Acronym Soup

It's not exactly a confidence builder to see the newest federal agency stumbling out of the starting blocks. The Agency Formerly Known as the Minerals Management Service (or AFKMMS) can't seem to settle on the right acronym, according to The Washington Post. All the good ones seem to have been taken.

Energy Obstructionists

The Associated Press notes a sudden reluctance on the part of energy companies to bid on federal oil and gas leases in the state Utah. But is it really surprising? Virtually every major auction offered in the Rocky Mountain West is fiercely contested by anti-drilling extremists. The knee-jerk obstructionism is simply wearing energy providers down. And given the obvious sway the extremists hold with this administration, and with Interior Secretary Ken Salazar (an obstructionists himself while in the Senate), it's little wonder that the Rocky Mountain energy boom went bust.

Macroeconomic forces have played a part in this, no question. But green extremism is also a significant factor, as these two news reports -- link and link -- make clear. Especially frustrating was the dishonest way that Salazar and the Obama administration unilaterally nullified dozens of legitimate energy leases in Utah shortly after coming to power. A number of those voided leases have been reinstated, thanks to the scrutiny of Utah's congressional delegation. But watching the administration attempt to justify that abuse of power proves to me that the Obamatons (much like the Clintonistas) are absolutely devoid of any principle, save for political expediency and interest group loyalty. And I'm glad to see folks aren't just laying down for it.

From Thursday Deseret News:

Utah oil and gas leases should be reinstated, report says
Analysis is latest in ongoing fight over 2008 land auction

A new analysis by an association representing oil and gas producers asserts the Department of the Interior thwarted the public process and "second-guessed" its own land managers when it yanked bids on oil and gas parcels sold at a controversial auction in Salt Lake City last December.

Despite "aggressive" environmental protections included in the Bureau of Land Management's Resource Management Plans, the Interior Department recommended eight leases for removal and 52 leases for deferral, disregarding scientific evidence and input from Utah stakeholders, according to the association.

"It's a sad day when politics trumps the expertise of professional land managers and the hard work of citizens to develop economic and resource-development plans that the community has embraced," said Kathleen Sgamma, Independent Petroleum Association of Mountain States spokeswoman. "If you're not listening to your land managers and the public, who are you listening to?"

The report, released Thursday, is the latest in a series of volleys fired back and forth among environmentalists, the oil and gas industry and the Interior Department on the heels of the auction that was marred by protests and the arrest of activist Timothy DeChristopher.

Two months after the auction, Interior Secretary Ken Salazar pulled all 77 leases, saying they had been put on the table after a rushed "midnight" decision in the waning hours of the Bush administration. He later sent a hand-picked team led by Forest Supervisor Mike Stiles to Utah to conduct a review of the appropriateness of the leases offered at auction.
As a result of that review, Salazar removed eight parcels from consideration and put 52 more under additional review.

The petroleum association's 66-page analysis of Stiles' report found "no evidence" to support the resulting Interior Department decision and said Salazar showed a "lack of regard" for the seven-year public planning process that produced the Resource Management Plans.

Specific information for each parcel, location details, wilderness status and lease stipulations contained in the management plans are contained in the report, as well as a summary of why the association believes the parcel is appropriate for leasing.

One of the parcels, for example, was described as 160 acres with a western boundary located 4.5 miles from Canyonlands National Park, with existing state and federal leases between it and the park. The environmental protections mandated in the lease stipulation include air quality, paleontological resources and mitigation of impacts to endangered or threatened species such as the Mexican spotted owl.

"Based on this analysis, (the petroleum association) believes the 60 leases were legitimately sold at the December 2008 sale and should be reinstated to the winning bidders," the report said.

And here's a report from the AP earlier in the week:

SALT LAKE CITY (AP) -- A trade group says it's getting so hard to obtain an oil-and-gas lease in the Rocky Mountains that many drillers and land agents aren't even trying to buy one.
The criticism came after the government held an auction of public lands in Utah that was remarkable for how few parcels were offered or sold.

The Independent Petroleum Association of Mountain States says drillers are scared that the administration of President Barack Obama will hold up a lease after it sells one, so they aren't bothering with the auctions.

