C.J. Williams
“On Target“
Mascoma – Another Granholm Boondoggle?
In a June 27 press release, Governor Granholm lauded the State of Michigan’s historic investment in a $250 million cellulosic ethanol plant to be built in the Upper Peninsula by Massachusetts based Mascoma Corporation. The chosen site for the project is south of Sault St. Marie near the former Kincheloe Air Force Base in Chippewa County.
Toted as a “first of a kind” enterprise and one that will bring those elusive good paying jobs to Michigan, the state’s taxpayers can only hope this isn’t another of Granholm’s follies, as she brings yet another stray cat back to the state from her go anywhere, do anything forays in search of entrepreneurial start-up companies willing to set-up shop in the Great Take State; willing, that is, if the enticement package is generous enough.
In reality, at least a year’s worth of financially rewarding groundwork has gone into setting up the sweetheart “public/private partnership” deal funded with multi-million dollar grants, tax break incentives, and other perks, including a DNR public land swap, so this definitive announcement could be made eleven months after the first announcement last July.
Mascoma also qualifies for a $15 million state grant thanks to the largess of Michigan’s legislature, which recently passed new “Center of Energy Excellence” legislation that enables Granholm to dole out at least $45 to energy technology projects undertaken by for-profit companies selected by governor-appointed state economic officials.
According to the Detroit News, Mascoma is to be the first of what Granholm hopes will be 10 “Centers of Energy Excellence”, special zones where the State collaborates with universities to help finance new energy technology commercialization. Moreover, supply chain partners will be offered tax credits as encouragement to cluster around such projects.
From the way announcements about Mascoma Corporation coming to Michigan sound, one would think it’s an established company with a long track record of success. However, that’s not the case.
In reality, Mascoma, a Dartmouth College spin-off, is still involved with research in hope of developing patentable cellulosic ethanol technology. Since it’s a start-up company with little revenue of its own, Mascoma feeds at the grant trough, including capitalizing on a $50 million biofuels study grant given to MSU by the Dept. of Energy.
It’s also dependent on a gaggle of “venture” companies willing to invest their clients’ multi-millions in new technologies that may or may not pan out. The federal government, in its zest to encourage alternative energy technology, has also ponied up grants. Other investors include General Motors, Marathon Oil, and J. M. Longyear, LLC of Marquette, Michigan, which signed on with Mascoma as a “joint-venture” partner that will supply needed feedstock.
Billed in Granholm’s press release and various news articles as a leading natural resource company that will lend its significant project development experience to Mascoma, Longyear is actually a U.P. real estate management firm with title to at least 65,000 U.P. forestland acres (some sources say 76,500 acres), which in June was scheduled to undergo the sustainable forest certification assessment procedure, ala the Rainforest Alliance’s “Smartwood Program,” using the appropriate Forest Stewardship Council’s standard (read Nature Conservancy).
Steven Hicks, CEO of Longyear, is a 1983 MTU graduate who was appointed to the university’s Board of Control by Granholm last July. He’s also President and CEO of Minnesota Steel, of which Longyear LLC owns 51 percent. Longyear’s parent company is J. M. Longyear Heirs, Inc. whose line of business is listed as “Real Property Lessor Nonmetallic Metal Mining.”
One of Mascoma’s board members is former U.S. Senator Tom Daschle. Another is Jack Huggins of the Nature Conservancy who presented a seminar regarding “A High Growth Strategy for Ethanol” at the 2006 Peoria, Illinois Farm Show.
According to information posted at www.greenjobs.com, Mascoma is a cellulosic biomass-to-ethanol company with corporate offices located in Cambridge, Mass., and Research and Development labs in Lebanon, NH. Mascoma is developing advanced technologies in its own labs, with Professor Lee Lynd at Dartmouth College’s Thayer School of Engineering, by licensing “best in class” microorganisms and enzymes, and with other sponsored (read financially funded) research around the world.
Lynd, a Dartmouth Thayer School of Engineering professor who co-founded Mascoma Corp. in 2006 along with Professor Charles Wyman, received the first Lemelson-MIT Award for Sustainability on April 2, 2008. The $100,000 award was given in recognition of Lynd’s work on a single-step process for converting celluslosic material into ethanol and other biofuels in a process known as “consolidated bioprocessing,” which is considered to be an innovative low-cost configuration for cellulose hydrolysis and fermentation that’s still unfolding.
Feasting off grant money in Michigan isn’t Mascoma’s only claim to fame. It’s also using additional multi-million dollar government grants to build what it refers to as a “large-scale demonstration facility” in Monroe County, TN, as well as a “pre-commercial scale” plant in Rome, NY. In Michigan, Tennessee and New York, officials boast that their partnerships with Mascoma will make their state the leader in cellulosic ethanol technology. Granholm, of course, is adamant that her New Michigan will win the race.
Information found at the Web site of one of Mascoma’s investment partners, Atlas Ventures, points out to its clients that Mascoma produces biofuels from lignocellulosic biomass using proprietary microorganisms and enzymes developed in its laboratories and with partners throughout the world. In simple language, Mascoma uses a special strain of anerobic bacteria to break down cellulose into sugars that can be fermented into ethanol.
According to current information, it’s anticipated that the new plant will employ 50 workers. An additional 500 to 700 jobs related to collecting and delivering wood waste to the facility will be required. This is much better news than was given last July in an MTU article that claimed Mascoma expected to hire 20 to 40 full-time employees, as well as create 200 construction jobs, up to 300 forestry jobs, and another 150-200 transportation and maintenance jobs. The July ’07 article also indicated that MTU would be involved in “workforce development for the new plant, including training the next generation of scientists and engineers to work in the biofuels industry.
When fully operational in 2012, the plant is expected to produce approximately 40 million gallons of ethanol annually, which equates to 400 million gallons of gasoline under the 10 percent mixture allowed for motor vehicles. Mascoma believes they’ll be able to produce their product for about $2.90 per gallon.
Additional information found in an article produced last year by the Great Lakes Timber Professionals Association (GLTPA) of Rhinelander, Wisconsin, indicates that Mascoma is racing to be the first company in the nation to produce ethanol from wood on a commercial scale.
Of course, with the lackluster Granholm administration so desperate for those good paying jobs, where better than Michigan to set up shop, particularly since she and the legislature are so gullible when it comes to giving away the farm to produce a few eggs.
More information provided by the GLTPA is that the Michigan Economic Development Corporation (MEDC), led by President and CEO Jim Epilito, a Granholm appointee, worked with Mascoma on a tax incentive package for the project.
In fact, when Mascoma first announced its plan to set up shop in Michigan on July 19, 2007, it was stated that MEDC would help the company “identify a plant site within the state that will be strategically located to provide ready access to the feedstock needed each day for production.” At that time, it was stated that the full value of state incentives offered to Mascoma would be contingent on the final site selection. Apparently, MEDC selected the Chippewa County site and prepared an incentive package accordingly, that is unless Mascoma opted for site rather than a better freebie package that went along with any one of 19 other sites it purportedly was considering throughout the U.P., including one near L’Anse.
In the true spirit of public/private partnerships, MSU will be providing its expertise related primarily to pretreatment technology for cellulosic ethanol production, as well as with renewable energy crops the biorefinery can use.
Additionally, Michigan Tech will be partnering so as to contribute its knowledge of sustainable forestry management practices. MTU will also provide access to its state of the art automotive engineering labs for analysis of the plants biofuels, which will fit in nicely with its “wood to wheels” initiative that includes development of an automotive engine that will make the best use of the wood-based ethanol.
Bruce Jamerson, who was appointed as CEO and as a board member of Mascoma in March 2007, has been pitching the company to investors and from the looks of it, has been doing a mighty fine job. He came to Mascoma from VeraSun Energy Corporation where he’d been president for three years. Prior to working for VeraSun, he was president of Conifer Investments, an investment banking firm and early stage venture investor. He has also worked in the investment banking department of Credit Suisse First Boston in New York, focusing on energy companies.
It certainly seems that Mascoma has lots going for it, except maybe a bottle manufacturing department for all the snake oil its been peddling in Michigan and elsewhere.
http://www.timberpa.com/tpa_mag/michigan_update.htm
http://www.michiganvotes.org/2008-SB-1380
http://www.biobasednews.com/node/16670
http://biofuelsdigest.com/blog2/2008/06/page/3/
Michigan’s Sustainable Forests—Revisited
Dear Readers: There will be no On Target column until the week of June 30th, as I will be away from the keyboard and helping my oldest daughter and two grandchildren move into new, but less expensive, digs in the beautiful community of Kiel, Wisconsin, where they’ve lived for many years. As my grandson and granddaughter were born six years apart on the same day, we’ll also be celebrating their 6th and 12th birthdays on June 9th.
And, since I also have to pull grandma duty for my youngest daughter in the Copper Country on the two days when I would normally be researching and writing this column, I’m going to rerun an article I wrote in January of 2006 that’s related to “sustainable forestry.” Perhaps, now more than ever, you’ll be able to get a clearer picture of how rabid environmentalism and Gang Green are destroying our livelihoods and the nation’s economy, particularly in states like Michigan where there’s an abundance of natural resource wealth.
