Over this coming weekend, I encourage comments from anyone who was at the League of Women Voter's City of Ramsey council candidate forum (or viewing it when broadcast after the fact on QCTV).
Also, I encourage readers to look at comments to the post directly below, on Andrew Boho's candidacy and Jim Abeler's. In particular, if you know either Jim Abeler or David Elvig, please let them know someone has said they are "buddies" and please invite each of them to post a comment - is it so, what's the history, etc.
Information always is valuable.
It aids voter decision making.
Anyone wanting to comment on the county commissioner choices, the State House District 48B choices, or the Ramsey council choices - that's what an open thread is for.
The only restriction, comments containing clear indecency will be removed and comment monitoring will be done if things get abusive towards any individuals.
I commend all who have left comments to earlier posts.
I favor people putting their name up with their thoughts, but open comments means it is a user's choice. Nothing in any of the recent comments has been childish or out of line - the term "Minnesota nice" being appropriate.
My hope is that people will comment more frequently.
I welcome comments from people holding views differing from mine.
Regarding diversity of opinion: Of the other blogs where views may be similar or differing to mine, I most regularly read Blue Man on the DFL side and Gary Gross on the GOP side. Each has a personal focus and opinions rather than being anyone's party-line parrot. If everything each said simply fit my own thoughts, there'd be less cause to read either. Of the campaign sites fully running now (with substantial fresh and older content), I prefer that of Aubrey Immelman, Immelman for Congress, because he is the lesser known of the two GOP Sixth District candidates, and the better option in my opinion.
I wait to see what candidate Boho ultimately will do on his candidate and blog sites.
Finally, I truly would enjoy seeing comments from anyone thinking it would be a good idea for Thomas Gamec to be appointed to Ramsey's EDA next year. I think it's a bad idea and would prefer to see it not happen. If there is anyone thinking it's a good idea, please explain the thinking in a comment.
If the above seed proposals seem unappealing, remember, comments are invited that raise entirely new issues - about Ramsey, county or state elections and issues, policy at the national level, anything a reader believes is worth the time it takes to write something helpful and cogent for the rest of us.
Friday, August 29, 2008
Wednesday, August 27, 2008
AN ENDORSEMENT. He says that. He is right. It is a right we all are entitled to in the most prosperous nation on earth. He has my vote.
Here is the quote from Andrew Boho, DFL candidate for Minnesota House District 48B; and the emphasis is his not mine, in the original:
The man does not equivocate. He is no blue dog with fleas, misappropriating Wellstone Green. He earns use of the WELLSTONE GREEN color. He deserves its use. He honors it.
The campaign site is just started, here; the blog also, here.
The address is: 1816 3rd Avenue, Anoka MN, 55303
Now that you have the address - Send him a contribution.
He needs money to run. He needs money to win.
He is running against an entrenched generally well-liked incumbent, Jim Abeler, who WILL BE the November GOP candidate (once a minor mediocre impediment named Huizinga is removed from the GOP path in the soon-to-be-held primary).
It will then be Boho vs. Abeler. Boho has vision.
Abeler has incumbency. He is a strong candidate with a long record in office.
This is an early endorsement. A slam-dunk easy call. Andrew Boho needs support so please please provide it. Give him your cash and your vote. Send him and his healthcare commitment to the legislature. The more like him there are, the sooner the broken system gets fixed.
The above quote is taken from Andrew Boho's campaign blog. Here's the screen shot, click to enlarge. But save the campaign site and blog links as bookmarks to keep up with his progress.
We need a person who makes healthcare the number one issue it really is. We need someone with the courage to say not only change it, but change it all the way to where we join the progressive nations of Europe and north of our border. They are already where we should have been years ago. Where Paul Wellstone would have wanted us as a nation to be, had he lived. There is the war, energy, other things. But fix healthcare. Lessen the profiteering, increase the quality of the product. Make coverage universal, every man, woman and child within the borders should be covered. Without exception. With payment for the coverage system to come from general revenue funds. We can afford it. We need the strength to toss out the special interests and to insist on such a moral and proper priority.
Abeler should have been doing this kind of thing all those years he was in office. He should have been pushing for that level of decency and coverage. Abeler was remiss, that way. Whether achievable or not, reform never will happen without everyone thinking the issue is the single most important key issue, and courageously saying so, as Andrew Boho has done. And voting for the candidates with the courage to unequivocally say it, and promise to fight to do it. Anything less is more of the same. We don't need any more of more of the same. We've had enough of it, it's failed us and it's due for replacement.
