Will try to post from site of IEN

If you are seeing this it means that I was unable to post from conference site, but back soon,
gregor

AT IEN CONFERENCE SEE AGENDA BELOW

“Answering Mother Earth’s Call for Healing –Reaffirming Our Roots”
AGENDA
Day One – Thursday, July 17th (THEME: LAND)
5:30 Sunrise Ceremony – Lighting of the Sacred Fire – Everyone is invited to witness the
lightning of the Fire. The Fire (Coals) from the previous 14th Protecting Mother Earth conference
held in Leech Lake Anishinaabe territories in Minnesota have been brought to the Newe
Sogobee. This Fire will be burning for the 4 days of the conference. People in their menstrual
time are asked not to be around the Fire.
7:00 – 8:30 Breakfast
9:00 Opening Ceremony of the Conference
Prayer
Grand Entry of Indigenous Participants
Welcome by IEN/WSDP leadership
Western Shoshone Traditional Leadership, Local Tribal Officials
10:00 Big Circle: Western Shoshone History of the Struggle
Raymond Yowell, Former Chief, Western Shoshone National Council (WSNC)
Carrie Dann, Western Shoshone Grandmother and WSNC
Mary McCloud, Western Shoshone Grandmother and WSDP Board Member
12:30-2:00 Lunch Break & Youth Networking Meeting
2:00 Big Circle: History of the Indigenous Struggle of Turtle Island and Presentations on
Original Instructions, Traditional Systems, Traditional Economies and Trade Routes
· Oren Lyons, (Onondaga Nation), Faithkeeper of the Turtle Clan, Six Nations, New York
· Louise Benally (Dine'), Traditional Dineh Sovereignty Nation Big Mountain, Struggle to
Define Mother Earth, Arizona
· Speaker from the South (Abayala TBA)
· Arthur Manuel (Secwepemc Nation) Indigenous Network on Economics and Trade,
British Colombia, Canada
4:30-6:30 Big Circle: History of Colonial Laws against Indigenous Peoples, Doctrine of
Discovery
· Steven Newcomb (Shawnee/Lenape), Indigenous Law Institute, California, Columnist
Indian Country Today, recently released a book entitled, “Pagans in the Promised
Lands”.
· Tupac Enrique Acosta (Xicano Peoples), Tonatierra Instutute and Tlahtokan Aztlan,
Phoenix, speaking on the Confederacy of the Eagle and the Condor, liberation from
colonial boundaries.
· Andrea Carmen (Yaqui), International Indian Treaty Council, California/Alaska, speaking
on the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples
6:30 Evening Meal
7:30 – 9:00 Youth Plenary
9:00 – Performers (Robby Romero (Apache)/Trinidad Goodshield (Lakota) & Traditional
Round Dance
Purification Ceremonies available in the evening
Day Two – Friday, July 18th (AIR)
5:30 Sunrise Ceremony
7:00 – 8:30 Breakfast
9:00-9:30 Opening Ceremony (Traditional Teaching - North)
9:30-12:30 Big Circle: Indigenous Struggles on Extractive Industry: Mining the Sources of Life -
Voices from the North and South - Moderated by Robert Shimek (Anishinaabe), Minnesota.
Speakers: Carrie Dann (Western Shoshone), WSDP; Samuel McKay, (Kitchenuhmaykoosib
Inninuwu) (Big Trout Lake) First Nations, Ontario, Canada; Speaker from Abayala – Latin
America country TBA; and others TBA.
9:30-12:00 and 2:00-4:30 On-Going Demonstration/Training Projects
1. Composting Toilet Construction - Pennelys Goodshield (Anishinaabe), Sustainable
Nations Development Project
2. Solar and Wind Power, Jeff Tobe Solar Energy International and John Shimek
(Anishinaabe Youth), Honor The Earth organization and White Earth Land Recovery
Project
12:30-2:00 Lunch Break – and Youth Networking
2:00-4:00 Small Circles (Workshops)
1. Water Healing and Protection with Virginia Sanchez (Duckwater Shoshone), Nevada; Rick
Spilsbury, (Ely Shoshone), Nevada; and Felicia Bertin
2. Mineral Extraction – Strategies and Solutions (Part 1) for communities impacted by
mining and mineral extraction
3. Beginning Steps in Organizing 101 (Part 1) – Native Trainers: Indigenous Peoples Project
(IP3) - Ruckus Society
4. Climate Change 101 and Solutions: Trainers, Jihan Gearon (Dine’), IEN Native Energy and
Climate Program, Arizona; and Kandi Mossett (Mandan, Arikira, Hidatsa), IEN Tribal
Campus Climate Challenge, North Dakota, IEN
5. Using CERD as a Human Rights Tool to Address our Issues with Alberto Saldamando,
Legal Counsel, (Chicano/Zapoteca), International Indian Treaty Council, California and
Julie Fishel, Legal Counsel, Western Shoshone Defense Project. Newe Sogobia (Nevada)
6. Youth Activity: Elder and youth discussion on history and spirituality
7. Traditional Food and Plant Discussion led by Shoshone elder
4:00-4:30 Afternoon Break – Music Stage
4:30-6:30 Small Circles (Workshops)
1. Mineral Extraction – Strategies and Solutions (Part 2) for communities impacted by
mining and mineral extraction.
2. Organizing 101 (Part 2): IP3 Ruckus Society Native Trainers
3. Wisdom and knowledge of traditional teachings, understanding spirituality and
mythology, with Walter Porter (Tlingit) mythologist
4. Toxics Policy: The Need for Aggressive Action, with Shawna Larson (Ahtna
Athabascan/Sugpiaq), Alaska Community Action on Toxics and IEN/REDOIL, Alaska and
Andrea Carmen (Yaqui), International Indian Treaty Council, California/Alaska
5. Youth Activity: Archery
6. Traditional Food and Plants Discussion (led by Shoshone elder)
6:30 Evening Meal
6:45 Networking & Caucuses: Sacred Areas, Border Justice, etc.
8:00 Talent Show – Performances from the Struggle
Purification Ceremonies in the evening
