run creates disincentives for people to get involved with recovering species."

Kempthorne, boss of the Fish and Wildlife Service, has been an outspoken critic of the act. When he was a U.S. senator from Idaho in the late 1990s, he championed legislation that would have allowed government agencies to exempt their actions from Endangered Species Act regulations, and would have required federal agents to conduct cost-benefit analyses when considering whether to list a species as endangered. (The legislation failed.) Last June, in his early days as interior secretary, Kempthorne told reporters, "I really believe that we can make improvements to the act itself."

Kempthorne is keeping good on his promise. The proposed draft is littered with language lifted directly from both Kempthorne's 1998 legislation as well as from a contentious bill by former Rep. Richard Pombo, R-Calif. (which was also shot down by Congress). It's "a wish list of regulations that the administration and its industry allies have been talking about for years," says Suckling.

Written in terse, dry legal language, the proposed draft doesn't make for easy reading.

However, the changes, often seemingly subtle, generally serve to strip the Fish and Wildlife Service of the power to do its stated job: to protect wildlife. Some verge on the biologically ridiculous, say critics, while others are a clear concession to industry and conservative Western governors who have long complained that the act degrades the economies of their states by preventing natural-resource extraction.

One change would significantly limit the number of species eligible for endangered status. Currently, if a species is likely to become extinct in "the foreseeable future" -- a species-specific timeframe that can stretch up to 300 years -- it's a candidate for act protections. However, the new rules scale back that timeline to mean either 20 years or 10 generations (the agency can choose which timeline). For certain species with long life spans, such as killer whales, grizzly bears or wolves, two decades isn't even one generation. So even if they might be in danger of extinction, they would not make the endangered species list because they'd be unlikely to die out in two decades.

"It makes absolutely no sense biologically," wrote Hasselman in an e-mail. "One of the Act's weaknesses is that species aren't protected until they're already in trouble and this proposal puts that flaw on steroids."

Perhaps the most significant proposed change gives state governors the opportunity and funding to take over virtually every aspect of the act from the federal government. This includes not only the right to create species-recovery plans and the power to veto the reintroduction of endangered species within state boundaries, but even the authority to determine what plants and animals get protection. For plants and animals in Western states, that's bad news: State politicians throughout the region howled in opposition to the reintroduction of the Mexican gray wolf into Arizona and the Northern Rockies wolf into Yellowstone National Park.

"If states are involved, the act would only get minimally enforced," says Bob Hallock, a recently retired 34-year veteran of the Fish and Wildlife Service who, as an endangered species specialist, worked with state agencies in Idaho, Washington and Montana. "States are, if anything, closer to special economic interests. They're more manipulated. The states have not demonstrated the will or interest in upholding the act. It's why we created a federal law in the first place."

Additional tweaks in the law would have a major impact. For instance, the proposal would narrow the definition of a species' geographic range from the landscape it inhabited historically to the land it currently occupies. Since the main reason most plants and animals head toward extinction is due to limited habitat, the change would strongly hamper the government's ability to protect chunks of land and allow for a healthy recovery in the wild.

The proposal would also allow both ongoing and planned projects by such federal agencies as the Army Corps of Engineers and the Forest Service to go forward, even when scientific evidence indicates that the projects may drive a species to extinction. Under the new regulations, as long as the dam or logging isn't hastening the previous rate of extinction, it's approved. "This makes recovery of species impossible," says Suckling.

Gutting the Endangered Species Act will only thicken the pall that has hung over the Fish and Wildlife Service for the past six years, Hallock says. "They [the Bush
administration] don't want the regulations to be effective. People in the agency are like a bunch of whipped dogs," he says. "I think it's just unacceptable to go around squashing other species; they're of incalculable benefit to us. The optimism we had when this agency started has absolutely been dashed."

3-27-07
Endangered Species Act changes in the works...Janet Wilson and Julie Cart
http://www.latimes.com/news/science/environment/la-na-endangered28mar28,1,7044899.story
Bush administration officials said Tuesday that they were reviewing proposed changes to the way the 34-year-old Endangered Species Act is enforced, a move that critics say would weaken the law in ways that a Republican majority in Congress was unable to do...draft of suggested changes, which was leaked Tuesday, would reduce protection for wildlife habitat and transfer some authority over vulnerable species to states. Acting under orders from Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne, who has long fought for changes in the law, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Director H. Dale Hall said he had asked his senior field staff to evaluate proposals in the draft by policy advisors in the Departments of Interior and Commerce, which oversee almost 1,300 imperiled species. Hall made his comments after environmental groups and the online journal Salon.com published a draft version of the proposals Tuesday. The draft contains language from Kempthorne's proposed 1998 legislation and from a controversial bill by former Rep. Richard W. Pombo (R-Tracy), both of which died in Congress.

3-27-07
Washington Post
Govt. eyes changes in Species Protection...H. Josef Hebert, AP
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/03/27/AR2007032701623_pf.html
Details of some of the proposed changes surfaced Tuesday in a number of draft department documents released by environmentalists, who said the changes would amount to a gutting of the federal Endangered Species Act. Department spokesmen said the drafts were still under review and that no decision had been made by Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne on whether to proceed. "The focus is how we can do a better job of recovering more species," department spokesman Hugh Vickery said in an interview. He called the documents that have surfaced preliminary and in some cases out of date. Some of the proposed changes are outlined in a 117-page draft regulation and in a half-dozen separate memorandums, some dating back to last summer and others as recent as mid-February. The proposed changes "touch on every key program under the Endangered Species Act. It is a rewrite from top to bottom," said Kieran Suckling of the Center for Biological Diversity, a national environmental group based in Tucson, Ariz. The draft was the subject of a story Tuesday on Salon.com. Vickery said the 117-page document, which includes many of the proposed changes, is old. "It does not represent the latest thinking by the Fish and Wildlife Service," he said. "Recommendations are still being floated." But Daniel Patterson of Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, which put the documents on its Web site Tuesday, said the memos have been circulated among agencies outside the Interior Department, suggesting that the proposals are in the late stage of consideration.

3-30-07
Stockton Record
GOP launches early attack on McNerney...Hank Shaw
http://recordnet.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070329/A_NEWS/703290337
National Republicans have begun their attempt to unseat Rep. Jerry McNerney, D-Pleasanton, a full 20 months before Election Day 2008. The Republican National Campaign Committee, which spent tens of thousands of dollars in an unsuccessful effort to save former Tracy Rep. Richard Pombo last fall, has included McNerney in its first round of targets posted on www.therealdemocratstory.com. NRCC will also send about 100,000 e-mails into McNerney's 11th District highlighting their criticism of the freshman Democrat's voting record. McNerney has voted with Nancy Pelosi 100 percent of the time so far this year.

3-31-07
Center for Biological Diversity
Interior Department Official Distorted Agency's Own Science to Avoid Protecting Endangered Species...Press Release...3-29-07
http://www.biologicaldiversity.org/swcbd/press/macdonald-03-29-2007.html
Report from Inspector General Department of Interior Blasts Assistant Secretary for Fish, Wildlife and Parks Julie MacDonald
3-23-07...A copy of the Inspector General’s report is available at http://www.biologicaldiversity.org/swcbd/programs/esa/pdfs/DOI-IG-Report_JM.pdf.

3-31--07
San Francisco Chronicle
Judge tosses new forest rules...Henry K. Lee
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/03/31/BAGE5OVFUT1.DTL&hw=endangered+species&sn=003&sc=374
A federal judge in San Francisco threw out the Bush administration's new rules Friday for managing the country's 155 national forests, saying the government had failed to consider the environmental effects that could result from the changes...administration also failed to give the public a chance to review the new regulations before they went into effect in 2005, U.S. District Judge Phyllis Hamilton said in a ruling on two consolidated lawsuits filed by environmental groups and the state of California. Hamilton said the government had violated the National Environmental Policy Act and the Endangered Species Act and couldn't institute the new rules until environmental reviews are conducted. More than a dozen environmental groups had filed suit, including Citizens for Better Forestry, Defenders of Wildlife and the Sierra Club.

3-32-07
San Francisco Chronicle
UC faculty to join talks on big BP biofuels deal...Rick DelVecchio
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/03/31/BAGE5OV6G61.DTL&hw=uc&sn=001&sc=921
UC Berkeley's administration has invited faculty members to join the contract talks on the $500 million BP biofuels deal amid pressure to ensure that campus traditions and values are safeguarded in the partnership. Journalism Professor Bill Drummond, chairman of the campus Academic Senate, said the administration will allow four professors who chair Senate committees -- Calvin Moore, Patrick Kirch, Christopher Kutz and J. Miguel Villas-Boas -- to participate in the negotiations... The university's administration is being sharply challenged by faculty members who fear the BP deal is so big that it threatens to upset the tradition of shared governance on campus between the Academic Senate and the administration. A petition signed by 130 faculty members, including some of the campus' most widely respected academics, calls for the immediate convening of a blue-ribbon committee to look into aspects of the BP deal that impinge on the Academic Senate's mandate. The petitioners argue that decisions on hiring faculty and allocating resources to the BP-funded Energy Biosciences Institute, to be staffed by 50 BP-appointed researchers and 100 from academia, are going forward without proper campus review. A second petition by a different group of faculty members seeks to cancel the BP deal on the grounds that it constitutes the "greenwashing" of the oil company's environmental record through its association with the university. Robert Dudley, a UC Berkeley professor of integrative biology and a member of the Academic Senate's academic freedom committee, said the lack of disclosure of the BP deal's details is "potentially suspicious."...cited a 1998-2003 research deal under which the Swiss biotech firm Novartis provided $25 million in funding to the university's Department of Plant and Microbial Biology. Faculty members were upset that a funding deal that large wasn't discussed universitywide before it was implemented. Ironically, the Novartis controversy prompted Cornell's faculty to develop standards that could be put into action in a similar partnership. Cornell faculty's 26-page document was finished in 2005 after two years of debate...document coined a new term for large-scale research sponsorships: "strategic corporate alliances."

3-30-07
San Francisco Chronicle
UC-Merced hopes to lure large-campus rejects...San Jose Mercury News
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2007/03/30/state/n125253D42.DTL&hw=uc&sn=009&sc=878
The University of California, Merced has a new strategy to attract students:...The "Shared Experience" program will allow about 1,000 students who narrowly miss admission to UC Berkeley, UCLA, UC Irvine or UC San Diego to attend the Merced campus for two years, and then finish their studies at a more established school. Growth has been slower than expected at UC Merced, where freshman enrollment dropped 38 percent last fall in the school's second year. The Shared Experience program was also used to increase attendance at UC Santa Cruz in the 1980s, when some students were guaranteed subsequent entry to the Berkeley campus.

3-31-07
Los Angeles Times
Southland's dry spell could get worse...Betinna Boxall
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-dry31mar31,1,7683947
Nature is pulling a triple whammy on Southern California this year. Whether it's the Sierra, the Southland or the Colorado River Basin, every place that provides water to the region is dry. It's a rare and troubling pattern, and if it persists it could thrust the region into what researchers have dubbed the perfect Southern California drought: when nature shortchanges every major branch of the far-flung water network that sustains 18 million people. The mountain snowpack vital to water imports from Northern California is at the lowest level in nearly two decades. The Los Angeles area has received record low rainfall this winter... And the Colorado River system remains in the grip of one of the worst basin droughts in centuries. Thanks to a bountiful Sierra snowpack in the spring of 2006, the state's reservoirs are in good shape. Twice during the 20th century — in the late 1950s and the early 1980s — drought strained all three regions that supply Southern California, said Scripps Institution of Oceanography hydrologist Hugo Hidalgo. UCLA geography professor Glen MacDonald, warned, "if you went into a decade or longer of persistent drought that affected the Sacramento [River Basin], the Los Angeles area and the Colorado, you would end up basically taxing all of the those water storage facilities, from the dams on the Colorado to what we have here, to beyond the breaking point." As a result of this spring's skimpy Sierra snowpack — it's at 46% of the normal statewide average — the State Water Project will reduce deliveries of Northern California water to the central and southern parts of the state, but not dramatically.

Washington Post
Extinct sense...Editorial
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/03/30/AR2007033001998.html
IT LOOKS LIKE another story of endangered ethics on the Bush administration's environmental staff. Last week the Interior Department's inspector general submitted the results of an investigation of Julie A. MacDonald, the deputy assistant secretary for fish and wildlife and parks, to congressional overseers. According to numerous accounts collected in the inquiry, Ms. MacDonald has terrorized low-level biologists and other employees for years, often yelling and even swearing at them. One official characterized her as an "attack dog." Much of this bullying, the report suggests, was aimed at diluting the scientific conclusions and recommendations of government biologists and at favoring industry and land interests. Ms. MacDonald's subordinates said she has trenchantly resisted both designating new species as endangered and protecting imperiled animals' habitats. She defended her interventions in an interview with the inspector general's staff, saying that she kept Interior's scientists accountable, according to the report. But the evidence available suggests she was at the least too aggressive. H. Dale Hall, director of the Fish and Wildlife Service, recounted a battle he had with Ms. MacDonald over the Southwest willow flycatcher, an endangered bird. claims that Ms. MacDonald insisted on lowering that to 1.8 miles so that the nesting range would not extend into California, where her husband maintained a family ranch. The inspector general noted that she has no formal training in biology. The inspector general's review of Ms. MacDonald's e-mail account also showed that she had close ties to lobbying organizations that have challenged endangered-species listings and that she had "misused her position" to give them information not available to the public on Interior Department policy. Reports of Ms. MacDonald's alleged sins have emerged soon after revelations of other ethical lapses by Bush environmental appointees. J. Steven Griles, the former second in command at Interior, pleaded guilty to charges stemming from the Jack Abramoff scandal. And Sue Ellen Wooldridge, formerly the government's top environmental lawyer, jointly purchased a vacation home with Mr. Griles and a lobbyist for ConocoPhillips. These are troubling incidents. Ms. MacDonald works for an agency tasked with making determinations based on scientific fact, not on her, or her lobbyist friends', inclinations. She appears to have betrayed that vital principle. The inspector general has sent his report to top officials at the Interior Department. They should investigate for themselves the document's troubling descriptions and take action to ensure that Ms. MacDonald and other managers at Interior make policy fit the science, not the other way around.

4-1-07
Sacramento Bee
Canal still best Delta water fix...Dan Walters
http://www.sacbee.com/111/story/147490.html
One of Brown's better initiatives was closing a gap in the water system that had been started under his father, Pat Brown...the "Peripheral Canal" enjoyed support from both environmentalists and municipal and agricultural water agencies... After a highly misleading, farmer-financed campaign, voters rejected the Peripheral Canal in 1982. Had the Peripheral Canal been built as Jerry Brown urged, the fish being chewed up in the pumps would have been alive and more numerous. Had the Peripheral Canal been built, we wouldn't have to worry so much about Delta levees collapsing due to an earthquake or being breached by rising ocean levels from global warming, either of which would threaten water deliveries. But the canal wasn't built. Schwarzenegger described the fish-kill decision as "one more indication of how our system doesn't really work, and that we have to upgrade it. We have to fix our levees. There are a lot of things that need to be done. We need to have more above-the-ground water storage. We have to start thinking about our Delta; it's very, very vulnerable. As I said, one earthquake and one big storm, and it could wipe out this whole system, and 25 million people will suffer because of it." Arnold Schwarzenegger is the first governor since Brown to truly confront the water policy gridlock. Schwarzenegger described the fish-kill decision as "one more indication of how our system doesn't really work, and that we have to upgrade it. We have to fix our levees. There are a lot of things that need to be done. We need to have more above-the-ground water storage. We have to start thinking about our Delta; it's very, very vulnerable. As I said, one earthquake and one big storm, and it could wipe out this whole system, and 25 million people will suffer because of it." He's right.

There is something about a governor that loves a dam. Maybe it's the ribbons. In any event, Our Hun is no different. But the justification for more off-stream storage of water in California is beginning to reach a stage we might call "officially sanctified lunacy." It based on the mathematical assumptions that benefit a very powerful handful of people: the Hun, parts of the Legislature and the editorial board of the McClatchy Chain. The numbers go like this: as long as the finance, insurance and real estate sector of the economy continues to lavish campaign contributions on politicians and buy enormous quantities of media advertising, the politicians and the Chain will continue to promote the voodoo math that because the population is growing, the quantity of water in California can be made, magically, to grow by building more dams.

Regarding this latest promotion of the Temperance Flats dam on the San Joaquin River above the Friant Dam on the same river, the McClatchy chain, after a few false starts quoting the fulminations of a Tulare County congressman of knuckleheaded rightwing sentiments rapidly going out of fashion, they have gotten their rhetoric down: WATER CRISIS for the growing population. This conveniently obscures the San Joaquin River Settlement Agreement that would -- by federal court ruling -- put enough water back in the San Joaquin River below the Friant Dam (and the Friant-Kern Canal that sucks out most of its water) so that the river actually flows on the surface of the earth across Fresno County and contains enough fresh water so that salmon could again inhabit it from the Delta to the Friant Dam.

The distraction of the Temperance Flat project -- CRISIS IN WATER SUPPLY! -- shows that the McClatchy Chain remains firmly on the side of unlimited population growth in California and the fewer and fewer people who truly benefit from it, come drought or high water.

It is bad enough that the public had to wait 18 years, arguing on behalf of fish, to get a federal court ruling that would mean, if it is ever implemented, that a river would not go underground for 50 miles and when it surfaces be filled with agricultural drainage for the remainder of its 100-mile journey to the Delta.

It is bad enough that the Delta smelt population had to crash so severely that an Alameda County Superior Court judge ruled last week that the pumps to the California Aqueduct must stop in 60 days unless there is a solution to another wildlife crisis.

It is bad enough that Westlands Water District of Fresno is permitted to buy 3,000 acres of river frontage on a tributary feeding into the Shasta Dam, just in case it is decided to increase the size of the reservoir.

There can be no more naked display of the unmitigated greed of finance, insurance and real estate interests and the pusilanimity of politicians and the McClatchy Chain, and that's the main chance for the public. This is a cartoon written so large anybody can see it. A huge number of people, from all parts of California, can now see that its plumbing system is absurdly vulnerable -- a sizeable levee break in the Delta would cause a crisis in drinking water supplies for 24 million people and large floods besides -- and yet this narrow group of special interests keeps mindlessly promoting more water storage. There is no more water, and the system that delivers it now is waiting for an earthquake or floods to self-destruct, as the result of a 30-year run of corrupt policies promoting unlimited population growth at the expense of limited natural resources, a period marked by the arrival of laws that recognize resource limits.

The public wants the San Joaquin River back. A federal court ruling says it should get its river back. Therefore, every special interest in the land must gather together to promote yet another dam on that river to make absolutely certain the public does not get its river back. Fifth graders would reject the math behind the proposal and have a good class giggle at the absurdity of this particular "word problem."

If it isn't the ribbons, maybe it's the money. It sure isn't the math.

Badlands
--------------------

3-26-07
San Francisco Chronicle
Schwarzenegger promotes dams as way to boost water reserves
Associated Press
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2007/03/26/state/n162231D22.DTL&hw=water&sn=003&sc=593

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger on Monday promoted a $6 billion plan for increased water storage and protecting fresh water supplies, calling for two new dams and better management of the delta.