HEALTHCARE IS A RIGHT. UNRECOGNIZED AS SUCH AT PRESENT, BUT ULTIMATELY HAVING TO BE ACCORDED THAT STATUS, OR WE AS A NATION SINK TO INDECENCY. WE DESERVE AND NEED AN ULTIMATE SINGLE-PAYER GENERAL COVERAGE SYSTEM, NATIONWIDE EVENTUALLY, BUT STARTED ON THE RIGHT PATH IN MINNESOTA IF THAT'S WHAT IT TAKES. ANYONE OPPOSING THAT IS A ROADBLOCK TO PROGRESS AND OPPOSED TO DECENCY, AND AS SUCH ALL THE OPPONENTS ARE SHAMEFUL, SMALL, MEANHEARTED PERSONS.
VOTE BOHO.
What we are witnessing today is a complete and catastrophic failure of the health insurance market to deliver much needed care to low and middle income families. We need to restore dignity and affordability to this broken system. That’s why I’m calling for the establishment of a single-payer health care program in Minnesota—and if elected, I will fight, tooth and nail, to make it happen.
The man does not equivocate. He is no blue dog with fleas, misappropriating Wellstone Green. He earns use of the WELLSTONE GREEN color. He deserves its use. He honors it.
The campaign site is just started, here; the blog also, here.
The address is: 1816 3rd Avenue, Anoka MN, 55303
Now that you have the address - Send him a contribution.
He needs money to run. He needs money to win.
He is running against an entrenched generally well-liked incumbent, Jim Abeler, who WILL BE the November GOP candidate (once a minor mediocre impediment named Huizinga is removed from the GOP path in the soon-to-be-held primary).
It will then be Boho vs. Abeler. Boho has vision.
Abeler has incumbency. He is a strong candidate with a long record in office.
This is an early endorsement. A slam-dunk easy call. Andrew Boho needs support so please please provide it. Give him your cash and your vote. Send him and his healthcare commitment to the legislature. The more like him there are, the sooner the broken system gets fixed.
The above quote is taken from Andrew Boho's campaign blog. Here's the screen shot, click to enlarge. But save the campaign site and blog links as bookmarks to keep up with his progress.
We need a person who makes healthcare the number one issue it really is. We need someone with the courage to say not only change it, but change it all the way to where we join the progressive nations of Europe and north of our border. They are already where we should have been years ago. Where Paul Wellstone would have wanted us as a nation to be, had he lived. There is the war, energy, other things. But fix healthcare. Lessen the profiteering, increase the quality of the product. Make coverage universal, every man, woman and child within the borders should be covered. Without exception. With payment for the coverage system to come from general revenue funds. We can afford it. We need the strength to toss out the special interests and to insist on such a moral and proper priority.
Abeler should have been doing this kind of thing all those years he was in office. He should have been pushing for that level of decency and coverage. Abeler was remiss, that way. Whether achievable or not, reform never will happen without everyone thinking the issue is the single most important key issue, and courageously saying so, as Andrew Boho has done. And voting for the candidates with the courage to unequivocally say it, and promise to fight to do it. Anything less is more of the same. We don't need any more of more of the same. We've had enough of it, it's failed us and it's due for replacement.
HEALTHCARE IS A RIGHT. UNRECOGNIZED AS SUCH AT PRESENT, BUT ULTIMATELY HAVING TO BE ACCORDED THAT STATUS, OR WE AS A NATION SINK TO INDECENCY. WE DESERVE AND NEED AN ULTIMATE SINGLE-PAYER GENERAL COVERAGE SYSTEM, NATIONWIDE EVENTUALLY, BUT STARTED ON THE RIGHT PATH IN MINNESOTA IF THAT'S WHAT IT TAKES. ANYONE OPPOSING THAT IS A ROADBLOCK TO PROGRESS AND OPPOSED TO DECENCY, AND AS SUCH ALL THE OPPONENTS ARE SHAMEFUL, SMALL, MEANHEARTED PERSONS.
VOTE BOHO.
RAMSEY - Aug. 28, 7-8:30 pm, at City Hall -- League of Women Voters pre-primary Candidate Forum [the mayor and at large seats].
This forum info has not been that well publicized. I got notice of it from an ADS box flyer, from candidate Shryrock.
Checking QCTV's online schedule for Ramsey, it will not be carried live.
It will be videotaped and broadcast Saturday, 10:30 am and 5 pm (if they hold to their presently published schedule).
Candidates for mayor and for the at large seat will be speaking.
Ward 2 and Ward 4: These seats only have two candidates. Hence, with no primary those candidates will not participate in a candidate forum until before the general election.
By phone, candidate Shyrock said she believed it would be held in the "Alexander Ramsey Room."
HOWEVER - the city website says it will be in council chambers. That is more likely because the camera setup and QCTV control booth are there.
Here's what the city website says:
All candidates were listed earlier on Crabgrass; see, here (with known candidate websites listed for anyone wanting to have a look before the forum).
The LWV Minnesota website did not have any easily found info on it about this session.
The QCTV shchedule is here (that link is for the balance of this week, and I expect the link will not change and still be good when the schedule is updated for next week).