Day Three – Saturday, July 19th (WATER)
5:30 Sunrise Ceremony & Water Ceremony
7:00 – 8:30 Breakfast
9:00-9:30 Opening Ceremony (Traditional Teaching - East)
9:30-12:30 Big Circle: Energy Road of Destruction and Climate Change
Moderated by Clayton Thomas-Muller (Mathias Colomb Cree), Canada, Speakers: Nuclear: Ian
Zabarte (Western Shoshone), on Yucca Mountain, a proposed site for radioactive nuclear waste;
Geothermal and Sacred Area: Radley Davis (Pitt River) on Medicine Lake, California; Fossil Fuels
from Top of the World: Faith Gemmill (Gwichin Alaska), REDOIL, oil drilling, Alaska; Tar Sands:
Eriel Deranger (Fort Chipewyan Dene) on tar sands in Alberta Canada; Fossil Fuels Gas and Oil
Pipeline: Melina Laboucan-Massimo (Lubicon Cree), British Colombia; Fossil Fuels Oil Refinery:
Casey Camp-Horinek (Ponca) on oil refinery, Oklahoma; Loren White Jr. (Hidatsa) on oil drilling
and proposed refinery in North Dakota; Coal Fired Power Plant and Coal Mining: Elouise Brown
(Dine’), Dooda Desert Rock, New Mexico; Fossil Fuel, Coal Mining, Energy Policy: Enei Begaye
(Dine’/ Tohono O'Odham) Black Mesa Water Coalition on fossil fuel energy development on the
Navajo Nation, Arizona.
9:30-12:00 and 2:00-4:30 On-Going Demonstration/Training Projects
1. Straw Bale Wall (House) and Earth Plaster Construction - Pennelys Goodshield
(Anishinaabe), Sustainable Nations Development Project, California
2. Solar and Wind Power, Jeff Tobe Solar Energy International, Colorado, and John Shimek
(Anishinaabe Youth), White Earth Land Recovery Project and Honor The Earth
organization, Minnesota
12:30-2:00 Lunch Break - Youth Networking
2:00-4:00 Small Circles
1. Campaigning on Energy Issues (Part 1) – Strategies and Solutions with communities
impacted by energy and climate policies and development.
2. Direct Action Training Part 1 with IP3 – Ruckus Native Trainers
3. Corporate Campaign Development: Trainer, Miho Kim, Data Center, California
4. Toxic Waste Burners and Gasifiers: Trainer, Bradley Angel, Greenaction, California
5. Youth Activity: Traditional Foods and Plants Walking Tour
6. Cultural Resources Research and Reporting for Environmental Assessments: Monique
Sonoquie (Chumash/Apache). California, Ian Zabarte (Western Shoshone), WSNC, Newe
Sogobia, and Micheal Nixon (Seneca)
7. Indigenous Sustainable Economies: Arthur Manuel (Secwepemc Nation) Indigenous
Network on Economics and Trade, British Colombia, Canada and others TBA
4:00-4:30 Afternoon Break – Music Stage
4:30-6:30 Small Circles
1. Campaigning on Energy Issues (Part 2) – Strategies and Solutions with communities
impacted by energy and climate policies and development
2. Direct Action Training (Part 2): IP3 Ruckus Society Native Trainers
3. Well-Being: Healing Our Mind and Bodies of Contaminants: Renee Gurneau (Red Lake
Anishinaabe), Minnesota, Kathleen Tsosie (Dine’) New Mexico, and Jeanne Shenandoah,
traditional midwife, (Onondaga), New York
4. Indigenous-Centered Education: Nurturing the Next Generation of Indigenous
Leadership with Deb Harry, Kooyooe Dukaddo (Pyramid Lake Paiute), Nevada, Emerging
Indigenous Leaders Institute
5. Sacred Areas: Struggles of the Heart to Protect the Sacred: Sonny Weahkee, SAGE
Council, New Mexico, interactive session
6. Youth Activity: Making Dream Catchers
6:30 Evening Meal
6:45 Networking & Caucuses: Sacred Areas, Border Justice, etc.
8:00 Drum and Dance Celebration – Grand Entry – Participants in Traditional Outfits –
Honoring
8:00 Video and Films TBA
Late Night Purification Lodge Ceremonies
Day Four – Sunday, July 20th (FIRE-SUN-SPIRIT)
[Field trip this morning to a mining impact zone. (Approximately 2 hour round trip) – People
who sign up.]
5:30 Sunrise Ceremony
7:00 – 8:30 Breakfast
8:00 Departure on Field Trip
9:00-9:30 Opening Ceremony (Traditional Teaching - South)
9:30-12:30 Big Circle: Ethno Stress, Internalized Oppression and Healing: Renee Gurneau, (Red
Lake Anishinaabe), Minnesota and Dr. Eduardo Duran (invited), co-writer of the publication,
“Native American Postcolonial Psychology, California.
12:30-1:30 Lunch Break
1:30-3:30 Big Circle: Strategies for a Sustainable Indigenous Community and World
Original Instructions
· Community/Global Well-Being – Spirit, Environment, Economy, Culture – Speaker, Mato
Awanyankapi, Dine’/Dakota, Indigenous Environmental Network, Minnesota
· Protecting Cultural Heritage in a Globalized World – Speaker, Debra Harry, Kooyooe
Dukaddo (Pyramid Lake Paiute), Indigenous Peoples Council on Biocolonialism, Nevada
· Next Generation (Youth) Leadership - Speaker, TBA by the Youth Committee
Statements for Commitment
4:00 Closing Ceremony – Putting the Fire to Rest
.
Camp Take-down
6:00 Evening Meal

McCain: ‘I Know How to Win Wars’

McCain: ‘I Know How to Win Wars’

by Juliet Eilperin

ALBUQUERQUE — Arguing that the status quo in Afghanistan “is not acceptable,” Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) suggested today the U.S. can win the battle against the Taliban by “applying the tried and true principles of counterinsurgency used in the surge” in Iraq. In a prepared speech peppered with attacks against the presumptive Democratic nominee, Sen. Barack Obama (Ill.), McCain suggested Obama had been proven wrong in Iraq and lacked the judgment to oversee military forces in Afghanistan and elsewhere.