"Our state's population is increasing rapidly. We also have earthquakes and major storms that could really destroy our levee system," the governor said, speaking against the backdrop of Friant Dam at Millerton Lake, in the Sierra foothills east of Fresno.

Two-thirds of Californians depend on the Sierra Nevada snowmelt for drinking water while Central Valley growers use it to irrigate their fields. Schwarzenegger said the state's expected growth — to 55 million people by 2050 — requires it to create more water storage.

In addition, officials must plan for the effects of global warming, which is expected to reduce the Sierra snow pack and lead to earlier run off. Rising sea levels also could increase salinity in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, jeopardizing fresh water supplies.

Schwarzenegger introduced his water projects in January during his State of the State address, proposing $4.5 billion for reservoirs and groundwater storage, $1 billion to manage the delta, $250 million for restoration of several rivers and $200 million for water conservation.

The governor faces building two new dams, one above the existing Friant Dam and Millerton Lake and another in the northern Sacramento Valley.

Environmentalists have criticized Schwarzenegger's plans. They say California could find more cost-effective ways to meet its water needs, particularly through conservation.
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3/27/07
Fresno Bee –
Editorial: Addressing water needs; Governor presents his plan to increase water surface storage

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger took up the cudgels in Fresno Monday for the controversial proposal to build new surface storage capacity for water supplies in California, including a dam above Millerton Lake in the Temperance Flat area. Unlike the story line of most of his action movies, it won't be a fight the governor can win alone.

The governor, backed by agricultural and business interests, originally included money for new dams in last year's package of infrastructure bonds. Such projects proved too much for Democrats in the Legislature to swallow, and the people never got a chance to vote on them.

Schwarzenegger said he would be back with a new water storage package, and Monday's media event at the base of Friant Dam marked the public kickoff of the new campaign. Schwarzenegger stood in front of an assemblage of local elected officials and asked for public support to lobby the state's legislators on the effort.

The Bee supports the idea of a new dam at Temperance Flat, assuming the engineering and environmental studies underway confirm its feasibility. Such additional surface storage is badly needed in California, and must be part of a three-part package that also includes underground storage and dramatically revved-up conservation efforts.

The vehicle for Schwarzenegger's water package would be a $5.95 billion bond measure. The vast majority of the funds -- $4.5 billion -- would be set aside for surface water storage projects. About $1 billion would be spent on efforts to keep the vital Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta healthy. Another $260 million would be spent on the state's rivers, including the San Joaquin, and some $200 million would be used to provide funding for local water conservation efforts.

State Sen. Dave Cogdill, R-Modesto, is the principal sponsor of SB 59, which would place the measure on the ballot.

It won't be easy. Democrats flatly rejected the approach last year, and continue to argue that conservation and groundwater storage are the only viable solutions to California's looming water crisis.

And crisis it is: The state's population is expected to grow by 30% in the next 20 years, and if even the most conservative estimates of global climate change prove true, we could have serious shortages of water in the state by the next generation.

There are many details to be decided, and battles to be fought. But this is no routine political exercise. The future of California is on the line, and the governor is correct to push for more water storage capacity.

The price of academic integrity

Jennifer Washburn lays out the case against the British Petroleum/UC,Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, University of Illinois-Urbana deal: $500 million from BP to set up an Energy Biosciences Institute to do BP-directed science for BP profits, using public facilities and publicly paid university sciences.

"Big Oil buys Berkeley" lays out a completely compelling case against the deal. The one thing I thought she missed was consideration of how much $500 million in industry funds could suppress science tending to suggest that biofuels are not the silver bullet for our energy woes.

She touches on another theme, which I would have liked to see her explore further. I guess I'll have to buy her book, University Inc.: The Corporate Corruption of Higher Education.

This is shameful. The core mission of Berkeley is education, open knowledge exchange and objective research, not making money or furthering the interests of a private firm. In the last two decades, however, Cal and other universities — increasingly desperate for research dollars — have signed agreements that fail to protect their essential independence, allowing corporations excessive control over their research.

I agree it is a shameful, probably dangerous corruption of academic independence and the public mission of UC. It is as ethically indefensible as the salaries UC administrators get "so that they will be competitive with private industry standards." I also believe it will have the effect of suppressing ethical concerns at Cal, worsening an already blighted history in that area.

But, is the economic concern accurate? Are universities "increasingly desperate for research dollars"? And, if so, why? I am sure that the answer to that question is extremely complicated, involving the privatization of many formerly government functions, particularly in institutions like the Pentagon and the Department of Agriculture. Bear in mind that UC is a land grant university, whose Cooperative Extension has been working at the county level in California agriculture for many decades, with varied results depending in recent years on what agribusiness lobby is dominating the USDA at the moment.

Public funds, at least in California, account for roughly 25-percent of the UC operating budget. I don't know what the percentage is in New Mexico, where the UC/Los Alamos National Laboratory is one of the state's top employers. While it is safe to say that without that 25 percent, a great many things at UC could not happen. On the other hand, this percentage, shrinking through the years, is not in the commanding position it once was to enforce, economically, the mission of the university -- "education, open knowledge exchange and objective research." State funding of UC has suffered erosion, and is now seen as "local matching funds" somewhat similar to a local sweetener to attract federal highway funds for road projects. UC is funded, overwhelmingly, by private corporations and the federal government (the latter being in some instances pretty much like the former).

Passage in 1980 of the Bayh-Dole Act didn't help. This law enabled universities to

Public confidence in the objectivity of research may be eroded

Academia's relationship with private industry changed in the United States when Congress passed the Bayh-Dole Act in 1980.1 This law enabled universities to patent their discoveries and license them to private corporations. This policy fostered collaboration between academia and industry, which created jobs and products of immediate commercial value. But the delicate balance between academic and corporate expectations has swung too far toward private profit at the expense of public trust. Universities are threatened by a growing public concern that industry funding distorts research and undermines its traditions of objectivity, independence, and free exchange of ideas. -- The unhealthy alliance between academia and corporate America

--Spyros Andreopoulos, Director emeritus, Western Journal Med. 2001 October; 175(4): 225–226.

Furthermore, the process is well-established and champions of academic independence are not found either on the UC Regents or among UC administrators, who together comprise a committee that must rank among the premier grant whores in the world.

But, what if the public has doubts about ethanol and the genetic engineering that this oil company-funded scientific institute will be doing? How can the public compete against $500 million? What state legislator, during committee meetings on the UC budget (that little 25-percent matching fund) is going to stand up against a half a billion bucks? One can almost hear the sneer of UC lobbyists.

In short, the state's "public research university" has been hijacked by an oil company in what top UC officials are calling another win-win, public-private partnership. This is certainly not the first time this has happened -- consider the land boondoggle of UC Merced as a recent example, and UCM's proposed University Community as another. Novartis paid a mere $25 million to Cal for genetic research a few years ago. Conflict took place, involving Cal environmental scientist, Ignacio Chapela, indigenous cultivars of corn in Oaxaca, GMO gene drift, Nature Magazine and the awesome flak machine of the Biotechnology Industry Organization. Novartis chose to duck the heat and leave town. Chapela eventually got his tenure, blocked until he brought a lawsuit, by UC administration.

Let us, for a moment, consider another way of framing the issue, different from the win-win, public-private flak. We do this with apologies to another Cal professor, George Lakoff, one of the nation's leading sophists, who appears to be trying to patent the breath-takingly new idea of teaching liberals rhetoric.

UC depends on prestige for its grants. A one-tune pony, it must constantly employ legions of flaks to sing its song: "UC is the greatest public research university in the universe." In fact, it makes much more sense, producing a much richer sense of reality, to consider UC a public front for corporate and federal government research (much of which is guided by corporate lobbies).

What happens if you take the "public" out of the win-win, private partnership between UC and the oil company? If the public, with its mere 25-percent ante on the table, is unable to guide UC research to something of importance to the public, why not remove the ante and take its money off the table? UC isn't committed to educating the youth of California. UC is about UC prestige in some of the most lethal science and technology known to man. Arnold the Hun and the Legislature remain in the game of matching funds strictly to be seen as Big Shots in the glowing reflection of UC "public" research, which isn't public and may not even be research so much as it is flak-money spent to suppress science suggesting that the corporate sponsor du jour is researching things of actual danger to the public.

Badlands Journal
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3-24-07
Los Angeles Times
Big oil buys Berkeley...Jennifer Washburn
http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-oe-washburn24mar24,1,2582704.story
ON FEB.1, the oil giant BP announced that it had chosen UC Berkeley, in partnership with the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, to lead the largest academic-industrial research alliance in U.S. history. If the deal is approved, BP will give $500 million over 10 years to fund a new multidisciplinary Energy Biosciences Institute devoted principally to biofuels research. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, UC administrators and BP executives immediately proclaimed the alliance — which is not yet a done deal — a victory for higher education and for the environment. But here's another way to see it. For a mere $50 million a year, an oil company worth $250 billion would buy a chunk of America's premier public research institutions, all but turning them into its own profit-making subsidiary. This is shameful. The core mission of Berkeley is education, open knowledge exchange and objective research, not making money or furthering the interests of a private firm. In the last two decades, however, Cal and other universities — increasingly desperate for research dollars — have signed agreements that fail to protect their essential independence, allowing corporations excessive control over their research. Most corporations sponsor university research one study and one lab at a time. With the Energy Biosciences Institute, BP would exert influence over an entire academic research center (spanning 25 labs at its three public partners), bankrolling and setting the agenda for projects that cut across many departments. What's more, BP would set up shop on campus:... BP also would set up private labs on these campuses, where all the research would be proprietary and confidential. The fine print of the plan, which UC made public only after it was leaked, doesn't create much confidence. Californians need to know that their public university is dedicated to pursuing the best science, not just science that generates profits for BP. Five hundred million dollars is a nice chunk of change, but does any amount of money justify "reinventing" UC Berkeley's academic integrity?

submitted by Bill Hatch

Big Shots are found everywhere in American society. So, viewing them from the San Joaquin Valley of California, once a great agricultural area now mindlessly converting itself as fast as violation of environmental law and regulation and common sense permits to another Western slurb, is as good a place as any to observe Big Shots.

American society is plagued with Big Shots, people that have gotten to some position of power through an excess of aggression, which they use to bully others. The rest of us all too often take the bullying in stride, hoping for a better day or, under the relentless onslaught, cave and grow permanently afraid.

All Big Shots have some self-righteous ideology, fundamentalism or doctrine to shout down at the rest of us from their positions, just a little above us one way or another.

The self-justification can be anything from “good work habits” to “the war against global terrorism.” All of it is a smoke screen for big-mouthed little cowards playing authoritarian games, throughout the sick institutional structure of this nation – from the orchard and tomato field to the packing shed to the city council to the school to the development corporation and the oil company to the White House.

We sit and read and hope somehow the “We the People” of the high-school texts will miraculously manifest that mythical unity We are said to possess to get the Big Shots off our backs, without risking anything. But, there is too much power, too much money floating around America, too many weapons in obedient hands and way too little human dignity left to stop this imperial cannibalism that is devouring millions of people in our imperial way – the toll rising, unabated by weak political resistance within the empire’s “homeland.”

Americans now confuse order and government in the “homeland” with bullying and being bullied. We elect a majority of Democrats in Congress to stop the war and their “leadership” blows us off in favor of the military contractors, the oil companies and the Israel lobby. But, will the public stand up to them? Call them by their name: hypocrites, sanctimonious bribe-takers, hacks and buffoons? Sue them? Prosecute them? Call their propaganda by its name?

America is a frightened, ruthless, unjust and ugly society full of denial and a guilt growing too large to measure, let alone accept. More than 600,000 Iraqis are dead because of a 30-year political “vacation” taken by the citizens of the USA, culminating in this atrocity. Our health care system is broken because America does not care about its people’s health. Top American political leadership is sociopathic because it serves at the pleasure of transnational corporations with no commitment to anything but their profits and the destruction of government regulation rather than the people and law. But the people are too besotted with corporate propaganda to know their rights, their interests and how to defend either. Yet, the US is losing “the war against terrorism” for the same reason it long ago lost the “war on drugs”: the Big Shots are too corrupt to win a war or stop the carnage of this one. Or rebuild New Orleans. Or save our environment. Or even put a dent in global warming.

Big Shots dominate our federal, state and local legislatures and our media corporations. The political situation in America is, in fact, much more critical than most Americans can imagine. There are entire institutions, vital to a functional society that have dropped off the map of the civilized world because they have been so rotted out by the greed of special interests, bribery and corruption. A small example, that will be familiar only to the very few remaining candid souls living in rural America, will be this year’s Farm Bill, which will demonstrate again that the Department of Agriculture is so corrupt it cannot identify national interest or even farmers’ interests. Likewise with the Food and Drug Agency, that has made unwitting guinea pigs of the entire American society and any foreign markets for our crops too stupid or oppressed to avoid it for the free, unregulated experimentation of the health effects of genetically modified organisms. Resource agencies charged with enforcing environmental law and regulation are daily corrupted by development corporations. Agency-by-agency, institution-by-institution, where can we find one that is working for the People? As glad as we may be made by tidings of churches, with congregations 10,000 strong, doing incredible feats of community outreach and care, can they replace a government that is supposed to serve 300 million people and is not supposed to be owned by transnational corporations?

American universities promote those character traits of sycophantic aggression prized by the corrupt corporate power elites that fund research for private profit rather than public benefit. High school dropouts, unlike the PhDs that staff the nation’s national laboratories, are not recorded to have produced American weapons of mass destruction that menace the world. These weapons aren’t the products of education; they are from its simulacrum, the university/corporate technology/military complex. To these must be added the “independent experts” whose regular gigs are at the brothel think tanks.

As ever, on the cutting edge of military technology, the Pentagon now conducts war by hurling immeasurable (at least by its accounting) tons of pork at the enemy, possibly hoping to crush him under the sheer weight ham and bacon. While the Pentagon appears to have crushed our side, the insurgents have long ago gone on to their own civil war.

Jake Plummer is outraged over the treatment of Pat Tillman: They knew it was friendly fire then–it makes you sick

By: John Amato on Friday, September 15th, 2006 at 4:15 PM - PDT
On HBO’s Inside the NFL, Peter King interviewed Denver QB Jake Plummer about the horrific treatment the Tillman family have received over Pat’s death. There have been four investigations into what really happened to him and now a fifth one is getting close to being completed. How reprehensible has this been for the Tillman family? Pat is killed and they were repeatedly lied to. The family is not speaking out, but Plummer is. Good for him. Somebody has to.

Video-WMP Video-QT (rough transcript)
http://www.crooksandliars.com/2006/09/15/jake-plummer-is-outraged-over-the-treatment-of-pat-tillman-they-knew-it-was-friendly-fire-then-it-makes-you-sick/

King: When you first heard that they hid these irregularities, were you outraged?

Plummer: It just made you feel kinda sick that they’d cover up something like that to–for whatever reason. We were all led to believe he died in leading his troops up the hill and then they come tell us it wasn’t–it was friendly fire. What can you do– you’re at their mercy and you just feel for the family…

I mention Big Shots only because there might be lingering in the American collective unconscious – that immense psychic ocean of all that is suppressed and ignored – some residual folk memory of resentment against Big Shots. Perhaps a residual sense of the political taste that caused people to fight to the death against the British so many years ago. However, it is probable that Americans, after 30 years of corporate propaganda, have been so overwhelmingly persuaded of their unique brilliance, success and that Beautiful Freedom we all enjoy, that they all conceive of themselves as Big Shots, entitled citizens, above the masses. In our area, the masses are imagined by our fictitious Big Shots to be foreigners, Mexicans and Asians and such. Casual observation suggests, however, that when Americans, convinced of their Big Shot status, are muscled by the equally convinced, the former group – rather than getting down to political realities – tends instead to develop a severe case of the vapors. “How dare they!” etc. Generally, their croquet balls are carefully aimed and demurely stroked at a non-lethal local official, in no position to help or to harm, simply one more minor Big Shot on his or her way up or down the ladder to Big Shot Heaven. Missing the target amounts to an alliance with one’s own gravedigger, but if one doesn’t know that, there is not point in bringing it up.

“Use it or lose it,” voter registrars used to mutter in front of supermarket doors at the feckless passers-by. They didn’t use it and they did lose it. Everyman the Big Shot, on his way into WalMart, was above mere voting.

The proper American hero of today is Yossarian, the terrified WWII bombardier of Catch-22. When you tell the truth to power, power will fire back. Yossarian wasn’t crazy. Fighting fascism is dangerous work. But, having allowed this unaccountable, authoritarian power to take root on the ground, it must be defeated even though it fights back. That would take courage and spirit, and probably fewer vacations. But, of course, Catch-22 was just a funny novel written 50 years ago, which said some rather off-message things about the “greatest generation.”

Our local McClatchy Chain corporate outlet is a Big Shot with barrels of ink that is never off-message. The Chain is part of the immense advertising/public relations empire in charge of controlling our taste, distorting all issues with one aim – the destruction of a truly public perspective in favor of the very private, “special” perspective of the private profits of their paymasters and their social equals in the Club de Big Shots. In the San Joaquin Valley, the McClatchy Chain relentlessly attacks the San Joaquin River Settlement Agreement, reached between local, state and national environmental groups and farmers and local, state and federal water agencies. The idea of accord between agriculture and environmental groups is an abomination to McClatchy advertisers – principally real estate development, finance and insurance – and they cannot allow this agreement to live, which would put Sierra snow melt back into the state’s second-longest river all the way to the Delta. To this destructive end, the Chain has taken to quoting every inane utterance of Rep. Devin Nunes, R-Visalia, a bullyboy for corporate agribusiness welfare. The Big Shots the Chain does not name, who are bankrolling Nunes’ attack on the settlement, are smoother and worse.

The Big Shots intend to protect their power and their wealth. That’s all they have to say now, and all they ever had to say, millions of barrels of ink ago. Where’s the “Progress”? What did agribusiness, built on federal water, crop subsidies and low wages, really accomplish? Where is the quality in those islands of wealth surrounded by poverty and economic anxiety? What was the ideal served? Where is the happiness?

Do we live to buy what we don’t need to keep corporate CEOs in the style to which they have become accustomed, averaging 300 times higher compensation than the median income of their employees? Do we live for the fame of having invaded and destroyed already crippled nations to plunder their resources? Do we live to support and applaud or suffer in fearful silence the fraud and corruption of predatory plutocrats? Were we born to become the generation that forgot the difference between news and advertising? Is our purpose in life here in the San Joaquin Valley and elsewhere to stand at attention and sing hymns of praise to the destroyers of the Public Trust and the builders of grotesque slurbs – just because Big Shots have the “freedom” to do it?

Is this nation’s destiny freedom for Big Shots and the shaft for the rest of us?

“Of course not, of course not,” I hear you saying.

I end in communion with the great Dodge City lawman, Bat Masterson, who went on to a distinguished career as a New York City sports writer. He wrote:

There are many in this old world of ours who hold that things break about even for all of us. I have observed, for example, that we all get the same amount of ice. The rich get it in the summertime and the poor get it in the winter. -- Bat Masterson

I received a note from the MoveOn.org political action team today, urging me to personally thank Rep. Dennis Cardoza, Shrimp Slayer-Merced, for voting for the Iraq Accountability Act, which was passed today, 218-212, two Republicans voting in favor, and 14 Democrats joining the Republican opposition. Tallying up the Democrat opponents, I found six members of the Progressive Caucus and seven members of the 43-member Blue Dog Caucus, of which Cardoza is the communications director. Strange bedfellows, but these are fractious times.

