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Water Torture – Upcoming Symposium, Kool-Aid for the Uninformed

5/26/2013

http://seekingalpha.com/article/24410-t-boone-pickens-invests-in-water-should-you

WE have been following announcements and articles about the upcoming “free” symposium being offered in Bellingham on May 30-31 called “Water Supply: Searching for Certainty in Uncertain Times.”

WE have good reason to believe that the information being presented will be insidiously stacked for a pre-determined outcome. If you attend, it’s certain you’ll be “educated” that:

The “science is in.”
There isn’t enough water for both people and fish.
Climate change is going to make this worse.
“Exempt” water use, if not “illegal,” must be policed.
Tribal claims about water rights are rock solid; better not question them.
Property owners should put their fate in the hands of public-private partners to manage their resources and land.
It’s all too complicated for you to deal with – leave it to the “experts.”
If you don’t get with the program, you’ll be in a world of hurt.
Voluntary land use trades for water and mitigation will bring certainty (for your own good).
Halting rural and ag development will be necessary soon.
No other approach is “sustainable”.
And above all, don’t ask too many questions. There are no answers but these official answers.

Don’t be delphi’d. The narrative at this symposium is Kool-Aid to the uninformed.

Look at the list of presenters, and you’ll see that big money interests behind this symposium have everything to gain. The symposium is about land control as much as water resources (this land is your land, this land is their land). The program will pitch an elaborate system of autocratic control through trusts, a "natural resources marketplace," and a water management board that in all likelihood would never be directly accountable to anyone, just as notorious and remote as the WTA and PUD #1.

http://islandbreath.blogspot.com/2011/04/kiuc-sells-off-water-rights.html

What would stop it?

Is the water situation so dire that nannycrat control of Whatcom County is necessary?
News flash! The Pacific Ocean isn’t going to go dry and it’s highly unlikely that the North Wind will ever stop blowing rain our way.

So, while Whatcom County will always be one of the wetter counties in the entire state and nation, numerous well-known rent-seekers stand to make a fortune if citizens can be convinced that they should check their freedom at the door. [Musical note/quote: Bob Dylan, "You don't need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows," and "The pump don't work cause the vandals took the handle." Subterranean Homesick Blues.]

(Lest you think we're going dry, here's some verified climate data - precipitation and snowpack:

Click the images to see detailed information about actual data showing current trends.)

Given that - will the public be offered anything but envirodoom and restrictive agency policy?

http://www.silverbearcafe.com/private/home1.5.html

No. The presenters control the data and the narrative. This symposium is set to nudge the public in one direction only. If you revisit the recent "WRIA Watch" post, you'll notice that WIT folks are among the chief organizers and presenters of this symposium.

Whatcom Planning & Development and Public Works departments (and their cohorts at the City of Bellingham) have been directly involved, along with WWU/WSU based WWIN. Now, WWIN stands for the Whatcom Watersheds Information Network which claims to be a community group, but it's obviously run by bureaucrats. And the contractor hired to put this together is directly affiliated with the Puget Sound Partnership, who tirelessly promotes its "Action Agenda". Farm Friends (a grant-dependent lobby more than a real farm group) is involved, along with Futurewise's Jean Melious and the tribes. These special interests have their DNA all over this “free” informational extravaganza. The truth is, this event is being put on at considerable public expense to push official programs.

And none of the agencies behind this -- not one -- has an interest in protecting private citizens' water rights as they've existed historically. The thing is, we citizens aren't organized, and our interest in this topic is diffuse -- we're all busy working at our livelihoods. For the organizers, promoting the planning, "conservation" and "restoration" trade is their livelihood.

http://www.orionmagazine.org/index.php/articles/article/455/

Across the board, the “education” looks stacked. The only thing "certain" is that big dollar interests and career bureaucrats will have steady jobs far into the future policing citizens' water use, no matter how much pain and expense it inflicts on little guys like ranchers, small ag, small dairies and horsemen, tree farmers, and all the other people with private wells who can't afford to fight "the bigs" where it comes to retaining their rights.

WE wonder, "Who approved the grand plans that these people are presenting?" Look through the two day play-by-play script. Most of the presenters are staffers and middle-management types, lawyers, and a truckload of tribal employees. Some have extremely thin credentials to present the topics slated.