“I know how to win wars. I know how to win wars,” McCain told the audience at a town hall in Albuquerque. “And if I’m elected President, I will turn around the war in Afghanistan, just as we have turned around the war in Iraq, with a comprehensive strategy for victory, I know how to do that.”

McCain outlined a plan that includes sending at least three additional brigades; establishing a “unity of command” that will oversee U.S. as well as NATO forces; appointing a “Afghanistan czar” to report directly to the president on the progress of the war; and a boost in non-military assistance.

The presumptive GOP presidential nominee openly mocked Obama for his inexperience in the region, saying the Democrat had made up his mind about the war without surveying how U.S. troops were faring there.”Senator Obama is departing soon on a trip abroad that will include a fact-finding mission to Iraq and Afghanistan. And I note that he is speaking today about his plans for Iraq and Afghanistan before he has even left, before he has talked to General Petraeus, before he has seen the progress in Iraq, and before he has set foot in Afghanistan for the first time,” McCain said. “In my experience, and I’ve traveled around the world, usually at your expense, fact-finding missions usually work best the other way around: first you assess the facts on the ground, then you present a new strategy.”

McCain read two different quotes from Obama providing contrasting view of Iraq. In January 2007 the Illinois senator said of the surge, “We cannot impose a military solution on what has effectively become a civil war…. I don’t know any expert on the region or any military officer that I’ve spoken to privately that believes that that is going to make a substantial difference on the situation on the ground.” A year later Obama said he said that he had “no doubt” with the increase in troops “we would see a reduction in violence” in Iraq.

“My friends, flip-0floppers all over the world are enraged,” McCain said, as the friendly Republican audience laughed. “It gives new meaning, it gives new meaning.”

In addition to detailing how he would wage the fight on the ground in Afghanistan, the Arizona senator said he would work to rout out insurgents in Pakistan and convince Afghanistan’s neighbors the country should shift “from a theater for regional rivalries into a commons for regional cooperation.” Modeling his approach on Iraq, McCain said when it came to terrorists enjoying sanctuary in Pakistan, “This must end.”

“We must strengthen local tribes in the border areas who are willing to fight the foreign terrorists there — the strategy used successfully in Anbar and elsewhere in Iraq,” he said. “We must convince Pakistanis that this is their war as much as it is ours. And we must empower the new civilian government of Pakistan to defeat radicalism with greater support for development, health, and education.”

Taking a further swipe at Obama, McCain argued that his opponent’s willingness to consider a military strike against Pakistan has undermined counterinsurgency efforts there.

“In trying to sound tough, he has made it harder for the people whose support we most need to provide it,” he said. “I will not bluster, and I will not make idle threats. But understand this: when I am commander in chief, there will be nowhere the terrorists can run, and nowhere they can hide.” The audience cheered.

McCain took pains to point out that when it came to Iraq, both he and Obama “agreed the Bush administration had pursued a failed strategy there and that we had to change course,” but only he backed the surge in troops there. “Today we know Senator Obama was wrong,” McCain said. “The surge has succeeded.”

Buoyed by surveys like this week’s Washington Post-ABC News poll, which shows Americans give him higher marks as a commander in chief than Obama, McCain argued he has already shown he is better prepared to wage war in Afghanistan and Iraq. “In wartime, judgment and experience matter,” McCain said. “In a time of war, the commander in chief doesn’t get a learning curve. If I have that privilege, I will bring to the job many years of military and political experience; experience that gave me the judgment necessary to make the right call in Iraq a year and half ago.”

I am at IEN conference till July 21st . Follow links on this page, below

15^th Indigenous Environmental Network
Protecting Mother Earth Conference
“Answering Mother Earth's Call for Healing --
Reaffirming Our Roots”

July 17 – ^20th 2008

Secure Conference Registration & Donation Links
Para Chasquido español Aquí

Conference Agenda
.doc or .pdf. format

Important Information For Conference Attendees
.doc or .pdf format

(Includes Directions, Other Important Information, Ceremony Protocols, etc.

India's fight over 'national interest'

By Soutik Biswas BBC News, Delhi

The leaders say the deal is historic

What constitutes the national interest in India, a country trying to reconcile economic growth and inequality at home and pining to claim its place in the world at the same time?

Is it a landmark nuclear deal with the United States under which India will get access to US civilian nuclear technology and fuel?

An agreement which the government says will help meet some of oil-scarce India's spiralling energy demands. One, which it insists, will deepen strategic relations with a country with whom India had a near-hostile relationship during the Cold War.

Or does the national interest lie in taming runaway double-digit inflation - the highest in over a decade - that is choking growth and showing no signs of abating?

Or does it lie in tackling a stubborn unemployment problem that persists despite a recent economic boom?

The failure to come to a bipartisan answer to this tricky question - why can't a government carry off a nuclear deal and tackle poverty at the same time? - has plunged India into a bout of fresh political uncertainty.

Undue influence

Communist allies of India's Congress party-led governing coalition have withdrawn support after it decided to move ahead with the nuclear deal.