Reading through the press reports on the bill, I noticed that some critics of it made allusions to pork.

"The sweeteners in this bill are political bribery," said Rep. Sam Johnson, R-Texas, who was a prisoner of war in Vietnam and who delivered an emotional speech to conclude the Republican side of the debate. -- LA Times, March 23, 2007

I thought, before I rushed into the arms of MoveOn's conveniently available website to send our members of Congress our thanks (when I write Cardoza, the messages bounce back unopened), I might check out the pork a little first.

There may be some reason these agricultural appropriations are included in a bill on Iraq War appropriations. Maybe the old Contract-on-America crowd are just griping because they have not gotten used to two-party rule in the House yet. There could be a reasonable explanation why $252 million for the Milk Income Loss Contract Program is included in this bill beyond what Johnson calls "political bribery." But, the most reasonable explanation is that the communications director of the Blue Dog Coalition, representing the second largest dairy district in the nation, got a "sweetner." All but the handful of the remaining 34 Blue Dogs who aren't from agricultural districts, got their sweetners, too.

So, Speaker Pelosi lost progressive representatives Kucinich, Lee, Waters, Waston and Woolsey on principle, but picked up less-than-progressive Cardoza and the 34 Blue Dog Democrats, for a price.

Rep. Sam Farr, D-Carmel, a long-term opponent of the Iraq War, is in a special category. The spinach growers in his district, "the Salad Bowl of the Nation,"economically harmed last fall by an outbreak of E. Coli traced to his district, got $25 million in relief. But Farr sits on the powerful House Appropriations Committee and on three subcommittees:

* Subcommittee on Agriculture, Rural Development and Food and Drug Administration (FDA)
* Subcommittee on Military Construction and Veterans Affairs
* Subcommittee on Homeland Security

which puts him in a position to both know what he wants and to get it. However, in this instance, where his vote seemed in little doubt, it appears the Speaker may have rewarded with some honey-cured ham.

More than 650,000 Iraqis have died in this war, now longer than WWII. This war was begun and maintained by one-party, rightwing Republican rule in the White House and Congress, during a period when, it is said, pork was also distributed to friends of the Republican administration like Halliburton. Vice President Dick Cheney was CEO of Halliburton before he reentered "public service." After billions in no-bid contracts in Iraq, Halliburton has expressed its loyalty to the nation by moving its corporate headquarters to Dubai.

So there is pork and there is pork, Mr. Sam.

We are by no means beyond the trauma of authoritarian one-party rule. In that shadow a middle-aged Northern Californian does a little dance at the pure normalcy of the pork deals. Farr plays the game like his father, former state Sen. Fred Farr did. Cardoza plays as his predecessors did. Pelosi deals with the rurales as San Francisco politicians have always dealt with them, when they needed them. But, don't you tell Cardoza that his bio-region has anything to do with the politics; Not necessarily judging by what he says, but by what he does, in his view, his farming district is a metropolis-in-waiting.

Therefore, I am going to resist the request of MoveOn.org to thank Cardoza for doing the right thing. The way it looks now, if the Senate doesn't take the timetable out, Bush will veto it. Neither House or Senate Democrats have the votes to override. So, maybe the pork stays in, the timetable goes out, and even the almond growers -- in case the bees didn't work this year -- will get bailed out with Crop Disaster Assistance.

But business-as-usual is preferable to recently deceased Contract on America.

Bill Hatch
---------------

Nita Chaudhary, MoveOn.org Political Action (moveon-help@list.moveon.org) +Add contact
To: Bill Hatch (billhatch@hotmail.com)
Subject: Rep. Cardoza does the right thing on Iraq

Dear MoveOn member,
We're one step closer in the fight to end the war. Today the Iraq Accountability Act passed Congress. For the first time, Congress passed a real deadline to end the war—by fall of 2008. Your representative, Congressman Dennis Cardoza voted right and helped make that happen.

This was a very hard vote for members of Congress. But Rep. Cardoza supported Speaker Pelosi in her strategy to wind down this war. Can you write him a quick note to say 'thanks' for bringing us one step closer and to keep up the fight until all our troops are home?

http://pol.moveon.org/endwar?id=10080-5558129-WDXVEY&t=1

There's no question that this bill was not as strong as most of us would have wanted—-and we're going to keep fighting together to bring the troops home sooner than next year. But it's an important step forward, and at today's vote 63 of the 71 members of the Out of Iraq Caucus voted for the bill. All but 2 Republicans voted against it.

Now the fight moves to the Senate. If Senators also pass a hard timeline to end the war then this plan goes to the President.

If he makes good on his promise to veto it, he'll be forced to stand up in front of the American people—a strong majority of whom want to set a date to end the war—and argue for a war with no end. And he'll have to veto funds for the war along with the timeline and send the whole thing back to Congress.

We've taken one big step in the right direction and together, we are going to keep fighting until we bring all our troops home safely.

This is just the beginning. Please write Rep. Cardoza and thank him for making this victory possible.

http://pol.moveon.org/endwar?id=10080-5558129-WDXVEY&t=2

Thanks for all you do,

–Nita, Eli, Justin, Karin and the MoveOn.org Political Action Team
Friday, March 23rd, 2007
-------------------

http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d110:HR01591:@@@D&summ2=m&
H.R.1591
Title: Making emergency supplemental appropriations for the fiscal year ending September 30, 2007, and for other purposes.
Sponsor: Rep Obey, David R. [WI-7] (introduced 3/20/2007) Cosponsors (None)
Related Bills: H.RES.261
Latest Major Action: 3/22/2007 House floor actions. Status: Considered under the provisions of rule H. Res. 261.
House Reports: 110-60
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
SUMMARY AS OF:
3/20/2007--Introduced.

U.S. Troop Readiness, Veterans' Health, and Iraq Accountability Act, 2007 - Makes emergency supplemental FY2007 appropriations for specified activities related to the global war on terror to the Departments of Agriculture (including food aid to Africa and Afghanistan), of Justice, of Defense (Military, including funds for Iraqi and Afghan security forces), of Defense (military construction and base closure), of Energy, of Homeland Security, of Veterans Affairs (particularly veterans' health programs), and of State (including international peacekeeping operations), and related agencies as well as the House of Representatives.

Provides funds to enable military commanders in Iraq and Afghanistan to respond to urgent humanitarian relief and reconstruction requirements.

Specifies conditions for assistance to Lebanon.

Prohibits the use of funds under this Act to deploy any unit of the Armed Forces to Iraq unless the chief of the military department concerned has certified to the congressional appropriations committees in advance that the unit is fully mission capable. Sets a maximum number of days for deployment in Iraq for military units. Authorizes the President to waive such prohibition and deployment limits on a unit-by-unit basis for reasons of national security.

Directs the President to transmit to Congress by specified dates certain determinations and certifications with respect to conditions to be met by the Government of Iraq. Requires redeployment of the armed forces from Iraq if any of such conditions is not met.

Directs the President to appoint a Coordinator for Iraq Assistance, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate.

Declares that Congress will fully support the needs of members of the Armed Forces who the Commander in Chief has deployed in harm's way in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom and Operation Enduring Freedom, and their families.

Declares the sense of Congress that the U.S. Constitution grants: (1) the President the sole role of Commander in Chief; and (2) Congress the sole power to declare war.

Declares the sense of Congress that: (1) the commanders of the U.S. armed forces in Iraq should be allowed to conduct the war and manage the movements of the troops; and (2) Congress should remain focused on executing its oversight role.

Makes additional appropriations for disaster relief and recovery related to Hurricanes Katrina and Rita to the Departments of Agriculture, of Commerce, of Defense (Civil), of Homeland Security, of Health and Human Services, of Education, and of Housing and Urban Development.

Makes appropriations to the Secretary of Agriculture for emergency crop and livestock disaster assistance.

Makes additional appropriations for specified purposes to the Legislative Branch and to the Departments of Agriculture, of Commerce, of State, of the Interior and of Agriculture (for wildfire suppression), and of Health and Human Services (for the Low-Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP) and for response to an influenza pandemic).

Rescinds specified unobligated balances of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). Prescribes requirements for DHS contracts, subcontracts, and task orders.

Requires each federal agency that has awarded at least $1 billion in the preceding fiscal year to develop and implement a plan to minimize the use of no-bid and cost-reimbursement type contracts.

Makes appropriations to the Department of Health and Human Services, Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, to eliminate the FY2007 shortfall in funding for the State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP).

Fair Minimum Wage Act of 2007 - Amends the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 to increase the federal minimum wage to: (1) $5.85 an hour, beginning on the 60th day after enactment of this Act; (2) $6.55 an hour, beginning 12 months after that 60th day; and (3) $7.25 an hour, beginning 24 months after that 60th day. Applies federal minimum wage requirements to the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands and to American Samoa.

Small Business Tax Relief Act of 2007 - Amends the Internal Revenue Code to extend and revise: (1) the work opportunity tax credit; (2) expensing for small businesses; and (3) the credit for certain taxes paid with respect to employee cash tips.

Waives alternative minimum tax limits on the work opportunity credit and the credit for taxes paid with respect to employee cash tips.

Defines qualified joint venture with respect to family business taxes.

Makes certain dependents ineligible for the lowest capital gains rate.

Lengthens the period of failure to notify a taxpayer of liability before interest and certain penalties must be suspended.

Increases the amount of any required installment of estimated tax otherwise due in 2012 from a corporation with assets of at least $1 billion.

------

SEC. 3107. MILK INCOME LOSS CONTRACT PROGRAM.

Notwithstanding subsections (c)(3), (f), and (g) of section 1502 of the Farm Security and Rural Investment Act of 2002 (7 U.S.C. 7982), there is hereby appropriated $283,000,000, to remain available until expended, for payments under such section, using the payment rate specified in subsection (c)(3)(B) of such section, from September 1, 2007, through September 30, 2008. Of such amount, $252,000,000 shall be available only on or after September 30, 2007, and only so long as an Act to provide for the continuation of agricultural programs for fiscal years after 2007, including such section 1502, is not enacted.

H.R.1591
U.S. Troop Readiness, Veterans' Health, and Iraq Accountability Act, 2007 (Reported in House)

-----------------------

SEC. 3101. CROP DISASTER ASSISTANCE.

(a) Assistance Available- There are hereby appropriated to the Secretary of Agriculture such sums as are necessary, to remain available until expended, to make emergency financial assistance available to producers on a farm that incurred qualifying quantity or quality losses for the 2005 or 2006 crop, or for the 2007 crop before the date of the enactment of this Act, due to damaging weather or any related condition (including losses due to crop diseases, insects, and delayed harvest), as determined by the Secretary. However, to be eligible for assistance, the crop subject to the loss must have been harvested before the date of the enactment of this Act or, in the case of prevented planting or other total loss, would have been harvested before the date of the enactment of this Act in the absence of the damaging weather or any related condition.

(b) Election of Crop Year- If a producer incurred qualifying crop losses in more than one of the 2005, 2006, or 2007 crop years, the producer shall elect to receive assistance under this section for losses incurred in only one of such crop years. The producer may not receive assistance under this section for more than one crop year.

(c) Administration-

(1) IN GENERAL- Except as provided in paragraph (2), the Secretary of Agriculture shall make assistance available under this section in the same manner as provided under section 815 of the Agriculture, Rural Development, Food and Drug Administration and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2001 (Public Law 106-387; 114 Stat. 1549A-55), including using the same loss thresholds for quantity and economic losses as were used in administering that section, except that the payment rate shall be 50 percent of the established price, instead of 65 percent.

(2) LOSS THRESHOLDS FOR QUALITY LOSSES- In the case of a payment for quality loss for a crop under subsection (a), the loss thresholds for quality loss for the crop shall be determined under subsection (d).

(d) Quality Losses-

(1) IN GENERAL- Subject to paragraph (3), the amount of a payment made to producers on a farm for a quality loss for a crop under subsection (a) shall be equal to the amount obtained by multiplying--

(A) 65 percent of the payment quantity determined under paragraph (2); by

(B) 50 percent of the payment rate determined under paragraph (3).

(2) PAYMENT QUANTITY- For the purpose of paragraph (1)(A), the payment quantity for quality losses for a crop of a commodity on a farm shall equal the lesser of--

(A) the actual production of the crop affected by a quality loss of the commodity on the farm; or

(B) the quantity of expected production of the crop affected by a quality loss of the commodity on the farm, using the formula used by the Secretary of Agriculture to determine quantity losses for the crop of the commodity under subsection (a).

(3) PAYMENT RATE- For the purpose of paragraph (1)(B) and in accordance with paragraphs (5) and (6), the payment rate for quality losses for a crop of a commodity on a farm shall be equal to the difference between--

(A) the per unit market value that the units of the crop affected by the quality loss would have had if the crop had not suffered a quality loss; and

(B) the per unit market value of the units of the crop affected by the quality loss.

(4) ELIGIBILITY- For producers on a farm to be eligible to obtain a payment for a quality loss for a crop under subsection (a), the amount obtained by multiplying the per unit loss determined under paragraph (1) by the number of units affected by the quality loss shall be at least 25 percent of the value that all affected production of the crop would have had if the crop had not suffered a quality loss.

(5) MARKETING CONTRACTS- In the case of any production of a commodity that is sold pursuant to 1 or more marketing contracts (regardless of whether the contract is entered into by the producers on the farm before or after harvest) and for which appropriate documentation exists, the quantity designated in the contracts shall be eligible for quality loss assistance based on the 1 or more prices specified in the contracts.

(6) OTHER PRODUCTION- For any additional production of a commodity for which a marketing contract does not exist or for which production continues to be owned by the producer, quality losses shall be based on the average local market discounts for reduced quality, as determined by the appropriate State committee of the Farm Service Agency.

(7) QUALITY ADJUSTMENTS AND DISCOUNTS- The appropriate State committee of the Farm Service Agency shall identify the appropriate quality adjustment and discount factors to be considered in carrying out this subsection, including--

(A) the average local discounts actually applied to a crop; and

(B) the discount schedules applied to loans made by the Farm Service Agency or crop insurance coverage under the Federal Crop Insurance Act (7 U.S.C. 1501 et seq.).

(8) ELIGIBLE PRODUCTION- The Secretary of Agriculture shall carry out this subsection in a fair and equitable manner for all eligible production, including the production of fruits and vegetables, other specialty crops, and field crops.

(e) Payment Limitations-

(1) LIMIT ON AMOUNT OF ASSISTANCE- Assistance provided under this section to a producer for losses to a crop, together with the amounts specified in paragraph (2) applicable to the same crop, may not exceed 95 percent of what the value of the crop would have been in the absence of the losses, as estimated by the Secretary of Agriculture.

(2) OTHER PAYMENTS- In applying the limitation in paragraph (1), the Secretary shall include the following:

(A) Any crop insurance payment made under the Federal Crop Insurance Act (7 U.S.C. 1501 et seq.) or payment under section 196 of the Federal Agricultural Improvement and Reform Act of 1996 (7 U.S.C. 7333) that the producer receives for losses to the same crop.

(B) The value of the crop that was not lost (if any), as estimated by the Secretary.

(3) DUPLICATIVE PAYMENTS- The Secretary of Agriculture shall ensure, to the maximum extent practicable, that no producer on a farm receives duplicative payments under this section and any other Federal program for the same loss.

(f) Eligibility Requirements and Limitations- The producers on a farm shall not be eligible for assistance under this section with respect to losses to an insurable commodity or noninsurable commodity if the producers on the farm--

(1) in the case of an insurable commodity, did not obtain a policy or plan of insurance for the insurable commodity under the Federal Crop Insurance Act (7 U.S.C. 1501 et seq.) for the crop incurring the losses;

(2) in the case of a noninsurable commodity, did not file the required paperwork, and pay the administrative fee by the applicable State filing deadline, for the noninsurable commodity under section 196 of the Federal Agriculture Improvement and Reform Act of 1996 (7 U.S.C. 7333) for the crop incurring the losses; or

(3) were not in compliance with highly erodible land conservation and wetland conservation provisions.

(g) Timing-

(1) IN GENERAL- Subject to paragraph (2), the Secretary of Agriculture shall make payments to producers on a farm for a crop under this section not later than 60 days after the date the producers on the farm submit to the Secretary a completed application for the payments.

(2) INTEREST- If the Secretary does not make payments to the producers on a farm by the date described in paragraph (1), the Secretary shall pay to the producers on a farm interest on the payments at a rate equal to the current (as of the sign-up deadline established by the Secretary) market yield on outstanding, marketable obligations of the United States with maturities of 30 years.

(h) Definitions- In this section:

(1) INSURABLE COMMODITY- The term `insurable commodity' means an agricultural commodity (excluding livestock) for which the producers on a farm are eligible to obtain a policy or plan of insurance under the Federal Crop Insurance Act (7 U.S.C. 1501 et seq.).

(2) NONINSURABLE COMMODITY- The term `noninsurable commodity' means a crop for which the producers on a farm are eligible to obtain assistance under section 196 of the Federal Agriculture Improvement and Reform Act of 1996 (7 U.S.C. 7333).

SEC. 3102. LIVESTOCK ASSISTANCE.

(a) Livestock Compensation Program-

(1) AVAILABILITY OF ASSISTANCE- There are hereby appropriated to the Secretary of Agriculture such sums as are necessary, to remain available until expended, to carry out the livestock compensation program established under subpart B of part 1416 of title 7, Code of Federal Regulations, as announced by the Secretary on February 12, 2007 (72 Fed. Reg. 6443), to provide compensation for livestock losses during calendar years 2005 and 2006, and during calendar year 2007 before the date of the enactment of this Act, due to a disaster, as determined by the Secretary, including wildfire in the State of Texas and other States and blizzards in the States of Colorado, Kansas, Nebraska, New Mexico, and Oklahoma. However, the payment rate for compensation under this subsection shall be 75 percent of the payment rate otherwise applicable under such program.

(2) ELIGIBLE APPLICANTS- In carrying out the program described in paragraph (1), the Secretary shall provide assistance to any applicant that--

(A) conducts a livestock operation that is located in a disaster county with eligible livestock specified in paragraph (1) of section 1416.102(a) of title 7, Code of Federal Regulations (72 Fed. Reg. 6444), an animal described in section 10806(a)(1) of the Farm Security and Rural Investment Act of 2002 (21 U.S.C. 321d(a)(1)), or other animals designated by the Secretary as livestock for purposes of this subsection; and

(B) meets the requirements of paragraphs (3) and (4) of section 1416.102(a) of title 7, Code of Federal Regulations, and all other eligibility requirements established by the Secretary for the program.

(3) ELECTION OF LOSSES- If a producer incurred eligible livestock losses in more than one of the 2005, 2006, or 2007 calendar years, the producer shall elect to receive payments under this subsection for losses incurred in only one of such calendar years, and such losses must have been incurred in a county declared or designated as a disaster county in that same calendar year.

(4) MITIGATION- In determining the eligibility for or amount of payments for which a producer is eligible under the livestock compensation program, the Secretary shall not penalize a producer that takes actions (recognizing disaster conditions) that reduce the average number of livestock the producer owned for grazing during the production year for which assistance is being provided.

(5) LIMITATION- The Secretary shall ensure, to the maximum extent practicable, that no producer on a farm receives duplicative payments under this subsection and another Federal program with respect to any loss.

