Nevada Bloggers rock
Both Vote Jim Gibbons Out! and Las Vegas Gleaner were mentioned this morning in a Reno Gazette Journal story about the political blog world in Nevada. Both are great blogs that I try to read daily, and its interesting to see the impact blogs can have on local races in the West:
Nevada has been blogged.Just ask Chancellor Jim Rogers, who still might be a Republican, or U.S. Sen. John Ensign, who still might have a political bombshell to drop on a would-be opponent.
Already players on the national stage, political bloggers have arrived in the Silver State and are poised to alter Nevada's campaign landscape.
Nevada's nascent blogosphere recently revealed the past drug use of potential U.S. Senate candidate Jack Carter and instigated a controversy that compelled Rogers to become nonpartisan.
Blogs are Internet journals that offer a running commentary on the issues of the day, with writers combing other blogs, mainstream media and other sources for nuggets often overlooked by the established press. Beyond that, they offer an instantaneous forum for political debate.
It's a citizen punditry that already is breaking news in Nevada and shaping debates in some of the state's key races.
"Local political blogs have a lot of potential to shape politics in Nevada and be influential in the same way that national blogs have been influential," said Donica Mensing, a journalism professor at the University of Nevada, Reno. "They can set up buzz about candidates, skewer campaigns, hold figures accountable."
Emmett O'Connell | November 21, 2005 | Comment on This Post (3 so far) |
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Just attended the first planning meeting for the Recall Reid committee in Reno. The place was packed We are going to do it. He's gone.
Posted by: Jay Mahn | Apr 15, 2006 1:00:28 PM
See http://www.giveemhellharry.com/blog
Harry Reid has the guts to have a wide open blog. Like the wild West, it is a wild blog.
Posted by: Leo Brown | Apr 15, 2006 4:56:50 PM
Please help.
Las Vegas has begun the process of perpetrating a massive water grab.
The likely result will be massive dust bowls in the valleys for up to 300 miles north of Las Vegas.
The BLM is taking comments on the pipeline network until September 18 and the Nevada State Engineer will open the case on Southern Nevada Water Authority's applications for Rural Nevada's water on September 11. If we let the politicians know that the people of Nevada, including the people of Las Vegas, are against this; maybe we can avert this unnecessary disaster.
Here's the story:
Urban, rich, Southern Nevada wants to pipe in water from an area in Rural Nevada (and Utah) almost the size of Vermont. Everyone in Rural Nevada is against taking water from the desert (and most residents of Las Vegas aren't comfortable with it, either). But, Rural Nevada has the politically unenviable trait of being the least densely populated area in the Nation – which means that Rural Nevada is always in the minority. This time, however, it's “screw Nevada”... by Nevada.
Las Vegas developers are drooling for the profits they could get by sustaining unsustainable growth – in a city that is already congested to the point of daily gridlock. And maybe, probably actually, someone is scheming to make billions... by manipulating water customers like addicts.
What makes this whole thing so unjust is that it's not necessary:
1.Las Vegas is capable of recycling almost all its water back to the Colorado River. Las Vegas' only substantial water losses are through evaporation – and since there is essentially no farming in Las Vegas, almost all of Las Vegas' water losses are for luxuries. Which means; Las Vegas politicians are willing to literally kill a huge, pristine natural environment in Central Nevada, to perpetuate an artificial tropical island lifestyle of water waste. (Southern Nevada Water Authority has been attempting to reduce waste, but still has a long way to go.)
2.Las Vegas could build offshore, wave powered, desalination plants – and offer more water to California than Las Vegas would be asking for, in an exchange for a larger allotment from the Colorado River. This option would likely end up being more profitable in the long run – because (just in case Southern Nevada hadn't noticed) more water is available from the Ocean than the desert.
So, why doesn't Southern Nevada Water Authority (SNWA) desire the less ecologically devastating desalination option?
