Legalectric

Here are a few comments filed, very articulate and specific reasons why the Department of Energy shouldn’t “participate” in this Section 1222 transmission project:

From BLOCK Plains & Eastern here are a few links (thanks for sending them, hard to get anything up here in the woods):

Please skip to page 264 of the PDF to read our BLOCK Plains & Eastern Clean Line: Arkansas and Oklahoma official comment:

http://www.energy.gov/…/Comment%20from%20BLOCK%20Plains%20%…

We would also like to acknowledge and thank Downwind, LLC, for formally supporting our efforts to date. They are an organization of landowners in eastern Arkansas (represented by Jordan Wimpy of Gill Ragon Owen, PA, Little Rock) that has formed in opposition to the Plains and Eastern project:

http://www.energy.gov/…/Comment%20from%20Downwind%2C%20LLC%…

Jordan Wimpy’s FANTASTIC comment on behalf of Downwind, LLC:

http://www.energy.gov/…/Comment%20from%20Downwind%2C%20LLC%…

Oklahoma Attorney General E. Scott Pruitt for his Office’s comment. The potential protection to landowners in Oklahoma, Arkansas, and Tennessee that your comment might help afford cannot be overstated:

http://www.energy.gov/…/f24/Comment%20from%20OAG%2007-13-15…

Southwest Power Resources Association lays out the MANY problems RE: liability in this project, and their comment should be read by all with an interest:

http://www.energy.gov/…/Comment%20from%20Scott%20Williams%2…

Comment from the Colorado River Energy Distributors Association (The equivalent to SPRA for the Western Area Power Association) supporting SPRA’s objections to the Project:

http://www.energy.gov/…/Comment%20from%20Leslie%20James%20o…

Will tidy this up when there’s better access.  Internet is NOT to be taken for granted, nor is cell phone access, here on the Canadian Border!  It’s the “Not-so-Great Northern Transmission Line road show.  The same DOE office is handling the GNTL project as the Plains & Eastern Clean Line, different staff, but pretty close.  The transition from D.C. to Roseau and Baudette must be a rough one!  But there’s good coffee and treats, thanks for breakfast!

Quick — email angela.colamaria@hq.doe.gov and ask that they hold public hearings, just like they did for the environmental review!

Today is the deadline for Comments on the “Section 1222” review, time to tell the DOE what you think of this (&($%&(#@*%&()# project!

BLOCK_Comment_Motion_FINAL

BLOCK_Comment_Attachments_A-J

Are we having fun now?

And good news today too — we’re getting some “US TOO!” support on our previously filed Petitions and Motion.  YES!  That helps!

My latest book arrived today, put Little Sadie in the house when mailman arrived, had to sign for something else and didn’t want her to sink her teeth into him.  Anyway, it’s Dan T. Carter’s “The Politics of Rage: George Wallace, the Origins of the New Conservatism, and the Transformation of American Politics.  Someone posted an article recently that referenced it, and it seemed so fitting. You can order it HERE at www.abebooks.com!

I remember George Wallace and his runs for President, though I don’t remember his inauguration rallying cry when first Governor, much written by KKK wordsmith Ace Carter, “Segregation now… segregation tomorrow… segregation forever.”  I also remember clearly, and remember my distrust, as Wallace claimed to own the errors of his racist past and beliefs.  Still skeptical… but I’m reading this to get a better handle on white supremacy in the U.S., how it’s morphed over the years, and how it’s all connected.  This rage that I see so often, I don’t get it, didn’t then, don’t now, and I’m seeing it in people near and far, such visceral rage, and I just can’t understand the origin.  But in just the first 41 pages, I see it’s the same framing.  George Wallace did indeed tap into fears, tensions, hostility and hate, rewrapped it over time, and shaped the rhetoric of open and of submerged racism that’s still used today.

Photos say it all…

Yes, it’s really this bad.  That’s the sun on a “clear” day.  Air quality is baddest of the bad, “Unhealthy” per the MPCA which isn’t exactly fond of negative declarations like that.  Got a 200 reading at St. Michael, that’s as high as the scale goes, so I’m sure that somewhere it’s off the charts.  It was 193 this afternoon in Prestigious East Phillips, and… well… note how few monitors there are around the state.  We don’t have one in Red Wing.  There probably isn’t one in yours either.

See “current conditions” here.

Keep in mind this is biomass we’re breathing, and the emissions from trees are pretty awful.  Ask Alan Muller about that.

This is the result of all the fires in Canada added to the baseline pollution of the ND and MN coal plants, the turkey shit burner in Benson, all the garbage burners around the state including here in Red Wing.  We have a microclimate here in the Mississippi River valley, but it’s not just here where it gathers, it’s bad everywhere, the whole state, well, almost.

Don’t deep breathe, don’t do any outside exertion, don’t breathe the air if you can help it.  If you’re like me, you’re probably hacking and wheezing a bit.

                                      Photo by Linda Wallace

The Hartland firefighter who put the Stars & Bars battleflag on the city fire truck for the Albert Lea parade has been suspended.   He seems to be starting to figure out that he didn’t think it through.  As a condition of keeping his job, he should have to do some homework and write about Minnesota participation in the Civil War and the meanings of the use of that flag from the 1940s to the present, to be published as Commentary in the Albert Lea Tribune.

The parade organizer still refuses to take any responsibility.

It’s hit TIME Magazine:

Firefighter Suspended for Flying Confederate Flag During Parade

From KMSP:

Firefighter suspended for flying Confederate flag at parade in Albert Lea, Minn.

In the Albert Lea Tribune:

Hartland firefighter suspended after flying Confederate flag in parade