(6) DEFINITIONS- In this subsection:

(A) DISASTER COUNTY- The term `disaster county' means--

(i) a county included in the geographic area covered by a natural disaster declaration; and

(ii) each county contiguous to a county described in clause (i).

(B) NATURAL DISASTER DECLARATION- The term `natural disaster declaration' means--

(i) a natural disaster declared by the Secretary during calendar year 2005 or 2006, or calendar year 2007 before the date of the enactment of this Act, under section 321(a) of the Consolidated Farm and Rural Development Act (7 U.S.C. 1961(a)); or

(ii) a major disaster or emergency designated by the President during calendar year 2005 or 2006, or calendar year 2007 before the date of the enactment of this Act, under the Robert T. Stafford Disaster Relief and Emergency Assistance Act (42 U.S.C. 5121 et seq.).

(b) Livestock Indemnity Payments-

(1) AVAILABILITY OF ASSISTANCE- There are hereby appropriated to the Secretary of Agriculture such sums as are necessary, to remain available until expended, to make livestock indemnity payments to producers on farms that have incurred livestock losses during calendar years 2005 and 2006, and during calendar year 2007 before the date of the enactment of this Act, due to a disaster, as determined by the Secretary, including hurricanes, floods, anthrax, wildfires in the State of Texas and other States, and blizzards in the States of Colorado, Kansas, Nebraska, New Mexico, and Oklahoma.

(2) ELECTION OF LOSSES- If a producer incurred eligible livestock losses in more than one of the 2005, 2006, or 2007 calendar years, the producer shall elect to receive payments under this subsection for losses incurred in only one of such calendar years. The producer may not receive payments under this subsection for more than one calendar year.

(3) PAYMENT RATES- Indemnity payments to a producer on a farm under paragraph (1) shall be made at a rate of not less than 30 percent of the market value of the applicable livestock on the day before the date of death of the livestock, as determined by the Secretary.

(4) LIVESTOCK DEFINED- In this subsection, the term `livestock' means an animal that--

(A) is specified in clause (i) of section 1416.203(a)(2) of title 7, Code of Federal Regulations (72 Fed. Reg. 6445), or is designated by the Secretary as livestock for purposes of this subsection; and

(B) meets the requirements of clauses (iii) and (iv) of such section.

(c) Limit on Amount of Assistance- The Secretary of Agriculture shall ensure, to the maximum extent practicable, that no producer on a farm receives duplicative payments under this section and any other Federal program for the same loss.

SEC. 3103. SPINACH.

There is hereby appropriated to the Secretary of Agriculture $25,000,000, to remain available until expended, to make payments to growers and first handlers, as defined by the Secretary, of fresh spinach that were unable to market spinach crops as a result of the Food and Drug Administration Public Health Advisory issued on September 14, 2006. The payment made to a grower or first handler under this section shall not exceed 75 percent of the value of the unmarketed spinach crops.

Some say the media is just jumping on it. Others say it's a coming disaster. Reliable sources say we won't be able the judge the true situation of America's Honey Bee population until about June, when San Joaquin Valley almond growers -- the largest employers of pollinating bees in the nation -- check the set in their orchards for nuts and mummies.

Meanwhile, the Sierra Club is following a line of scientific inquiry, nearly as old as the massive plantings of genetically engineered corn, which asks the question: is bee-hive collapse related to GMOs? Whether this will prove a fruitful line of inquiry or not, apparently it is one that has been neglected by regulators and most land-grant university scientists. The bee crisis, if there is one, may be related to a crisis of funding in land-grant universities, which have become publicly subsidized labs for rent by biotechnology corporations for lack of adequate government funding and adequate public consideration of the products of the research.

Another factor may simply be the "sorcerer's apprentice" syndrome of some biologists excited about cracking this genome and that genome and seeing what they can create, without terribly close attention to the famous "unintended consequences."

The pesticide companies that bought the seed companies and exploited the new genetic science never cared much about the consequences of pesticides, from DDT forward, except when government regulation intruded on the bottom line, causing the companies to expend enormous sums for lobbying, public relations and campaign contributions.

If, in fact, convincing scientific research appears that GMOs are the cause of a serious collapse of bee hives in America, the suppression of the science and scientists who have discovered this, the propaganda campaign from the biotechnology industry, the search for members of Congress amenable to biotech industry cash, and the controversies on campus are going to be huge events in the culture, because the stakes are so high.

It would be helpful to know if the same phenomenon is also occurring in Canada and Argentina, at least, where huge GMO plantings are present.

The connection between GMOs and bee-hive collapse would seem to have some bearing on the massive, subsidized commitment to ethanol production, which uses GMO corn varieties, raising the question of unintended -- because unresearched -- consequences of "clean" ethanol emissions. Are potentially dangerous genes incinerated in the internal combustion process? Probably just a dumb question.

Results of research showing the connection between bee-hive collapse and GMOs is going to be about as popular in the corporocracy as Rachel Carson was.

Badlands editorial staff
-----------------------------

3-13-07
Despite buzz on bees, experts disagree on seriousness of problem
By Jim Downing
McClatchy Newspapers
http://www.sunherald.com/mld/sunherald/news/nation/16893200.htm
(MCT)

SACRAMENTO, Calif. - Bees are dying by the billions. Nobody knows why. And the crops they pollinate - California almonds especially - are at risk.

Or at least that's been the buzz.

In the past month, the new and mysterious honeybee ailment known as "colony collapse disorder," which seems to cause entire hives of bees to leave home and never return, has made the front page of newspapers from Sacramento to New York. Fox News and National Public Radio aired reports. A "CBS Evening News" crew spent weeks following a bee-disease investigator around the nation. Even Comedy Central's Stephen Colbert took up the issue, urging investors to hoard bees.

"The fewer there are, the more they're worth," Colbert said.

Yet despite all the attention, there's little solid data on the severity of the problem.

"I'm not convinced that it's so much worse than what we saw in 2004 and 2005," said Eric Mussen, a bee specialist with the University of California, Davis.

While bees are undoubtedly in trouble this year, Mussen said, there's little evidence so far that it's anything other than the continuation of their long struggle with disease, environmental stress and the hardship of being hauled cross-country in midwinter to pollinate crops in California.

"This time the media just became much more involved in it," he said.

News accounts have cited dramatic losses of 70 percent or more reported by some commercial beekeepers from coast to coast. But because no comprehensive survey of the industry exists, it's hard to say just how many hives have been hit.

"About all we've got is anecdotes," said Troy Fore, executive director of the American Beekeeping Federation.

A clearer picture should emerge in June. That's when the U.S. Department of Agriculture surveys the developing almond crop. If the billions of bees now laboring in the almond orchards in California's Central Valley are sufficiently strong and numerous to do their work - and the weather is favorable - the trees will be laden with nuts this summer.

Bees have become big business in recent years. Each hive rents for $140 or so, and California's almond growers alone will spend roughly $200 million hiring beekeepers to let their bees loose in the orchards this year. A good chunk of the bees also are essential to the production of about $12 billion in other crops nationwide, according to a Cornell University study.

But while bees have been growing in importance as pollinators, no state or federal agency monitors them. The agencies do track honey production, but that's tied only loosely to the size of the bee labor pool, since many beehives are now managed mainly as pollinators rather than honey-makers.

What information there is on bee vigor comes mostly word-of-mouth and, lately, through the media. With the spotlight on both beekeepers and almond growers - and millions of dollars at stake - rumors have been flying.

Some beekeepers accuse others of playing down the crisis out of pride, or in hopes that their clients, the almond farmers, won't start to question the health or the value of their rented bees. Other beekeepers trumpet the die-off, calling for government relief and higher rental fees from almond growers.

The California Almond Board, on the other hand, surveyed almond farmers and issued a statement last month. While bee supplies may be fairly tight, the board said, there are enough to go around.

Years ago, Mussen said, many Central Valley counties employed a bee inspector to check the health of rented hives. That person helped resolve disputes between beekeepers and farmers and served as an informal census-taker.

Today, those inspectors are scarce. One of the few remaining is Clifton Piper, who has checked hives for the Merced County (Calif.) Department of Agriculture since 1973. He isn't sure about the big picture, either.

"It's difficult to see just how short the shortage is," he said. Beekeepers often bolster weak hives with imported packages of bees from Australia, he said. And in cold and rainy weather, it's hard to tell whether sluggish bees in a hive are sick or simply chilly.

Dennis vanEngelsdorp, a Pennsylvania bee expert participating in a nationwide research effort that hopes to better characterize colony collapse disorder, said the investigation has been somewhat hampered by beekeepers unwilling to admit that their bees are dying.

"Sometimes beekeepers are ashamed that they have a problem, so they may not be as transparent as they might be," he said.

That's not the case for Placerville, Calif., beekeeper Rich Starets. He's lost 225 of his 300 hives since November. But he places the blame squarely on his own beekeeping missteps, such as poor timing of feeding and medication. And, based on conversations with fellow beekeepers, he's convinced that the much-discussed colony collapse disorder is chiefly the result of imperfect beekeeping.

"There's plenty of guys that didn't lose two-thirds of their hives this year," he said.

While the price that a hive commands in an almond orchard has nearly tripled in just the past four years, beekeepers' costs have risen, as well. Much of the money goes to treat bees against an ever-growing variety of pests and pathogens, to feed them corn syrup and protein supplements and to pay breeders for replacement bees when hives die off.

That's a lot to keep track of, especially for a part-time beekeeper like Starets, 40, who makes most of his living fixing cell-phone towers for AT&T.

But, he said, "It's up to me ... to learn how to keep bees in a changing world."

Dozens of his now-barren hive boxes are stacked in a meadow along Green Valley Road near Shingle Springs. On a recent morning, Starets cracked one lid open, revealing a cluster of a few dozen dead bees huddled together as if for comfort. They had started to mold. A healthy hive would have 20,000 or more bees at this time of year.

Online bee discussions on sites like beesource.com and honeybeeworld.com have been brimming with speculation on the cause and extent of the die-off. There are rumors of desperate almond growers offering $300 a hive for healthy bees, and theories blaming the die-off on everything from cell-phone signals to genetically modified crops.

Researchers like vanEngelsdorp are hoping to put the speculation to rest by finding a cause or a collection of causes - aside from beekeeper error - for the reported die-off. They're currently analyzing samples from healthy and sick colonies around the country.

For his role in the race to solve the mystery of colony collapse, vanEngelsdorp has become a minor media star. He's lately been spending 70 percent of his time talking to reporters and giving radio and television interviews, he said.

"You realize that this is an opportunity to help explain how important bees are," he said.

He knew the story had reached critical mass, he said, after what he overheard during lunch at an International House of Pancakes in Florida last week.

"Across the way there were these two old ladies," he said. "And one was saying, `Did you hear all the bees are dying?'

"And I'm thinking, Wow. It made IHOP conversation."
---------------------

3-22-07
GM WATCH daily
http://www.gmwatch.org

1.Bee demise - Are GMOs the missing link?
Sierra Club press release, March 22 2007

Are honey bees the canary in the coal mine? What are honey bees trying to tell us that we should pay attention to?

One out of every three bites of food that we consume is due to the work of honeybees, serving as crucial pollinators. Yet food production may be severely impacted by the recently reported Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD). Beekeepers are reporting estimates as high as 80% loss of their honey bee colonies.

There's a link that's not being investigated. Highly respected scientists believe that exposure to genetically engineered crops and their plant-produced pesticides merit serious consideration as either the cause or a contributory factor to the development and spread of CCD.

Laurel Hopwood, Sierra Club's Chair of the Genetic Engineering Committee states, "In searching for the cause of massive honey bee losses nationwide, we must leave no stone unturned to find the answer. Is the release of genetically engineered organisms the smoking gun?"

This past decade we are seeing releases into the environment that we have never before seen on this planet. Genetic engineering involves the artificial transfer of genes from one organism into another, bypassing the protective barrier between species. Scientists admit that unintended consequences may occur due to the lack of precision and specificity in the DNA sites on different plant chromosomes where the inserted genes randomly end up. According to the prominent biologist Dr. Barry Commoner, "Genetically engineered crops represent a huge uncontrolled experiment whose outcome is inherently unpredictable. The results could be catastrophic."

Regulators don't look, so they don't find. The USDA and EPA have failed to adequately assess the potential for lethal and sublethal impacts of engineered crop pesticides on pollinators like honey bees and wild bees, including the larvae brood and young bees. They have failed to study the effects of the practice of feeding honeybee colonies genetically engineered (GE) corn syrup and parts of recycled hives containing additional GE food residues.

Considering that loss of honeybee pollinators can leave a huge void in the kitchens of the American people and an estimated loss of 14 billion dollars to farmers, it would be prudent to use caution. If genetically engineered crops are killing honeybees, a moratorium on their planting should be strongly considered.

In a letter sent to the Senate and House Agriculture Committees sent yesterday, Sierra Club urges our elected officials to initiate investigations to determine if exposure to genetically engineered crops or corn syrup is the missing link.
-----------------------

2.GE and bee Colony Collapse Disorder -- science needed!
http://www.sierraclub.org/biotech/whatsnew/whatsnew_2007-03-21.asp

Contact: Sierra Club
Laurel Hopwood
216-371-9779
lhopwood@adelphia.net

Dear Senator Thomas Harkin,

We share similar concerns. The viability of a robust food supply is paramount to the American people.

One out of every three bites of food that we consume is due to the work of honeybees, serving as crucial pollinators in agriculture and farming communities. Yet agriculture and food production may be severely impacted by Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD), a trend documented in honey bee colonies and prominently featured in a New York Times story(1). Beekeepers are reporting estimates as high as 80% loss of their honey bee colonies. Such a huge loss of the services of bees is extremely serious and beekeepers report it's a growing trend.

The cause of CCD is unknown. Although factors being considered include pesticides, mites, microbial disease and habitat decline, there's a possible link that's not being investigated. Highly respected scientists believe that exposure to genetically engineered crops and their plant-produced pesticides merit serious consideration as either the cause or a contributory factor to the development and spread of CCD.(2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10) In searching for the cause of massive honey bee losses nationwide, we must leave no stone unturned to find the answer.

This past decade we are seeing releases into the environment that we have never before seen on this planet. Genetic engineering involves the artificial transfer of genes from one organism into another, bypassing the protective barrier between species. Scientists admit that "unintended consequences" may occur due to the lack of precision and specificity in the DNA sites on different plant chromosomes where the inserted genes randomly end up. According to the prominent biologist Dr. Barry Commoner and pioneer in ecology, "Genetically engineered crops represent a huge uncontrolled experiment whose outcome is inherently unpredictable. The results could be catastrophic."(11) Dr. David Schubert has expressed similar concerns in pointing out some of the significant holes existing in current genetic engineering technology that raise serious questions about how well we understand it and how to apply such a new emerging science.(12) An issue Dr. Schubert raises is the "unpredictability" in the artificial gene splicing technology that is routinely performed in genetic engineering because it may lead to unpredictable consequences. Are the honey bees trying to tell us about the "unintended consequences" from large-scale genetic engineering in agriculture?

Investigators have raised the possibility that honey bees are experiencing a sublethal effect such as a "suppressed immune system" from an unknown toxin. However, sublethal effects have not been fully investigated. Dennis van Engelsdorp, a bee specialist with the state of Pennsylvania who is part of the team studying the bee colony collapses, said the "strong immune suppression" investigators have observed "could be the AIDS of the bee industry," making bees more susceptible to other diseases that eventually kill them off.(1) Nonetheless, a concern is that genetically engineered crops are being ignored as a possible culprit, especially with tens of millions of acres now being planted each year of cultivars producing large concentrations of pesticides that did not exist on such a scale just a decade ago.

Currently regulators fail to require adequate analysis of transgene insertion sites. This omission results from the failure to appreciate the magnitude of genetic damage sustained by transgenic plants.(11,12) Regulators have also failed to adequately assess the potential for lethal and sublethal impacts of engineered crop pesticides on pollinators like honey bees and wild bees, including the larvae brood and young bees. Studies are needed to evaluate the impact of GE crops on sublethal effects such as learning and feeding behavior. In addition, honey bee colonies are being fed GE corn syrups and parts of recycled hives containing additional GE food residues. The effect of these feeding practices on bees needs study.

Considering that loss of honeybee pollinators can leave a huge void in the kitchens of the American people and an estimated loss of 14 billion dollars to farmers, it would beprudent to use caution. If genetically engineered crops are killing honeybees, a moratorium on their planting should be considered.

Senator Harkin, as Chairman of the Senate Agriculture Committee, you are in a key position to initiate investigations to determine if exposure to genetically engineered crops is the missing link. Emergency funding for research on the pollinator decline needs to be available to researchers and the USDA.

Most sincerely,
Laurel Hopwood, Chair
Sierra Club Genetic Engineering Committee

References:
1. Alexei Barrioneuva, "Honeybees, Gone With the Wind, Leave Crops and Keepers in Peril," The New York Times, February 27, 2007:
http://select.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F10B1FF8355A0C748EDDAB0894DF404482

2. Malone,L and Pham-Delegue,M. "Effects of transgene products on honey bees (Apis mellifera) and bumblebees (Bombus sp.)" Apidologie 2001,32,287-304.

3. Obrycki,J, Losey, J, Taylor,O, Jesee,L. "Transgenic insecticidal corn: Beyond insecticidal toxicity to ecological complexity." Bioscience May 2001/Vol 51 No. 5

4. Pham-Delegue, M.H., et. al. 2002. "Direct and Indirect Effects of Genetically Modified Plants on the Honey Bee," Honey Bees: Estimating the Environmental Impact of Chemicals, pp. 312-326.

5. Picard-Nioi, A.L,.et al. Pham-Delegue, M.H. "Impact of proteins used in plant genetic engineering: Toxicity and behavioral study in the honeybee." J. Econ. Entomol.997,90,1710-1716.

6. Ricarda A. Steinbrecher, "Risks associated with ingestion of Chardon LL maize, The reversal of N-acetyl-L- glufosinate to the active herbicide L-glufosinate in the gut of animals," Chardon LL Hearing, May 2002, London.

7. Mohr KI and Tebbe CC. "Field study results on the probability and risk of a horizontal gene transfer from transgenic herbicide-resistant oilseed rape pollen to gut bacteria of bees." Appl Microbiol Biotechnol. 2007 in press,DOI 10.1007/s00253, 007-0846-7.

8. Ramirez-Romero,R,Chaufaux,J and Pham-Delegue,M. "Effects of Cry1Ab protoxin, deltamethrin and imidacloprid on the foraging activity and the learning performances of the honeybee Apis mellifera, a comparative approach" Apidologie 36 (2005) 601-11.

9. Hilbeck,A and Schmid,J. "Another view of Bt proteins-How specific are they and what else might they do" Biopestic. Int. 2006,2,1-50.

10. Morandin,L and Winston,M. "Wild bee abundance and seed production in conventional, organic and genetically modified canola" Ecological Applications 2004,15,871-81.

11. Commoner, B. "Unraveling the DNA Myth: The spurious foundation of genetic engineering." Harper's Magazine, February 2002, 39-47.