The city posting text is here (directly linked from the city's homepage, "In the News").
A REQUEST TO READERS - I may not be there. It might be helpful if someone there suggested that the LWV moderator and the QCTV person confirm the televising schedule and announce it at the start of the session, to confirm things.
I presume that earlier forum format will be followed: opening statements; LWV prepared questioning with alternating order of response; then questions on cards from the audience, screended for redundancy and to fit timing, by the moderator.
Please leave a comment confirming or correcting info here, if you have more reliable information about format, timing, broadcasting, etc.
Checking QCTV's online schedule for Ramsey, it will not be carried live.
It will be videotaped and broadcast Saturday, 10:30 am and 5 pm (if they hold to their presently published schedule).
Candidates for mayor and for the at large seat will be speaking.
Ward 2 and Ward 4: These seats only have two candidates. Hence, with no primary those candidates will not participate in a candidate forum until before the general election.
By phone, candidate Shyrock said she believed it would be held in the "Alexander Ramsey Room."
HOWEVER - the city website says it will be in council chambers. That is more likely because the camera setup and QCTV control booth are there.
Here's what the city website says:
The League of Women Voters is sponsoring a pre-Primary Candidates Forum in the City of Ramsey. The forum will allow residents to meet and ask questions of the candidates who are running for election in the primary. The forum is scheduled for 7:00 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. on Thursday, August 28, 2008, in the Council Chambers at the Ramsey Municipal Center, 7550 Sunwood Drive NW.
All candidates were listed earlier on Crabgrass; see, here (with known candidate websites listed for anyone wanting to have a look before the forum).
The LWV Minnesota website did not have any easily found info on it about this session.
The QCTV shchedule is here (that link is for the balance of this week, and I expect the link will not change and still be good when the schedule is updated for next week).
The city posting text is here (directly linked from the city's homepage, "In the News").
A REQUEST TO READERS - I may not be there. It might be helpful if someone there suggested that the LWV moderator and the QCTV person confirm the televising schedule and announce it at the start of the session, to confirm things.
I presume that earlier forum format will be followed: opening statements; LWV prepared questioning with alternating order of response; then questions on cards from the audience, screended for redundancy and to fit timing, by the moderator.
Please leave a comment confirming or correcting info here, if you have more reliable information about format, timing, broadcasting, etc.
Monday, August 18, 2008
Huffington Post reports, CREW, a watch dog group, filed a formal complaint against Coleman's DC living arrangements.
I don't know what other media coverage there has been of the complaint, but my Google Alert popped up the Aug. 14, 2008 Huffington Post item. We in Minnesota mostly know the story, so I will not excerpt. Have a look at the HP item, however, as it shows the story is growing legs nationwide. As it should. It is a questionable arrangement. On Aug. 15, Bloggers for Change also commented, again showing out-of-state concern. On Saturday, Aug. 16, Big E, at MnBlue had more detail - fisking the excuse set Coleman gave in defense of his housing perk. While that is local not national attention, it is one further indication the drumbeat is getting louder, and the problem will not be quelled by Coleman's dismissive hand-waving.
It is real, and it is disturbing.
Earning what he does, having that arrangement, and then the other things about it -- campaign money to the landlord's business, the landlord's wife on the Coleman staff payroll - coupled with the friendly favorable housing discount - it all is troubling in showing the wrong side of how things too often are done in DC.
CREW is an acronym for "citizens for responsibility and ethics in Washington."
The complaint is not too new, it was filed July 1, of this year. CREW is not without a history concerning its scrutiny of Coleman, as this site search reveals. And CREW is not non-partisan. They ferret out GOP error, or related things such as their formal complaints last cycle against Mac Hammond's use of the Living Word Christian Center to promote Michele Bachmann's candidacy and against his little private air force, paid for by the congregation.
What is news is that however much Coleman would want to end the discussion, the problem is one that apparently will not go away.
Finally, a largely unrelated but interesting linkover about Coleman, and why has he shown an interest in Mark Olson's state Senate candidacy, at Lloydletta's Nooz. There's an ongoing thread there at the Nooz (most recently this) about Mark Olson's local GOP endorsement and how there is a split where even GOP blogger regulars get heat from other GOP regulars, talk-show hosts in particular, over this Mark Olson for State Senate situation, endorsed locally despite having the wife-beating conviction; and it is speculative why Coleman would weigh in his voice at all, (it IS a hornet's nest but not one affecting national events), other than to distance himself clearly from any GOP approval of spousal abuse, directly or indirectly via endorsement of a candidate for office having that blemish, or otherwise.
Coleman is on the proper side of things, but it is curious why he'd talk of that. Mark Olson, to the best of my knowledge, is not critical of Coleman's living arrangements in DC.