India's dour communists hate anything to do with the US - they argue that the deal would give the Americans undue influence over India's foreign and nuclear policy.

Wrong, says the government.

In the words of the architect of the deal, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, the agreement is historic and does India good. It is "an offer you cannot refuse".

Communist leader Prakash Karat has led the opposition to the deal

After nearly a year of sniping with the government over the fine print of the deal, the communist allies, who command 59 seats in India's 542-seat parliament, have decided that enough is enough.

Meanwhile, faced with the ignominy of becoming a lame duck government or possible early elections triggered by the nuclear row, India's Grand Old Party has been stitching up deals with a regional party and independents that would compensate for the loss of communist support in parliament.

Many analysts see this as a sorry tale.

They say the passage of a truly significant agreement which could change India's relations with the US and the world has had to rely finally on political horse trading, again exposing the murky underbelly of Indian politics.

"The Congress had dug itself into an impossible situation. If they didn't back the deal, everyone would have said, justifiably, that they let the communists walk all over them," says political commentator Pratap Bhanu Mehta.

"The puzzle is how did the party ever commit to this deal without doing the preparatory political work early on."

Down to the wire

The showdown over the deal between the communists and the Congress began nearly a year ago. The communists' historical anti-American ideology was well known to all.

So the way the battle over the deal went down the wire has baffled observers.

Most say Congress's tardy political management skills and a curious ruling diarchy - the technocrat Manmohan Singh as prime minister and party chief Sonia Gandhi as the political decision maker - are to blame for the crisis.

Critics have questioned Sonia Gandhi's political management

When the Congress, a dynastic party, won an unexpected victory at the general elections in 2004, the Italian-born Sonia Gandhi was the natural choice to become prime minister.

But after the defeated Hindu nationalist BJP party kicked up a storm over her nationality, she passed on the prime ministerial baton to the able, honest, unassuming and largely apolitical economist-bureaucrat Manmohan Singh.

Mr Singh, as federal finance minister, was responsible for opening up the Indian economy in 1991.

But he has never won a popular election and, as one analyst says, is a "prime minister who does not derive his power from the people".

So even as he agreed the deal with US President George W Bush, his party failed to sell it to its key communist allies.

"The problem is that a prime minister without political reflexes and a base cannot deliver even on foreign policy or economic issues," says analyst Mahesh Rangarajan.

Mr Singh has tried to make the nuclear deal the showpiece achievement of his tenure, and his legacy to the nation.

But critics say key economic, labour and farm reforms have remained stillborn because of resistance from within the party and its allies. And the jury is still out on the government's grandiose $2bn "back-to-work" scheme.

Rising woes

Mr Singh spoke eloquently of reforming public and educational institutions when he took office. Most of his efforts were stymied by obdurate allies, and a number of senior ministers.

Congress is wooing Samajwadi leader Mulayam Singh Yadav

"A prime minister of India must have the ability to stand on his own political feet. I cannot think of any major issues except this nuclear deal when the PM has had his way," says Pratap Bhanu Mehta.

That also has come at a cost - making an ally out of a former political foe to take the nuclear deal forward.

To add to the government's woes, the allies' pullout comes at a time when inflation and high interest rates are hurting the poor and the middle classes respectively.

So even if the governing coalition manages to save the deal and staves off early elections, its political fortunes look dim.

Even the government admits that inflation, fuelled by steep oil prices, is here to stay for a while.

And a nuclear deal cannot win votes in a country where many people still worry about their roti, kapda and makan (bread, clothes and home).

At the end of the day, the Congress still runs the danger of losing it all in the "national interest".

"Imagine," says an analyst, "that the deal hits more bumps in the completion stage and gets stuck."

Only the future will tell whether the deal finally served the national interest or sundry "self interests" - the Congress and its new-found allies.

It is possibly the biggest gamble by India's Grand Old Party in its chequered history.

Happy Trinity Day

Happy Trinity Day

Happy Trinity Day: on this day in 1945, the first atomic bomb was detonated in Los Alamos, NM.

Don't miss Ellen Klages's award-winning Green Glass Sea, the best story ever written about trinitite (the radioactive green-glass "rocks" made from sand fused by the Trinity detonation) and remember, you can buy the stuff online!

With gallows humor, the Los Alamos physicists got up a betting pool on the possible yield of the bomb. Estimates ranged from zero to as high as 45,000 tons of TNT. Enrico Fermi, who won the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1938 for his work on nuclear fission, offered side odds on the bomb destroying all life on the planet.

J. Robert Oppenheimer, scientific director of the Manhattan Project, was under no illusions about what he and his fellow physicists had wrought. The effects of the blast, the equivalent of 20,000 tons of TNT, moved the intellectual Oppenheimer to quote from the Bhagavad Gita: "If the radiance of a thousand suns were to burst at once into the sky, that would be like the splendor of the mighty one. Now I am become Death, destroyer of worlds."

More prosaically, Dr. Kenneth Bainbridge, site director of the Trinity test, said: "Now we are all sons-of-bitches.