12. Schubert, D. "Regulatory regimes for transgenic crops." Nature Biotechnology 23,785 - 787 (2005).

"It appears that there were no environmental reviews considered along with (that) decision," said Marsha Burch, a Grass Valley-based attorney representing the SJRRC. "It's our assertion that that violates the California Environmental Quality Act." -- Merced Sun-Star, March 17, 2007

The Sun-Star celebrated St. Patrick's Day in fine style, writing fairly about those against child sacrifice to the great god, Asthma, in the San Joaquin Valley.

Bill Hatch

3-17-07
Merced Sun-Star
RMP lawsuits mount...Corinne Reilly
http://www.mercedsunstar.com/local/story/13395685p-14013730c.html
It could be more than a year before a judge decides whether Riverside Motorsports Park can begin construction, or whether it must start over with a lengthy environmental review process...attorneys on both sides say it could take that long to resolve a handful of lawsuits now pending against the project. In January, four groups -- the California Farm Bureau Federation, the San Joaquin Raptor Rescue Center, Protect Our Water, and Citizens for the Protection of Merced County Resources -- filed suit against Merced County to stop the racing complex, which is planned to cover 1,200 acres of farmland near Castle Airport. All the groups say the county violated the California Environmental Quality Act because it failed to adequately evaluate noise, traffic, pollution and other environmental impacts the track could bring before the Board of Supervisors approved the project in December. On Friday, the San Joaquin Raptor Rescue Center announced it's adding another lawsuit to the pile. most recent suit claims the Board of Supervisors didn't provide enough evidence to support its decision to override a previous ruling that racetrack developers shouldn't be allowed to build in proximity to Castle Airport's runway. The suit also alleges the county didn't consider the environmental impacts of that decision. "It appears that there were no environmental reviews considered along with (that) decision," said Marsha Burch, a Grass Valley-based attorney representing the SJRRC. "It's our assertion that that violates the California Environmental Quality Act." County officials said they hadn't been served with notice of the most recent suit by Friday afternoon, and county attorneys hadn't read it. When the Board of Supervisors voted on the project, supervisors Deidre Kelsey and John Pedrozo voted against certifying environmental reviews of the projects, saying they believed they were not thorough. The county's three other supervisors voted to approve the reviews. Fincher said the county and the law firm representing RMP have spent countless hours compiling documents that will make up an approximately 25,000-page official record of all information the Board of Supervisors considered before voting on the project. Among the documents to be included in the record are all plans and materials racetrack developers have turned in to the county, the project's environmental impact report, transcripts and minutes from public hearings, all written feedback from the public, related e-mails, and all notices the county posted to inform the public about the project. Burch, who is representing the SJRRC in the most recent lawsuit, said portions of the record gathered for the other suits might be used to avoid duplicating efforts. Burch said she believes that if the most recent case is handled separately from the others, it will likely conclude before the rest. "Compared to the other lawsuits, this one has a fairly narrow focus," she said. "I don't see it changing the timeline of when we might expect to see all of the challenges (against RMP) resolved." Foster Farms and the Federal Bureau of Prisons -- which runs the Atwater Federal Penitentiary that borders the racetrack's planned site -- also raised concerns over the project. Foster Farms has since reached an agreement with RMP to avoid a lawsuit....the Bureau of Prisons has also reached an agreement with RMP officials... Under an agreement between RMP and the county signed before the project's approval, RMP is responsible for paying all county expenses related to the suit.

Campbell, Joseph, The Masks of God: Occidental Mythology, pp. 459-473.

MERCED (March 16, 2007) -- Two local environmental groups filed suit Thursday in Merced County Superior Court against Merced County, the Board of Supervisors and Riverside Motorsports Park, LLC under provisions in the State Aeronautics Act and the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA).

San Joaquin Raptor Rescue Center and Protect Our Water challenged the December 12 Board of Supervisors' decision to override the Castle Airport Land Use Commission and reduce the diameter of the noise/safety restricted zone around the airport sufficiently to permit Riverside Motorsports Park to built its facility nearby.

The two local environmental groups petitioned the court for a writ of mandate to set aside the Dec. 12 override on the basis that it violates the Aeronautics Act and CEQA, to make adequate findings of fact, prepare, circulate and consider legally adequate environmental review for the override, and suspend activity that could result in any change of alteration of the physical environment until the override is legally compliant.

The causes of action for the suit are Merced County's abuse of discretion under the Aeronautics Act and CEQA, including:

· Failure to make fact-specific findings required by the Aeronautics Act;

· Failure to set forth findings sufficient to bridge the analytical gap between the raw evidence and the ultimate Board decision to reduce the size of the airport noise/safety zone;

· Failure to analyze the environmental impacts of the override under CEQA;

· Failure to consider the override a project under CEQA;

· Failure to provide any findings as required by CEQA on a project.

"In a nutshell, the Board could not certify the racetrack environmental impact report without reducing the size of the airport's noise/safety zone," said Lydia Miller, president of the Raptor Center.

"We are represented by the skilled and experienced environmental law firm of Don Mooney and Marsha Burch,"Miller added.

The petition is attached.

For further information contact:

Lydia Miller

San Joaquin Raptor Rescue Center

Merced CA 95341

(209) 723-9283

DONALD B. MOONEY

MARSHA BIRCH

Law Offices of Donald B. Mooney

Davis CA 95616

(530) 758-2377
---------------------

The petition:

DONALD B. MOONEY (SBN153721)
MARSHA A. BURCH (SBN 170298)
LAW OFFICES OF DONALD B. MOONEY

Telephone: (530) 758-2377
Facsimile: (530) 758-7169

Attorneys for Petitioners
San Joaquin Raptor Rescue Center
and Protect Our Water

IN THE SUPERIOR COURT OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA

FOR THE COUNTY OF MERCED

SAN JOAQUIN RAPTOR RESCUE
CENTER; and
PROTECT OUR WATER
Case No.:

Petitioners,
VERIFIED PETITION FOR WRIT OF MANDATE
v. COUNTY OF MERCED; MERCED COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS; AND DOES 1-10

Respondents.

RIVERSIDE MOTORSPORTS .
PARK, LLC and DOES 11-100

Real Parties in Interest.

Code Code Civ. Proc. § 1094.5; State Aeronautics Act, Pub. Res. Code
§§ 21676.5 and 21670; and CEQA, Pub. Res. Code § 21000, et seq.

INTRODUCTION

1. By this action, Petitioners San Joaquin Raptor Rescue Center and Protect Our Water (“Petitioners”) challenge the action on December 12, 2007, by the County of Merced and the Merced County Board of Supervisors (“County” or “Respondents”) overruling a finding of inconsistency by the Merced County Airport Land Use Commission (“ALUC”) between the Merced County Airport Land Use Plan and the Riverside Motorsports Park Project (the “Override”). Petitioners allege that these actions violate the Public Utilities Code, specifically the State Aeronautics Act (Public Utilities Code §§ 21670 and 21676.5) (the “Act”). Petitioners also allege violation of the California Environmental Quality Act (“CEQA”) Public Resources Code section 21000 et seq., as a result of Respondents’ failure to conduct environmental review of the discretionary Override decision. Petitioners seek a determination from this Court that Respondents’ action in overriding the inconsistency determination of the ALUC is invalid and void as contrary to law and/or an abuse of discretion.
PARTIES
2. Petitioner San Joaquin Raptor Rescue Center is a non-profit group that works for preserving wildlife habitats and the environment in general in the San Joaquin Valley and Merced County area. To that end, it is involved in efforts to protect the resources of the Valley, including air and water quality, the preservation of agricultural land, and the protection of wildlife and its habitat. The Center also is committed to public education regarding these various issues and ensuring governmental compliance with the law of this state. The Center is composed of persons whose economic, personal, aesthetic, and property interests will be severely injured if the adoption of the project is not set aside pending full compliance with CEQA and all other environmental laws. Center members utilize and enjoy the County's and State's natural resources. The Center brings this petition on behalf of all others similarly situated who are too numerous to be named and brought before this court as petitioners. As a group composed of residents and property owners generally within the San Joaquin Valley and specifically in Merced County, the Center is within the class of persons beneficially interested in, and aggrieved by, the acts of respondents as alleged below. Members of the Center participated in the administrative processes herein, and exhausted its remedies. Accordingly, the Center has standing to sue.
3. SJRRC and its members have a direct and substantial beneficial interest in ensuring that Respondents comply with the laws relating to environmental protection, safety and land use issues. SJRRC is affected by Respondents’ failure to comply with the Act.
4. Petitioner Protect Our Water is an unincorporated association formed in 1998 for the purpose of increasing the awareness, appreciation, and preservation of the environmental resources within the Central Valley region of central California, as well as within other areas of the State of California. POW aims to protect natural resources and the environment and to uphold the integrity of environmental and land use planning and review processes. POW’s membership includes residents and property owners within Merced County and the San Joaquin Valley in general, and as such is within the class of persons beneficially interested in, and aggrieved by, the acts of Respondents as alleged below. POW participated in the administrative processes herein, has exhausted its remedies, and has standing to sue.
5. POW and its members have a direct and substantial beneficial interest in ensuring that Respondents comply with the laws relating to environmental protection, safety and appropriate land use planning. POW is affected by Respondents’ failure to comply with the Act.
6. Respondent Merced County is a political subdivision of the State of California and a body corporate and politic exercising local government power. Merced County is responsible for compliance with the Act.
7. Respondent Merced County Board of Supervisors is a legislative body duly authorized under the California Constitution and the laws of the State of California to act on behalf of the County of Merced. Respondent Merced County Board of Supervisors are responsible for regulating and controlling land use within the County including, but not limited to, compliance with California land use laws, including the Act.
8. Petitioners are unaware of the true names and capacities of Respondents identified as Does 1-10. Petitioners are informed and believe, and on that basis allege, that Respondents Does 1-10, inclusive, are individuals, entities or agencies with material interests affected by the Override. When the true identities and capacities of these Respondents have been determined, Petitioners will, with leave of Court if necessary, amend this Petition to insert such identities and capacities.
9. Real Party In Interest Riverside Motorsports Park, LLC is a California Limited Liability Company and conducting business in the state of California. RMP is the applicant for and beneficiary of the County’s general plan amendments, zoning changes, and certification of the Riverside Motorsports Project (“Project”), the subject of the ALUC’s inconsistency determination, which was overridden by Respondents.
10. Petitioners are currently unaware of the true names and capacities of Does 11 through 100, inclusive and therefore sue such unnamed Real Parties in Interest by their fictitious names. Petitioners are informed and believe and thereon allege, that fictitiously named Real Parties in Interest have an interest in the subject of this Petition. When the true identities and capacities of Real Parties in Interest have been determined, Petitioners will, with leave of Court if necessary, amend this Petition to include such identities and capacities.
BACKGROUND FACTS
9. The RMP Project is proposed for construction on 1,187 acres of agricultural land located east of the City of Atwater in the County of Merced. Castle Airport (formerly Castle Air Force Base) and the Castle Specific Urban Development Plan area are located immediately southwest of the Project site.
11. The RMP Project is proposed to include the construction of a regional motorsports recreation, entertainment and commercial business facility.
12. The Notice of Preparation (“NOP”) of the environmental document for the Project was originally circulated to the Governor’s Office of Planning and Research on July 22, 2003. Following release of the NOP, revisions to the Project description were identified by RMP that required the NOP’s recirculation. The NOP was recirculated on March 14, 2005 for a 30-day comment period.
13. On October 1, 2003, the ALUC made a determination that the Project is inconsistent with the Merced County Airport Land Use Plan.
14. On December 12, 2006, the Merced County Board of Supervisors, relying upon Public Utilities Code section 21676(b), overrode the ALUC’s inconsistency determination, approving Resolution 2006-189. Resolution 2006-189 is attached hereto as Exhibit A and made a part hereof by this reference.
15. Resolution 2006-189 includes conclusory findings regarding noise impacts related to the Override, but the Resolution does not include any specific findings of fact related to safety. The findings do not include any reference to environmental review for the Override, nor do they include findings required by CEQA.
16. On December 12, 2006, the same date Resolution 2006-189 was adopted by Respondents, Respondents certified the Final Environmental Impact Report for the RMP Project.
17. On December 19, 2006, the Board of Supervisors approved the General Plan Amendment to expand the existing Castle Specific Urban Development Plan boundaries to include the Project site; approve the amendment to the Circulation Chapter of the General Plan; approve the amendment to the Merced County Zoning Code to change the existing zoning designations on the Project site from General Agriculture (A-1) and Exclusive Agriculture (A-2) to Planned Development (PD); remove the Project site from the Agricultural Preserve Area; and approve the Master Plan.
JURISDICTION AND VENUE
18. This Court has jurisdiction over the alleged violations of the Act contained in this Petition pursuant to Code of Civil Procedure section 1904.5. With respect to the CEQA cause of action, this Court has jurisdiction over this action pursuant to sections 1085 and 187 of the California Code of Civil Procedure and section 21168.5 of the California Public Resources Code. Petitioners believe that this action is properly brought as a petition for writ of mandate under those provisions. However, should this Court conclude that this action cannot be properly be brought as a petition for a writ of mandate, petitioners request that this Petition be construed as a petition for writ of administrative mandamus (for which jurisdiction would lie pursuant to Code of Civil Procedure sections 1094.5 and 187, and Public Resources Code section 21168), or for other appropriate extraordinary relief.
19. Venue for this action properly lies in the Superior Court for the State of California in and for the County of Merced pursuant to section 394 of the Code of Civil Procedure.

EXHAUSTION OF ADMINISTRATIVE REMEDIES
AND INADEQUACY OF REMEDY

20. Petitioners have performed any and all conditions precedent to filing the instant action and have exhausted any and all available administrative remedies to the extent required by law. Petitioners timely submitted written comments on the Override.
21. Petitioners have no plain, speedy or adequate remedy in the course of ordinary law unless this Court grants the requested writ of mandate to require Respondents to set aside their Override. In the absence of such remedy, Respondents’ approvals will remain in effect in violation of State law.
22. This action has been brought within 90 days of the Override as required by Code of Civil Procedure section 1094.6.
STANDING
23. Petitioners have standing to assert the claims raised in this Petition because Petitioners and their members’ environmental interests are directly and adversely affected by the County’s Override.

ARBITRARY AND CAPRICIOUS ACTIONS
24. Petitioners bring this action on the basis, among others, of Government Code section 800, which awards Petitioners’ attorneys’ fees in actions to overturn agency decisions that are arbitrary and capricious, such as the decisions here in question.
FIRST CAUSE OF ACTION
(Abuse of Discretion)
Violations the State Aeronautics Act
Public Utilities Code section 21001, et seq.
25. Petitioners reallege and incorporate by reference Paragraphs 1 through 24, inclusive, of this Petition, as if fully set forth below.
26. Respondents committed a prejudicial abuse of discretion and failed to proceed in a manner required by law by failing to make fact-specific findings as required by the Act, and failed to set forth findings sufficient to bridge the analytical gap between the raw evidence and the ultimate decision.
27. Respondents violated the Act in failing to make findings sufficient under Public Utilities Code section 21676(b) and as required under Code of Civil Procedure section 1094.5.
28. Respondent’s failure to comply with the requirements of the Act renders the Override inadequate as a matter of law and requires that Respondent’s decision be set aside.

SECOND CAUSE OF ACTION
(Abuse of Discretion)
Violation of CEQA, Public Resources Code, § 21000 et seq.

29. Petitioner realleges and incorporates herein, as if set forth in full, each and every allegation contained in paragraphs 1 through 28 of this petition and further allege as follows:
30. Respondents have abused their discretion and failed to act in the manner required under CEQA with respect to the Override because they have failed to analyze its environmental impacts, and failed to make any determination at all with respect to the applicability of CEQA to the Override determination.
31. CEQA applies to “discretionary projects proposed to be carried out or approved by a public agency.” (Pub. Resources Code § 21080(a).) Approval of the Override was a “Project” under CEQA because the Override is an activity carried out, supported by, or authorized by a public agency, “which may cause either a direct physical change in the environment, or a reasonably foreseeable indirect physical change in the environment.” (Pub. Resources Code § 21065; Guidelines § 15378(a).)
32. Respondents made no CEQA findings related to the Override. Accordingly, Respondents’ Override should be set aside.
PRAYER FOR RELIEF
WHEREFORE, Petitioners pray for judgment as follows:
1. That this Court issue a peremptory writ of mandate ordering the County to:
(a) vacate and set aside its December 12, 2006, Override on the ground that it violates the State Aeronautics Act, Public Utilities Code section 21001 et. seq.;
(b) prepare adequate findings of fact, including findings bridging the analytical gap between the raw evidence and the ultimate decision;
(c) vacate and set aside its December 12, 2006, Override on the ground that it violates the California Environmental Quality Act, Public Resources Code section 21000 et seq.;
(d) prepare, circulate and consider legally adequate environmental review for the Override;
(e) suspend all activity that could result in any change or alteration to the physical environment until Respondents have taken such actions as may be necessary to bring its determination, findings or decision regarding the Override into compliance with the Act and CEQA;
2. For Petitioner’s costs associated with this action;
3. For an award of reasonable attorneys’ fees pursuant to Code of Civil Procedure section 1021.5; and
4. For such other and further relief as the Court may deem just and proper.

Respectfully submitted,

LAW OFFICES OF DONALD B. MOONEY

Dated: March ___, 2007

By Donald B. Mooney
Attorney for Petitioners
San Joaquin Raptor Rescue Center, and
Protect Our Water

On March 14, the Merced Sun-Star reported that the former Cowgirl Chancellor of UC Merced, Carol Tomlinson-Keasey, was an unsuccessful finalist for a university administrative position in Hawaii,

according to Robert Bley-Vroman, the search committee's chair.

On March 15, the paper reported that The cowgirl said she'd dropped out before the final selection and is now thinking about going to Atlanta to be with her family and maybe get a job with the Carter Center, founded by former President Jimmy Carter.

Bad reporting on Wednesday, good reporting on Thursday? Or another dose of the cowgirl's patented UC Merced Bobcatflak?

Who cares? She came, she built the first phase of the campus at UC's own risk, without proper federal environmental permits. Then she left, allegedly to work on a book. Then came the Hawaii plan. Now comes the Atlanta plan.

The cowgirl has a unique place in Merced history. Her development strategy started a huge speculative housing boom, now busting about us. She railroaded public process, environmental law and regulation at the local, state and federal levels. While here, she was adored by the press and all dear local leaders, who were willing to bend and break anything to smooth the way for building the first phase of UC Merced, bulldozing a municipal golf course to do it when the public objected to the original site in one of the densest fields of vernal pools in existence. She was a perfect UC administrative front for a corrupt land boom. Merced will be sorting out the consequences of the deals in which she participated for years to come with state legislators, congressmen and lobbyists.

She claimed UC Merced would be the most environmentally friendly campus of all. She meant its buildings, not its location. She promised a high-tech, bio-tech future for Merced. UC Merced's memorandum of understanding with UC/Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory suggested possible future involvement with research on weapons of mass destruction. She promised a medical school for Merced. The Valley looks like a promising site for medical research into respiratory illness, in part because of the speculative building boom for which UC Merced is an anchor tenant. UC Merced's seminal research into the contribution of cow farts to Valley air pollution confirmed many suspicions that the campus research agenda was developer- rather than scientist-driven.

The cowgirl was given a difficult task by the UC Board of Regents and our dear leaders; she did and said what was necessary to get building on the ground; she left, announcing she would write a book about the founding of the campus. She also said she would come back to UC Merced as a professor. Now, she's off to Georgia.