FINALLY: In closing, if you do not read any other linked item about Coleman or Mark Olson, the one at MnBlue by Big E, and the Nooz item about why is Coleman vocal about Olson, are most highly recommended.
_____UPDATE____________
Talking Points Memo also is keeping it front burner; Aug. 15, after having previously visited the issue; June 27. Some of the comments, both posts, are interesting. There's an undercurrent around the blogs about Coleman being a womanizer, some comments to the TPM posts make that allegation. Personally I believe that irrelevant to the job and duties. But if the GOP is hooting loudly over Franken's satirical writing from eight years ago, it makes it fair game to ask where Coleman's sleeping lately and who with.
Both lines of "campaign information" are gutter trash. Both should be discarded. But attack dogs barking on one side will get the other item bandied about. Who wins then? Nobody.
_________FURTHER CREW UPDATE_________
More past CREW whistle blowing, by CREW, here, this time on suspect Minnesota GOP financial operations, mishandling of money and then apparent retaliatory actions, 2007.
_________FURTHER CREW UPDATE__________
Regarding the Pastor Mac Hammond Flying Circus, and the parallel CREW complaints about the Bachmann dog-pony show at the mega-Church Hammond runs as a personal cash cow - his prosperity in his prosperity ministry - and about the church funded airplane gig; STRIB, online, Friday, Aug. 22, 2008 has a full report of how the IRS is bumping heads with the flying pastor of prosperity; here. Read it quickly, STRIB has the habit of pulling online articles into pay-per-view archive status after only a week or two of open viewing.
It's a hoot. Well worth reading and chuckling a bit. Hammond made himself an attention getter and ...
"Peak oil" and the "tipping point;" is it here, is it soon to come?
This will be short. The extensive article is, " Waking up to the threat of 'peak oil'," by Ron Way, here, posted today, Monday, Aug. 18, 2008, at minnpost.com
Read it there. Read it seriously. I generally realize finite resources are just that, finite, and that there are petrochemical uses that to me are more valuable to society than today's combustion and tomorrow's shortages.
I first heard of formalized "Peak Oil" collective thinking from Will Thompson, a transportation planner living in Ramsey. It is real, the question being when do we hit the "tipping point" when extraction begins to lessen yearly and prices accordingly shift higher greatly, and alternate energy utilization becomes real, by necessity and not by effort of visionaries now pushing that sane policy.
There is currently a shrill, bombastic election year cry against the sane long-term view. The bombast will lead to nothing long term. The better perspective of sincere commitment to alternative energy development and exploitation also would improve balance of payments (which currently are out of whack and anything but balanced). The sane view is to wean us from consuming petroleum profligately with more and more of it having to be purchased from foreign sources regardless of what some hopeful GOP politicians will tell you is a quick fix the Dems oppose, ones who'd play on voter gullibility.
By that I of course mean the false "Drill Here, Drill Now, Pay Less," chorus of falsehood, where as best as I can tell it was Newt Gingrich (who will sell you the goods as well as taking free contributions) who did the kickoff. Yet many in the GOP have picked up the tune, as a way to divert attention from the real unfixed troubles we face: healthcare, higher education costs, the mortgage mess, an unwinable war caused for us under a hail of false premises, and a devalued dollar in a time of stagnant wages; all the result of the Bush-Cheney-McCain-Coleman White House and Senate cabal the GOP has given us, tarted up as if it were "leadership" and "statesmanship."
The alternative to Gringrich foolery, the sensible long-term energy policy perspective, is something I recall hearing best advocated by Bob Olson, a DFL hopeful in the Sixth District whose sensible thinking got derailed and all but ignored, in the District.
Olson was the candidate who could have handily defeated Michele Bachmann, if only he'd been endorsed for the task.
Presently, we need two things, first, to sweep house of the short-term demagoguery and bad policy, and to shift to sounder energy thoughts, while admitting there is much else to talk of fixing and to realize that those who have put things where they are will be least likely to undo their mischief. We need change, we have to believe in it, and we need sensible people, not war profiteering for Big Oil, Halliburton, or Carlyle Group.
Fixing things is, of course, the second thing needed. Obama and Franken are the broom to sweep up. Then let us hope they can fix things in a consensus way to right what's wrong in the nation.
Again, cute slogans are no answer, but a distraction that only misleads. And "Drill Here, Drill Now, Pay Less," mixes up ideas that do not necessarily at all follow one another. So, read that peak oil article, it is worth the time. And for your own good, don't be taken in again by Newt Gingrich, the "Contract With America," charlatan whose time in Congress was a disaster for the nation. Newt was the bagman and perpetrator for that flim-flam of the voters, and proud of it.
"Caveat Emptor" used to mean something back when we were a less gullible nation. Fool me once, shame on you -- all that. Newt again is on the move, so why should any of us trust a thing about it?
