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The University of California and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, which UC manages, recently announced plans to build a level-4 bio-defense lab near Tracy. Level-4 labs store the most dangerous diseases known to man -- Ebola, dengue fever, Lassa fever and "other illnesses for which there are no known cures." (1)

Last week WalMart staff joined three local chambers of commerce to hold a public meeting on the company’s proposed 1.2-million square-foot distribution center, to be located at the Mission Interchange of Highway 99. The Mission Interchange will join the highway to UC Merced, via the Campus Parkway, the southern leg of a beltway road around Merced that will convey traffic to the campus and the growth it is inducing north of the city.

The WalMart distribution center will bring about 1,000 trucks in and out of Merced per day.

There is a theory in political science that a nation's foreign policy is ultimately defined by domestic policies rather than perceived outside threats or opportunities. If this is so, the summer of 1979 may well have been the definitive fork in the road for the United States. President Jimmy Carter's "Crisis of Confidence" speech at that time turned out to be one of Ronald Reagan's main issues against him in the 1980 election.

From Florida comes the news that the US Fish & Wildlife are now asking developer consultants to prepare biological opinions on endangered species. It's another win/win, public/private partnership, except for the Public Trust. In fact, the Badlands editorial staff has yet to see a WWPPP where the public or wildlife were winners.