The industry group also complains the new administration is doing little to clear a $100 million backlog of leases that were sold years ago but are being stifled by legal or bureaucratic review.

The energy crisis of a few years has abated for now, due to the global economic downturn. But it will return, and persist, in the years ahead. Spiking prices and short supplies will have Americans crying out for relief (remember the chants of "drill, baby, drill" that were heard not so long ago?) and wondering who's to blame. But energy obstructionists always can count on the amnesia of average Americans to shield them from blame when the uproar commences.

Federal Agency Could Use More Gun Control

The government expects average Americans to keep close tabs on our personal firearms, lest sloppiness lead to thefts, accidents or guns finding their way into the wrong hands. But how carefully does the federal government keep track of its firearms?

Not very carefully, according to this just-released report by the Inspector General at the U.S. Department of Interior, which identified a number of problems with how the agency stored and accounted for weapons. While investigators didn't identify any specific cases in which federal firearms ended up in the wrong hands, or made their way to the black market, the lax management it describes at some agency weapons caches raises the possibility that this occurs.

Average citizens who handled their personal firearms in this way might be accused of reckless endangerment, or at least be called irresponsible. But when the federal government is involved, it's business as usual.

Here are some key experts from the IG report:

"All bureaus have policies and procedures designed to control and safeguard property that are generally consistent with Department standards and other federal regulations. Despite these policies and procedures, we found that most DOI law enforcement programs could not accurately account for their cached firearms. Inventories were found to be inaccurate and those responsible for firearms accountability did not always follow established procedures for conducting periodic inventories or reporting and investigating missing firearms. We found 373 inventory discrepancies out of the 1,334 firearms we physically handled. These discrepancies include: firearms listed on inventories but not present; firearms present, but not listed on inventories; and administrative errors such as lost and unprocessed paperwork or transposition errors. Consequently, the Department cannot accurately account for the number of law enforcement firearms it has or where those firearms are actually located."

"We discovered inconsistencies in the diligence paid to firearms inventories at most National Wildlife Refuge System (NWRS) locations we visited. During a review of the NWRS armory at FLETC, where approximately 400 weapons were stored, we found that the NWRS had not conducted an official inventory for over two years. NWRS belatedly conducted an inventory of those weapons in response to our data request. When questioned about the lack of annual inventories, the NWRS official responsible for those firearms said “you’re not going to like what I’m about to say” and confessed that he has refused to conduct the required inventories because of inaccurate inventory reports he received from NWRS headquarters. We learned that prior to his assignment to FLETC, a paid student intern had been given responsibility for firearms after a past firearms custodian had been relieved of his responsibilities.

When we compared the NWRS armory firearms inventory that was certified on April 2, 2009, to our April 20, 2009 physical inventory of those firearms, we discovered over 100 firearms that were not in the armory as indicated in the official inventory records. We also found several firearms on the inventory were listed as assigned to personnel who had retired in 2004, as well as other firearms that had been assigned to personnel who had resigned and now works for the Department of Homeland Security. Firearms that had been documented elsewhere as destroyed were still listed on current inventories."

What the IG found at New York Field Office of the U.S. Park Police was troubling.

"Our findings at the U.S. Park Police (USPP) New York Field Office (NYFO) further highlighted our concerns over disconcerting attitudes towards firearms accountability and security. Original property receipts were stored in a plastic bag, abandoned and personal weapons were intermixed with government-owned firearms, and gun safes containing a silenced machine gun and other firearms were unlocked. An unknown number of keys had been issued to the firearms storage area, firearms custodians were unaware of the number of guns in their inventory or their origin, and guns physically present were not listed on the inventory.

Three weapons originally purchased in 1993 (two of which were never used), and which are now obsolete, were reported as missing. They were subsequently discovered at the abandoned USPP firearms range during the course of our assessment. USPP could not tell us when those guns were last inventoried or had been physically seen.arms.