“Forest certification is a seal of approval for environmentally responsible wood and paper products,” said Governor Granholm in a January 12th (2006) press release.
“Third-party forest certification is critical for those companies that want to ensure that the paper and wood products they purchase and use are legally harvested from well-managed forests,” said DNR Director Rebecca Humphries.
“Today marks an historic milestone in Michigan’s forest management history,” said Granholm. “Dual certification affirms that our state-owned forests are managed in a healthy, sustainable way.”
So what were these two empowered females blathering about? Well, you’re about to find out! But, please bear in mind that state government, including the governor, are supposed to serve state citizens; we employ them by voting and we fuel our State agencies, their personnel and programs, with our tax dollars, sales tax, permit fees, park entrance fees, license fees and a whole host of other pocket-emptying schemes.
We do not employ those who work for us to also work for global citizens, all under the oppressive thumb of UN treaties and programs that have been systematically degrading and destroying America’s Constitution and our right to individual ownership, as state and national citizens.
If those, whom we employ as state servants, don’t like this fact, they need to dial 1-800-Leave-the-USA and take their Socialist, “for the common good,” conceptual collectivism with them when they go!
We, my friends, are the State and our forests are now certified according to two standards, which require them to be managed in such a parsimonious way that they, and all that dwells within, will sustain all the world’s people for a minimum of one hundred years.
As faithful readers of my articles may well guess, the Nature Conservancy has played a part in staging this part of the Wildlands Project scenario, which is nothing more than a ruse to control the world’s forests through the machinations of the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) and the Sustainable Forest Initiative (SFI). Half, 50%, of Michigan is forestland, and the globalists want it all.
Both the FSC and SFI require complying with specific mandates for “sustainable management” in order for Michigan to market “green” wood and “green” forest products in America and overseas. As with most eco-language, the word “sustainable” is deceptive; what it actually means is that our resources will be managed so only the barest minimum will be taken for our personal needs. No more Charmin or Kleenex for us in the not too distant future; it’s back to cornhusks and a looking glass arm for the proletariat, but enough timbering will be allowed to provide aloe soaked potty-paper for the Elitists.
America’s timbering giants have known this was coming for years, have added to their forestland coffers by squeezing out little guy operations, and have taken advantage of “green” credits in order to keep making money as long as possible. Some have allowed themselves to be taken over by timber and real estate investment corporations.
To do otherwise and engage in traditional timbering and manufacturing forest products would have entailed continuous litigation of costly environmental lawsuits filed by environmental attorneys being churned out of the University of Virginia School of Law and other learning institutions.
Now that the Sustainable Development stage has been properly set to sell privately owned millions of forestland acres, deals are being brokered through one of the Nature Conservancy’s “unique private-public partnership” deals, such as Governor Granholm’s “U.P. Big Deal.”
Worse is that our Federal Government also engages in “unique private-public partnership” deals with a little help from the Conservancy. So, when the Senate Finance Committee or IRS investigates the organization, TNC gets a slap on the wrist, an admonition to do better, and a pristinely processed press release, exonerating their questionable financial wheeling and dealing, is issued to the bought and paid for news media, which then totes the good news to the American public.
Remember John Kerry’s “global report card,” which is internationally graded every five years, and the global plan for the 21st Century, Agenda 21? Certified Sustainable Forests are a part of that plan, as will be fresh and salt waters, agricultural products, textiles, dwellings, and you name it.
Michigan forests have now been dually labeled SFI and FSC certified as globally sustainable by an independent 3rd party certifier, which was mandated be done by January 1, 2006.
A false market was created years ago for “green” wood and “green” forest products, driving up costs for suppliers and consumers. The world, or so it’s claimed, wants only certified “green” forest products, and, by golly, if Home Depot or Lowes doesn’t have that in their warehouse, they won’t be building new stores on any wetland mud-puddle anytime soon.
The Sustainable Forestry Board governs the Sustainable Forest Initiative Certification, which our State forests received. Two board members are TNC’s President and CEO, Steve McCormick, and George Fenwick, who founded the American Bird Conservancy after spending 16 years with TNC as VP for Science, VP for Ecosystem Conservation, and Chair of TNC’s “Last Great Places” Campaign Steering Committee. The Board uses Ann Arbor based NSF International Strategic Registrations as its acceptable 3rd party certifier.
The Forest Stewardship Council requires stronger compliance mandates than SFI. In their January 2002 newsletter, the Forest Stewardship Council announced that the Nature Conservancy had joined their membership that also includes the National Wildlife Federation, of which MUCC is an affiliated member, the Sierra Club, and others. One of FSC’s 3rd party certifiers is NSF International Strategic Registrations of Ann Arbor.
According to the August 11, 2005 Natural Resources Commission meeting minutes, Lynne Boyd, MI-DNR reported that:
“Forest certification is review of the on-ground forest practices against standards that address environmental, social and economic issues. It provides for an independent, third party review of how effectively these practices are carried out; and a periodic re-verification and recertification after the initial certification. Once certified, audits will be continual. The Legislature requires Michigan to be certified by one independent auditing group. Governor Granholm committed for dual certification. The Sustainable Forestry Initiative and the Forest Stewardship Council will be utilized for certification. She stated that FSI is an industry driven standard that originated in the US and looks at forest management practices. The FSC was an international standard that originated in third-world countries looking more at social aspects of managing forest and land.”
The 3rd Party Certifier retained by the Sate to audit our forests for good management practices and 100-year sustainability was NSF Strategic International Registrations, which presented SFI and FSC Certificates to the State during at a meeting of the Natural Resources Commission in Muskegon.
NSF Strategic International Registrations is a subsidiary of NSF International, an independent, not-for-profit organization and also the UN’s World Health Organization Collaborating Centre for Food and Water Safety and Indoor Environment.
Additional NSF International’s services include safety audits for food and water industries, management systems registrations delivered through NSF Internal Strategic Registrations, Ltd., organic certification provided by Quality Assurance International, and education through the NSF Center for Public Health Education. It was founded in 1944 and is headquartered in Ann Arbor.
So, congratulations, fellow Michiganders, our forests have met the mark according to current SCI and FSC Sustainable Seal of Approval mandates. They join neighboring and dually certified MN and WI State Forests, designated World Heritage Sites, American Heritage Rivers, National Heritage Sites, National Heritage Scenic Highways, etc., all generally within designated UN Biospheres and the thousands of miles-wide buffering Reserves, all managed according to the U.N.’s Agenda 21 mandates.
Our nation’s richest resources; the forests, waters, and all that lies far underground, like the world’s richest source of native copper in TNC’s Keweenaw Peninsula “Last Great Place” and the oil and gas reserves under Lower Michigan’s UN Bio-reserve, are only some of the really “pristine jewels” often referred to in TNC’s literature or toted to every Tom, Dick, and Harry willing to listen, including many of those whom we’ve elected to serve us, not the global community.
http://www.nsf.org/business/about_NSF/
http://www.law.virginia.edu/html/academics/environment/env_courses.htm
http://www.michigan.gov/documents/NRCMINUTES8-11-05_136289_7.pdf
http://www.midnr.com/publications/pdfs/divisions/forest/ForestCertification/MyWebsFC/index.htm
http://www.un.org/esa/sustdev/siteindex.htm
http://www.michiganvotes.org/2004-HB-5554
http://www.michiganvotes.org/2004-SB-1023
Bankers’ Holiday
Those with computers may recently have received an info-message beseeching people to withdraw their U.S. dollars (Federal Reserve Bank Notes) from all accounts they may have with lending institutions, except when penalties will be incurred for doing so, i.e., prematurely cashing in a certificate of deposit or not maintaining a specific savings account balance.
This particular lending institution boycott is to last from June 5th through June 15th and is purportedly designed to “strengthen the buying power of the U.S. Dollar by limiting the amount in circulation, therefore reducing inflation.”
The message goes on to report that withdrawing these funds reduces the lending institutions’ reserves and minimizes the amount of money they can lend, thereby reducing inflation and lowering prices. As it now stands, lending institutions can loan out their holdings to the tune of nine times the amount held, so, in essence, when we deposit our paychecks or monetary “windfalls,” banks can lend out nine times the amount of our deposit. Multiply that by a gazillion people, and you’ll have a better grasp of how much worthless credit is being issued.
The Federal Reserve, a.k.a. “the Fed,” is the equivalent of a “central bank.” It’s actually a bank for banks, but it’s also a bank of sorts for the federal government. The government has no oversight authority regarding the Fed, and no power currently exists that can demand it be audited. Its powerful decisions are derived from elitist “think tankers” whose job it is to second guess economic “cause and effect” related to lowering or raising interest rates and/or printing more worthless paper money that has routinely over the past many years put the American people further and further into debt.