Huntsman miffed by Bush official's

Huntsman miffed by Bush official's pessimism on energy future

By Matt Canham
The Salt Lake Tribune

Article Last Updated: 07/14/2008 06:21:27 AM MDT

PHILADELPHIA - As the nation's governors were calling for an energy revolution that would eliminate the reliance on foreign oil and fight climate change, a Bush administration official told them it wasn't "realistic" to think the United States could or should become energy independent.
That was not what Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. wanted to hear.
He called the remarks from a Department of Energy deputy assistant secretary "the most pessimistic comments made today." And later in an interview with The Salt Lake Tribune, he said the position will leave the department "on what I think is the wrong side of history.'
The National Governors Association wraps up its summer meetings today (MONDAY) and energy policy has dominated the agenda. In a mostly bipartisan manner, these state executives called for an expansion in renewable sources of energy like wind and solar. They requested more research into capturing the pollution from burning coal and into new types of biofuel. They even delved into more politically touchy subjects, such as increasing offshore drilling and building new nuclear power plants.
But it was the comments of DOE Deputy Assistant Secretary James Slutz, who works in the office of fossil energy, that caused the biggest stir.
He told a meeting of the association's natural resources committee, of which Huntsman is a member, that coal, oil and natural gas will remain "indispensable," and while the United States gets much of its oil from

domestic wells, it will forever need to import oil to meet demand.
"I would imagine that the Department of Energy would be taking just the opposite approach and that is leading out with a vision," said Huntsman, who also criticized President Bush's $1.2 billion hydrogen fuel cell project as paltry.
He tried to rally governors behind "a moon shot" approach to tackling energy, which he also pushed two weeks ago at the Western Governors Association meetings in Wyoming.
"It takes presidential leadership, nothing short of that will do," he said, referring to President Kennedy's famous call to put a man on the moon.
While Huntsman has long been a supporter of Republican candidate John McCain, he said both major candidates have shown an interest in taking on the issue. He believes the new president should make energy policy the dominant issue of his first year in office and should start speaking out even before the inauguration.
The western governors will try to develop a plan that either Obama or McCain could adopt that would try to tackle the rising costs, the pollution and the reliance on foreign suppliers, many of whom are antagonistic to the United States.
A presidential call for an energy awakening would have to focus on renewables, said Robert Malone, president of BP America, an oil company that is highly invested in other types of energy.
Malone said past presidents starting with Nixon have made half-hearted calls for energy independence, or small attempts to grow an alternative fuel industry, that has left the nation in the bind that it is in.
"As a nation we can't afford to get it wrong again," he said.
One expert disagreed with Huntsman's "moon shot" approach.
Vijay Vaitheeswaran, a presenter at the conference and correspondent for The Economist, who also co-authored "Zoom: The global race to fuel the car of the future," said the next president shouldn't make the mistakes of his predecessor by betting big on some alternative sources that have yet to be proven.
He wants government leaders to "remove the perverse and distorted subsidies" from things like oil and corn-based ethanol and get out of the way.
"Solutions emerge from the bottom up, they always have."

Huntsman miffed by Bush official's pessimism on energy future

By Matt Canham
The Salt Lake Tribune

Article Last Updated: 07/14/2008 06:21:27 AM MDT

PHILADELPHIA - As the nation's governors were calling for an energy revolution that would eliminate the reliance on foreign oil and fight climate change, a Bush administration official told them it wasn't "realistic" to think the United States could or should become energy independent.
That was not what Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. wanted to hear.
He called the remarks from a Department of Energy deputy assistant secretary "the most pessimistic comments made today." And later in an interview with The Salt Lake Tribune, he said the position will leave the department "on what I think is the wrong side of history.'
The National Governors Association wraps up its summer meetings today (MONDAY) and energy policy has dominated the agenda. In a mostly bipartisan manner, these state executives called for an expansion in renewable sources of energy like wind and solar. They requested more research into capturing the pollution from burning coal and into new types of biofuel. They even delved into more politically touchy subjects, such as increasing offshore drilling and building new nuclear power plants.
But it was the comments of DOE Deputy Assistant Secretary James Slutz, who works in the office of fossil energy, that caused the biggest stir.
He told a meeting of the association's natural resources committee, of which Huntsman is a member, that coal. oil and natural gas

remain "indispensable," and while the United States gets much of its oil from
domestic wells, it will forever need to import oil to meet demand.
"I would imagine that the Department of Energy would be taking just the opposite approach and that is leading out with a vision," said Huntsman, who also criticized President Bush's $1.2 billion hydrogen fuel cell project as paltry.
He tried to rally governors behind "a moon shot" approach to tackling energy, which he also pushed two weeks ago at the Western Governors Association meetings in Wyoming.
"It takes presidential leadership, nothing short of that will do," he said, referring to President Kennedy's famous call to put a man on the moon.
While Huntsman has long been a supporter of Republican candidate John McCain, he said both major candidates have shown an interest in taking on the issue. He believes the new president should make energy policy the dominant issue of his first year in office and should start speaking out even before the inauguration.
The western governors will try to develop a plan that either Obama or McCain could adopt that would try to tackle the rising costs, the pollution and the reliance on foreign suppliers, many of whom are antagonistic to the United States.
A presidential call for an energy awakening would have to focus on renewables, said Robert Malone, president of BP America, an oil company that is highly invested in other types of energy.
Malone said past presidents starting with Nixon have made half-hearted calls for energy independence, or small attempts to grow an alternative fuel industry, that has left the nation in the bind that it is in.
"As a nation we can't afford to get it wrong again," he said.
One expert disagreed with Huntsman's "moon shot" approach.
Vijay Vaitheeswaran, a presenter at the conference and correspondent for The Economist, who also co-authored "Zoom: The global race to fuel the car of the future," said the next president shouldn't make the mistakes of his predecessor by betting big on some alternative sources that have yet to be proven.
He wants government leaders to "remove the perverse and distorted subsidies" from things like oil and corn-based ethanol and get out of the way.
"Solutions emerge from the bottom up, they always have."

Longest Walk 2 Song, I am there singing out my heart

Longest walk song recorded live at Ft. Defiance, AZ. 2008. Look for me in back, gregor

Bush Signs Spy Bill, ACLU Sues

By Ryan Singel July 10, 2008 | 3:58:54 PMCategories: NSA

President Bush addressed reporters Thursday morning as he signed a bill expanding his surveillance powers.
Photo: White House

The American Civil Liberties Union filed suit Thursday over a controversial wiretapping law, challenging the constitutionality of the expanded spy powers Congress granted to the president on Wednesday.