Events like this are professionally orchestrated by promoters, and loaded with shills -- with a few token “outliers” invited to make the event look fair. But the "fork in the road" outcome on Day 2 is designed for a crescendo of applause, and the illusion of community support and consensus. (While there are methods to keep heavily programmed meetings on the up-and-up, they require encyclopedic knowledge of the material plus intensive training. Amateurs confronting the ersatz authority of blue-ribbon panels often find themselves lambs to the slaughter.) If you don’t want to be manipulated, you may be better off elsewhere.

The bureaucratic overtake of water resources and land management can proceed only if the public goes along willingly. “Low information voters” are all-too willing to support the idea that others' rights are arbitrary. This event aims to manipulate with slick presentations, while impressive looking "experts" spout unfamiliar material and cite law cases. A big gobsmacked crowd is essential to make the junta look good.

Maybe you're going. If you are, listen closely to the rhetoric and try to find out what triggered this odd conglomerate to make the pitch they're promoting. Don't doubt for a minute that it doesn't intend to limit citizens' direct control of their property and resources.

But some people have decided not to go. Sentiments heard about town include:

Our
Water
Is Our
Business

This is
Local?
NO!

No
Thumbs
On The
Scale

Insider
Trading
Inside

Wheeling
& Dealing
Inside

We Insist
On A Fair
Process

No More
Secret
Deals

Real Farmers
Want Truth
About Water

No More
Crony
Deals

Power
Grab

How Dry
We’re Not

Kool-Aid
For The
Uninformed

Those could make some dandy signs. WE honestly don't know if anyone will protest this event, but it sounds like a very good idea.

11 Comments

Property Rights and use - Are they not tangible?

5/25/2013

3 Comments

Given that so many moves are underway to control land use here (by Futurewise and paid Puget Sound Partnership apologists, local planning and public works staffers, and state agencies) to restrict if not completely deny the use of privately held property, WE thought it was important to share this story. It explains a few fundamentals that must not be forgotten.

Heaven forbid the court of appeals' opinion in this case should stand. PLF has begun action; they're taking the issue the Washington State Supreme Court:

Yes, the Due Process Clause covers property owners.
Pacific Legal Foundation, by Daniel Himebaugh
April 3, 2013

We recently filed another brief asking a court to hold that the Fourteenth Amendment’s Due Process Clause protects property owners. I say another brief because the question of what constitutes protected “property” for due process claims continues to come up in various cases that PLF attorneys are litigating. The latest case on this important issue is Manna Funding, LLC v. Kittitas County.

The Due Process Clause says that no state shall deprive any person of property without due process of law. Naturally, you first need to know whether a person had “property” before you can determine if the government unlawfully deprived her of it. This is where courts sometimes trip up. In Manna, the Washington Court of Appeals held that Manna Funding—the owner of a tract of land—could not sue for damages when Kittitas County arbitrarily denied Manna’s request for a rezone, because Manna did not demonstrate that it had a constitutionally protected property interest at stake in the rezoning process.

You might think that demonstrating a property interest in Manna’s case would be easy. It is well-established that landowners enjoy a variety of legally protected property rights, including the right to use their property. As the Washington Supreme Court put it, “The basic rule in land use law is still that, absent more, an individual should be able to utilize his own land as he sees fit.” Furthermore, property owners who seek permission from the government to develop their property retain the “right to be free of arbitrary or irrational zoning actions,” according to the U.S. Supreme Court. This applies to Manna, so what happened to Manna’s property rights in the state court of appeals?

Instead of acknowledging that Manna has a property interest deriving from its ownership of land, the Washington Court of Appeals looked to whether Manna had an “entitlement” to have its property rezoned. The court found that there is no right to a rezone and therefore no property interest, but that misses the point. A property owner who needs special permission to use her property is not seeking a government entitlement (like social security or welfare) that may or may not constitute a property “right.” A property owner already has constitutionally protected property rights. Obtaining a land use permit is merely the process that the owner must follow in order to exercise those rights. The Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals said it well in River Park v. City of Highland Park: Zoning restrictions are not the measure of an owner’s property interest; they just create a set of rules restricting the exercise of preexisting property rights.

This does not mean that the government violates the Constitution every time it denies a land use permit. However, it does mean that the Due Process Clause applies whenever a property owner seeks permission to use her property in a particular way, because the owner has a property interest in her land and enjoys the right to be free of arbitrary government decisions related to her permit application.

Related posts:

There's an irritating attitude about rights that Whatcom County government has exhibited for some time: "What's not permitted isn't permitted." Really? How far does that go? When do zoning regulations, recommended stormwater "practices," mitigation requirements, and other prohibitions amount to uncompensated "takings" of not only property but personal rights?