Noting that the excuse for the latest 7-percent tuition increase for UC students was that UC needs to pay its faculty and administrators close to what they could earn in the private sector, we thought about the cowgirl from another angle. She was the lowest paid UC chancellor at a little more than $225,000. However there were perks and a retirement package including a year's salary at a professor's grade (on which she was planning to write that book about how the campus was founded). We hope she invested wisely and flipped a few residential properties during her stay. If she didn't, she is perhaps unique among public officials of her time. The cowgirl earned the salary roughly equivalent to a mid-level manager in a development corporation -- about right for her skill set and task. She promised the moon and delivered some bricks and mortar. Only the greater footprint remains in doubt. But there are a lot of development footprints in doubt in Merced at that moment.

Like a good development corporation manager, she never conversed with the public; she announced and pronounced, ran an effective sales and propaganda campaign that was munificently funded by the California public and made her deals in the backroom.

The people of California, without whose support UC could lose its front and become nothing but a private lab full of malevolent science, don't want entrepreneurial UC scientists. We don't want university administrators who behave like corporate gunslingers. We don't want more technocrats. we want educated leaders, not crude, deceitful hustlers of educational institutions bought and sold by private corporations. No, we cannot compete with private industry for academic salaries. We expect professors that love to teach, administrators who love to provide the best institutions in which education can take place. We expect our public research university to care about education and not constantly prostitute itself for the latest corporate grant.

Will we pay for a university we can be proud of as an educational institution? We can't beat private industry. No university, public or private, ever could. To claim otherwise is nothing but cheap flak. But UC Merced immediately sold out to the agribusiness plutocrats of the Valley. Looking back on the history of UC involvement with the Valley, we cannot help thinking that was not completely by accident. In its land-grant college aspect, UC, through the cooperative extension, has at times done useful work on behalf of agriculture. Where UC has failed consistently and completely is in the area of critical thought about the Valley, blocked at every step by the same agribusiness interests that flocked to get their names on various walls of the new campus.

Nonetheless, we have never been against a second UC campus in the Central Valley. We wonder if from rotten beginnings great things can grow, but we understand the importance of manure in the growing process. Unfortunately, UC Merced continues to look like nothing more than an urban anchor tenant in a land boondoggle aiming to urbanize everything east of Highway 99 from Tulare to Placer counties, complete with its own Foothills Freeway. That is unacceptable to the public, however lucrative it may appear to the good friends of UC Merced, regents, congressmen and large landowners included.

If the Valley public does not want to become a dumping ground for toxic weapons research and residential development at the expense of health and quality of life, it must find a means of engaging this extremely arrogant, deceitful institution, which makes the most dangerous weapons of mass destruction on earth, in a long, frank conversation. Otherwise, UC will do in the Valley what it has done everywhere else in the state: lend its prestige and its research energy to economic and power elites who despise the public (for the public's own good, of course).

We're glad there will be no luau for the cowgirl in Hawaii and we trust Ol' Jimmy can see through this one in a glance. It's time California quit exporting its corruption. Unlike the cowgirl, we'll stay to fight the consequences of her "leadership."

In her suits of that particularly regal shade of blue we always suspected only certain, unnamed Berkeley tailors and dressmakers were issued from UC Central, with her golden jewelry and gold-tinted hair, the cowgirl was a real piece of work. We watched her lie in her teeth to legislative committees. We watched her corrupt newspapers. We watched her crawl into the political beds of real enemies of the public interest. All to get her job done. There is no way we can claim to have caused her as much damage as she caused our environment and our poor, complicated, struggling community. But we tried, and we got an edge in wordwise. At least (she claims) she's off to Atlanta, where the Federal Highway Authority once did suspend funds due to air pollution caused by rampant, unregulated urban growth.

However, we feel she's aiming in the wrong direction when she thinks of going to the Carter Center. Where she belongs is at the side of Newt Gingrich, when he runs for president.

Badlands editorial board
-------------

Notes:

3-14-07
Merced Sun-Star
Hawaii passes on former UC Merced Chancellor...Victor A. Patton
http://www.mercedsunstar.com/local/story/13382702p-14002920c.html
UC Merced founding chancellor Carol Tomlinson-Keasey has been eliminated from the running to become the University of Hawaii at Manoa's next chancellor. UC Davis Provost and Executive Vice Chancellor Virginia Hinshaw was announced Tuesday as University of Hawaii President David McClain's choice to lead the university's prestigious Manoa campus. Hinshaw and Tomlinson-Keasey were among four finalists...University of Hawaii's Board of Regents is expected to vote Thursday whether to make McClain's selection of Hinshaw official. Tomlinson-Keasey, 64, said in February that she was approached in December by consultants conducting the University of Hawaii at Manoa chancellor search and decided to apply. She left UC Merced in August, saying that she wanted to dedicate time to family and write a book about the campus. Tomlinson-Keasey guided the university's planning in 1998 as senior associate to then-UC President Richard Atkinson and was named chancellor the following year

3-15-07
Former chancellor says she took her name out of running for Hawaii job...Victor A. Patton
http://www.mercedsunstar.com/local/story/13386813p-14006410c.html
Former UC Merced chancellor Carol Tomlinson-Keasey says she opted out of the University of Hawaii at Manoa's chancellor search prior to this week's announcement by the school's president that a new chancellor has been selected. Although a story published in Wednesday's Merced Sun-Star stated that Tomlinson-Keasey has been eliminated from the chancellor search, she said in an e-mail that she decided not to pursue the position after visiting the campus. Tomlinson-Keasey also said she sent a letter last week to University...also said she sent a letter last week to University of Hawaii President David McClain informing him that she wished for her name to be removed from consideration in the chancellor search...said she made her decision "after careful deliberation." "My children are moving to Atlanta and I think I will look for something with the Carter Foundation or with the Task Force for Child Survival and Development, which is also located in the Atlanta area," Tomlinson-Keasey said in the letter.

Modesto Bee
UC Merced earns gold star for 'green' building efforts...Michelle Hatfield
http://www.modbee.com/local/story/13386424p-14006119c.html
The University of California at Merced is trying to set the standard when it comes to environmentally friendly buildings. UC Merced's central plant earned a gold certification under the category of Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design, a prestigious distinction sought by many universities and companies across the nation...central plant is composed of three buildings — a three-story facility that includes most of the campus's power operations, a telecommunications building and a 2-million gallon water-storage tank. The LEED certification is handed out by the U.S. Green Building Council. "We want to be a model. We're trying to figure out how to set the standard without having to drain natural re-sources," said Mark Maxwell, LEED coordinator at UC Merced. The central plant was recognized for its efficient energy management, water-use reduction, recycling, waste management, lighting and landscaping. The complex earned marks for using recycled materials. UC Merced also uses its water tank to cut energy costs. The campus's ongoing construction also is environmentally minded.

Tracy Press
Hard Ball...John Upton
http://tracypress.com/content/view/8279/2/
Attorneys for the Tracy Press have demanded the city provide e-mails sent and received by Tracy Vice Mayor Suzanne Tucker relating to Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory’s proposed biological laboratory and an increase in open-air explosions. Attorney Mark Connolly told city attorneys Bill Sartor and Debra Corbett in a nine-page letter Tuesday that he and San Francisco-based First Amendment lawyer Karl Olson would file a lawsuit if the city fails to hand over the e-mails by the end of next week. Tucker and city lawyers have argued that the e-mails between Tucker and the lab are exempt from California open government laws because Tucker sent and received the e-mails as a private citizen using a personal e-mail address and a personal computer. Tucker, like other council members, does not have a city e-mail address. The March 13 letter included summaries of 77 related e-mails to and from Tucker that were obtained by the Tracy Press and activist Carole Dominguez through public records requests. Connolly said in the letter that the e-mails showed Tucker “was clearly acting in her capacity as a member of the City Council on city business.” Californian Newspaper Publishers Association attorney Jim Ewert said Tucker’s claim that her e-mails are exempt from public records laws because she used personal equipment has never before been tested in court. Tracy Press publisher Bob Matthews said Wednesday it was a “cut-and-dried” decision to take legal action against the city. Matthews described government openness on the relationship between Tucker and the Department of Energy’s $1.7 billion a year weapons lab as “an important public issue.” Tucker is the only member of the council to support the proposed Department of Homeland Security bio-lab...also supports lab plans to increase the size and power of explosions at the lab’s Site 300 test site, which were last week put on hold when the San Joaquin Valley Air Pollution Control District demanded the lab analyze health impacts from radioactive dust from the test explosions, pointing to community concerns regarding the blasts. Tucker sits as mayor when the council discusses Lawrence Livermore issues because Mayor Brent Ives works for the lab and is required to step down because of conflict-of-interest laws. The Tracy Press requested, beginning in December, e-mails relating to the bio-lab and Site 300 explosions that were sent between Tucker and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory; other members of the council; senior city employees; and members of Tracy Tomorrow and Beyond.

San Francisco Chronicle
UC, CSU reach again for students' wallets...Tanya Schevitz, Jim Doyle
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/03/15/MNGSDOLLAB1.DTL&hw=uc&sn=001&sc=1000
California's 626,000 public university students got clobbered Wednesday with their fifth tuition hike in six years as the governing boards of both the University of California and the California State University agreed to raise the price of attendance dramatically. UC Board of Regents and the CSU Board of Trustees said they had no choice but to increase the costs next fall to maintain the quality of the institutions. Regents acknowledged this is probably not the end of annual increases for UC students. Since the 2001-02 school year, undergraduate tuition has climbed 92 percent at UC's campuses and 94 percent at CSU's schools. One UCLA student, 19-year-old Sarah Andrews, seemed to sum up the students' disappointment: "They are trying to tell me that they do not value ... students who come from low-income families, students of color and students who are not blessed enough to have parents to pay for a $23,000 education, students who work two to three jobs to get by, students who commute and take the bus to avoid high living costs." The fees are rising as both institutions are under fire for their compensation of executives, among other things. Abraham Ramirez, a student at Cal State Fullerton, pointed out that since 2005, CSU executives have received an average 23 percent pay increase "on top of an inflated salary." At UC, students in the professional schools, including law, business, medicine and dentistry, will take the hardest hit with an average 10 percent increase...with the new increase, the fee will be close to $23,000 for medical school and $26,000 for UCLA's dentistry program. The state Legislative Analyst's Office had recommended a 2.4 percent increase in CSU student fees, saying that amount would be sufficient to bridge the gap between state funding cuts and the university's needs. But university officials said they need not only to account for inflation but also to make up for cuts in past years. A key reason for raising fees, UC officials said, is to improve student services, such as mental health services.

Fresno Bee
Foothill highway back on the map...Russell Clemings
http://www.fresnobee.com/263/story/35422.html
Six years after the controversial idea was last studied, then shelved, a proposed north-south highway along the Sierra foothills may be revived as part of a state-funded master plan for the San Joaquin Valley... so-called Foothill Freeway -- a Highway 65 extension that would link Exeter to Chowchilla -- has been part of the state highway system since 1959, but only on paper. None of it has been built. Even its route remains unclear. Now, Fresno and Madera county planners are talking about the highway again. They see it as a way to ease congestion on the Valley's main north-south route, Highway 99, and to connect future growth hot spots such as southern Madera County's Rio Mesa area and Fresno County's Millerton New Town. .Opponents, in contrast, see only the specter of further urban sprawl. The state Department of Transportation last produced a study six years ago but set it aside in the face of environmental opposition and mixed reactions from local government leaders...the proposal is "still officially inactive" but could be brought back if a consensus emerges from the current San Joaquin Valley Blueprint effort, in which planners and other leaders are trying to define a vision for the Valley at midcentury. It was during Blueprint-related meetings that talk of reviving Highway 65 first arose, participants say. Meanwhile, in the same meetings, Fresno city planners are taking the idea one step further, proposing that Highway 65 be part of a beltway incorporating some form of mass transit as well as highways. The "Metro Rural Loop" would encircle Madera and the Fresno-Clovis metropolitan area. It would include land use policies to encourage high-density development on major transit corridors within the loop while preserving farmland elsewhere. The state's 1959 plan called for Highway 65 to extend from its current end north of Exeter in Tulare County to Rocklin in Placer County, northeast of Sacramento. The 2001 study covered only the area between Exeter and Chowchilla, where the new highway would connect to an eastward extension of Highway 152. It never pinpointed a route.

7 a.m. The roar of the highway, elevated somewhat above us here in Merced, spreads through the old town. A siren wails. A freight train rumbles through town on the north tracks, whistle blasting. The streets are already filling with traffic. The sun is taking the winter chill out of the air.

It all sounds and feels like the hustle and bustle of a town growing in prosperity, business, commerce, all the things that common sense calls good. So what if a few hundred people lose their houses on mortgages they should never have bought into? Even a few thousand. They made bad financial decisions.

Listen to the Big Sound rumbling on the highway and the rails. The Valley is growing, prosperity is coming. That sound means more work, maybe. So what if the air’s getting worse and we’ve got water and sewer issues? And what’s a morning in the Valley without greeting a homeless person on the sidewalk? The Valley has always had a population of mobile citizens without regular addresses.

Some say we ought to try to impose some limits on our growth, if not to avoid filling towns with strangers that do not a city make, to protect the environment and respect the natural resources. Others say, No. Government, alleged to be of, by and for the people, should stay out of the way of business. Let the market impose limits (as the present housing “correction” is doing). The environment is nothing but the arena in which growth happens. How growth occurs is totally a function of the invisible hand of the marketplace. Any assertions that the environment has intrinsic value or is related to public health and safety in any way, or that local land-use authorities ought to consider the limits included in environmental law and regulation, are nothing more than but irritating grumblings of malcontents. Furthermore, these malcontents do not realize that we must speak with One Voice to persuade upper echelons of government to help fund our growth. Because the best friend the free market ever had was a government controlled by business.

“Forget all your worries!” say the diesels rumbling up and down the highway, the freight trains whistling on the tracks. “This is the Valley! We work! We produce! We are many industries based on agriculture!”

In fact there were problems then and there are problems now. Then, the invisible opposable thumb of the free market was squashing a number of small farmers overproducing one of the most perishable fruits on earth, the cling peach of ancient memory. Throughout it all, processors rose and fell. The names on those canneries are largely forgotten. It’s ancient history. Other processors survived and flourished and became giants, supporting the remaining productive farms, now much larger themselves than the old farms and dairies. Urban growth occurred to take the overflow from the Bay Area, where industries new and old boomed and property values boomed. The ominous thing was that some time in there the Sierras and the Coast Range became invisible unless it had just rained or there was a strong wind.

At some point, well past the real moment of loss of balance between the urban and the rural, the city and the environment, even dull-witted people began to notice that it is almost impossible to travel in the Valley out of sight of urban development. Now, the Valley is a region of rural parts, but it is no longer rural.

Even remembering crops like the huge tonnage of cling peaches seems more than faintly ridiculous. It is gone, and with it, a local way of life is gone. The economy adjusted. We are here, now, not there, then. The economy should have no history. It is all about now and the future, just as, in those days, it was about that now and that future, the latter of which not resembling our present at all. Who could have imagined the changes? It was always disreputable to imagine changes or to remember "ancient history."

One of the paradoxes of the Valley economy begs the question whether growth raises all ships. Is it possible to have growth and at the same time growing poverty? Observing the ever-expanding outskirts of Sacramento, we see rings of tract housing that was once owned, is now rented, and is deteriorating. The paradox is that we usually assume that poverty is not a sign of growth because we equate growth with prosperity. But are all ships rising? In the recent speculative housing boom, the ships of all homeowners rose, at least on paper. But how many bad mortgages, mortgages the lenders knew the new homeowner would be unable to cover as the rate rose, are out there in the midst of the regional housing boom, ready to explode, leaving empty homes and unfortunate lives? The speculative housing boom seems to have been about money rather than a great need for houses, as our local unaffordable housing prices demonstrate. Nevertheless, I just received a telephone message telling me that a company had checked out my credit and decided I could afford to buy one of these houses – a statement that I know to be absurd.

Apparently, the way the mortgage business operates is that the predatory lender unloads mortgages (s)he knows full well will default into secondary markets. Housing economist Dean Baker sketches how the housing bubble is bursting:

The fall thus far has been relatively modest (around 3 percent nationwide), but with prices going in the wrong direction, most new homebuyers have no equity that they could rely upon to meet their monthly payments. As a result, delinquency rates began to soar in 2006. More than 10 percent of the subprime adjustable rate mortgages issued last year (the most risky category) were already seriously delinquent or foreclosed within 10 months of issuance. This is even before any of these mortgages reset to a higher interest rate. With foreclosure rates soaring, the music is about to stop. The investors who bought up these mortgages in the secondary market are now refusing to lend more money. Credit is drying up for both the subprime and the Alt-A market, which is a notch above subprime in creditworthiness. These two segments of the housing market together accounted for 40 percent of the mortgages issued in the last two years. If 40 percent of potential homebuyers suddenly have problems getting credit, it has to have a large impact on the housing market. Throw into the mix that the inventory of unsold homes is 25 percent higher than at the same time last year. And, the number of vacant units up for sale (normally an indication of a highly motivated seller) is up more than 40 percent compared to last year. Since house prices fell by three percent last year (six percent in real terms), it looks like we have the beginnings of a serious slide in house prices. And, a sharp fall in house prices will lead to more problems in the mortgage market. That is the story of a collapsing housing bubble. It is not pretty. It was predictable.

San Joaquin, Stanislaus and Merced counties already rank among the top foreclosure rates and least affordable housing in the nation. It might be predictable that the housing bubble will collapse more severely here.

The bust was predicted. The information was available to Valley business and political leaders. This information was suppressed, ignored, denied and mocked. Or is it that the Valley cannot think in any economic terms but boom and bust? Is that the legacy of agriculture?

Now the construction-defect lawsuits are starting. Some would say that is inevitable during an “inevitable” housing boom, when contractors are building too much, too fast, in a market driven by speculation. Toxic mold problems, which Merced has seen before, have not yet surfaced to the extent they have in class action suits in Sacramento suburbs. Already, however, there are rumors that homeowners are getting dire warnings from the developers that sold them their homes about the consequent loss of property value from disclosing defects.

The probable result is urban growth accompanied by the growth of poverty. Could this have been prevented? If so, how, in a state and region committed to the view that “growth is inevitable.” Think about the arrogance of this phrase for a moment, in terms of the huge parts of the US where growth is not happening at all -- in fact the reverse is happening. “Growth is inevitable,” our leaders say, shrugging their shoulders and collecting their cuts as the public schoolyards fill up with present-day equivalents of WWII surplus Quonset huts.

What sort of economic growth is suppressed by urban growth? Was construction, real estate sales, finance and insurance work the only kind of work? What are the economic and social costs of the steady deterioration of the quality of California public education since developers gained political control of the state? How about the costs of health care?

Why did Merced take the great plunge into housing development? Although it is still an unspeakable question, the consequences of the great speculative housing boom may make it a very pointed question by the end of the year.

Has the ideology of “raising all ships through inevitable growth” been a true guide or simply developer flak? Or, has it just redistributed income upward and caused the growth of more poverty?

How will our dear business and political leaders cover up all this, when even the local newspaper smells the story?

