agimarc@ak.net Monday, Sep 9, 2013 Howdy all, a few Interesting Items for your information. Enjoy – In this issue: 1. EPA 2. Bakery 3. Spaceship 2 4. Recalls 5. Culverts 6. DC Cops 1. EPA. Our Federal Masters at the EPA sent their private military into Alaska over the last several weeks, with a series of armed raids into placer mining claims in the Fourtymile River area in interior Alaska. The intra-agency feds wore body armor and carried automatic weapons. There were over 30 claims raided to investigate suspicion of violations of federal and state clean water laws. When complaints about the raid, tactics and attitude of the feds hit the fan, Alaska’s Governor Sean Parnell went ballistic, demanding an immediate explanation from the EPA Administrator. There were reports of State employees involved, though at the time of the report in the local McClatchy fish wrapper, they were all crawfishing as fast as humanly possible to get out of the line of fire. In the old days, it was the miner

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Interesting Items
EPA War on energy
Alex Gimarc
agi...@ak.net



Monday, Sep 9, 2013



Howdy all, a few Interesting Items for your information. Enjoy –


In this issue:

1. EPA
2. Bakery
3. Spaceship 2
4. Recalls
5. Culverts
6. DC Cops

1. EPA. Our Federal Masters at the EPA sent their private military
into Alaska over the last several weeks, with a series of armed raids
into placer mining claims in the Fourtymile River area in interior
Alaska. The intra-agency feds wore body armor and carried automatic
weapons. There were over 30 claims raided to investigate suspicion of
violations of federal and state clean water laws. When complaints
about the raid, tactics and attitude of the feds hit the fan, Alaska’s
Governor Sean Parnell went ballistic, demanding an immediate
explanation from the EPA Administrator. There were reports of State
employees involved, though at the time of the report in the local
McClatchy fish wrapper, they were all crawfishing as fast as humanly
possible to get out of the line of fire. In the old days, it was the
miners that held the firearms, with the feds showing up hat in hand.
My how things have changed. The tactics were clearly meant to
intimidate the miners. Though I don’t believe they will get the
response they want if they keep this up. And the state employees who
cooperated with the planning and execution of the raids are in
jeopardy of losing their jobs.
http://www.adn.com/2013/09/05/ 3059732/parnell-orders- investigation-of.html

The EPA also fined Shell Oil over a million dollars for clean air
permit violations for their drilling attempts in the Chukchi Sea in
2012. The permit required new emissions control equipment that had
not been used in the Arctic before and Shell had a difficult time
orchestrating the drilling attempt to the new and unreasonable
standards written by the EPA. This is all proceeding as expected,
with the EPA busily writing emissions standards that are either too
expensive or too unreasonable to meet. If a company capable of
bringing billions of dollars of resources and expertise to bear on the
problem of clean water and clean air is incapable of doing what they
need to do to the new standards, it would appear that the EPA has done
precisely what they intended, shut down Arctic exploration via the
simple stroke of the regulatory pen. Final story comes out of
Indiana, where Duke Energy in return for a clean air permit for a new
coal gasification plant has agreed to shut down five coal fired
generation plants, removing 668 MW of electric generation from the
grid by 2018. The agreement was with the Sierra Club and several
other environmental groups. This brings to over 50,000 MW of coal
fired generation shut down since 2010. The agreement also requires
Duke Energy to purchase solar energy produced by their rate payers or
install 15 MW of “green” unreliable energy generation (wind or solar).
They only reason they agreed to this extortion is the value of the
new coal gasification operation. The greens and EPA are abusing the
licensing and permitting process to push their political agenda down
the collective throats of an unwilling public. And it will make
energy more expensive and less reliable for all of us in the years to
come.
http://dailycaller.com/2013/ 08/30/enviro-lawsuit-forces-
five-indiana-coal-plants-to- shut-down/

2. Bakery. The freedom of association enshrined in the First
Amendment no longer applies to religious Americans in Oregon. A small
bakery owned by a Christian family that refused to sell a wedding cake
to a pair of lesbians shut its doors in response to a yearlong
anti-discrimination investigation by the State of Oregon. The small,
family owned business had done business with the couple before, so
they had no history of choosing sides in the culture wars. However,
they were Christians and as such wore their beliefs on their sleeves,
allowing themselves to be singled out for government led bullying by
the lesbians. In short, much like the New Mexico photographer who
refused to do a gay wedding photo shoot, they were set up and targeted
based upon their Christian religion and beliefs. The business chose
to close the store and move the bakery operation into their home
rather than spend years paying legal bills defending their religious
beliefs. Once the Children of the Rainbow are perceived as bullies
and thugs, using the power of government to harass and intimidate
their neighbors and law-abiding Christians, they will lose the public
relations wars and become as beloved as the Islamists. They aren’t
chopping off any heads, but they are just as in your face and just as
nasty. And the reaction to their actions will be just as unpleasant
and richly deserved.