Upon discovering the physical conditions of the NYFO armory and the management of their firearms, we notified the USPP Chief about our observations. The chief subsequently ordered an investigation be conducted regarding the three missing weapons. He also ordered the armory moved to a more appropriate location under new supervision, a complete audit of the firearms property management function, and inventory of all weapons. The deputy chief confirmed that these tasks had been completed . . ."

. . . Two assault weapons located in NYFO firearms storage closet.

A senior law enforcement executive who has spent 30 years in NWRS told us he knows that refuges “squirrel” away firearms. In another case, we discovered two assault weapons stored in the NYFO firearms storage closet that were not listed on the official inventory. Both weapons were labeled “safe keeping private owner abandoned.” We received two conflicting accounts about how these weapons came into USPP custody when we questioned the office’s firearms custodians about those weapons. One explained that they had been turned in approximately 18 years ago by a private citizen after the assault weapons ban went into effect. The other told us that the weapons had been seized as evidence during a criminal investigation but were no longer needed. Neither firearms custodian could tell us why the weapons were still being stored."

Not every weapons cache the IG visited was badly managed, thankfully. But enough were to make one wonder whether similar conditions exist inside other federal agencies -- and to make one think that there's a good deal of hypocrisy in the constant lecturing about firearm safety that average citizens get from government officials. Government officials often are leading the cheers for more gun control for the rest of us. Maybe they need a little more of their own.

Here's a final salvo from the IG's report:

All Departmental law enforcement programs require that missing or stolen assigned firearms be immediately reported and investigated. The Department also requires that all missing firearms be reported to the Office of Law Enforcement and Security (OLES) through Serious Incident Reporting procedures. Despite these requirements, we found that weapons missing from firearms caches are handled differently and are less likely to be reported as missing or investigated. Instead of handling missing cache firearms the same as a missing assigned firearm, in most cases, missing cache firearms discovered during annual property inventories are simply treated as inventory discrepancies or paperwork errors. It is not until the firearms inventory is completed and supporting documents are reviewed, sometimes days or months later, that a weapon may be considered missing and reported as such.

How missing firearms are reported varies among bureaus and their individual office locations. In most cases, the person responsible for maintaining the firearms inventory is also the person responsible for reporting missing weapons. Many individuals we interviewed could only describe procedures used to investigate missing weapons in general terms. Concerns over the inherit dangers that these missing firearms pose to public safety should necessitate a sense of urgency for bureaus to make every effort to locate missing weapons; however, we found some cases where bureaus did not always report, or report in a timely manner, missing firearms. We found that in some cases, missing weapons are merely reported to a Board of Survey with little or no documentation and then requested to be removed from an office’s inventory. In other cases, criminal or administrative investigations of the missing firearm are conducted depending on the circumstances of the loss. In many cases nothing is done, and the weapons remain on the inventory for weeks or even years without any action being taken. The Department’s inventory process exacerbates this problem by failing to provide a mechanism for more frequent inventories or timely entries into property management systems."

Collateral Damage

Most media coverage of the public land wars follows a familiar but simplistic pattern. You have the malevolent force called "industry" on one side, poised to ruthlessly plunder the planet for private gain. Then you have the good guys, wearing green hats, who are just trying to "save" something "pristine" and "precious." Ignored in this sort of coverage are the Americans caught in the middle -- Westerners who appreciate (but don't necessarily worship) their natural surroundings, but would also like decent paying jobs, in something other than an ice cream scoop economy that caters to tourists.

I'm talking about unemployed timber workers in Oregon and Washington, living on welfare because America cares more about the Spotted owl than it cares about them. I'm talking about out-of-work commercial fishers in New England, California and Florida. I'm talking about ranchers and miners who've thrown in the towel, because government regulators are waging war on them. I'm talking about energy industry workers who aren't working, because anti-drilling zealots have derailed another domestic gas and oil project.

I'm talking about Jeremy and Amber Harrison of Vernal, Utah, who traveled all the way to Washington last week, for an appointment with an Interior Department official whose decisions can mean work or a welfare check for so many Westerners. They went carrying hand-written letters from folks back in Utah, who were left in the lurch when Interior Secretary Ken Salazar, immediately after confirmation, unilaterally canceled 77 drilling leases in the state, which he and a few green groups say pose a threat to national parks.