This is perhaps best explained in an excerpt from Rep. Ron Paul’s excellent new book, “The Revolution – A Manifesto.” The excerpt begins on page 140:
“Throughout most of American history the dollar has been defined as a specific weight in gold. Until 1933, in fact, 20 dollars could be redeemed for one ounce of gold. But that year, the U.S. government went off the gold standard, and henceforth, American currency would be redeemable into nothing. The government actually confiscated Americans’ holdings of monetary gold, nullified even private contracts that called for payment for a good or service in gold, and declared the dollar no longer redeemable into gold by American citizens – but made allowances for redemption by foreign central banks at 35 dollars an ounce, a devaluation of the dollar from its previous ratio of $20.67 an ounce. And even this tenuous link to gold was severed in 1971, when Richard Nixon declared that within a year, at the $35 exchange rate, we would not have an ounce of gold remaining. Other governments had begun to realize that the dollar, which was being massively inflated, was losing its value, and more and more were demanding gold in exchange for dollars. At that point Nixon officially closed the gold window, so that not even foreign central banks could get gold for dollars. In so doing, he cut the dollar’s last lingering tie to gold.
“Now let’s consider at least a few of the nuts and bolts of how the Federal Reserve System typically operates. When we read that the Federal Reserve chairman is cutting interest rates, what does that mean? Analysts are referring to something called the federal funds rate, the rate that banks charge when they borrow from each other. The banks are required to keep a specific fraction of their deposits on reserve, as opposed to lent out, to be available for customer withdrawal. Banks can find themselves below the reserve requirement set by the Fed if they have made a lot of loans or if an unusually large amount of people have withdrawn funds. Banks borrow from each other when they need additional cash reserves to meet the reserve requirement.
“The federal funds rate rises when there is too much demand from banks looking to borrow and too little supply from banks willing to lend… Although it (the Fed) cannot directly set the rate, it can intervene in the economy in such a way as to push it upward or downward. The way it pushes the rate down is by buying bonds from the banks. That gives the banks more money and therefore more reserves on hand to lend to banks that need it. Funds available to be lent to other banks are now less scarce, and a correspondingly lower federal rate reflects this.
Where does the Fed get the money to buy the bonds? It creates them out of thin air, simply writing checks on itself and giving them to banks. If that sounds fishy, then you understand just fine.
“…When the Fed intervenes like this, increasing money supply with money and credit it creates out of thin air, it causes all kinds of economic problems. It decreases the value of the dollar, thereby making people poorer. And in the long run even the apparent stimulus to the economy that comes from all the additional borrowing and spending turns out to be harmful as well, for this phony prosperity actually sows the seeds for hard times and recession down the road.”
To continue with this synopsis, allow me to quote Rep. Paul’s words on page 159: “Right now our government is borrowing $2.2 billion every day, mainly from China and Japan, to pay for our overseas empire. As our dollar continues to decline, thanks to the Federal Reserve inflation, the American debt instruments that these countries are holding lose their value. We cannot expect these and other countries to hold on to them forever. And when they decide that they no longer wish to, our fantasy world comes crashing down on us. No more empire, no more pledging ever more trillions in new entitlements. Reality will set in, and it will be severe.”
Frightening, isn’t it, to know this is happening right under our noses, and to realize that those whom we’ve elected to office, presumably other than Rep. Paul, couldn’t care less? While they strut and pompously pontificate about all the good they’ll do if elected, once elected they do little in the way of good compared to all the harm they do through tax and spend legislation padded with a few billion slipped in here and a few billion slipped in there, as though money grows on trees. Well, thanks to the Fed, apparently it does, though it has little value anymore.
The earmarks, the pork barrel spending on a plethora of multi-million dollar roads and bridges to nowhere and gifts to conservancies and land trusts and historical preservation outfits; the billions of dollars allocated to fund U.S. empire building in foreign lands, and billions more for useless entitlement programs that do nothing but treat symptoms rather than the cause of peoples’ misery, are breaking the taxpayers’ backs.
In America, a great many of our military veterans live and sleep on sidewalks and in doorways of our major cities; a great many of our nation’s children go to sleep at night shivering in heatless hovels listening to the rumblings of their empty bellies; and a great many young families struggle to pay their bills while an obstructionist Congress, dominated by Democrats and RINOS and led by socialist Nancy Pelosi, caves in to Gang Green’s rabid eco-environmentalism and prevents drilling for oil on American soil or off our nation’s coastline; while an obstructionist Congress refuses to close our borders and send foreign freeloaders packing; while an obstructionist Congress votes in favor of Obama Lama Ding Dong’s $845 billion Global Poverty Tax to alleviate suffering in third world countries in spite of the fact that charity should begin at home; while an obstructionist Congress votes to override a president’s veto of an outrageously expensive entitlement program for the farming industry; and while an obstructionist Congress turns a deaf ear to the will of the people and opens its welcoming arms to UN treaties that are contrary to the Constitution of the united States of America and our Republic.
Come June 5th, do what you will with what little money you have, but in all honesty, simply removing it from the bank for ten days will do nothing to resolve the mess we’ve allowed our elected to get us into.
If you really want things to change for the good of all Americans, give what you can afford to the campaigns of those whom you know in your heart support Rep. Paul’s effort to restore the Constitution and our inalienable rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Five or ten dollars may not seem like much, but to political candidates who aren’t being funded by lobbyists and other special interest groups, or even their own political party because they’re known Constitutionalists, every little trifling amount means a lot when they’re added together.
If we want to get the monkey off our back, we need to unseat the monkeys currently wasting our money in Washington, D. C. Once you’ve read Rep. Paul’s book, you’ll be more than ready to do just that. While it may be available in your local book store, “The Revolution – A Manifesto”, published by Grand Central Publishing, can also be ordered online now at Amazon.com for under $12. It’s in stock and you should have it in only a matter of a few days.
http://www.amazon.com/Revolution-Manifesto-Ron-Paul/dp/0446537519
Casperson—Candidate or Chicken Little?
After fifteen years, Michigan’s 1st Congressional District finally has what’s turning out to be the Queen Mother of all primary races to unseat Rep. Bart Stupak, a dutiful Democrat who supports U.N. treaties that are destroying America and the constitutional rights of We, the People.
Three Republicans who want Stupak’s seat are campaigning to win the August 5th primary and the right to run in the November general election. For two, Linda Goldthorpe and Don Hooper, it’s so far been a friendly battle, but it appears the third contender, current state Rep. Tom Casperson, doesn’t play well with others.
The first of four “First District Congressional Debates” was held in Boyne City on the evening of May 10th. Goldthorpe was there, Hooper was there; Casperson wasn’t.
On April 25th, Petoskey and Traverse City radio station WJML Radio Newstalk, which is sponsoring the entire debate series, formally invited the candidates to take part. Goldthorpe accepted immediately, Hooper accepted immediately; Casperson waited until almost the last moment to decline.
“No Show” Casperson turned down the invite through a May 7th press release, which was e-mailed to WJML at 1:22 p.m. on Friday, May 9th by 1st District GOP chairman, Joel Westrom of Marquette.
Casperson’s press release reads: “Unfortunately, I will not be participating in this Saturday’s debate that has apparently been unilaterally organized by the Goldthorpe campaign. It is certainly important that constituents of the 1st Congressional District get a chance to meet the candidates and understand our views. Unfortunately, I was just informed of this debate, which in any event is quite premature as the Congressional filing deadline has not passed. So, out of respect to those people and groups to whom I previously pledged my attendance this weekend, and out of fairness and respect to those candidates that have yet to declare their candidacy, I believe the most appropriate way for me to continue to introduce myself is to maintain the schedule I have had in place for weeks.
However, once the filing deadline has passed, I look forward to working with each of the declared candidates to lay the foundation for additional debates.”
To cut to the chase, on May 7th Casperson claimed he was just informed of the May 10th debate; that it was organized in a one-sided manner by the Goldthorpe campaign; that it was too premature to hold it before the May 13th candidacy filing date; and to be fair and respectful to anyone who’d file their candidacy at the last minute, he believed it most appropriate for voters to meet him by sticking to his long-planned schedule.
In truth, Casperson knew about the possibility of a debate series on Feb. 21st when he, Goldthorpe, Hooper, and some state and district level GOP leaders were copied on an e-mail sent by Goldthorpe campaign manager, Bill Kosloskey of Petoskey, to Joel Westrom.
Kosloskey indicated he’d like the 1st GOP District and state leadership to address, as a group, the idea of debates or town hall meetings. Among other things, he wrote: “Personally, I’d like to see four or five public debates/town hall meetings, moderated and/or sponsored by the Michigan GOP between all 3 candidates that would facilitate getting their positions out in the open to the constituents in our area – at least two in the U.P. and as many down here, starting as early as next month. I’d be more than willing to work on putting one together to serve the Petoskey, Harbor, Charlevoix and other surrounding areas.”
In an e-mailed response on Feb. 21st, Westrom wrote: “That is great you are trying to put a forum together for the candidates. Please contact all the candidates and let me know what you come up with.”