The heart of this issue is addressed at the WE page, Diminishing Property Rights. The timeless principles discussed are not partisan or ideological. The matter of fairness related to "yours, mine, and ours" is universal. Rights and justice are the keystones of healthy and vibrant civilization.

3 Comments

Whatcom Tea Party Rally at IRS

5/22/2013

1 Comment

As you probably know, the IRS recently apologized for targeting organizations with names including “patriot” and “tea party” for tax audits and tax-exempt application delays prior to the 2012 election.

In response to that, on Tuesday, May 21 during the noon hour, the Whatcom Tea Party held a rally at the corner of Cornwall and West Magnolia.

Lining all four corners of the intersection, protesters held signs that said, "IRS Apology Not Accepted", "End IRS Corruption", "Stop IRS Political Discrimination", "Enemies Lists Are So 1970's", "Now, Just Taxes. Next, Just Health Care", "We Warned You About Things Like This", "We the People..." and more.

Not to put too fine a point on it, but the kind of government corruption that the IRS is guilty of, really is what the tea parties have been warning us about. At the same time the IRS story was breaking, President Obama was telling Ohio State University graduates,

Unfortunately, you've grown up hearing voices that incessantly warn of government as nothing more than some separate, sinister entity that's at the root of all our problems. Some of these same voices also do their best to gum up the works. They'll warn that tyranny always lurking just around the corner. You should reject these voices.

Should we really, Mr. President? Should we really? Glen Kessler at The Washington Post politics blog suggests we have reason to be concerned:

A bushel of Pinocchios for IRS’s Lois Lerner

In the days since the Internal Revenue Service first disclosed that it had targeted conservative groups seeking tax-exempt status, new information has emerged from both the Treasury inspector general’s report and congressional testimony Friday that calls into question key statements made by Lois G. Lerner, the IRS’s director of the exempt organizations division.

The clumsy way the IRS disclosed the issue, as well as Lerner’s press briefing by phone, were seen at the time as a public relations disaster. But even so, it is worth reviewing three key statements made by Lerner and comparing them to the facts that have since emerged. (Continue reading...)

If the current scandalabra that we're seeing in Washington D.C., doesn't give us pause to question authority, and to be wary of tyranny, then what the hell does?

1 Comment

Reconveyance: One Last Chance to Contact DNR

5/16/2013

1 Comment

Update: Offer Expired!

The comment period has closed. Let's hope the BNR at the DNR do the right thing, and listen to the voices of citizens about the importance of this state-managed property.

The Lake Whatcom Reconveyance will remove 8,800+ acres of land from timber harvest rotation that the Department of Natural Resources has used to support schools, county government, the port, other taxing entities and the Whatcom County timber industry. The Growth Management Hearings Board has been asked by a citizen named Jack Petree to determine whether the Whatcom County Council violated the Growth Management Act in requesting this reconveyance. (Read more at News About The Reconveyance Challenge...) Zoning is a part of the issue.

But the heart of Petree's concern is that active forestry as a resource should be protected just like agriculture is supposed to be protected under the GMA (growth management act). And, the DNR has a duty to keep forest resources productive.

You still have a last-minute chance to write to the Board of Natural Resources in Olympia to ask the board to hold off on their decision in early June about the Lake Whatcom Reconveyance until the Hearings Board has had a chance to make a decision. The cutoff date is Friday, May 17 for any letters, emails or calls to the BNR.

WE encourage readers who want to see active forestry continue to send an email right now. The Board of Natural Resources should wait for the Hearings Board to consider case 13-2-0016.

While the Whatcom Land Trust has always claimed that to have no financial motivation or interest in the outcome of this case, it's filed to intervene and be a party in the Hearings Board case. Surprised? WE aren't.

NEWS: Now foresters have become involved. This blog just reported that "Tom Westergreen, Richard Whitmore, and the A.L.R.T. corporation (a timber harvesting firm) have lawyered up and challenged the reconveyance. The Hearings Board has consolidated the Petree challenge and the new challenge so, a new timeline is established."

This is not a "right wing - left wing" issue. Active recreation supporters have questioned this too. See this extremely good letter that was posted at the Whatcom Watchdog.

It's important that this resource protection issue should be sorted before the state BNR makes its decision. Ask them to wait.

Here is the contact information:

Board of Natural Resources
1111 Washington St. SE
PO Box 47001
Olympia, WA 98504-7001
bnr@dnr.wa.gov
360-902-1103

Fax: 360-902-1775

Today is your last chance to contact the DNR with your concerns!