Read it there. Read it seriously. I generally realize finite resources are just that, finite, and that there are petrochemical uses that to me are more valuable to society than today's combustion and tomorrow's shortages.
I first heard of formalized "Peak Oil" collective thinking from Will Thompson, a transportation planner living in Ramsey. It is real, the question being when do we hit the "tipping point" when extraction begins to lessen yearly and prices accordingly shift higher greatly, and alternate energy utilization becomes real, by necessity and not by effort of visionaries now pushing that sane policy.
There is currently a shrill, bombastic election year cry against the sane long-term view. The bombast will lead to nothing long term. The better perspective of sincere commitment to alternative energy development and exploitation also would improve balance of payments (which currently are out of whack and anything but balanced). The sane view is to wean us from consuming petroleum profligately with more and more of it having to be purchased from foreign sources regardless of what some hopeful GOP politicians will tell you is a quick fix the Dems oppose, ones who'd play on voter gullibility.
By that I of course mean the false "Drill Here, Drill Now, Pay Less," chorus of falsehood, where as best as I can tell it was Newt Gingrich (who will sell you the goods as well as taking free contributions) who did the kickoff. Yet many in the GOP have picked up the tune, as a way to divert attention from the real unfixed troubles we face: healthcare, higher education costs, the mortgage mess, an unwinable war caused for us under a hail of false premises, and a devalued dollar in a time of stagnant wages; all the result of the Bush-Cheney-McCain-Coleman White House and Senate cabal the GOP has given us, tarted up as if it were "leadership" and "statesmanship."
The alternative to Gringrich foolery, the sensible long-term energy policy perspective, is something I recall hearing best advocated by Bob Olson, a DFL hopeful in the Sixth District whose sensible thinking got derailed and all but ignored, in the District.
Olson was the candidate who could have handily defeated Michele Bachmann, if only he'd been endorsed for the task.
Presently, we need two things, first, to sweep house of the short-term demagoguery and bad policy, and to shift to sounder energy thoughts, while admitting there is much else to talk of fixing and to realize that those who have put things where they are will be least likely to undo their mischief. We need change, we have to believe in it, and we need sensible people, not war profiteering for Big Oil, Halliburton, or Carlyle Group.
Fixing things is, of course, the second thing needed. Obama and Franken are the broom to sweep up. Then let us hope they can fix things in a consensus way to right what's wrong in the nation.
Again, cute slogans are no answer, but a distraction that only misleads. And "Drill Here, Drill Now, Pay Less," mixes up ideas that do not necessarily at all follow one another. So, read that peak oil article, it is worth the time. And for your own good, don't be taken in again by Newt Gingrich, the "Contract With America," charlatan whose time in Congress was a disaster for the nation. Newt was the bagman and perpetrator for that flim-flam of the voters, and proud of it.
"Caveat Emptor" used to mean something back when we were a less gullible nation. Fool me once, shame on you -- all that. Newt again is on the move, so why should any of us trust a thing about it?
Gary Gross shoots at Elwyn Tinklenberg using Bob Anderson's ammunition.
Bob Anderson, Independence Party candidate for Congress in Minnesota's Sixth District, has had an editorial commentary published in the St. Cloud Times.
Gary Gross, at the Let Freedom Ring blog, was the Google Alert I got, and he links to the St. Cloud Times original.
Interestingly, in the August 18, 2008 item, Anderson says:
Also in Google Alerts, this Ted Sher pic, from his Flickr photostream postings, showing l-to-r, Elwyn Tinklenberg, Al Franken, and Nancy Schumacher, (if I read the name tag correctly) at the Sunday, Aug. 17, Wellstone Dinner in St. Cloud.
It is an event which I did not attend. It is more for party regulars not independent voters. Yet, from the online pre-dinner notice, the dinner included a keynote speaker and two other brief commentators:
I wish Tinkenberg would quit representing himself as if he is the IP candidate. He is not. Bob Anderson is. That "DFL and Independence Party endorsed candidate" might be technically true, but it has baggage, no surprise, given that Tinklenberg's ties run deep into Ventura-Barkley land.
My hope is that the weak, bipolar, and flawed Tinklenberg candidacy in the Sixth District does not harm Franken's chances, in the district, for votes enough to retire Norm Coleman. Anderson's editorial comment about the Tinklenberg lobbyist status and seeing a too-cozy thing Tinklenberg appears to have going with James Oberstar, those are things that have not gone unnoticed in the blogs. Indeed, the GOP leaning Let Freedom Ring blog hit on the same Anderson statement. Anderson's op-ed was a short item, and he left out the taconite tailings lobbying, but the gist of Anderson's comments did hit the nail on the head.
Franken is a good man, and has a true "Wellstone" position on key issues. Tinklenberg has that IP background, which is not by any measure what Paul Wellstone stood for or was about. I hope Franken does well in the Sixth.