Additionally in that e-mail, Westrom let Kosloskey know he’d been very supportive of Casperson and his bid for Stupak’s seat. “We have almost 150 leadership positions in the First Congressional District alone including county Chairs and their officers (VC, Sec, Treasurer) I work with on a regular basis. It seemed almost unanimous that they were supporting Tom Casperson,” he wrote.
This, mind you, was prematurely going on long before the May 13th filing date deadline even though two other candidates had informally made their intentions known, one as early as last summer at the 1st Congressional District picnic held at St. Ignace. In fact, the “Casperson for Congress” hype began to surface in various GOP blogs as early as fifteen months ago in the winter of 2007.
In response to Kosloskey via a Feb. 22nd e-mail copied to Westrom, Hooper wrote, “I wholeheartedly approve of your support for candidate debates. However the party leadership will fight this ardently. They believe they have already selected the candidate so why should they give notoriety to their opposition. However the voting public would love this, so we must depend on folks like you to bring it to reality… I would be delighted to participate."
According to Kosloskey, “The Hooper and Goldthorpe campaigns agreed to meet just a few days after Don’s email, opening up a professional, cross-campaign dialog about the debates. Never did the Casperson campaign, or any representative thereof, contact either the Hooper or Goldthorpe campaigns to indicate a willingness to participate in the planning of any debate program.”
Additionally, Westrom indicated in two more emails to Kosloskey, dated April 4th and 7th, that he’d “talk with the officers about the debates and see what they think and how it would be coordinated” and also “talk to Tom about the debate idea and see what he thinks”. However, there was no feedback from Westrom indicating he followed up on what he claimed he’d do regarding the debates.
With four debates hoped for and the clock ticking, Kosloskey called Casperson several times, but wasn’t able to connect with him until April 14th when they talked for 84 minutes. At that time, says Kosloskey, Casperson indicated an unwillingness to participate in the debates, as planned, but did say he’d be more likely to participate if someone else proposed them.
With the 1st GOP leadership dragging its feet and Casperson’s negativity, Kosloskey knew if there were to be any debates at all, he needed to quickly find an acceptable sponsor. Among other entities, he contacted the Petoskey News Review on April 15th about sponsoring the series. That e-mail was copied to three different radio stations, as well as to the three candidates and several other individuals.
Shortly after being copied on the request for help, WJML came forward to sponsor the debates, find moderators to conduct them, and handle all the nitty-gritty details. Anyone who attended the first debate, which was also broadcast and now archived online, knows that no partiality was shown to the candidates.
The foregoing being the case, Casperson obviously knew early on that the debate series was being planned but showed no interest in helping with the planning or checking on progress being made.
Far from being a one-sided effort on the Goldthorpe campaign’s part, the Hooper campaign has been actively involved in the debate planning, as has the sponsoring radio station and other individuals.
While Casperson believes the first debate should have been held after the May 13th filing date to give potential Republican ticket late-comers a chance to partake, that date appears not to have concerned him or the state and 1st District GOP leadership when they prematurely opted to formally throw their support behind Casperson last summer.
According to information included in the MI-GOP chairman’s 7/14/07 daily online newsletter, “That’s Saul, folks!” he and the state Republican National Committee members signed a formal “RNC Rule 11” letter on July 13, 2007 regarding Casperson.
The first portion of Rule 11(a) reads: “The Republican National Committee shall not, without written and filed approval of all members of the Republican National Committee from the state involved, contribute money or in-kind aid to any candidate for any public office except the nominee of the Republican Party or a candidate who is unopposed in the Republican primary after the filing deadline for that office.”
Actually, out of respect and fairness to all contenders, political party ethics mandate that a party shouldn’t support or endorse any candidate who faces opposition in the primary. Only after the primary, when one Republican candidate remains, is it truly proper for the party to support, financially or otherwise, the voting public’s candidate for the general election. Regardless, one 1st GOP District candidate has prematurely received “favorite son” status.
The problem is that We, the People haven’t yet had a chance to voice our opinion, through our CONSTITUTIONAL RIGHT to vote in the August 5th primary, as to which of the three Republican candidates WE believe will be the best person to compete against Bart Stupak, and most importantly to represent OUR voice in Congress.
Many 1st District voters feel the next three months should be used to discover what the three candidates believe about issues so we can most effectively cast OUR votes at the ballot box instead of letting the MI-GOP usurp a privilege that rightfully belongs to We, the People.
The second debate will be held in the U.P. at the Houghton High School auditorium on Friday, June 6th at 7 p.m. Perhaps this time there will be three podiums instead of just two.
http://www.time4tom.com/index.html
https://www.goldthorpeforcongress.com/
http://www.congressdebates.com/
http://migop.blogs.com/blog/2007/07/articles-of--13.html
http://www.gop.com/About/Rules11-20.htm
Is It a Bird, a Plane? No! It’s Super Bart to the Rescue…
The subject line of Rep. Stupak’s most recent e-mailed newsletter reads: “Congressman Stupak Fighting For Michigan Families, Achieving Results.” “Wow,” I thought after reading that heading. “Some good news at last!” However, after perusing the missive’s contents, it appears his achievements have pretty much been limited to fighting to pass legislation that makes the federal Do-Not-Call Registry permanent and to “working hard,” as chairman of the House Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee, to protect families from unsafe food and drugs.
“When you sit down for dinner,” claims Stupak, “you shouldn’t have to worry about contaminated foods or being harassed by telemarketers.”
Nope, we shouldn’t, and we shouldn’t have to worry about the price of gas and food, how to pay the mortgage, or where money will come from for our astronomical heat and power bills. But, it’s certainly comforting to know that Super Bart has fought a courageous battle to alleviate the worry about telemarketers calling during the supper hour.
According to Stupak, the federal Do-Not-Call Registry is “one of the most successful government programs ever created.” Yes, folks, thanks to Bart’s willingness to fight on behalf of Michigan families, the registry time limit has been extended and we’ve been saved from the dreaded task of having to re-register our phone numbers this June.
Though it probably doesn’t apply to those pesky mealtime phone calls from political campaign volunteers championing their favored politician at election time, this “successful” government program has already registered at least 132 million home and mobile telephone numbers to the list. Pretty impressive, eh? If you haven’t already done so, you can add yours by calling 1-888-382-1222 to help make this government program not just merely successful, but phenomenally successful.
As for working hard to protect consumers from unsafe food and drugs, the congressman wrote that “recent cases of botulism in beans, salmonella in peanut butter and E.coli in spinach are all signs of a disturbing trend that threaten our health and national security.”
You read that right, folks! There’s a trend for food and drugs contaminated with the Devil only knows what to reach American shores or come across our unprotected inland borders, as more and more imported products reach our store shelves and produce bins. Contaminated foodstuff can also come from our own nation’s produce fields and processing plants where “no habla ingles” migrants, illegal and otherwise, do the jobs able-bodied welfare recipients, who can rightfully call themselves Americans, don’t do because government gives them a free ride on the taxpayers’ nickel.
To turn around this disturbing trend, Rep. Stupak has in the past year alone held hearings to “look at” more than 100 food recalls and has put pressure on the Food and Drug Administration to increase inspections abroad and get on the stick when it comes to monitoring food and drugs imported from China. Apparently that’s not already part of the job description, or, if it is, they just needed a reminder.
Oddly, though Stupak’s newsletter was e-mailed on April 25th and though his position as chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee’s Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee brings the matter into his venue, he made no mention of a more troublesome matter that became public through an April 12th Associated Press (AP) article written by Larry Margasak.
The disturbing article, titled “Disease Lab Has Had Accidents With Virus,” explains that the only U.S. facility allowed to research the highly contagious and extremely destructive foot-and-mouth disease (FMD), a.k.a. hoof-and-mouth disease, has had several accidents with the feared virus. That facility, the Animal Disease Center, is located on Plum Island, 100 miles northeast of New York City in the Long Island Sound. Fortunately for Americans, the contamination has so far been held to the island.
The FMD virus, which strikes cloven-hooved animals, including wild game, can be carried on a worker’s breath or clothes, or on vehicles leaving a lab, which is why the facility is located 100 miles from shore. According to Margasak, researchers who work with the live virus on Plum Island aren’t permitted to own animals at home that would be susceptible to the disease, and they must wait at least one week after work before going any place where susceptible animals might be located.
To bring this into perspective, consider that an FMD epidemic in Great Britain in 2001 caused the government to slaughter 6 million sheep, cows and pigs, devastating the country’s livestock industry and raising havoc with the economy. Outbreaks still occur to this day.
Rosa Tennenbaum wrote about the 2001 catastrophe in her article “Globalization Kills.” She opened with this paragraph: “Smoldering pits filled with animal carcasses, blockades and checkpoints on roads and highways, empty stockyards; a ban on all public meetings, all sports events cancelled, many schools closed: This is Great Britain under quarantine. As the 21st Century dawns upon this industrialized country, scenes as if from the Middle Ages now predominate. The United Kingdom has entered the Post-Industrial Age.”