3. Spaceship 2. Thursday, Richard Branson’s Virgin Galactic
Spaceship 2 had its second powered flight, going supersonic for the
first time. It also topped out over 56,000’. Spaceship 2 is modeled
after Bert Rutan’s Spaceship 1, which won the X-Prize in 2004, flying
over 100 KM into space twice in a seven day period. Virgin Galactic
is a commercial spaceflight company in the business of selling
suborbital rides into space. It plans on the first commercial flights
somewhere in 2014. This is a very big deal, as NewSpace is opening
manned space flight to ticket paying customers.
http://www.latimes.com/ business/money/la-fi-mo-
virgin-space-ship-test- 20130905,0,4631303.story

4. Recalls. A pair of democrat state senators in Colorado who led
the passage of new gun control legislation written and supported by
NYC Mayor Bloomberg are up for recall this week. National democrats
have poured a lot of money and resources into the campaigns for them
to retain their seats in the legislature. Breitbart reported that the
DNC and US Senators have gotten themselves involved. The targeted
democrats have done what democrats always do, and gone to the pulpit
in an effort to save their sorry political carcasses from recall. We
will see how angry average Colorado residents are about the new gun
control legislation. This will be very interesting to watch.

5. Culverts. One of the problems we here in Southcentral Alaska have
had for years is that sport fishermen have been losing ground to Cook
Inlet commercial fishermen in the fight for salmon returns out of Cook
Inlet. On a normal year, the commercial fleet takes roughly 98% of
all returning salmon out of the salt water before the fish hit fresh
water streams. Fishing is governed by a management plan put together
by the Board of Fish, comprised of appointees by the Governor to
rotating fixed terms. The management plans are then executed by the
Alaska Department of Fish and Game (ADF&G), who also provides
fisheries biologist expertise in crafting it. The Board of Fish
governs fishing statewide, so Cook Inlet, with over half the
population of the state is just one area of concern. The current
Commissioner of Fish and Game, one Cora Campbell reportedly got her
start as a lobbyist for commercial fishing in Southeast Alaska, so she
is not sympathetic to any user group other than commercial fishermen.
As a result of all this, we have the functional equivalent of
regulatory capture of a publicly owned resource by a single user
group, yet another example of the tragedy of the commons. Here in
Cook Inlet the entire management plan for salmon is centered around
the second run of red salmon into the Kenai River, normally the last
half of July every year. It is a massive return of red salmon that
draws fishermen worldwide. But the Kenai River sits south of most
fresh water streams in Cook Inlet. When the return is large, ADF&G
allows the commercial boats to roam the Inlet for a long time, and
they catch a lot of fish not going to the Kenai. This damages salmon
returns into the MatSu, upper Cook Inlet, Turnagain Arm, and the
Anchorage Bowl. When the nets are out of the water, salmon start
showing up again. For years, sports fishermen and guides in the MatSu
have been complaining about mismanagement of their returns, with most
of those complaints falling on deaf ears. Last week, a habitat expert
for the MatSu Borough blamed poor culvert installation for the poor
salmon returns, likely fishing for some state money to replace around
500 culverts flagged as unsatisfactory for fish passage. The United
Cook Inlet Drift Association whose members have been under fire for
decades for sweeping all fish out of the Inlet happily agreed, blaming
the poor returns on development in the MatSu. The problem with all of
this is that the streams with the largest returns are not developed at
all. And if the fish don’t get to the fresh water at all, they won’t
be able to spawn regardless of what the culverts are doing. This is
going to require some action by the legislature to solve, and so far,
MatSu and Anchorage Bowl legislators do not seem inclined to step into
the fray. Perhaps we can encourage them a bit this next session of
the legislature.

6. DC Cops. Did you know that spent bullet and shotgun casings are
considered live ammunition by DC cops? Their possession will lead to
an arrest, $1,000 fine, up to a year in jail and a criminal record.
And the DC police force and the politicians holding their leash
apparently don’t have anything better to do than to hassle tourists
with traffic stops looking for spent bullets in vehicles. Word to the
wise: Avoid Washington DC, as the Beltway sickness infesting the
congress critters does not appear to be limited to elected officials
at the federal level. http://washingtonexaminer.com/
warning-d.c.-cops-under- orders-to-arrest-tourists-
with-empty-bullet-casings/ article/2535216

More later -

- AG


"If ye love wealth better than liberty, the tranquility of servitude
better than the animating contest of freedom, go home from us in
peace. We ask not your counsels or arms. Crouch down and lick the
hands which feed you. May your chains set lightly upon you, and may
posterity forget that ye were our countrymen."
- Samuel Adams, speech at the Philadelphia
State House, August 1, 1776.