The Harrison's wanted to deliver a "human impact statement." But the official, Deputy Interior Secretary David Hayes, snubbed them at the last minute -- reinforcing the message that arrogant Washingtonians are indifferent to the collateral damage their decisions inflict out here in fly-over country. Here's the story, as told by the Deseret News.

Stood-up Vernal couple still seek to tell oil-lease story in D.C.

They were there to talk about oil leases, but official canceled

When told they could meet with the Interior Department's No. 2 official, Jeremy and Amber Harrison pulled money out of their tight savings and with friends' help traveled to Washington, D.C., from Vernal, hoping to tell how canceling federal oil leases is hurting Vernal.
But after they arrived, an aide to Deputy Interior Secretary David Hayes called and canceled the meeting that had been scheduled in the office of Rep. Rob Bishop, R-Utah. They were told no other time was available with Hayes, but an alternate official could maybe meet with them sometime.

"This is not the way people ought to be treated," said an upset Bishop. He said his office had verified the meeting last week, but it was canceled at the last minute. "It is unfortunate. I mean these guys came back on their own dime to try and meet with Hayes."

It comes as the House Natural Resources Committee is beginning two days of hearings Wednesday on how to meet America's energy needs while protecting the environment, as administration officials, environmental groups, sportsmen, landowners and others are scheduled to testify.

Amid that, the Harrisons had sought Bishop's help to meet with Hayes and bring 150 or so letters from Vernal residents about how the administration's cancellation of oil leases there is hurting them. "It's going to be like a human impact statement," Bishop said, noting he will enter all of those letters into the record at the hearing.

"We need Americans at work, not foreigners" selling foreign oil to America, Jeremy Harrison said. He and his wife want to tell how unemployment has gone from about 1 percent around Vernal to 8.5 percent, which they blame largely on administration actions making it harder to drill for oil.

Amber Harrison said she and her husband own a small business to truck crude oil. "Our income has gone down drastically. We were on the verge of losing a few items, but we were able to pull things out," she said.

"But a lot of people around us have lost entire homes and cars and are wondering if they can feed their families," she said. "Many people have had to move away because they cannot find a job." Amber Harrison said she and her husband attended a "tea party" protest in April, and began talking with others about the need for a group to counter what they feel are misleading claims by environmental groups.

She said they formed a citizens group called Grassroots Alliance for Public Lands. "It was our response to the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance," she said, and it started looking for ways to get out the story of the economic impacts of actions that make drilling harder.

When Hayes traveled to Vernal earlier this year for a hearing on canceled oil leases, the Harrisons and other members of their grass-roots alliance were there.

"I did get up and speak with David Hayes and I presented him with an 'I Love Drilling' T-shirt signed by people in Vernal. We were hopeful that because of comments he had made directly to me, that he would be willing to meet with us. Unfortunately, the willingness just isn't there," Amber Harrison said.

The Harrisons are meeting, however, with all members of the Utah delegation and with the Western Caucus of the House to tell stories of people in Vernal. They will also attend the hearings on energy, and Bishop has promised to ask some questions on their behalf while also presenting their letters.

One letter is from 9-year-old Heather Mendoza. It says that before her grandfather was laid off from his oil industry job, they lived in a home where she had a horse and a dog.
"We sold my horse because we could not afford to keep her. Where we moved in Vernal, we had to get rid of my dog as well," Mendoza wrote. "The only thing I ask is please let my grandpa go back to work so we can at least stay in Vernal."

In another letter, Kathleen Fladeland wrote that her husband has been out of work since February, after working in the oil industry for 40 years. "I am working a part-time job, but it does not cover even a quarter of our bills," adding they will "soon be in foreclosure if he can't find a decent job."

In another letter, Julie Curry wrote how even her car wash for large trucks in Vernal has been hurt by canceling oil leases, so truckers have fewer jobs and less need of her service.
"Our business has experienced a 67 percent decrease," she wrote, adding that it went from having nine employees earlier this year to now having just two.