Considering that America has entered the Post-Industrial Age, too, thanks in good part to eco-environmental extremists and the UN’s Agenda 21-Sustainable Development program, Rosa’s article, which can be found online through the first link at the end of this column, is recommended reading.
Other Foot and Mouth Disease outbreaks have occurred in Taiwan in 1997, as well as in China for the past two years. An FMD epidemic in India has reached such proportions that, if the virus isn’t soon controlled and the disease eradicated, it will spell doom for India’s already pathetic rural economy. Argentina, which, like other countries, exports meat to America and elsewhere, joins a host of many other countries battling FMD, as the virus spreads like wildfire from country to country. Like the trend for food and drugs to be contaminated that Stupak referred to in his newsletter, one might say the spread of the FMD virus is a trend, too.
To date in America, the contamination caused by previous accidents with the virus has been held to Plum Island, which has managed to contain the virus for over fifty years, but if the powers that be have their way, the research center will be moved to a new facility somewhere on the mainland and therein lays the rub.
According to Margasak’s article, the Plum Island animal disease research facility had been operating under the auspices the U.S. Dept. of Agriculture, but that changed in 2003 when the lab was turned over to the Homeland Security Dept. because preventing a FMD outbreak has been made part of the nation’s biological defense program.
Not happy with the present location, Homeland Security wants to move the lab inland and is considering five locations to become the home of a new “National Bio- and Agro-Defense Facility.” While they could leave the FMD research lab at Plum Island, they’d like everything housed in one place, preferably in Manhattan, Kansas; Athens, GA; Butner, NC; San Antonio, TX; or Flora, Mississippi. The new site could be selected late this year and the new lab would open in 2014. Margasak reported that the number of livestock in the counties and surrounding areas of the potential sites range from 542,507 in Kansas to a mere 132,900 in Georgia, according to a Homeland Security Dept. internal study. On the other hand, the only livestock on Plum Island are those animals brought in for research.
Of course, now that America is being forcibly de-industrialized and redeveloped by environmental zealots to become “sustainable” for the sake of future generations of the world’s people, many areas of our nation are starved for jobs. As a result, several governors are clamoring to bring Homeland Security’s new facility to their state, even if the FMD virus and research vaccine makers come with it. What insanity!
According to Margasak, leaders of the House Energy and Commerce Committee are worried about the lab’s likely move, including Chairman John Dingell of Michigan and investigations subcommittee chairman, Bart Stupak, both of whom demanded reports and other studies related to the consequences of live virus research on the U.S. mainland.
While one might think this should be a no-brainer, let’s not forget that there are many lawmakers in office or running for re-election who support the UN Agenda 21-Sustainable Development Program. Therefore, it stands to reason that anything that promotes making do with less, as decreasing food supplies and the increasing cost of living will force the American people to do, will be championed among those whose allegiance is to the UN and a one world order first and to their constituency last.
In his April 25th newsletter, Super Bart wrote that “Washington has made the wrong decisions for too long, and it’s time to change and rebuild our economy now.”
Seems to me that since he’s been a U.S. representative for the past 15 years, he helped make those wrong decisions. We need change all right, but not the change that’s being brought about by adhering to the UN’s Agenda 21–Sustainable Development Program, which Stupak is known to have supported when he first took office in 1993. The change America really needs is a change of faces in Congress so that constitutionalists, and not socialists, run the government of, for, and by We, the People.
http://www.schillerinstitute.org/food_for_peace/ffp_hoof&mouth.html
http://www.townhall.com/news/us/2008/04/11/accidents_at_disease_lab_acknowledged
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/1189977.stm
http://www.house.gov/stupak/newsletters.shtml
April 28, 2008
Vol. 9 Issue 16
What follows is a letter to all politicians written by Ron Ewert, President of the National Association of Rural Landowners, Issaquah, Washington. He’s just one member of a vast network of property rights activists throughout America who communicate with one another and pass along information via the Internet.
With Ron’s permission, I’m spreading his letter as far and wide as possible so that others may be encouraged to shake off the ties that bind, namely the complacency and apathy with which so many Americans have accepted the politicians’ collective intrusion into the personal lives of We, the People.
Time is running out for us to take our nation back from those who are turning our Republic into a Fascist dictatorship, and by “us” I mean more than a handful of people who, like Ron Ewert, have a lot more starch in their spine than my grandma had in her crocheted doilies on washday...
“Dear politician:
We finally get it! For a growing number of us, it’s now crystal clear what you are trying to do and have been doing for far too long. You think we’re ignorant, stupid, naive and apathetic. Some of us are, but our eyes are open now. It took eighty to one hundred years of us looking the other way, while you pretty much did whatever you wanted to do. But those days are over. The pendulum swings slowly, but it swings nevertheless, and it now swings towards freedom.
We’re watching and we’re learning and we’re telling others to watch and learn, as well. Your free hand to strip us of our individual rights, our property and our pride, and tear down our institutions of freedom and liberty that made America one of the greatest, most prosperous and most generous nations on Earth is finally over. Oh, you may have a few more years yet to chip away at our freedom and our sovereignty, but nothing lasts forever and we’re waking up to the dawn of what you’ve created and what we let happen.
We’re finally able to see through the clouds you have used to shroud the light of our Sun as well as our liberty. The proud people of other new-world countries, like Canada, Australia and New Zealand, are waking up to what their governments are and have been doing, as well. Their voices are now being heard and added to ours.
Sure, you’ve been successful in buying off a large segment of the American population and they won't bite the hand that feeds them, but there are those among us who have pierced the veil of your deceit and are now on a path to return you to the limited powers strictly authorized by our constitution.
Because of our in-attention, you have become corrupt and filled with your own power. Your egos have become blown out of proportion by years upon years of no resistance to your chicanery.
Because you see, Oh arrogant politician, there are those among us who remember what it was like before our government began to become seriously intrusive into our private lives, our property, our income and, ultimately, our freedom.
There are those among us who have an indelible memory of the principles upon which this great land was founded and have been witness to the irresponsible and unconscionable erosion of those principles.
There are those among us who have watched over the years as the “frog” (us) was slowly heated (freedoms denied) and died (became captive) in the pot because the changes in temperature over time were almost imperceptible.
There are those among us who realize our freedom is directly related to the level of our involvement in the process that maintains those freedoms, but have lost our voice in screaming our concerns to the multitudes and the politicians who have rejected our message.
There are those among us who are acutely aware of the inescapable fact that the “Price of Freedom and Liberty is truly Eternal Vigilance.” We give homage and sincere honor to those brave souls who’ve been wounded or died to maintain that freedom.
There are those among us who know we have allowed our government to buy our vote in return for compensation that had no relation to our labors or our investments. Nothing comes without a price and the price has been the loss of pride, dignity, honor, self-respect and most important, our individual freedom. We’ve been seduced, undressed, lined up and given our marching orders without a shot being fired.
There are those among us who still remember the sweet smell of individual accomplishment and achievement and the rewards we received for our hard work.
There are those among us who still set high moral and ethical standards for ourselves and those around us.
There are those among us who’ve watched in silence for way too many years as you increased your power by creating law after law and then creating bloated bureaucracies to pass even more law without your oversight, which is your constitutional duty to maintain as legislators.
You have wrapped the people of America in a tangled web of laws that overlap, contradict and conflict with each other, allowing the vultures of our society, the lawyers, to straighten out the mess you created. But the lawyers don't straighten out the mess; they make it even more complicated, all the while filling their own bank accounts at the expense of the naive and ignorant.
There are those among us who’ve watched the U. S. and state Supreme Courts, as well as the lower level courts, twist and turn our constitution and the law and legislation you pass into travesties of injustice and betrayal. We have watched as courts uphold laws in order to bolster the power of the legislative and executive branches of government, all the while thumbing their collective noses at the CONSENT OF THE GOVERNED and the Supreme Law of the Land.
But we’re done watching. We have awakened from our long sleep and we are awakening others. The days of you raising your right hand and swearing an oath to preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States and then do just the opposite are coming to an end. There is a price for lying, deceit, propaganda and corruption and that price will catch up to you for the natural law states that, eventually, no bad deed goes unpunished.
The job of the politician is to uphold the Constitution upon which they swear solemn oath. The job of the politician is to protect the American people from all enemies, foreign or domestic, even if the domestic enemy is advocating laws that violate our constitutions, as do most social and environmental laws. The job of the politician is to vigorously defend the individual freedoms granted to the American people by their creator and codified into law in our constitution.
However, the job of the politician is not to micro-manage every individual's life to some set of unreasonable standards that were created by some commission staffed with over-educated idiots, or a bureaucrat, or politician that have the arrogance to think they know better how to manage our individual lives than we do.
In short, Mr. and Mrs. Politician and Bureaucrat, you don't own our land, you don't pay our taxes or our mortgages, you don't own our lives and you do not know what is best for us.
Mr. or Mrs. Politician, live up to your sworn oath and constitutional duties, stay within your constitutional limits, protect us from all enemies foreign and domestic and get out of our individual lives. We don't need you and we don't want you. We can take care of ourselves or each other. That is what true freedom is all about and that is exactly what we intend to defend.