The federal lawsuit was filed with the court just hours after Bush signed the bill into law.

The ACLU is suing on behalf of journalist and human rights groups, asking the court put a halt to Congress's legalization of Bush's formerly secret warrantless wiretapping program. The ACLU contends (.pdf) the expanded spying power violates the Constitution's prohibition on unreasonable searches and seizures.

On Wednesday, the Senate gave final congressional approval to a massive expansion of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, finishing a year of debate over how far the U.S. government should be able to conduct blanket surveillance using telecom facilities inside the United States.

In passing the FISA Amendments Act, Congress gave the executive branch the power to order Google, AT&T and Yahoo to forward to the government all e-mails, phone calls and text messages where one party to the conversation is thought to be overseas. President Bush signed the bill into law Thursday morning, describing it as a bill that "protect[s] the liberties of our citizens while maintaining the vital flow of intelligence."

The ACLU contends those blanket powers to grab international communications of Americans without specific court orders violate the Fourth Amendment and would stymie journalists who often speak to confidential sources outside the country.

Plaintiff Naomi Klein, the liberal columnist and author, said the surveillance would compromise her writing about international issues.

"If the U.S. government is given unchecked surveillance power to monitor reporters' confidential sources, my ability to do this work will be seriously compromised," Klein said.

Longtime foreign correspondent Christopher Hedges admits that surveillance is not a new obstacle for journalists, but says this goes a step too far.

"There is a lot of monitoring that goes on especially when you are overseas," Hedges said. "But this creates a further erosion in my ability to work as a journalist."

The suit, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York Thursday, asks the judge to stay the implementation of the new powers, until its constitutionality is determined.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation, which has spearheaded the still ongoing lawsuits against the nation's telecoms, will challenge the provision of the bill that gives retroactive amnesty to telecoms that are being sued for helping the government spy on Americans without warrants.

They argue that Congress's attempt to have citizen lawsuits dismissed violates the separation of powers.

But the San Francisco-based online rights group also announced in a fund-raising letter on Thursday that it would also challenge the constitutionality of the bill's expanded spying powers.

"We are also preparing a new case against the government for its warrantless wiretapping, past, present and future," said EFF senior staff attorney Kevin Bankston, who said the details were being withheld to keep the element of surprise.

"But suffice to say it will be quite different from the other cases against the government that have been filed so far," Bankston said. "Like with our case against AT&T, however, the ultimate goal will be the same: to halt the mass interception of Americans' communications and to dismantle the dragnet spying network that was first exposed by our witness, AT&T whistleblower Mark Klein."

(Story updated to quote EFF's Bankston)

See Also:

• Senate Approves Telecom Amnesty, Expands Domestic Spying Powers
• Senate Rejects Amendments That Would Have Stripped Telecom Amnesty ...
• Netroots Activists Mad at Obama for Spy Bill Flip-Flop
• AT&T Whistleblower: Spy Bill Creates 'Infrastructure for a Police ...
• Court-Approved Wiretapping Rose 14 Percent in '07

Sold for $69,000: Alcatraz Flag

Sold for $69,000: Alcatraz Flag

By Michelle Locke

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — A flag believed to have flown when a group of American Indians occupied Alcatraz nearly 40 years ago sold for $69,000 at an auction Thursday.

The flag was sold to an unidentified private collector, said Bruce MacMakin, senior vice president of PBA Galleries in San Francisco where the flag was sold.

It wasn't clear how big a role the flag had in the 1969 protest. Some participants of the occupation said they didn't recall the flag and were dismayed at the idea of it being sold for profit.

"I think that's a stretch, to call that historic," said Adam Fortunate Eagle Nordwall, one of the organizers of the 19-month occupation. "When I look at the picture of that flag, it really doesn't do anything to me as an artist, or as a Native American. It really is not symbolic of the Indian cause."

But MacMakin said the seller provided detailed documentation, including a 1970 photograph from the San Francisco Chronicle that showed it flying on Alcatraz and a snapshot of the woman who designed the flag handing it over to be raised.

"It was just fascinating," MacMakin said.

Known to many as "The Rock," home to a now-closed federal penitentiary, Alcatraz also was the site of three American Indian occupations, the longest and best-known of which began on Nov. 20, 1969, when organizer Richard Oakes led a group of supporters to the island.

The protest got massive attention and drew thousands of American Indians from around the country. The occupation ended in June 1971, but the movement it inspired continued, inspiring a new era of American Indian activism.

At the time of the occupation, Nall, a Penobscot Indian, was living in San Francisco. The flag she designed, which consists of red and white stripes with a teepee made up of stars, was intended as a symbol of unity honoring American Indians, according to paperwork accompanying the flag.

The flag was sold on behalf of Daniel Hagar, a Florida man who said Nall, who died in 1983, was his stepfather's aunt.

Hagar, 55, said he contacted museums and some tribes before putting the flag up for sale, but no one wanted it except as a gift. He said he hopes the flag eventually is put on display.

"It's quite a piece of American Indian history," he said. "I just thought it should be where other people could see it."

Nordwall, who did not live on Alcatraz during the occupation but made frequent visits, wasn't happy about the auction, but was glad to see interest being paid to a key moment of American Indian history.

"That's the positive side as I see this story," said Nordwall, now 78 and living on a reservation in Nevada. "It gets people reacquainted with the fact that there was an occupation of Alcatraz."