Bill Hatch

Notes:

3-6-07
Truthout.com
http://www.cepr.net/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1072&Itemid=45
The Housing Bubble Starts to Burst
By Dean Baker

I know that the people of California will demand a better university for themselves, because without it, their options for a survivable future, let alone a future they might desire, are dim. -- Ignacio H. Chapela, Associate Professor UC Berkeley – March 2007

Meanwhile, however, the UC Board of Regents will undoubtedly rubber-stamp the BP-UC deal to produce more uncontrollable genetically engineered organisms. Among the other grave distortions of language surrounding California’s “greatest public research university in the world,” is the term conflict-of-interest. The present chairman of the Regents is Richard Blum, husband of Sen. Dianne Feinstein. Together, they have extracted all meaning from the term.

Badlands editorial staff
-------------------------

Remarks Prepared by Invitation of the Chair of the Academic Senate University of California, Berkeley

On the Berkeley-British Petroleum Proposition:
Things are Often Not what they Appear.

Presented on the Floor of the Academic Senate of the University of California, Berkeley Division.

In eight minutes.

by
Ignacio H. Chapela
Associate Professor

Things are often not what they appear.

This Session

This session, for instance. It will be portrayed as the latest expression of the vibrant democratic system of shared governance for which Berkeley was once known. Far from it, this session is a last-minute hurried afterthought by a leadership caught asleep at the wheel, a session convened only because of the rising outrage and opposition to the presence of British Petroleum on our campus.

May nobody claim that eight minutes of my clumsy words represent any kind of reasonable and legitimizing discussion. May nobody leave this room thinking that there is anything like a legitimate process in place to guarantee that this Faustian deal with the British transnational corporation is not what it portends, the last - and I believe final - coup de grace to the very idea of a university that can represent the best interest of the public.

The Technical Value of the Premises

I have tried for size the word Prostitution as best describing that for which the Chancellor and his associates would like us to sign.

When faced with this concept, I have heard the proponents of this deal simply shrug and say: "But at least we can agree that it IS a lot of money - and even perhaps some science may come out of it!" So leaving prostitution aside, why not glance at the science?

What would certainly come out of the BP-Berkeley facilities would be a large number of genetically altered, reproducing, LIVING organisms to be released in the public environment.

In Berkeley, in the Midwest and around the world. Genetically-modified (or "GMO") grasses, trees, algae, bacteria, viruses destined for intentional, large-scale release in the public environment.

These organisms do not represent Science. If anything, they may represent our failure as scientists to assume the deep inadequacies of our understanding about living organisms and the ecology of our planet. I do not need to dwell on it: read it in the front pages of your newspapers.

Despite a third of a century and more than $350 billion dollars invested in the trinket, a hurricane remains more predictable, and a wildfire remains more controllable than GMO organisms. Meanwhile, they have proven to be a disastrous economic proposition, not to speak of their environmental and social consequences.

Cognizant of this reality, BP-Berkeley proponents would wish to rename everything in their trade to give it a fresh face of novelty: GMOs should now be called "DNA circuits", pieced together from "Biobricks" through a craft not called transgenesis, but "Synthetic Biology"; decomposition, the process which has defeated many better minds in the past may be more tractable - they suggest - if it can be renamed "depolymerization". And so on.

In the BP-Berkeley spirit I would suggest we rename "science" what used to be called "magic" in my childhood: addressing a question by drawing a cloak of confusion and secrecy over it, only to extract a pre-arranged answer to the pre-arranged question.

We hear that the magic of "DNA-circuits" should also produce some science in the physics departments. BP-Berkeley proponents wish to deny it, but the proposition that more energy can be extracted from a process than what is invested into it does not follow the phoney rules of the stock market or the wild-eyed predictions of venture capitalists. Biofuels may be convenient because they shove the tragic aspects of our insatiable consumption to the invisible corners of the Third World, but they will not change the laws of thermodynamics, nor - I suspect - will they succeed in the medieval quest for perpetual motion machines.

Do we need a solution to the crazed consumerism binge of the short two centuries we have spent burning our fossil-fuel accounts?

Certainly. If we do not find it soon, the solution itself may come and get us, and we may not like it. But does the BP-Berkeley proposal address any of the questions necessary to find that solution? I believe not. At least there are very legitimate and reasonable concerns, growing by the day in the last few weeks here and abroad, that the idea of Biofuels embodied in the BP-Berkeley proposal is not only short-sighted, but fatally flawed:

For a measure, Indonesia without Biofuels used to be close to 20th in the world as producer of CO2 in the atmosphere. In a few years with biofuels it is now third, only behind the US and China.

Signing the contract with British Petroleum would yoke the university to a flawed and potentially very dangerous route at least for the next decade. Because of the investments and commitments made and because of the roads not taken, most probably much longer.

The evidence keeps coming in about the inadequacy and dangerous nature of the proposal, but we cannot afford to even see or acknowledge it, even before signing the contract, for fear of scaring the money away.

If we signed that contract, can anyone seriously imagine that Berkeley would be in a position to undertake significant research to show the problems with the BP strategy? Can anyone believe that after signing the contract we could be working on alternatives that do not involve patents, immoral profit margins, economies of scale and command-and-control governance? Look at the subservient motions of this very Senate, and answer these questions truthfully, at least to yourselves (at night, in the bathroom?).

After signing the contract with BP, will anyone ever believe our objectivity and advice as we move into the most difficult part out of the social and environmental decomposition that we live in?

Chancellor Berdahl, while signing with one hand the predecessor of the BP-Berkeley agreement, the Novartis-Berkeley deal, was writing with the other hand:

"The issue is not that Novartis may direct the research exclusively to topics that may yield profits for the company; it is, rather, that the perception of the objectivity of our faculty may be compromised and with it the confidence that their research is dedicated to the public good. Few would put a great deal of confidence, I suspect, in the objectivity of lung cancer research funded by tobacco companies."

The evidence is in, and we cannot afford to see it?

We already missed the opportunity of listening to the best advice of our faculty. In addition to Berdahl's, the following names, and what they could have contributed are but a sampler of the many important campus voices that are clearly not represented here:

Clark Kerr - the dangers of the university-industrial complex.
Nancy Peluso - probable consequences of the BP deal in Indonesia.
Miguel Altieri - ditto for the Amazon basin, plus the many non-patent alternatives to global disaster.
Michael Watts - ditto for Asia
Claudia Carr - ditto for Africa
Gordon Rausser - the difference between first right of refusal and first right of negotiation. Basics of negotiation strategies.
Bob Buchanan - the limits of microbial transgenesis
Bob Berdahl - the possible limits to privatization
Laura Nader - the impossibility of unlimited power through knowledge
David Hollinger - the unsustainability of using the university as a political workhorse
Tad Patzek
Urs Cipolat
Gray Brechin
Bob Brentano
Jennifer Miller
Iain Boal
Louise Fortmann ... the list goes on

Can we call this a "Berkeley"agreement when these and many other voices are not here?

Things are often not what they appear: there are other names.

This agreement, which many fear as an unacceptable private-public partnership, is very much a private-private partnership. Attention faculty in English, Music or Rhetoric: do not hold your breath for the financial crumbs to fall from the party table for your programs, because the chickens are all counted, and they carry name-tags around their necks.

I mean to say: the reason why you have not heard mention of even the concept of Conflict of Interest is precisely because nobody in the partnership seems to recognize the idea.

To my knowledge the last time Conflict of Interest was considered worth visiting, again involved the Novartis-Berkeley deal. One of the overseers of that Deal, Prof Jasper Rine, stated in his legal declaration on conflict of interest caused by his simultaneous involvement in private and public science-making:

" … the possibility of conflict of interest is non-existent, since the science happening in my lab at Berkeley is exactly the same as the science happening in [my outside company]" A curious but clearly faulted definition of the concept, I should point out.

It is not surprising then to see that conflict of interest levels that would have been considered unthinkable even a decade ago would not deserve even a note in the BP-Berkeley designs. The conflicts and mutual-self-serving dealings are many, large and very complex, but once again in eight minutes we are reduced to a mention of a few examples.

BP-boosters propose to focus on grasses and other "DNA circuits" controlled by a company in Walnut Creek called Mendel Biotechnology. Mendel is thus a major, little-mentioned partner in this deal. Mendel has an alliance with Monsanto, the world’s monopoly of transgenic seeds, for more than $40 milllion dollars. This long-term relationship includes a Vice President of Monsanto on Mendel’s board; in their words, their reciprocal interests are "highly aligned". So it stands to legal reason --by some standard I suppose-- that there would be no conflict of interest between BP, Berkeley, Mendel, Monsanto, and the deployment of their products for profit over more than 200 million acres of transgenic (excuse me, "Synthetic Biology") crops? In this proposal, Berkeley is nothing but a business partner with these corporations, professors entrepreneurs and students simply cheap labor, paying high fees for the privilege of giving their work to the right corporation.

Principals in Mendel's Board of Directors and Scientific Advisory Board are Prof. Brian Staskawicz, of Berkeley, and Prof. Stephen Long of the University of Illinois (the other business partner in this Proposal). Both entrepreneurs' interests inside campus and out are probably so identical that they do not need to worry about conflict of interest. Whether their students can maintain such clear alignment in their allegiance between finding out what is true and publicly desirable and finding out what is profitable might be a different question.

Chris Sommerville, CEO of Mendel, has been apparently rushed in to Berkeley through a secretive and highly irregular flash-hire process to be safely on the UC side as a professor for the signing of the agreement. His campus interviews, behind closed doors, apparently happened last Tuesday, although the Chancellor had already announced more than a month ago that he would unilaterally appoint him. Not surprisingly, there is no outward sign that the Academic Senate even knew about all this. Oh, I nearly forgot: Mr Sommerville's wife is reportedly also getting another professorial position at Berkeley through the same process - I am not sure what she does professionally.

Of course, no contract will be official without the signature of the Regents but here again, the Chair of the Regents, Richard Blum, stands in multi-million-dollar conflict of interest over his financial engagement with "development" corporations that are already signed on to begin the digging and concrete-pouring in Strawberry Canyon, as has been well documented by investigative journalist Peter Byrne.

Prof. Dan Kammen's description of the goals here is appropriate, and seems to describe the real environmental interest in the BP-Berkeley proposal: He said that the goal of the BP-Berkeley deal was "to generate an ecosystem of companies". We now have an inkling of the "biodiversity" making up this "innovation environment"; now we know that what is really meant here is a trophic web of favoritism that would have shamed the Soviet system, in an environment of profit-driven conflict of interest.

BP's Benefit

As the smell of depolymerization (British Petroleum-word for decomposition) continues to emerge from the extraordinary proposition, few stop to ask what else would BP get out of all this.

Time is short, so we are back to citing samplers from a much larger collection.

I will leave a marker here for what I think is the most important benefit to BP apart from the obvious greenwashing and the very large public subsidization of its faulty science, research development, distribution and marketing: the liability haven provided by Berkeley.

If the production of Synthetic Biology "DNA circuits" entails with it very clear risks, Berkeley is providing an unrivalled degree of protection against public scrutiny, through the abuse of the public privilege assigned to us in the Constitution of the State of California to conduct our affairs in privacy, for academic freedom's sake. This privilege can also be used, as if it were a private right to secrecy, to deflect public inquiry and to protect BP, Dow, Monsanto, Mendel, Savia, Amyris and the rest of the "ecosystem of companies" from the evident and imminent liability in Moral, Fiduciary and Legal terms associated with the release of herbicide resistant weeds, algae, all kinds of microbes, crops and the rest of it.

Thanks

It is not all bad. I want to thank the many students and faculty who are awakening to the situation of their university, the public of California and the world who understand what is at stake and will hold us accountable for it, as they are doing here tonight.

But I also want to thank British Petroleum, not for the $500,000,000.00 - which, at $600 of after-tax profit per second for last year does not represent much - but for the arrogant and reckless style with which they have come to our Campus. With this they have already helped uncover the depth and breadth of the problems with/for our university that this proposal entails. These problems were really in need of public attention, and they will get it.

I Believe that I stand here for a majority within this campus, throughout the State and in the world who also believe that the time has come to re-take control of our institutions as the only possible way forward from the enormous environmental and social catastrophe that we are already living through.

I Trust that this Academic Senate, the only legitimate body of representation for our faculty, will stand up against this last push to declare us irrelevant in the worst moment of social and environmental need.

I know that the people of California will demand a better university for themselves, because without it, their options for a survivable future, let alone a future they might desire, are dim.

Let there be light.
-----------------

Note:

Answers.com
http://www.answers.com/topic/richard-c-blum

Wikipedia: Richard C. Blum

Richard C. Blum is an investment banker and the husband of United States Senator from California Dianne Feinstein. He is the Chairman and President of Blum Capital Partners, L.P., a long-term strategic equity investment management firm that acts as general partner for various investment partnerships and provides investment advisory services. He founded the firm in 1975. He also owns 75% of the voting stock in Perini.

Educated
He graduated from the University of California, Berkeley, where he received his B.S. in business administration in 1958, and an MBA in 1959, both degrees coming from the Haas School of Business.

Boards

On March 12, 2002, Blum was appointed by California Governor Gray Davis to a 12-year term as one of the Regents of the University of California. Blum also serves on the boards of the following companies:

CB Richard Ellis Group, Inc. (Chairman)
Newbridge Capital, LLC (co-Chairman)
Glenborough Realty Trust

Blum has a strong interest in Tibet and Tibetan Buddhism. In 1981 he attempted to climb Mount Everest from the Tibetan side with Sir Edmund Hillary. He is the Chairman and founder of the American Himalayan Foundation, which has given millions of dollars to build hospitals and schools in Tibet and Nepal.

In addition to the AHF, Blum’s not-for-profit endeavors include service as Trustee of The Carter Center; member of the Board of Trustees of The Brookings Institution; Co-Chairman of the The World Conference of Religions for Peace; Director at the World Wildlife Fund; Member of Governing Council of the Wilderness Society; and Member of the Board of Trustees of the American Cancer Foundation.

The Center for Public Integrity has reported that Blum and his wife, Senator Dianne Feinstein, are making millions of dollars from Iraq and Afghanistan contracts through his company, Perini. [1] Critics have also argued that Feinstein's support of policies that are friendly to the Chinese government are because of her husband's extensive China-related business holdings.

References
Biographical sketch in the San Francisco Chronicle
Blum Capital Partners, L.P.
Blum Biography at the University of California
Richard Blum hones art of upping shareholder value. Loren Steffy; Bloomberg News; August 4, 2002.

“In order to fight each other, the chicks born from the same mother hen put colors on their faces.” -- Buddhist monk Thich Nhat Hanh, founder of study centers and active in working for peace during the war in Vietnam.

"You don't know who's swimming nekkid till the tide goes out." -- attributed to Warren Buffett, NPR Marketplace, March 9, 2007

This site has been critical of local leadership for some time. Although at times individuals have been singled out, there has been more criticism of the entire leadership institution, or cult, in the Valley, than of any individual. Experience arguing with government about its policies and direction demonstrate quite vividly that the individuals are nearly completely interchangeable by the time they have been selected for leadership.

It has been the direction, most of all, that has been so disturbing, although the means by which the direction has been achieved are not above reproach. These means, involving much corruption of existing law and public process will continue to be challenged because they must be challenged.

However, the leaders, egged on by a remorselessly personalizing media that tends to present a story involving the most general principles of law and ethics as gossip, take personal affront when they are caught just doing another deal, business as usual. They ought to spare the public their sensitivities; most people know somehow that our individual leaders, whatever their strengths and attractiveness may be, are no match for the special interests whose profits are the true guides of the direction the town and county have taken.

The problem is neither personal or local. There are many regional influences in the same direction. For example, the San Joaquin Valley Unified Air Pollution Control District proposes a negative declaration for its new ozone plan. Having drawn even with the worst air pollution basin in the nation, the district doesn't want an environmental impact report on its plan. Regional councils of governments, also appointed boards, pretend to have some concern for air quality but in fact function as legally suitable recipients for federal highway funds based on their transportation plans that promote even more urban growth. These COGs and CAGs are responsible for a series of county measures to increase sales taxes to create matching funds that, they hope, will attract more highway funds. San Joaquin County, which has had such a sales tax increase for several years, just discovered that this particular form of bribery doesn't work -- either because the state transportation department doesn't think the county's plan is that good or because other counties had more political muscle.

Some might take this message from CalTrans to San Joaquin County as a nearly divinely inspired excuse to slow Valley growth. But those people are not members of the Valley leadership cult, for which more growth is the only solution to all problems.

At the level of the state Legislature, nobody but a shrinking group who will never see sixty again can even remember when developers didn't control the important legislation, despite the environmental posturing of elected officials, which has grown positively theatrical with the arrival of Our Hun in the governor's office.

Beyond the state Legislature, our region in particular has been visited by the Pomboza, a bipartisan partnership between representatives Richard Pombo, R-Tracy, and Dennis Cardoza, D-Merced, which introduced numerous bills to gut the Endangered Species Act on behalf of developers building in their adjoining north Valley districts. Although Pombo was defeated by outraged environmentalists from around the country in the last election, he has joined an anti-environmental lobbying firm, so we imagine the Pomboza is alive and well behind the scenes, where Pombo may prove an even more environmentally
destructive politician than he was as the chairman of the House Resources Committee, since November restored to its earlier title, Natural Resources Committee.

Further examples of the federal approach to the San Joaquin Valley include: the Bureau of Reclamation's latest scheme to avoid responsibility for the selenium disaster on the west side: privatize the San Luis Reservoir; and the full-court attack of Rep. Devin Nunes, R-Visalia, against the Fraint Dam/San Joaquin River Settlement. The precedent of environmentalists, farmers and water districts coming to an agreement (albeit under warning from federal court that a settlement would be better than a judge's decision strictly by the law), must not be allowed to see the light of day or the world will end, according to Nunes -- willing to skewer his fellow Republican, Rep. George Radanovich of Mariposa in the process.

California's senior US senator, Dianne Fienstein, is the wife of investment banker, Richard Blum, presently chairman of the UC Board of Regents. This power team has rendered the term "conflict of interest" meaningless in California.

In a war began as the result of lies the administration told, the US military, the most powerful, best armed, most highly technologized and expensive miltary in the world, "is in danger of being driven back by a few tens of thousands of lightly armed irregulars, who have developed tactics capable of destroying multimillion-dollar vehicles and aircraft." The American military reaction in Iraq is characterized as "unadorned state terrorism." There is no doubt that denial historical knowledge goes straight to the top of US government. Bush now has been caught so thoroughly in his web of lies that drumbeats for impeachment keep growing.

Obviously, it won't do to blame local leaders for the general dysfunction and atmosphere of lies and destruction. However, given the topography and climate of the San Joaquin Valley, its leaders' growth policy for the profit of national and international finance, insurance and real estate interests at the expense of the public health and safety in the agricultural heartland of the most productive farming and ranching state in the nation, is, in a word, absurd, upside-down, backwards. However, if you stand on your head, it all comes clear: the leaders aren't actually leaders, they are just a select group of strong personalities trained in a cult to follow business, the bigger business the better. What they call "the real world" in authoritative tones designed to crush all question or criticism, is in fact a materialist fantasy of a hierarchy of wealth. This theory of leadership that is actually followership begs the lamentable question: who will be found nekkid when the tide goes out? We would prefer leadership that addresses the real, organic problems of the Valley and find means of improving things. Paving it over simply denies the responsibility of maintaining one of the most vital agricultural areas in the nation.