We, who have the right to exercise "THE CONSENT OF THE GOVERNED" will re-assert our power over the government and stop you cold from morphing this once proud and great land into the mind-numbing mediocrity of European-style socialism.” …Ron Ewart, President, NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF RURAL LANDOWNERS, P. O. Box 1031, Issaquah, WA 98027 - 425 222-4742 or 1 800-682-7848 (Fax No. 425 222-4743) Website: www.narlo.org
Come this November, folks, you will have the opportunity to vote in what may well be the most important election of your lifetime. If you’re not registered to vote, get registered now and help rid the House and the Senate of those whose allegiance has been shown to be to the United Nations,’ its global ‘sustainabilists’ and not the American people.
If you’ve never voted before, are ashamed to admit it, and worrying about not knowing how the process works in your precinct, remember the words of my friend, Wisconsin Bob, who often reminds me that “ignorance is temporary, stupid is forever”. If you need help at the voting booth, ask for help and ask it loudly with pride for not wanting to remain temporarily ignorant or forever stupid.
April 21, 2008
Vol. 9 Issue 15
Are Snake Oil Salesmen Invading Michigan?
Since writing my column regarding Sovereign Deed, seemingly run by snake oil salesman Barrett Moore who was out to make his fortune on the taxpayer’s nickel at the exquisitely furnished Pellston Regional Airport, it appears another snake oil peddling outfit also may now be courting the State.
This deal involves 1,800 acres of land near the National Guard training grounds at Camp Grayling, not too far south of Pellston in northern Lower Michigan.
Some readers might wonder why a lady who lives in the northwestern corner of Michigan’s Upper Peninsula is concerned about something so distantly removed from her, but let’s keep in mind, folks, that a lot of scams perpetrated by snake oil salesmen in this state involve the misuse of tax dollars and/or fees we’re forced pay to the State’s tax and spend extortionists. With that being “said,” let’s delve into the issue, shall we?
First off, the 1,800 acres being eyed for purchase is public land held in trust for We, the People of Michigan by the MI-DNR. The property, populated by a mature stand of oak and pine, is located just south of Grayling along I-75 in Crawford County and is being offered at a so far undisclosed dollar amount.
The deal, which has pretty much been kept under wraps until lately, became a public matter thanks to the Bay City Times, which used the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) to ferret out what information could be had on this deal back in June of 2006. Recent state legislation regarding the movie industry may have removed this from the back burner, but we’ll discuss that rat smell later in this column.
Through the FOIA request, it was learned that a MI-DNR representative had signed an exclusive land purchase agreement with Axiom Entertainment of Rochester, Michigan, which wants to build a $160 million theme park, alternately referred to as “Main Street USA” or “Four Seasons,” on property about the size of 1,800 football fields.
That land had apparently been set-aside in 1999 and was to be sold bit-by-bit for industrial or commercial park purposes in coordination with local officials who had developed a zoning plan, or so the story is told.
Well, as luck would have it, along came a relatively new company, Axiom Entertainment, which, on behalf of its investors, was given the sole two-year right by the MI-DNR to buy the land, even though the outfit didn’t bother to submit a proposal regarding what it specifically had in mind in terms of theme park amusement at the time.
Apparently, so as not to give away the secret to competitors, real or imagined, there was a lot of clandestine negotiations between Axiom’s representatives and local and state officials away from the public’s ear. Now, isn’t that exactly how Sovereign Deed’s snake oil salesmen operated? Sure it is!
One contingency was that the State would have to make some road improvements to the park’s entrance at a rest stop along I-75. As of Nov. 2007, the developers had a pending application for an $11 million state grant for road improvements. Getting it should really be no problem because when developers need something done they can just stiff the workingman for more tax money, right?
It was noted, too, that the amusement park development might also necessitate relocating a snowmobile trail that runs through the property so it’ll still connect with the state and local trail plan. No problem; they can stiff the workingman trail riders for user fees and if that’s not enough, they can always fall back on the workingman’s tax money or use the DNR’s multi-million dollar public land sale money, right?
According to information included in a 7-31-06 item published in the Traverse City Record Eagle, Axiom was “seeking $25 million in help from the State for infrastructure improvements to the site.” That, dear readers, was in addition to the multi-million dollar road entrance improvements.
Perhaps feeling paranoid about possible leaks to what’s left of the state’s broke and badly bent taxpayers, as well as leaks to amusement park developer wanna-be’s lurking in the oaks, when Axiom representatives came courting to Crawford County sometime in Feb. of 2006, they asked county officials to sign “confidentiality agreements.”
The Michigan Land Use Institute investigated the matter and by June of 2007 had learned that those who signed the “let’s not spill the beans” agreements would be subject to legal action if they ran off at the mouth without express permission to do so from Axiom.
Those who thought it okay to hide things from the public included two elected township supervisors, a city manager, county controller, and the county’s Board of Commissioners’ chairman who just might stand to gain financially through an area business he owns.
To overcome other conflicts of interest for public figures, it appears Axiom has now dropped its request for $5 million in county bond financing, but the company might be interested in 10 to 12 years of township tax breaks with a projected value of $6.5 million over the first five years.
As of 10-25-07, Axiom indicated it was looking to finance the project with $60 million from equity partners plus an additional $100 million from banks and investors. It was also still looking to the State for multi-million dollar improvements to the area, as well as other “incentives.”
Writing for the Great Lakes Bulletin on 6-28-07, Glen Puit shared with readers that the amusement park would be built by a “brand new” company, MainStreet America, Inc., which is closely related to Axiom Entertainment. Axiom, by the way, is an offshoot of SBH Communications, founded in 1995 by its owner Susan Haddad who has also acted as a spokesperson for the developers.
Main Street’s principal investor is Patrick Crosson, who is also Axiom Entertainment’s special projects director. His partner, Daniel Cobb, is a documentary director and producer who founded the Daniel Brian & Associates ad marketing firm, which shares Axiom’s, MainStreet America’s, and SBH Communications’ address of 222 Main Street in Rochester, MI.
The Daniel Brian firm also owns Axiom TV, which, among other things, is marketing software technology being produced by a company named “Sunday’s Child.” Axiom TV, at present and among other things, is into a mail order business that peddles inexpensive old movies downloaded to DVDs.
Another “Main Street USA” investor is developer David Sinacola whose companies, the Sinacola Group and Rock and Waterscape, are into developing golf courses, shopping centers, apartment complexes and casinos. In fact, Mike Ilitch, Jr., son of multi-millionaire casino developers Mike and Marion Ilitch, is a partner of Daniel Brian & Associates and carries the title of executive producer.
According to Puit and others, plans for the Grayling fun park feature a winter wonderland, a giant water park (requires trucking in 8,000,000 gallons of water), a shopping district, public skating, a NASCAR track that converts to a wintertime snowmobile racing track, multi-player video games, an extreme-sports center, a train station, working-farm, at least three roller coasters, an indoor surfing center, toboggan sledding area and lift, children’s play area, convention center, hotel, and a 12 acre spot reserved for a ‘major anchor’ yet to be determined.” Want to bet that a major anchor under consideration isn’t a brand new casino?
Additional information indicates the developers are also planning to have the world’s largest Christmas tree and Ferris wheel, as well as a residential section that will include at least 450 apartments or 150 homes, no doubt for the 2,000 employees Crosson says might be hired. He claims 700 would be year-round workers and the rest seasonal, and has said, “Our minimum wage is $8 an hour. If you run a ride at a theme park, you have to have a college degree. The average starting salary for that will be around $36,000 a year. We think those are pretty good-paying jobs.”
Interestingly, the “amusements” being offered might provide excellent backdrops for movie and television ad producers and lend themselves well to recently Governor-approved legislation that’ll give a better than average tax break to those types of production companies. In fact, several Main Street USA theme park investment partners are into just that sort of thing, including Axiom Entertainment, MainStreet America, Inc., SBH Entertainment, and Daniel Brian & Associates.
According to online info, Michigan legislators formulated a package of bills to attract film producers. To sweeten the deal, the package “cast a wide net, defining ‘motion pictures’ as feature films, television shows, commercials, documentaries, music videos or other productions, excluding news and sporting events.”
To quote David Eggert’s 3-31-08 article “Michigan Movie Incentives Come With Price Tag” posted at www.canadianbusiness.com, “The marquee piece of legislation will give film studios a 40% refundable credit on production expenses in the state. For example, if an out-of-state studio has no Michigan Business Tax liability and spends $10 million on production in the state, the state will cut a check for $4 million. The credit otherwise can be used by in-state studios to reduce their state taxes. The nonpartisan Senate Fiscal Agency says if all the production expenses of a $150 million movie such as “Transformers” had been incurred in Michigan, it could have cost the state $47 million—at a time the budget is tight.”