1 Comment

Data, Dogma and Discovery

5/11/2013

6 Comments

Those of you who have been following the saga of Dr. Easterbrook on these pages might be interested in where this has gone since the last time WE spoke.

Dr. Donald Easterbrook was interviewed along with Gordon Fulks with Kim Greenhouse on May 6, 2013 for a podcast (audio) called Data, Dogma and Discovery.

Dr. E. says: I always end each of my talks with a thought that comes from Patricia Wentworth who was an author in 1949. So this is a quote of hers, and not originally mine. And the quote is that, "Dogma is an impediment to the free exercise of thought. It paralyzes the intelligence. Conclusions based upon preconceived ideas are valueless. It is only the open mind that really thinks.”

WWU faculty continue attack on Easterbrook
posted at Icecap

After a vicious character assassination attack on Dr. Don Easterbrook by the Geology Dept at Western Washington University (WWU) following his testimony at a Washington State Senate hearing, the attack continues this week from other WWU faculty (May 8 article at the Herald).

In the latest attack, John Hardy, a retired professor of Huxley Environmental College at WWU characterizes the Easterbroook data as “selective half-truths chosen to support a pre-conceived idea, i.e. that humans are not having significant effects on the Earth's climate.”

Hardy states: “yes it is true that there have been multiple periods of warning over the past 10,000 to 15,000 years (since the last ice age). And, yes, at times it was warmer than the present. Yes, this happened before the rise in atmospheric carbon dioxide from the burning of fossil fuel. What the author fails to explain (but surely knows) is that these warming periods are largely the natural result of the Milankovich Cycle, i.e. changes in the orbital configuration and distance between the Earth and sun that determines how much solar energy and consequent heat the Earth receives.” Two things are apparent in this statement: (1) Harding doesn’t understand the basis for Milankovitch cycles—they involve much more than the distance between the Earth and sun, and (2) he didn’t look at Easterbrook’s data (see below). Milankovitch cycles are very, very slow, taking tens of thousands of years and could not possibly be responsible for the sudden, abrupt climate shifts of 20-30 years shown in Easterbrook’s data.

Figure 1. Two periods of global warming this century.

Figure 2. Twenty periods of warming in the past 500 years

Figure 1 shows two periods of 20-30 year global warming this century, separated by a 30 year cool period. The first warming period (1915-1945) occurring before CO2 emissions began to soar after 1945 so it cannot have been caused by rising CO2. From 1945 to 1977, while CO2 emissions were soaring, the climate cooled, just the opposite of what should have happened if CO2 causes global warming. Thus, CO2 has little or no effect on climate.

Figure 2 shows 20 periods of global warming, each averaging 27 years, in the past 5 centuries. All of these occurred prior to significant increase in CO2 so could not possibly have been caused by CO2. Nor could they have been caused by Milankovitch cycles, which take many thousands of years. Thus, Harding’s conclusion is demonstrably false.

Harding states: “Past global temperature variations are also related to natural variations in atmospheric carbon dioxide. Global temperature rose five degrees Celsius 56 million years ago in response to a massive injection of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere from volcanic activity.” Temperatures were indeed warmer 56 million years ago, but there has never been any evidence to support the idea that they were due to increased CO2 from volcanic activity. Volcanic eruptions typically cause global cooling, not warming, and last only a few years. The Eocene warm period lasted for tens of millions of years so could not be due volcanic eruptions.

Harding states: “Today, burning of fossil fuel is releasing greenhouse gases to the atmosphere at 10 times that rate. Indeed, it is the speed of today's human-caused temperature increase that is more troubling than the absolute magnitude, because adjusting to rapid climate change will be difficult. For example, the natural warming since the last ice age 18,000 years ago to about 1850 (the beginning of the industrial revolution) was about 5 degrees Fahrenheit or less than 0.0003 degrees per year. The average global temperature increase from 1850 until now has been almost 2 degrees Fahrenheit, or 0.0122 degrees per year - a rate 41 times faster than the pre-industrial warming.” This statement is truly astonishing! Harding apparently (1) did not look at the Easterbrook data (see Fig. 3 below) and (2) apparently knows nothing about temperatures since the last Ice Age.

Figure 3. Temperatures from Greenland ice cores.