Any appeal to giantism finds a vigorous response in the Valley, however, because the Valley produces veritable Leviathans of corporate agribusiness and public works: Gallo Wine, Hilmar Cheese, Boswell Cotton, the largest public irrigation projects in the world, etc. This form of economic development has produced tremendous riches for a few and the lowest standard of living in the state for the many and has created a population dislocation in Mexico that has damaged both sides of the border and become a chronic, uncontrollable "hot-button" issue for the authoritarian racist crowd.

One of the major problems of thinking about the Valley is that its leadership denies the history of the Valley. Elites constantly form, rise, and morph between outside-funding cycles. A good example is the Great Valley Center, founded by a former pro-growth Modesto mayor on grants from a young, aggressive charitable foundation based in Silicon Valley and a group of the proper national environmental non-profits with completely self-serving agendas. As far as GVC was concerned, history began when it got its non-profit status and first grants. Its agenda was based on the idea that growth is inevitable and it produced numerous "smart growth" fantasies in a series of workshops and conferences noting for the declining quality of thinking and of sandwiches. Finally, it has joined in a win-win, private-public partnership with UC Merced, a public corporation convinced that absolutely nothing existed in the Valley before Itself arrived. The idea that history is nothing but the chronicle of the current leadership cult has been as thoroughly discredited as the flat-earth theory.

Despite high concentrations of wealth in a few agribusiness fortunes, there is relatively little philanthropy beyond projects that advertise their funders. Support for glamorless programs that get youth started in the right direction, shelter the homeless and care for the e;derly poor who honestly labored here and in general helps the community rise according to invaluable local knowledge about how resources should best be spent, was more evident 50 years ago than it is today. And UC Merced has made the situation worse by ripping off enormous tax-deductible contributions from regional plutocrats. UC Merced should not be blamed for this. The Valley has not had real charitable-spending leadership. The results of the lack of it are all around us. We have not been charitable where it matters. This must remain a mystery if one is not to indulge in futile blaming.

Nor can one blame Christianity for Valley churches that spend more time bashing gays than supporting the poor. We can see where an attitude of denial of reality greed and hypocrisy ends, but it is harder to see where it began. Perhaps, as some thoughtful religionists suggest, there is simply a loss of soul in America. Perhaps the prices paid for power and wealth were too high. Psychologist Erich Fromm noted 40 years ago:

The very picture of mid-twentieth century capitalism is hardly distinguishable from the
caricature of Marxist socialism as drawn by its opponents."

An article last week in the Merced Sun-Star, describes a quandary a Detroit-based developer and the city find themselves in:

Bellevue Ranch is the second largest development the company is currently working on.
Navigating endangered species and wetlands laws marks new territory for city officials too, who find themselves dealing with fairy shrimp for the first time within the city limit.

We begin with the Bellevue Ranch as a regulatory/development problem, with no reference to what it was, no reference to the lawsuit that produced the EIR on the project, and city officials are presented as having known nothing about the endangered species present on the land. This is deceit, not journalism.

The article echoes statements about vernal pools and fairy shrimp (endangered as are 11 species of plants found only around vernal pools) made from the earliest planning stages of UC Merced. It represents the earlier outrage, voiced by the various local Mr. and Ms. UC Merceds of their moments, that the fairy shrimp and the vernal pools in which they live are the greatest enemy Valley civilization has faced since Estanislao broke out of Mission San Jose. Once again, local business and political leaders, following the profit needs of outside developers, line up against an embattled federal resource agency charged under the Endangered Species Act with protecting endangered species that only live a few months a year and rarely exceed two inches in length. Yet their range in Merced County includes the eastern and western watersheds, the pastures where percolation takes place. By protecting fairy shrimp and vernal pools, local leaders would be protecting air quality and water quality and quantity for existing Valley residents. But local leaders didn't become local leaders by listening to any interest but business, which in the Valley regards all land in farming and ranching as fair game for more subdivisions. If it sounds as if I am excluding the farming and ranching business, like they say, there is no parcel of land in the Valley not for sale at a price. Agricultural organizations have fallen into a state of political autism, paralyzed by their dual position as both producers and landowners. Large landowners, like Mike Gallo and the Kelley family, become developers while smaller farmers suffer the steady degradation of their districts by encroaching urban development. In the battle between the farm and the subdivision, development always kicks the teeth out of "right to farm" policies.

So, we are in for another round of smart-growth fantasies as the air quality deteriorates and the water quality and quantity diminishes unless the nationwide speculative housing boom, particularly egregious here, produces a national recession that stops economic growth. Leadership by developer feeding frenzy halted by national recession is not our idea of leadership. The local followership cult is outrageously irresponsible, greedy, and it grovels before outside finance, insurance and real estate special interests.

Badlands editorial board
---------------------------------

Notes:

3-6-07
Merced Sun-Star
Tiny shrimp blocking builder...Leslie Albrecht
http://www.mercedsunstar.com/local/story/13354476p-13977705c.html

3-7-07
Merced Sun-Star
Building permits decline...Leslie Albrecht
http://www.mercedsunstar.com/local/story/13357619p-13980593c.html

2-22-07
Central Valley Business Times

California housing remains nation’s least affordable, despite cooling prices
LOS ANGELES
http://centralvalleybusinesstimes.com/stories/001/?ID=4411&ref=patrick.net

2-26-07
Modesto Bee
Vacant and costly
Empty homes leave owners on the hook
By J.N. SBRANTI
http://www.modbee.com/business/story/13300377p-13929065c.html

'Smart' rebels outstrip US
Top American generals make shock admission as Iraq leader pleads with neighbouring

countries to seal off their borders
Paul Beaver in Fort Lauderdale and Peter Beaumont
Sunday March 11, 2007
The Observer
http://observer.guardian.co.uk/world/story/0,,2031172,00.html

Surge and Destroy
The Brutality Escalates in Iraq
By Michael Schwartz
Tomdispatch.com -- March 11, 2007

Marx's Concept of Man, Erich Fromm, Ungar, New York, 1966.

Factories in the Field, Cary McWilliams, Peregrine Press, 1971 (originally published in

1935)

“My father rode a camel. I drive a car. My son flies a plane. His son will ride a camel.”
- Anonymous Saudi Sheik – 1982

March 7, 2007
CommonDreams.org
Ghawar Is Dead! The Wide-Spread Use of Advanced Extraction Techniques are Killing the Mother of All Oil Fields, by Matthew S. Miller

Having gone to a war that is ending up as "Vietnam in the desert," and getting ready to start another one that could end up being "Waterloo in the sand," against nations accused of thinking about developing weapons of mass destruction, the Bush administration in collaboration with UC Lawrence Livermore and UC Los Alamos national laboraties is set to fund development of a new generation of nuclear bombs. Although billions more of American taxpayers' money will flow toward California, removed from life-supporting programs into this weapons of mass destruction program, only an idiot would crow about it. Wiser eyes would weep at the state's public research university taking advantage of the administration's might-makes-right policy to enrich itself with this deadly work. The press covers the routine mechanics of empire.

This program is the ultimate pork barrel of fear and hatred. But it will provide UC with money, power and prestige, which we are told is a good thing. Somehow, because the Bush administration selected UC's Livermore lab over UC's Los Alamos lab, California is somehow a bigger, stronger, better province within the home states of the empire than puny little New Mexico.

Locally, we can be exceedingly proud that the Livermore lab got the contract to build the next generation of nukes because the most tangible connection the new UC Merced has to the greatest public research university in the universe (just ask them) is its memorandum of understanding with Livermore lab. Put that together with UC Livermore's plans for a biowarfare lab just outside Tracy to handle the most deadly toxins known to man and the recent increase in bomb testing going on at the same site, and the San Joaquin Valley is really moving up in the world. Our congressional leaders, who fought so valiantly so long against such overwhelming odds to bring us this lethal pork deserve our respect and highest praise. Maybe we didn't make it as the new Silicon Valley, but, by God and the United States of America, we got bombs and all the defense contracts behind them.

Success is right around the corner for the Valley. Our arrival on the Big Stage will be celebrated later this spring by the UC/Great Valley Center's annual conference. Now that UC has taken over the Center, gone are those conferences where local people were caught awkwardly in the act of stumbling through the mental effort of thinking and planning for the Valley future, coping with those tedious old-style problems like idiotic, unplanned development, air and water pollution, loss of farmland, ranchland and natural resources. This year, the new UC/GVC will present the vision of Dr. Carol Channing, keynote speaker of the conference, one of the most remorselessly positive entertainers on the face of the earth. Her most famous song, "Hello Dolly," was a ubiquitous, nauseating act of happy-happy-happy flak adopted by the Democratic Party to persuade the public to forget the Vietnam War.

Channing is expected to speak about her foundation's program to rebuild the rubble of arts programs in California's public schools, colleges and universities caused by 30 years of rampant growth that did not pay for itself. Now that we have the new nuke program, more depleted uranium and ebola on the way, I guess our leaders feel safe enough to promote an art class or two in high school.

Valley provincials might have preferred Lola Montez or at least Rose Maddux. The wigs of Dr. Channing, the world's most famous living blonde, remind us of the "atomic" beehive hairdos promoted by Las Vegas casino gangster flaks back in the days when the gambling tourist could actually watch a real nuclear bomb test in real time, out on the desert.

However, despite the mesmerizing power of "Hello Dolly," a few lyric fragments managed to sneak through at the time, for example:

There's somethin' happening here,
What it is ain't exactly clear.
There's a man with a gun over there,
Tellin' me I gotta beware.
I think it's time we stop,
Hey, what's that sound,
Everybody look what's going down...

- For What It's Worth, Stephen Stills, Buffalo Springfield, 1966

Badlands
--------------

3-2-07
San Francisco Chronicle
Bush administration picks Lawrence Livermore warhead design...Scott Linklaw, AP
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2007/03/02/state/n091011S16.DTL
The Bush administration selected Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory's design Friday for a new generation of atomic warheads, advancing a plan to update the nation's arsenal amid criticism from nuclear weapons opponents. The Lawrence Livermore design beat one submitted by Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico because it can be built with more certainty in the absence of underground testing, the National Nuclear Security Administration said. If approved by Congress, the new weapon would be much larger than Cold War-era ones...

US to Develop New Hydrogen Bomb
by Ralph Vartabedian
Los Angeles Times
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines07/0302-02.htm

The Energy Department will announce today a contract to develop the nation's first new hydrogen bomb in two decades, involving a collaboration between three national weapons laboratories, The Times has learned.

The mushroom cloud of the first test of a hydrogen bomb is seen in a 1952 file photo. The Bush administration is planning to develop a new hydrogen bomb - undermining efforts to stop nuclear proliferation. (Handout/Reuters)

The new bomb will include design features from all three labs, though Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in the Bay Area appears to have taken the lead position in the project. The Los Alamos and Sandia labs in New Mexico will also be part of the project.

Teams of scientists in California and New Mexico have been working since last year to develop the new bomb, using the world's most powerful supercomputers.

The weapon is known as the reliable replacement warhead and is intended to replace aging warheads now deployed on missiles aboard Trident submarines.

The contract decision was made by the Nuclear Weapons Council, which consists of officials from the Defense Department and the National Nuclear Security Administration, part of the Energy Department. Plans were underway Thursday to announce the award this afternoon.

The nuclear administration will issue the contract and run the program.

The cost of the development is secret, though outside experts said it would cost billions of dollars — perhaps tens of billions — to develop the bomb, build factories to restart high-volume weapons production and then assemble the weapons.

If Livermore does become the lead laboratory, confidence in the facility is likely to be bolstered, and political suggestions that its role in weapons development is unnecessary could be quelled.

A lead role by Los Alamos would help extract that facility from deep political problems growing out of security breaches.

The program is not expected to create a surge in employment at any of the labs

The program marks the first time the military has fielded a nuclear weapon design without an underground test. The last time scientists set off a hydrogen bomb was in 1991 under the Nevada desert.

President Clinton ordered a testing moratorium, and it has been continued by President Bush.

Since the reason for building the new bomb is to maintain confidence in the nation's nuclear deterrent, experts say, the Nuclear Weapons Council will want the most conservative design, which gives Livermore the upper hand.

The design details are secret, but Livermore's version utilizes major components that had been tested — though not produced — for a Navy bomb about two decades ago.

By contrast, Los Alamos selected a design that involved an atomic trigger and a thermonuclear component that had been tested individually.

However, the two elements were never tested together, said Philip Coyle, who serves on scientific advisory committees and formerly was deputy director at Livermore.

The Los Alamos design is said to contain highly attractive features, including innovative mechanisms that would prevent terrorists from detonating the bomb should they gain access to it, experts said. Those use controls were cited by military officials as a key factor in developing the weapon.

Proponents of the effort say that the nation's existing nuclear stockpile is getting old and that doubts will eventually grow about weapons reliability. They say the new bomb will not have a greater nuclear yield and could not perform any new military missions beyond those of existing weapons.

So far, those arguments have attracted bipartisan support, including from Democrats who have long played a leading role in nuclear arms issues.

Critics say the existing stockpile is perfectly reliable and can be maintained for decades. The new bomb will undermine U.S. efforts to stop nuclear proliferation, they say. In addition, a recent study showed that plutonium components in existing weapons were aging much more slowly than expected.

3-3-07
New York Times
New Design for Warhead Is Awarded to Livermore
By WILLIAM J. BROAD

The Bush administration announced yesterday the winner of a competition to design the nation’s first new nuclear weapon in nearly two decades and immediately set out to reassure Russia and China that the weapon, if built, would pose no new threat to either nation.

If President Bush decides to authorize production and Congress agrees, the research could lead to a long, expensive process to replace all American nuclear warheads in the next few decades with new designs.

The first to be replaced with the new Reliable Replacement Weapon would be the W-76, a warhead for missiles deployed on submarines.

Officials said the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California would design the replacement warhead based on previously tested components, allowing the administration to argue that no new underground tests would be necessary before deploying the new weapon.

Officials said, however, the Livermore design might eventually draw on technical contributions from a more novel approach on the drawing boards at Los Alamos Laboratory in New Mexico, Livermore’s longtime rival.

The surprise choice of a single laboratory reversed a tentative decision, reported in January, to combine elements of the Livermore and Los Alamos designs. In a behind-the-scenes debate over the last two months, nuclear experts inside and outside the government faulted the hybrid approach as unusual and technically risky, with some calling it a “Frankenbomb.”

Administration officials said the Livermore design had won primarily because its main elements were detonated beneath the Nevada desert decades ago, making it a better candidate under the nuclear test ban treaty, which the United States has signed but not ratified.

Thomas P. D’Agostino, acting administrator of the National Nuclear Security Administration at the Energy Department, told reporters that the Livermore design was “the most conservative approach.”

Administration officials said the hybrid had been rejected after senior members of the Navy, which will manage the W-76 replacement, worried that members of Congress would perceive it as more likely to require explosive testing.

The announcement of the research path had been expected in early January but was delayed, officials said, because of last-minute Navy concerns over control of financing and dividing the scientific labor.

The potentially expensive initiative faces an uncertain future and has generated much criticism from skeptics who argue that a new design for the nuclear arsenal is unneeded and is a potential stimulus to a global nuclear arms race.

“This is a solution in search of a problem,” said Daryl G. Kimball, executive director of the Arms Control Association, a group in Washington. “There is an urgent need to reduce these weapons, not expand them. This will keep the Chinese, the Russians and others on guard to improve their own stockpiles.”

Among lawmakers who declared their opposition was Senator Dianne Feinstein, Democrat of California.

“What worries me,” Mrs. Feinstein said, “is that the minute you begin to put more sophisticated warheads on the existing fleet, you are essentially creating a new nuclear weapon. And it’s just a matter of time before other nations do the same thing.”

Critics had ridiculed the hybrid approach as a compromise dictated by the politics of survival for the nuclear laboratories, rather than technical merit. In an unusual move, even senior arms designers spoke out publicly against what they called serious risks of merging differing designs from different laboratories.

“A hybrid design by inexperienced personnel, managed by committee, is not the best approach,” John Pedicini, technical head of the design team at Los Alamos, said last month in a public blog entry.

Mr. Pedicini conceded that the Livermore design had features “that are an advance over ours, and if we get the assignment, I would incorporate them in our design.”

“If this is what is meant by hybrid,” he said, “then the outcome would be good.”

The goal is to replace the arsenal of aging warheads with a generation meant to be sturdier, more reliable, safer from accidental detonation and more secure from theft.

The replacements will have the same explosive yields and other military characteristics of the current weapons, officials said, a point that senior administration officials have made to Russia in arguing that the new weapons do not represent an expansion of the American arsenal.

Mrs. Feinstein cited a report in December saying plutonium pits have a lifespan of at least 85 years, leading critics to question whether the new weapons are necessary.

David E. Sanger contributed reporting.

We presume that UC Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory would also be indemnified if deadly toxins escaped the biowarfare laboratory it is proposing to build at Site 300 outside Tracy, or if depleted uranium from its experiments with bombs on Site 300 contaminate the groundwater.

What does a million-dollar fine for security violations that endanger the population mean if the violator has an indemnification agreement that lets it get off without paying the fine?

Maybe it's a symbol or an allegory or a metaphor.

Badlands Journal

2/28/07
Los Angeles Times
UC cited for safety violations at Los Alamos
By Ralph Vartabedian, Times Staff Writer
February 27, 2007
http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/asection/la-na-fine27feb27,1,7704783.story?coll=la-news-a_section

The Department of Energy on Monday cited the University of California for 15 violations of safety rules in 2005 involving nuclear weapons research at Los Alamos National Laboratory, including a case of mishandled materials where low levels of radiation were spread across several states.

The violations would have carried a $1.1-million fine, but federal law waves such penalties for certain nonprofit contractors. UC's contract to run Los Alamos expired last year, but it is the lead contractor in a consortium that operates the lab.

It is the largest number of violations in UC's history of running Los Alamos. The fine, even though it won't have to be paid, ranks as the largest civil penalty in the history of the Department of Energy's nuclear safety program, the agency said.

The action is a preliminary notice. UC will have a chance to respond.

A spokesman for the lab declined to comment. UC officials were not available.

A history of security and safety breaches led the department's National Nuclear Security Administration, or NNSA, to put the Los Alamos contract up for competition last year, leading to the consortium arrangement.

But the lab, which dates to the Manhattan Project in World War II, continues to land in the center of controversy.

Its poor performance was the subject of two investigative hearings in the House last month, prompting calls by lawmakers to transfer some of Los Alamos' research to other labs.

Tom D'Agostino, acting chief of the NNSA, said in a notice to UC that the "large number of violations" reflected continuing "performance deficiencies over the last few years."

Five of the 15 violations were classified as Level 1, the most serious.

Department of Energy officials said they tried to let the lab correct some of its problems after a March 2005 violation, when several workers were exposed to radioactive materials while performing decontamination operations.

Another serious breakdown occurred in July 2005, the department said, when employees improperly handled radioactive americium and contaminated their work areas, homes and buildings in other states.

Special crews were dispatched to contain the radioactive contamination, which the Department of Energy said was below its limits. The violation notice said the lab management was putting emphasis on "mission accomplishment to the detriment of safety."

The other violations cited by the department involved improper safety procedures, training and record keeping on a wide range of issues, including combustible and radioactive materials.