Gary Gross, at the Let Freedom Ring blog, was the Google Alert I got, and he links to the St. Cloud Times original.
Interestingly, in the August 18, 2008 item, Anderson says:
Elwyn did not mention hybrids. You can't even get a Toyota Prius for six months plus a five hundred dollar deposit. We need to encourage greater production of hybrids and show the world we are serious about making real changes.
We can bring down prices of oil by personal conservation, drilling responsibly wherever we can, and reforming the rules for speculators. If we show a real desire to change, prices will come down. You may have already noticed reduced prices at the gas station.
As far as Elwyn being a member on the house transportation committee with Rep. Jim Oberstar, I feel he has already been a little too cozy with Rep. Oberstar as a lobbyist in his Tinklenberg Group. That is not the way to deal with transportation issues.
Also in Google Alerts, this Ted Sher pic, from his Flickr photostream postings, showing l-to-r, Elwyn Tinklenberg, Al Franken, and Nancy Schumacher, (if I read the name tag correctly) at the Sunday, Aug. 17, Wellstone Dinner in St. Cloud.
It is an event which I did not attend. It is more for party regulars not independent voters. Yet, from the online pre-dinner notice, the dinner included a keynote speaker and two other brief commentators:
The theme for this year's dinner, reflecting the excitement and hope that is in evidence across the country, is "Ordinary People Remaking America."
US Senator Amy Klobuchar will be the keynote speaker. Additionally, brief remarks will be made by Al Franken, DFL endorsed candidate for the United States Senate, and El Tinklenberg, DFL and Independence Party endorsed candidate for the United States House of Representatives in Minnesota Congressional District 6.
I wish Tinkenberg would quit representing himself as if he is the IP candidate. He is not. Bob Anderson is. That "DFL and Independence Party endorsed candidate" might be technically true, but it has baggage, no surprise, given that Tinklenberg's ties run deep into Ventura-Barkley land.
My hope is that the weak, bipolar, and flawed Tinklenberg candidacy in the Sixth District does not harm Franken's chances, in the district, for votes enough to retire Norm Coleman. Anderson's editorial comment about the Tinklenberg lobbyist status and seeing a too-cozy thing Tinklenberg appears to have going with James Oberstar, those are things that have not gone unnoticed in the blogs. Indeed, the GOP leaning Let Freedom Ring blog hit on the same Anderson statement. Anderson's op-ed was a short item, and he left out the taconite tailings lobbying, but the gist of Anderson's comments did hit the nail on the head.
Franken is a good man, and has a true "Wellstone" position on key issues. Tinklenberg has that IP background, which is not by any measure what Paul Wellstone stood for or was about. I hope Franken does well in the Sixth.
Sunday, August 17, 2008
FRANCE - An energy policy focused for years on nuclear power.
A perspective on Iran, if uranium enrichment is as claimed for power generation, what right have we to say they should consume their oil and not market it? Clearly that is an Iranian decision. Apart from weapons threats, which can be policed if Iran wants only power generation and good foreign relations, our concerns and voice should be limited. Otherwise it appears as if economic forces of a closed international cartel may factor into wanting to quell nations lacking the technology from developing it rather than buying plants, fuel and management services from the current market players.
And in assessing a US future where electric cars are a focus, the demand for electricity will increase. Green energy - renewable or perpetual sources such as wind, hydro, and solar are options where scaling up will be a factor and where each has drawbacks and uncertainties. Drought, inconsistent winds, and cloudy rainy days can happen and can last. Gusting and storm damage can affect any power plant, but wind turbines are sensitive to exceptional wind levels exceeding operating ranges.
The nuclear option has problematic dimensions of its own - fuel cycle management, fuel reprocessing, and waste management dimensions on technical and time scales that other options do not pose.
The triggering for this post is NY Times reporting of the latest French expansion of its commitment to nuclear power as the core of its energy generation and consumption (for non-transportation needs - although electric trains are in wider use in Europe than we envision). The French have relied on nuclear power and for them it has been reliable and largely accident free, so far. They do not simply store old fuel rods as we do, they reprocess them. The reprocessing step holds both threat and promise. Years ago a US "breeder" reactor program was a congressional football, with differing states wanting the local economy boost and the Savannah River proposal from South Carolina having clout as a favored project. It never left planning stages, because of highly publicized accidents at operational power plants here and in Russia at the time, which caused a reevaluation of enthusiasms.
The basics of the nuclear power option are straightforward even with technological details being quite complex - uranium has two main isotopes, the lighter one being present in a fraction of a percent in natural mined uranium and having three less neutrons in the nucleus while being fissile. The heavier isotope captures neutrons without immediate fission. Fission produces highly radioactive pairs of isotopes along with the release of energy. Some energy is high energy radiation, and shielding is needed along with containment to prevent human and environmental harm. The energy that is utilized is thermal, heat from the fission, via steam turbines as in conventional coal fired plants. Natural uranium cannot be used in reactors, the centrifuges and enrichment reported regarding Iran is a needed step to convert it to reactor fuel with the lighter isotope concentrated and where further concentration effort will produce weapon grade material. In the fuel rods the enriched uranium fissile fraction is consumed while the neutron concentration in the reactor has a secondary effect, neutron capture by the heavier uranium isotope yielding in short times plutonium, another fissile material, produced in a reactor.