Boxer Statement: Response to Bush Administration's Rejection of Global Warming Regulation

Boxer Statement: Response to Bush Administration's Rejection of Global Warming Regulation

Published on Jul 12, 2008 - 10:44:45 AM

By: Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works

Washington, DC July 11, 2008 - U.S. Senator Barbara Boxer (D-CA), Chairman of the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works, made the following remarks regarding the Advanced Notice of Proposed Rulemaking on global warming emissions released today by the Bush Administration:

Senator Boxer said: "The Bush Administration decision today to effectively reject regulation of global warming pollution under the Clean Air Act, creates a clear and present danger to the American people. Despite the Supreme Court's finding that EPA was ducking its responsibility under the law to control global warming emissions, the Bush Administration continues to block all action."

"We now know that top scientists have found that global warming presents a threat to the health and safety of the American people and that the Clean Air Act gives EPA the tools to protect the public. Special moneyed interests weighed in and lo and behold, today the Bush Administration has essentially ordered EPA to do nothing to address the danger of global warming."

"This proves that, despite all of the President's rhetoric at the G8 Summit about working to reduce global warming pollution, he meant none of it."

"This means that the Clean Air Act, signed by Richard Nixon and carried out by every President since, has been shredded by President Bush, who will go down in history as the first president to so gravely endanger the health and safety of the American people."

"My Committee is not going to let up this year. And next year, we will provide the new President with a report on the steps that can be taken to begin to address global warming immediately. It is important to note that just last month, 54 Senators supported moving forward to address global warming. Both Presidential candidates have also agreed that global warming requires urgent action and have confirmed they will sign the waiver to allow California and the other states to regulate greenhouse gas pollution from vehicles."

"At least we know that these dark days will come to an end soon."

German rethink on nuclear plants

German rethink on nuclear plants

By Bertrand Benoit

Published: July 14 2008 03:00 | Last updated: July 14 2008 03:00

Conservative politicians and Germany's big power companies have started work on an agreement to reverse the country's planned phasing-out of nuclear power.

The deal, which negotiators describe as little more than a sketch so far, would see nuclear plant operators setting up a fund using some of the extra profits derived from letting their plants run past the current deadline for the last plant closure in 2022.

The money could be used to finance research in renewable energy, lower electricity prices for poorer households, or efficiency measures such as a campaign to improve home insulation. Most plants in Germany generate considerable profits.

Bertrand Benoit, Berlin

NIST gets black eye over plutonium spill

INTERNAL REPORT SAYS POOR TRAINING, PROCEDURES MADE INCIDENT WORSE

BOULDER, Colo. (AP) -- An internal investigation found that sloppy safety procedures and poor training and response contributed to the mishandling of a plutonium spill at the federal National Institute of Standards and Technology lab last month.

A vial cracked June 9 and about one-quarter gram of powder containing plutonium spilled. An investigation by experts found that the vial probably cracked while three scientists were performing an experiment involving a spectroscopy system used to detect radiation.

One of the scientists, a visiting researcher from India, then washed his hands in the sink, sending a small amount of the plutonium down the drain into Boulder's public sewer system.

The researcher also left the lab with a contaminated notebook. Other researchers who entered and left the lab in the meantime were also exposed.

Even though the use of radioactive materials has increased over the years, the investigation found there were no procedures for handling plutonium or a plutonium spill.

One of the experts, retired supervisory health physicist Lester Slaback, said he wouldn't describe what happened as an accident.

"It was the inevitable (or at least highly likely) and forseeable end result" of problems in the lab, said Slaback, who worked at the lab for 21 years.

"These researchers are highly intelligent. Ignorance should not be an issue but certainly it was in this incident."

Officials say a few employees had internal plutonium exposure, which can lead to cancer.

Radiation was found in two buildings but officials say no threats to public health or the environment have been identified.

Federal officials have told the lab to stop using radioactive materials until it can show its procedures are safe.

NIST estimated that less than 11 percent of the spilled material may have ended up in the sewer system, which is within discharge limits of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.

U.S. Rep. Mark Udall, D-Colo., has scheduled a Congressional hearing on the incident on Tuesday.

FREE: Online "SECRET FALLOUT " the book

SECRET FALLOUT
Low-Level Radiation from Hiroshima to Three Mile Island
Table of Contents

The following is reprinted here with permission of the author,
Dr. Ernest J. Sternglass who owns the rights to this book.
Permission to distribute this book is freely given
so long as no modification of the text is made.

Entergy Vermont Yankee reactor cut to 23 pct power

NEW YORK, July 14 (Reuters) - Entergy Corp's (ETR.N: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) 620-megawatt Vermont Yankee nuclear power station in Vermont dipped to 23 percent power by early Monday, the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission said in a report.

On Friday, the unit was operating at full power.

Vermont Yankee, which entered service in 1972, is located in Vernon in Windham County, about 80 miles north of Hartford, Connecticut.

In January 2006, Entergy filed for a 20-year extension of the unit's original 40-year operating license. The company provided the NRC with additional information in August 2007.

It usually takes the NRC about 22 months (November 2007) to make a decision on a license renewal without a hearing and about 30 months (July 2008) with a hearing.

The NRC however has said it will likely take more time to make a decision due to the filing of the additional information.

During week of July 21, the NRC's Atomic Safety and Licensing Board (ASLB) will hold a hearing on three contentions concerning metal fatigue and the aging of the steam dryer and piping if the reactor.

One MW powers about 1,000 homes in Vermont.

Entergy, of New Orleans, owns and operates about 30,000 MW of generating capacity, markets energy commodities, and transmits and distributes power to 2.7 million customers in Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi and Texas. (Reporting by Scott DiSavino; Editing by John Picinich)

Backlog worth billions

Backlog worth billions
Justice Department taking too long to resolve backlog of cases alleging fraud

Sat, Jul 12, 2008 (2:08 a.m.)

A backlog of whistleblower cases accusing private contractors of defrauding the government out of billions of dollars has grown to more than 900, and lawyers say the Justice Department is either dragging its feet or is unable to deal with the burgeoning caseload.