Failed Hollywood actress Jennifer Granholm seems to like the deal, however. Crosson says the partners are thinking about putting Granholm’s face on a prominent display in a U.S.O. tour section of the park complete with a World War II airplane. Crosson is reported to have said, “She thought that would be kind of cool.”
http://www.mackinac.org/article.aspx?ID=8367
http://www.mlui.org/print.asp?fileid=17168
http://www.screenmag.tv/feature.aspx?fid=883
http://www.mlui.org/landwater/fullarticle.asp?fileid=17169
http://www.crainsdetroit.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070716/SUB/707150316
April 14, 2008
Vol. 9 Issue 14
Granholm & Co. Left With Snake Oil On Their Face
In a recent article titled “Pork for Pellston or Sovereign Deed,” I wrote about a private security company that wanted to set up a “pay to survive” shop at the Pellston Regional Airport in rural northern Lower Michigan.
In recent years, and thanks in good part to federal pork barrel spending by certain Michigan legislators, millions upon millions of taxpayer dollars has been invested in additional land and infrastructure improvements to make that tiny airport a lavishly adorned, state of the art facility fit for visiting royalty.
Located just south of the Mackinac Bridge and about a mile from the tiny village of Pellston, population now approximately 500, it seemed an unlikely spot to warrant so much spending. Regardless, it was apparently enough to draw the attention of at least one snake oil salesman who hoped to capitalize on Michigan’s economic vulnerability and the gullibility of the area’s community leaders, the state’s legislators, and, yes, even Governor Granholm.
Sovereign Deed’s founder, Barrett Moore, whose family has owned property in Pellston’s nearby Burt Lake/Petoskey area since the 1890s, claimed he’d ensure the safety of any and all who would pay a membership fee of $50,000 to his newly formed company, modeled after another of his private security enterprises, Triple Canopy. For that up-front amount plus another annual payment of $15,000, his employees, purportedly trained for survival readiness in the face of manmade or natural disasters, would ensure the company’s wealthy customers safe harbor and ample to drink and eat while they waited out a fear-inducing catastrophe, presumably after being transported out of harm’s way by some of Sovereign Deed’s employees.
Once the “behind closed doors” maneuvering between Sovereign Deed’s representatives and county and state officials become known to Joe Public, questions began to surface as to just what exactly was going on at Emmet County’s airport. The answers weren’t pretty, but the entire situation does serve one purpose and that’s to sound an alarm to all cashed-starved little communities whose respected leaders throw caution to the wind when smooth talking wheelers and dealers come calling.
Much to the relief of many community citizens, Sovereign Deed now appears to have pulled out of the preliminary deal it made with Emmet County officials, who, along with Gov. Granholm and a vast majority of the Michigan legislators, were ready to welcome a con man’s company to the state.
Not content to fade quietly into the sunset, Moore has posted a “Notice to Members” on his Sovereign Deed Web site. In part, it reads: “As Sovereign Deed enters its third year of operation and moves rapidly to expand its service offering, it has unfortunately become a political target. Even while the company works to provide its clients ground-breaking life-critical services in the face of disaster, an anti-establishment group seeks to disrupt these objectives by trying to undermine Sovereign Deed’s effort to construct a National Response facility in the State of Michigan. They use unscrupulous and defamatory tactics to promote their agendas. Their bias is evident. As is too common with these elements, truth is the first casualty.”
As more and more of the bizarre story emerges about how Mr. Moore duped the Michigan “powers that be,” it appears that the anti-establishment group he blames for undermining his efforts has done the state taxpayers a tremendous service by ridding Michigan of an unscrupulous snake oil salesman whose truthfulness was rightfully questioned.
Most of the following enlightening information is taken from an article written by Eartha Jane Melzer and published in the March 12th online Michigan Messenger under the title “Fear and failure haunted Sovereign Deed, say ex-employees.”
According to Ms. Melzer: “When Sovereign Deed LLC came to Emmet County last year advertising a plan to invest millions and create jobs with a privatized disaster-response service, state legislators and the Northern Lakes Economic Alliance put together a tax-financed package worth $19 million.”
As it turned out, Barrett Moore had lied about being an Army intelligence officer. Melzer learned that he actually had served time in an Australian prison for dubious used car deals before his conviction was overturned. Moore has also been sued for fraud three times and one lawsuit was initiated by some he worked with at Triple Canopy, another company he founded that garnered government contracts to provide protection for military workers in Iraq. Some of the so-called protectors now stand accused of shooting at innocent citizens who were just minding their own business.
In her article, Ms. Melzer wrote that “seven former Sovereign Deed employees have told Michigan Messenger that the firm was dysfunctional when they worked there in 2006 and 2007. They said Moore’s company was already in desperate economic shape when it began pitching Michigan officials on its disaster response service last year. Moore’s only business strategy, they said, was to capitalize on the state’s permissive economic system and its desperation for jobs—and that it almost succeeded.”
“The state was making decisions based on public relations,” said Larry Marks, the former marketing director of Sovereign Deed who left a year ago because he says he wasn’t being paid.
Also according to Melzer, Marks said Michigan officials failed to ask basic investor questions and never asked for an audited financial report. “The state is investing in its own future and jobs, and nobody said, ‘Let’s see the job descriptions,’” he said. “They say, ‘Gee whiz, if we don’t give the money, we are going to lose them.’ Well, sometimes you don’t want the business!”
Melzer also wrote that “Moore exaggerated the firm’s financial standing from the start” according to information supplied by another senior executive whistle blower. Other former associates said that Moore called his strategy of inflating the firm’s capabilities “playing puffer fish.”
Puffer fish, it should be noted, have the ability to inflate their extremely elastic stomachs to appear bigger than they are, and they also produce an exceptionally lethal poison, tetrodotoxin, which is approximately 1,200 times deadlier than cyanide.
Ms. Meltzer went on to write that Bret Hamachek, Moore’s former banker and friend, said he was disturbed when he learned that Michigan taxpayers were going to be brought in to fund the project.
It’s this writer’s humble opinion that Hamachek was probably more disturbed when Ms. Melzer set about ferreting out the truth, which Gov. “give me 5 years and I’ll blow you away” Granholm and her band of facilitating lawmakers failed to do before quickly formulating, passing, and signing into law legislation expressly designed to give taxpayer money specifically to ole puffer fish player Barrett Moore for his dysfunctional, but entrepreneurial, Sovereign Deed business.
The only thing Granholm seems capable of blowing away is the tattered corner of our threadbare pocket, the one that used to hold one coin to rub against another before she decided to build an entrepreneurial New Michigan on the taxpayers’ back.
Has anyone even thought to question her business acumen garnered during her tenure as an aspiring Hollywood actress, or as a college student and post-grad law student, or during her brief stint in a Detroit U.S. Attorney’s office prosecuting federal environmental crimes and then as Michigan’s Attorney General; groomed for that former position by Detroit’s Democrat political boss, Ed McNamara, who also mentored Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick? Kilpatrick, in case you haven’t heard, was recently caught messing with a “lady friend” employed through his office, and has now been indicted on 12 counts, including 8 felonies.
In closing her article about Barrett Moore and his Michigan dealings, Ms. Melzer wrote: “Marks, the company’s former marketing director, says the Sovereign Deed story illustrates a fundamental flaw in the state’s economic strategy.”
“Does the lack of transparency in Michigan’s economic development system rise to the level of malfeasance?” Marks asked. “I think so.”
“Desperate states go to desperate measures,” Hamachek said. “More and more snake oil people are going to show up. This was just one of the first.”
Hats off to Eartha Jane Melzer and to the Michigan Messenger for taking on the puffer fish and snake oil salesmen of the world.
Thumbs down to Gov. Granholm, however, whose only response so far seems to have been made through her mouthpiece, Liz Boyd, who defensively said, “The governor will not apologize for trying to bring jobs to Michigan.”
Ah, well, one might suppose it’s hard to apologize for poor judgment when wiping copious amounts of snake oil off one’s face.
http://michiganmessenger.com/showDiary.do?diaryId=978
http://www.michiganmessenger.com/tag.do?tag=Sovereign+Deed
http://michiganmessenger.com/magFront.do
http://www.federalobserver.com/archive.php?aid=12181
http://www.sovereigndeed.com/notice.html
http://www.mlui.org/growthmanagement/fullarticle.asp?fileid=16816
March 31, 2008
Vol. 9 Issue 13
The Dirty Clean Water Restoration Act of 2007
The Clean Water Act of 1972, officially the Federal Water Pollution Control Act, was designed to govern pollution in the “navigable waters of the United States.” Responsibility for the law was placed under the jurisdiction of the Corps of Engineers. Navigable waters were defined to mean water on which a canoe could float and the legislative mandate was quite broad: “to restore and maintain the chemical, physical and biological integrity of the nation’s waters.”
The legislative bill’s primary designer was Sen. Ed Muskie (D-Maine) who some consider the father of the modern day environmental movement. Muskie was Maine’s governor from 1955-1959 and then a senator from 1959-1980 before serving the Carter administration as Sec. of State from May 1980 to Jan. 1981.
In a glowing tribute on the “founders” page of the Edmund S. Muskie Foundation Website, Leon G. Billings wrote that “before Ed Muskie, there was no national environmental policy. There was no national environmental movement. There was no national environmental consciousness.”