Depending on the reactor engineering, the range of neutron energies and concentrations can be such that more usable plutonium fuel is produced than uranium fuel is consumed, so that a practically unlimited fuel supply for power generation is feasible without any further mining of uranium, merely from the stocks available. There are two problems with this "breeder" scenario, first, plutonium is more easily separated (chemically, not by physical isotope concentration) into a purified bomb-grade material via fuel reprocessing, with weapon proliferation being the worry, while the second problem is that reactor operating parameters for producing more fuel than consumed are more risky than for regular power reactors, with a substantially greater threat of catastrophic accident.
For weapons purposes since WW II until late in the twentieth century, a plutonium production effort was run by the government at Hanford, Washington, but presently there is an excess of weapons-grade plutonium "around" with our nation exchanging economic aid for the material during the break-up of the Soviet Union, and with both Russia and the US scaling back the number of deployed weapons with the surplused plutonium then stockpiled and guarded more closely than the gold in Fort Knox.
I have seen reporting of fuel rod construction involving plutonium oxide pellets aggregated into fuel rods, and presumably when fuel is reprocessed by the French they produce plutonium based fuel rods of a geometry and make-up that can be used in the same reactors that they initially operated with enriched uranium fuel only. According to nuclear treaties, Russia, China, Japan, the US, France, and England control the fuel and plant construction markets, while restricting proliferation that way. Other nations must either buy, or enter the market, as North Korea and Iran are poised to do. India and Pakistan hold weapons, but the extent of their nuclear power engineering plans and capabilities is something I have not researched. Nuclear energy presently is globalized as a highly-regulated cartel among government and private sector entities within existing highly-industrialized nations. There are safety and anti-proliferation reasons to support this as an ongoing arrangement, as well as economic prosperity and corporate balance sheet and income statement motives in support of such a status quo.
Because of widely reported accidents in Russia and the US, and because of uncertainty in nuclear waste handling and storage - where long-term radioactivity is the problem - the nuclear power industry in the US had fallen into disfavor and became non-expansive, domestically. Add to that a higher capital cost per amount of energy produced and longer construction ramp-up times for new nuclear plants, and we have opted to largely cap things in the US and add peak demand power options at a lower capital cost but higher operating cost, such as gas micro-turbine siting for the already highly-developed mature US power grid. With carbon combustion limits now being a treaty matter, and curbing global warming being a championed cause, (with skeptics), it appears that our nation, besides looking at green or renewable energy, might also turn again towards nuclear power generation in expanding its base grid capacity.
A google of the words "nuclear" "fuel" "reprocessing" can provide an entry into reports and policy papers on that part of the industry, whereas the engineering literature is more specialized and much of it was done paper-only, before the Internet came of age. Plus much of the engineering detail is proprietary, and generally less accessible. There is the patent literature, but the industry has trade secret expertise held for advantage within the various corporate players, so the policy and summary reporting is more accessible.
The reader can pursue that avenue as far as wanted. Reprocessing is being done now, by the French and others, so feasibility is not the question. Rather risk and policy issues predominate, as with the waste disposal question, as the major uncertainties. Moreover the cost and scale of an efficient and safe reprocessing operation are such that present capacity worldwide might suffice and new entrants into that market are deterred by regulatory and economic barriers.
With all of that as background, the Times reports, here, about France and it latest efforts:
The excerpt is lengthy, but the article has more detail. It sounds as if the siting was equivalent to putting something like that in Minnesota's Iron Range, where paranoia over tomorrow's job base generally outweighs worry over risks and consequences.
"Atoms for Peace," is what the nuclear power industry in its infancy was called, when first envisioned during the Eisenhower years, and promoted by the government then to counter the prior history of the industry as entirely for war-ending and cold war military purposes.
Finally, if you care to see what part of a multi-billion dollar power plant construction site looks like, in the process of being built, the Times provides this photo (click it to enlarge):
_________UPDATE__________
Of the Google returns on nuclear fuel reprocessing, two promising links are here and here; with an interesting PBS Frontline item, here; and Heritage Foundation weighing in with opinion, here.
And in assessing a US future where electric cars are a focus, the demand for electricity will increase. Green energy - renewable or perpetual sources such as wind, hydro, and solar are options where scaling up will be a factor and where each has drawbacks and uncertainties. Drought, inconsistent winds, and cloudy rainy days can happen and can last. Gusting and storm damage can affect any power plant, but wind turbines are sensitive to exceptional wind levels exceeding operating ranges.