Because, they claim that present desalination costs are slightly higher than the 10 year old estimates for the pipeline network. This ignores some facts. Although it is true that very high pressures are presently required for desalination, new desalination membranes have been invented which would substantially reduce desalination costs. Not surprisingly, one point SNWA has neglected to mention to us is that the power demands to pump water up to 250 miles across the State of Nevada won't be cheap with the pipeline network either – and won't get any cheaper (like desalination). SNWA wants to depend on coal fired power to run the pipeline pumps for up to 75 years. Here's an example of SNWA's apparent lack of foresight, the price of coal is bound to go up, and up – while the price of waves, wind, and solar will always be zero.
So, why is it that SNWA is so unwilling to think outside of the box? Is it simply conservative “drill another well” thinking? Does SNWA assume that Las Vegas just wants what's cheapest up front? Or, is there a secret agenda?
SNWA is a quasi-municipality, but it isn't as responsive to community as a typical municipality. Drying up Central Nevada isn't the best thing for Las Vegas. It will hurt Vegas' tourism industry. And, of course, this obviously isn't the best thing for Nevada... This is a water grab. And, historically, every water grab has made someone rich.
Could someone be scheming for a way to exploit us? Hey, why make water for California for an exchange, when you can sell it to them? Why pay to desalinate water, when you can take water from Rural Nevada and get paid to redistribute it? Moreover, why make fresh water, when its more expensive if you don't.
So, SNWA may be a “quasi-municipality” – but, what would a corporation do?
1.They would try to get as much free stuff as they can from the government.
2.They would provide some value added service to that free stuff.
3.They would charge as much as the market could bear for it – maybe even limiting supply to push up prices.
So far, SNWA is acting more like a corporation than a quasi-municipality (whatever that is). Maybe they have plans they haven't told us about. Could SNWA one day be privatized? Maybe, but it doesn't have to be. All that has to be privatized is some small process of the delivery of the water. From there, a choke-hold on supply can cause prices to skyrocket. Remember Enron power prices? Have you checked the profits of the oil companies recently? It appears that something that looks a lot like price gouging is becoming a common tactic to boost profits.
So, just what would someone do to score windfall profits?
SNWA has aligned themselves with the coal lobby, by promising to use coal fired power plants to run the giant pumps for the pipeline network. Other than for a political alliance, and the extra political clout to push this through, why would SNWA do this? Coal fired power plants require thousands of acre feet of water per year – water that SNWA covets.
Let's face it. Nevada has no water to run coal fired power plants. Nevada has no coal. Rural Nevada has no infrastructure to support the construction of the plants. Rural Nevada has few skilled employees to build and operate these plants. And most important, Rural Nevada doesn't have the customers to consume the power from additional coal fired power plants. The only thing Rural Nevada has, is what it doesn't have; enough people to stop a big corporation from forcing a massively water wasting, polluting coal fired power plant (and a water grab) down our throats. Yes, I said polluting. “Clean coal” is an oxymoron... Where there's fire, there's smoke. Where does the pollution go? They're not magicians. They can't just make the chemicals disappear. If they could, why haven't they helped out the auto industry?... Most of the visible air pollution would just be stored on the ground, in toxic sludge ponds, waiting to leak into what's left of our ground water. Talk about “screw Nevada.”
Benjamin Franklin once said that “Democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch.” It's pretty easy to figure out where this is all headed. This will just be the next, inadvertent step in the decades long, de facto effort, by the rest of the NIMBY Nation, to make Nevada a dumpsite – a wasteland.
Nevada is not a wasteland.
Nevada has the most environmentally virgin lands in the continental US. Nevada has the most mountain ranges in the continental US. Many of those mountains are covered with unique and beautiful forests. Nevada has many rare animals and plants that might be pushed to extinction by the trashing of our State. Nevada even has the largest Wildlife Refuge in the continental US – which is at risk from the water grab. Nevada is special. Nevada is worth saving.
For more information, check out my blog; NoShootFoot
http://noshootfoot.blogspot.com/
Thank you,
Rick Spilsbury
Posted by: Rick Spilsbury | Sep 6, 2006 11:36:51 AM
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(and yes, we know that sometimes they're very, very wrong. Other times, they're right on.)