None could say there’s no “national environmental consciousness” anymore, that’s for sure, as environmentalism has become almost rabid in intensity, particularly with more than sufficient nudging by Gang Green’s partnering “tax-exempt” stakeholder groups who pass around a peace pipe with the taxpayers’ resource management agencies one minute and then sue them the next.
The lofty goal of Muskie’s 1972 Clean Water Act was to make the nation’s lakes, rivers, and shoreline clean enough for swimming and fishing by 1983. The immediate task to be undertaken, however, was to stop municipal sewage plants and other government facilities (such as military bases) and industries, including manufacturing, mining, oil and gas extraction entities, and also certain agricultural businesses (i.e. animal feedlots) from dumping untreated or poorly treated wastes into the public’s navigable waters. (Surface water for drinking purposes is governed by separate legislation, the Safe Drinking Water Act of 1974)
The 1972 Clean Water Act was amended in 1977 and is now primarily administered by the Environmental Protection Agency, which helps state and local governments set up their own pollution control plans. The Clean Water Act of 1977 provided for billions of dollars in grants that helped local communities build sewage treatment plants. Unfortunately, now that many of those treatment plants have become obsolete and in need of updating and repairs, the broke and badly bent communities are hard put to foot the bill on their own.
While the federal government could continue to kick in with money for upgrades, as it’s done in the past, it seems there’s no longer enough money in the nation’s coffer. One might wonder how that can be since presidential hopeful Barack Hussein Obama had no qualms about recently introducing legislation that would use $84 billion in taxpayer money to augment what America already doles out to reduce poverty everywhere else but in the USA.
Though the goal of the Clean Water Act of 1972 wasn’t reached by 1983, at least 60% of the nation’s intrastate (within a state) waterways were considered clean enough for recreational purposes by 1998. Chances are much of the 60% was safe long before 1972, but figures regarding that notion aren’t readily available. The good Lord knows I swam and fished in one heck of a lot of Michigan water from 1950 until today and am no worse the wear for it.
Regardless, only a fool would argue that ensuring that water isn’t safe to swim or fish isn’t a good thing.
What isn’t a good thing, however, is that the Act has been and continues to be manipulated by environmentalists who yank lawmakers around by the ring in their nose, just as has happened with the Endangered Species Act, so that, as time passes, people lose more and more of their private property rights without really knowing what hit them, let alone the how and why of it.
The latest manipulation is in the form of the Clean Water Restoration Act of 2007, which eliminates the term “navigable waters of the United States” and replaces it with “waters of the United States.” As such, the new term means “all waters subject to the ebb and flow of the tide, the territorial seas, and all interstate and intrastate waters and their tributaries, including lakes, rivers, streams (including intermittent streams), mudflats, sandflats, wetlands, sloughs, prairie potholes, wet meadows, playa lakes, natural ponds, and all impoundments of the foregoing, to the fullest extent that these waters, or activities affecting these waters, are subject to the legislative power of Congress under the Constitution.”
To encapsulate that new definition for “waters of the United States,” it means all water, every last drop of it, even on your very private, do not trespass, land that the government lets you own in name only, provided you pay property taxes to do so.
In essence, if it rains hard enough on your land to cause a run-off into a roadside ditch, or gives rise to wet meadowland on the back forty, or a water filled pothole in your driveway, the feds believe the Constitution empowers them to apply their cockamamie law to your private property.
Technically, according to Article I, Sect. 8, the US Constitution allows the federal government to “regulate commerce…among the several states…” Being the devious bunch they’ve been long before being “transparent” about globalism and sustainability came into vogue, the ruling majority of our elected who serve in D.C. have interpreted their constitutional empowerment to mean they have the right to regulate the “navigable waters” of the United States because some goods are transported by boat.
Now they’re interpreting their empowerment to include striking the term “navigable waters” in favor of regulating mud puddles on anyone’s private property. And, if you don’t think Gang Green hasn’t helped in this endeavor, think again, as countless lawsuits have been filed against more than a few other than the U.P.’s Richard Delene and downstate Michigan farmer John Rapanos, who fought a long, hard, and very expensive battle regarding dubious wetlands on his private property 20 miles from the nearest navigable waterway.
In fact, the Rapanos v. United States case and another, Carabell v. United States, decided in 2006 by the Supreme Court in favor of the private property owners, may have provided the catalyst for the federal legislature’s decision to revamp the Clean Water Act so as to strike the term “navigable water” and replace it with “waters of the United States.” Not only that, but the feds also had their Constitution tampering legislation questioned in 2001 when a Supreme Court ruling limited the government’s reach to some extent by exempting isolated wetlands that didn’t cross state lines and didn’t have a hydrological connection to navigable waters.
Not having to fight city hall because they are city hall, a contingent of 174 U.S. Representatives, mostly Democrats, have decided to make an end run around the Supreme Court and bellied up to co-sponsor the newly contrived Clean Water Restoration Act of 2007, a.k.a. HR-2412. The bill was proposed by Rep. James Oberstar, a Democrat who, since 1975, has represented several counties in northeastern Minnesota that include the cities of Duluth, Brainerd, Grand Rapids, Hibbing, and International Falls.
Michigan legislators who don’t mind interpreting the Constitution in a very liberal manner so as to regulate the use of any water in any amount by We, the People and who have signed on as co-sponsors of HR-2421 are Republican Rep. Vern Ehlers and Democrat Reps. Conyers, Dingell, Kildee, Kilpatrick, Levin, and Stupak.
Russ Feingold (D-WI) introduced similar companion legislation, S-1870, in the Senate. Michigan Senators who co-sponsored Feingold’s bill are Carl Levin and Deborah Stabenow.
Clearly, our legislators need to get reacquainted with the 10th Amendment to the Constitution of the United States of America, which is part of We, the People’s Bill of Rights: “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”
To quote respected property rights activist Henry Lamb who wrote in his Feb. 4, 2008 article, ‘The Feds Are Trying to Steal Your Water’: “All limitations of freedom should arise from the government that is closest to the people and should be authorized by the consent of the people whose freedom is limited. In the case of water regulations, these regulations should arise from the government that is closest to the water source and water users, and these regulations should be approved by the people whose freedom is limited by them…
“…The regulation of non-navigable waters should remain in the hands of the state and local governments, where the people whose freedom is threatened can express their concerns and approve, or reject, specific regulatory proposals…
“…When Bill Clinton moved into the White House, every resource agency of the federal government was populated with recruits from politically powerful environmental organizations. The agenda that drives these organizations is not the U.S. Constitution, not the rights of the people. Their agenda is to force the people to behave in ways they think is best for society…
“…The people, and their local and state representatives, should rise up in outrage against this congressional effort to steal their water.”
http://canadafreepress.com/index.php/article/1698
http://www.unesco.org/water/wwap/wwdr/
http://www.nature.org/initiatives/freshwater/misc/
http://www.nature.org/initiatives/freshwater/
March 24, 2008
Vol. 9 Issue 12
While reviewing recent pork barrel spending, I researched Senators Carl Levin and Debbie Stabenow’s $1,778,000 taxpayer-money gift toward the completion of a permanent display housed at Alpena’s new visitor center.
As it turns out, the visitor center is the multi-million dollar Thunder Bay National Marine Sanctuary and Underwater Preserve’s tourist attraction at Alpena. Also, as it turns out, Iosco County residents weren’t too happy about having the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) in charge of their shoreline or in charge of the state’s underwater treasures in and around Lake Huron’s Thunder Bay area, either. Results of a Nov. 1995 ballot referendum showed those opposed to the marine sanctuary outnumbered those in favor of it by a margin of 3 to 1.
However, through lack of “transparency” (i.e. hiding the truth from the public), as well as through the contriving of compliant state officials and NOAA, which is a partner of the UN’s World Conservation Union (IUCN), citizens of the sovereign State of Michigan have been deprived sole control of the Great Lakes water surrounding a portion of the state’s 1st Congressional District in northern Lower Michigan.
Though the good people of Iosco County fought a tedious and courageous battle long before elected government officials and appointed bureaucrats felt the need for more transparency, the scourge of mass media’s lack of attention to the dirty business afoot in Michigan and the resultant ignorance among the flock of sheeple left but a few sheared sheeple to fight for the rights of many whose wool covered eyes prevent them from seeing beyond the end of their nose to this day.
Of course, this activity was taking place at a time when the IUCN cronies were covertly setting up their insidious system of UN-US Biospheres and surrounding bio-reserves, as part of the UN’s Man and the Biosphere Program.
Sen. Carl Levin was in office even then; has, in fact, been in office since 1979 during the time when both of the state’s UN Biospheres were designated in the U.P. at Isle Royale and in the Lower Peninsula near Petoskey, and when the UN Isle Royale Biosphere, at the insistence of the National Park Service (NPS), was kicked into fully functional mode in 1995 during the Clinton/Gore reign of environmental terror.
According to information on a NPS Website regarding the agency’s Maritime Heritage Program, &ldq