Jeremy Harrison said of such letters, "Stuff like this should not be happening in America."
He added that while environmental groups argue that canceling oil leases could help tourism in Vernal by making areas more pristine, "tourism may help a bit in summer. But the oil fields are what keeps the area going all year long."
e-mail: lee@desnews.com"

Several days later, at a congressional hearing, Secretary Salazar was asked by Rep. Bishop what response he had for people like the Harrisons. "Look at what is happening to real people on the ground as a result of decisions the Department of Interior has made in my home state of Utah," Bishop said. But the insufferably smug Salazar would not take responsibility, shifting that (as all Obama administration officials do) to the previous administration, which he says rushed the leases through.

"Salazar . . .said the Obama administration should not be blamed for economic problems in Utah oil country related to rescinding the auction, but the Bush administration should be for rushing the auction without fully consulting the National Park Service. "What happened with those 77 parcels … is that there was simply not the consultation that should have taken place there between the Bureau of Land Management and the National Park Service," Salazar told the House Natural Resources Committee. "Because that consultation did not take place, there was a need to review that to ensure that the other legal interests of the United States of America were being protected," he said . . .

. . . . Rep. Rob Bishop, R-Utah, complained that Deputy Interior Secretary David Hayes had canceled a meeting with Jeremy and Amber Harrison of Vernal who brought 150 letters from neighbors to describe economic distress from the canceled auction — after they spent their own money to travel to Washington on the promise of meeting him Tuesday.

"I'd be happy to take whatever documents they have," Salazar said, but said economic problems in the Uintah Basin should be blamed more on rushing a bad auction than on him for trying to fix it. "Sometimes what ends up happening is when the government does things in a rushed and wrong way, you end up having consequences to human beings like the Harrisons that you don't have when you do it the right way," Salazar said."

The oil and gas industry vigorously denies the process was shortcut. The Independent Petroleum Association of the Mountain States has produced a point-by-point rebuttal to these claims. An independent panel reinstated a number of the canceled leases, raising more doubts about the legitimacy of Salazar's actions. But the Interior secretary defending his abuses of power, arguing that he had the authority to unilaterally cancel leases "near" national parks.

"Many of those lease parcels are in fact going forward," Salazar said. "But the fact is I don't believe we should drill everywhere because not everyplace is appropriate for us to drill. We shouldn't be drilling near Arches National Park and Canyonlands and Dinosaur. Those are important treasures that we need to protect."

"Near" and "close" are relative terms in the sprawling West. What's "near" here would be "far" back East. Is a drilling rig 20 or 30 or 40 miles away from a national park boundary line really too close? Salazar and others are trying to make that claim (using what I call the "proximity ploy").

But since when did a single individual's subjective judgments become the basis for making such momentous decisions? And how many millions of acres of public lands are we removing from potentially productive uses when we draw such arbitrary and subjective buffer zones around parks? Given the prevalence of parks across the West -- just look at a map of southern Utah --isn't this a rationale for locking away a huge new swath of public lands?

That's exactly what it is.

Rep. Bishop is asking hard questions about whether Salazar's Interior Department colluded with outside groups on the issue. He pressed Salazar on this at the hearing:

"Bishop also complained that the department has not provided documents he has requested that he says may show it has a too cozy relationship with environmental groups that oppose oil drilling in Utah. "Your department has been foot-dragging, stonewalling and the only thing we have received is the apparently false claim that there are only seven communications," Bishop said. Salazar said, "We have thousands of pages, frankly, that have been sent over (or) are being sent over. … You've gotten a lot of those documents. You're getting a lot more."

Whether or not collusion can be documented, is there any doubt that Salazar and the Obama administration are water-carriers for the radical green groups that helped put them in power? No doubt, in my opinion. It's evident not just in the policies they're adopting, but in their arrogant indifference to the human casualties, and collateral damage to the American economy, these policies leave in their wake.

The Harrisons of Vernal Utah are just the tip of the iceberg.

Will Salazar's Home Turf Get Some Solar-Powered Pork?