From 18,000 to about 10,000 years ago, temperatures warmed and cooled as much as 20 °F in a single century. Virtually all of the warming from the last Ice Age to recent times occurred abruptly in a very short period of time about 10,000 years ago at rates of tens of degrees per century. It didn’t rise slowly over 18,000 years and to calculate an average over that whole period would not even be considered by any real scientist! Thus, Hardy’s conclusion that temperatures over that time period rose “less than 0.0003 degrees per year” is totally absurd. And to conclude that warming since 1850 has occurred at “a rate 41 times faster than the pre-industrial warming” is so ridiculous (just look at Fig. 3) that it is hard to imagine any real scientist reaching such a conclusion

Harding states that temperature records for Bellingham show that average February temperatures rose 5 °F from the 1920s to the 1990s. This number is highly suspect since the 1930s were warmer than the past decade and the temperature change is therefore much smaller.

Harding states: “Dr. Easterbook correctly notes that carbon dioxide makes up only a small percentage of our atmosphere. This does not mean it is irrelevant, in fact it shows just how powerful a greenhouse gas it is.” CO2 makes up only 0.039% of the atmosphere, has increased only 0.008% during the most recent period of warming, and accounts for only 3.5% of the greenhouse gas effect. To conclude that this proves “just how powerful a greenhouse gas it is” can only be arrived at by first assuming CO2 is the cause of warming. Since we know that CO2 cannot cause more than about 0.1 degree of warming, that assumption is not plausible and his conclusion is meaningless.

Harding states that CO2 “has increased by 37 percent since the beginning of the industrial revolution.” But that is meaningless--if you double nothing, you still have nothing! But even more important, water vapor accounts for about 95% of the greenhouse effect and in order to make their climate models work, computer modelers include a large water vapor factor based on the assumption that water vapor increases in lock step with rising CO2. Harding claims that water vapor “is now increasing due to increased ocean evaporation from the warming itself.” But is this really true? Figure 4 (below) shows atmospheric water vapor since 1948 at various level of the atmosphere and water vapor is not only not increasing, it is actually declining, thus making all of the model predictions worthless.

Figure 4. Atmospheric water vapor since 1948.

Harding states that "The probability that the level of coherence between.CO2 concentration and temperature is due to chance alone is about 2 out of 1 million." In other words, he claims that there is good correlation between temperature and CO2 and that the odds of that being coincidence is only 2 out of 1 million. But is there really a good correlation between CO2 and temperature? Figure 5 shows that there is no correlation at all between CO2 and temperature! One wonders how any person calling himself a scientist could construe otherwise!

What we can conclude about all of this is that this could have been a real discussion of climate issues, but Harding’s article contains no data and all of his unsupported assertions are contradicted by Easterbrook’s data. (See more stories at Icecap)

... so, the battle continues. Unfortunately, it seems the real battle is between truth (data and discovery) v. dogma. Will the truth out? Over time, it must.

Bonus: A scholarly reader - a physics professor emeritus in Massachusetts - just submitted this link to an article by Will Happer and Harrison Schmidt. The prof noted, "I have the highest respect for Happer. In the '90's he was fired from his science post by none other than Al Gore because he (Happer) insisted on better measurements of CO2 than those taken at airports."

6 Comments

Abandoned and Safeguarding Their Own Community

5/5/2013

1 Comment

Here is a video about a county in Oregon that's so cash-strapped there's not enough money for law enforcement anymore. Citizen volunteers have stepped up to fill the void -- with "Citizens Against Crime" handling theft cases and patrolling their roads and neighborhoods. These are not "vigilantes" but law-abiding citizens protecting themselves from crime and chaos.

This government has been forced to cut back severely on one of its most central duties.

Watch this short video, and learn firsthand why the Oregon county bumbled into their predicament:

Spoiler alert: Josephine County is broke because the BLM and environmentalists shut down local logging (a major part of the local economy, and a source of county government revenue), and now the citizens have to perform a critical government service by themselves because their government is broke. Read more about the story by clicking here, and here. The county tried to raise taxes, but with less work the people couldn't afford it and voted no. Whatcom County's just decided to give up over 8,800 acres of productive DNR timberland for a park, even though it's finances are often in crisis. Wages have been frozen for quite a while, furloughs and basic services are cut while planning, trail and park spending grows steadily.

Law enforcement is a legitimate and necessary government function. Environmental protection has been over-prioritized to criminalize normal human activities at a tremendous cost to individuals and the collective. Whatcom County could go down hard if we don’t get our priorities straight. Just like that county in Oregon.

1 Comment

Water Torture – Upcoming Symposium, Kool-Aid for the Uninformed

Property Rights and use - Are they not tangible?

Whatcom Tea Party Rally at IRS

Reconveyance: One Last Chance to Contact DNR

Update: Offer Expired!

Data, Dogma and Discovery

Abandoned and Safeguarding Their Own Community

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