Many of the cases involve federal payments to contractors for services connected with the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, The Washington Post reports. The caseloads have risen by 300 to 400 a year since 2001, commensurate with a period in which the services government is supposed to provide have increasingly been farmed out to private companies.

The Justice Department reviews whistleblowers’ allegations in a complicated process that is closed to the public. It can take 14 months or more for officials to determine whether the department should intervene, and can then take years to resolve a case.

The payoff for pursuing those accused of defrauding the government can be huge. The federal government has recouped almost $13 billion in recent years from cases in which verdicts or settlements were reached.

The 75 Justice Department lawyers assigned to these cases handle about 100 of them a year. That has created a backlog that will take a decade to clear, even if no new cases are added, a spokesman for Taxpayers Against Fraud, an advocacy group that supports more funding for whistleblower cases, told the Post.

Other critics say a lack of funding is only part of the reason for the delays and accuse the Justice Department of dragging its feet because federal officials don’t want to admit they have been overbilled and, what’s worse, have paid those bills.

This is ridiculous. Bush administration officials and Republican conservatives have called for cuts in social programs at every turn, while giving private contractors lucrative deals to provide vital services — which in some cases aren’t delivered, or for which the government is overcharged.

The Justice Department must investigate these cases more diligently and quickly and put an end to this fleecing of American taxpayers.

Bomber Error Led To Air Force Oust WASHINGTON (CBS News) ― Defense Secretary Robert Gates ousted the Air Force's top military and civilian leaders Thu

Bomber Error Led To Air Force Oust
WASHINGTON (CBS News) ― Defense Secretary Robert Gates ousted the Air Force's top military and civilian leaders Thursday, holding them to account in a historic Pentagon shake-up after embarrassing nuclear mix-ups.

Gates announced at a news conference that he had accepted the resignations of Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Michael Moseley and Air Force Secretary Michael Wynne - a highly unusual double firing, reports CBS News correspondent David Martin.

"I believe these actions are required because … the focus of the air force leadership has drifted with respect to perhaps its most sensitive mission," said Gates.

Gates said his decision was based mainly on the damning conclusions of an internal report on the mistaken shipment to Taiwan of four Air Force electrical fuses for ballistic missile warheads. And he linked the underlying causes of that slip-up to another startling incident: the flight last August of a B-52 bomber that was mistakenly armed with six nuclear-tipped cruise missiles.

The report drew the stunning conclusion that the Air Force's nuclear standards have been in a long decline, a "problem that has been identified but not effectively addressed for over a decade."

Gates said an internal investigation found a common theme in the B-52 and Taiwan incidents: "a decline in the Air Force's nuclear mission focus and performance" and a failure by Air Force leaders to respond effectively.

In a reflection of his concern about the state of nuclear security, Gates said he had asked a former defense secretary, James Schlesinger, to lead a task force that will recommend ways to ensure that the highest levels of accountability and control are maintained in Air Force handling of nuclear weapons.

In somber tones, Gates told reporters his decision to remove Wynne and Moseley was based on the findings of an investigation of the Taiwan debacle by Adm. Kirkland Donald. The admiral found a "lack of a critical self-assessment culture" in the Air Force nuclear program, making it unlikely that weaknesses in the way critical materials such as nuclear weapons are handled could be corrected, Gates said.

Gates said Donald concluded that many of the problems that led to the B-52 and the Taiwan sale incidents "have been known or should have been known."

The Donald report is classified; Gates provided an oral summary.

"The Taiwan incident clearly was the trigger," Gates said when asked whether Moseley and Wynne would have retained their positions in the absence of the mistaken shipment of fuses. He also said that Donald found a "lack of effective Air Force leadership oversight" of its nuclear mission.

The investigation found a declining trend in Air Force nuclear expertise - not the first time that has been raised as a problem, Gates said - and a drifting of the Air Force's focus away from its nuclear mission, which includes stewardship of the land-based missile component of the nation's nuclear arsenal, as well as missiles and bombs assigned for nuclear missions aboard B-52 and B-2 long-range bombers.

Gates also announced that "a substantial number" of Air Force general officers and colonels were identified in the Donald report as potentially subject to disciplinary measures that range from removal from command to letters of reprimand. He said he would direct the yet-to-be-named successors to Wynne and Moseley to evaluate those identified culprits and decide what disciplinary actions are warranted - "or whether they can be part of the solution" to the problems found by Donald.

White House press secretary Dana Perino said President Bush knew about the resignations but that the White House had "not played any role" in the shake-up.

Early reaction from Capitol Hill was favorable to drastic action.

"Secretary Gates' focus on accountability is essential and had been absent from the office of the secretary of defense for too long," said Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee. "The safety and security of America' nuclear weapons must receive the highest priority, just as it must in other countries."

Gates said he would make recommendations to Bush shortly on a new Air Force chief of staff and civilian secretary. Gates has settled on candidates for both jobs but has not yet formally recommended them, one official said.

Gen. Duncan J. McNabb is the current Air Force vice chief of staff.

Moseley, who commanded coalition air forces during the initial invasion of Iraq in March 2003, became Air Force chief in September 2005; Wynne, a former General Dynamics executive, took office in November 2005.

Wynne is the second civilian chief of a military service to be forced out by Gates. In March 2007 the defense secretary pushed out Francis Harvey, the Army secretary, because Gates was dissatisfied with Harvey's handling of revelations of inadequate housing conditions and bureaucratic delays for troops recovering from war wounds at Walter Reed Army Medical Center.

Wynne and Moseley issued their own written statements.

"As the Air Force's senior uniformed leader, I take full responsibility for events which have hurt the Air Force's reputation or raised a question of every airman's commitment to our core values," Moseley said.

Wynne said he "read with regret" the findings of the Donald report.