Southern Colorado's San Luis Valley seems like a suitable spot for solar power facilities. It's sunny most days. It's flat. It's relatively uncrowded. The federal government has some significant land holdings there. Thus, it makes sense that the valley would be among the locales the Interior Department is considering for the fast-tracking of such projects, as was reported in today's Denver Business Journal.

But the San Luis Valley also happens to be the home turf of Interior Secretary Ken Salazar, a former attorney general and senator from Colorado. His family owns land there. It's part of his brother's congressional district. And the economy isn't exactly booming. This raises the possibility that the valley could get an unfair leg up on the competition -- if it hasn't gotten one already -- should Salazar decide to toss it a little solar power pork.

That means Interior had better be very scrupulous and transparent about how these siting decisions are made, and permits are handed out, lest it appear that Salazar is using his office to do special favors for the home crowd.

The Western landscape seems ideally suited for such projects. There's still plenty of space; federal holdings are vast; and most states in the region, including Colorado, are falling all over themselves trying to jump on the "clean energy" bandwagon. But the prospect that this process will devolve into just another pork-barrel pig out seems real enough, seeing as how Salazar made this announcement while standing beside Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, who will undoubtedly be pulling strings to see that Nevada lands "its fair share" (and then some) of the projects.

Members of the legislative branch are justifiable renowned for "earmarking" federal dollars for pet projects. But high-ranking members of the executive branch are well-positioned to do the same, if they have the opportunity and inclination. I wouldn't mind seeing the San Luis Valley get in on the action, if the process is honest. But the process will have to be watched closely to ensure that's the case.

The Shanksville Ultimatum

It would be nice to have a memorial of some kind, somewhere, to the brave passengers and crew of Flight 93. Shanksville, Pennsylvania, the site where the plane came down after passengers led an uprising against hijackers, would seem like the best place to built it. But we do the dead no honors by allowing the U.S. government to seize that land, by threatening the use of eminent domain.

Interior Secretary Ken Salazar traveled to Shanksville last week, attempting to negotiate an end to the impasse by meeting with landowners. But the shameful ultimatum he laid down -- sell within a week or we'll use eminent domain -- betrays the ugly truth, that the federal government is bullying Americans off their land, is trampling their property rights, in order to meet some deadline for getting the project finished.

All the folksy charm Salazar can muster doesn't disguise the fact that he's in this case an intimidator, a henchman and a thief. He likes wearing cowboy hats, a prop meant to convince people he's in touch with his rural roots. But I hope he didn't wear one of his white hats to Shanksville. Black would have been more fitting on this occasion.

Reports the Philadelphia Inquirer:

"The order (to sell) came hours after Interior Secretary Ken Salazar and U.S. Sen. Arlen Specter (D., Pa.) met with people who own 500 acres in and around the Shanksville area, where Flight 93 crashed on Sept. 11, 2001, and with victims' relatives eager to see the memorial built in time for the 10th anniversary of the terrorist attacks.

"After meeting with the landowners and the Park Service today, I have high hopes that the parties are close to agreement and will be able to reach consensus over the land in the next week so we can keep the memorial on track without using eminent domain," Salazar said. "Only if the parties are not able to reach agreement will we have to use the last resort of eminent domain to acquire land."

Kendra Barkoff, Salazar's spokeswoman, said the deadline was essential to keep the construction on track. He directed National Park Service officials to meet with landowners early next week and report to him by Friday.

The decision by the National Park Service last month to pursue eminent domain touched off fierce criticism in an area where local residents have been deeply involved in efforts to plan the park and establish and staff the temporary memorial at the crash site. Two local members of the Flight 93 Federal Advisory Commission were so angry about the government's seizure plans that they resigned."

Trampling the rights of some Americans in order to "honor" other Americans is ironic, incongruous, and outrageous. It will forever leave a stain on any memorial built there. However welcoming they are to sightseers, locals will long remember the strong-arm tactics used by the federal government to get the property.

Perhaps a small plaque can be placed somewhere near the Flight 93 memorial, noting that this is also the place where America's belief in the sanctity of private property was laid to rest. We could call it the American Property Rights Memorial.