The nuclear option has problematic dimensions of its own - fuel cycle management, fuel reprocessing, and waste management dimensions on technical and time scales that other options do not pose.
The triggering for this post is NY Times reporting of the latest French expansion of its commitment to nuclear power as the core of its energy generation and consumption (for non-transportation needs - although electric trains are in wider use in Europe than we envision). The French have relied on nuclear power and for them it has been reliable and largely accident free, so far. They do not simply store old fuel rods as we do, they reprocess them. The reprocessing step holds both threat and promise. Years ago a US "breeder" reactor program was a congressional football, with differing states wanting the local economy boost and the Savannah River proposal from South Carolina having clout as a favored project. It never left planning stages, because of highly publicized accidents at operational power plants here and in Russia at the time, which caused a reevaluation of enthusiasms.
The basics of the nuclear power option are straightforward even with technological details being quite complex - uranium has two main isotopes, the lighter one being present in a fraction of a percent in natural mined uranium and having three less neutrons in the nucleus while being fissile. The heavier isotope captures neutrons without immediate fission. Fission produces highly radioactive pairs of isotopes along with the release of energy. Some energy is high energy radiation, and shielding is needed along with containment to prevent human and environmental harm. The energy that is utilized is thermal, heat from the fission, via steam turbines as in conventional coal fired plants. Natural uranium cannot be used in reactors, the centrifuges and enrichment reported regarding Iran is a needed step to convert it to reactor fuel with the lighter isotope concentrated and where further concentration effort will produce weapon grade material. In the fuel rods the enriched uranium fissile fraction is consumed while the neutron concentration in the reactor has a secondary effect, neutron capture by the heavier uranium isotope yielding in short times plutonium, another fissile material, produced in a reactor.
Depending on the reactor engineering, the range of neutron energies and concentrations can be such that more usable plutonium fuel is produced than uranium fuel is consumed, so that a practically unlimited fuel supply for power generation is feasible without any further mining of uranium, merely from the stocks available. There are two problems with this "breeder" scenario, first, plutonium is more easily separated (chemically, not by physical isotope concentration) into a purified bomb-grade material via fuel reprocessing, with weapon proliferation being the worry, while the second problem is that reactor operating parameters for producing more fuel than consumed are more risky than for regular power reactors, with a substantially greater threat of catastrophic accident.
For weapons purposes since WW II until late in the twentieth century, a plutonium production effort was run by the government at Hanford, Washington, but presently there is an excess of weapons-grade plutonium "around" with our nation exchanging economic aid for the material during the break-up of the Soviet Union, and with both Russia and the US scaling back the number of deployed weapons with the surplused plutonium then stockpiled and guarded more closely than the gold in Fort Knox.
I have seen reporting of fuel rod construction involving plutonium oxide pellets aggregated into fuel rods, and presumably when fuel is reprocessed by the French they produce plutonium based fuel rods of a geometry and make-up that can be used in the same reactors that they initially operated with enriched uranium fuel only. According to nuclear treaties, Russia, China, Japan, the US, France, and England control the fuel and plant construction markets, while restricting proliferation that way. Other nations must either buy, or enter the market, as North Korea and Iran are poised to do. India and Pakistan hold weapons, but the extent of their nuclear power engineering plans and capabilities is something I have not researched. Nuclear energy presently is globalized as a highly-regulated cartel among government and private sector entities within existing highly-industrialized nations. There are safety and anti-proliferation reasons to support this as an ongoing arrangement, as well as economic prosperity and corporate balance sheet and income statement motives in support of such a status quo.
Because of widely reported accidents in Russia and the US, and because of uncertainty in nuclear waste handling and storage - where long-term radioactivity is the problem - the nuclear power industry in the US had fallen into disfavor and became non-expansive, domestically. Add to that a higher capital cost per amount of energy produced and longer construction ramp-up times for new nuclear plants, and we have opted to largely cap things in the US and add peak demand power options at a lower capital cost but higher operating cost, such as gas micro-turbine siting for the already highly-developed mature US power grid. With carbon combustion limits now being a treaty matter, and curbing global warming being a championed cause, (with skeptics), it appears that our nation, besides looking at green or renewable energy, might also turn again towards nuclear power generation in expanding its base grid capacity.
A google of the words "nuclear" "fuel" "reprocessing" can provide an entry into reports and policy papers on that part of the industry, whereas the engineering literature is more specialized and much of it was done paper-only, before the Internet came of age. Plus much of the engineering detail is proprietary, and generally less accessible. There is the patent literature, but the industry has trade secret expertise held for advantage within the various corporate players, so the policy and summary reporting is more accessible.
The reader can pursue that avenue as far as wanted. Reprocessing is being done now, by the French and others, so feasibility is not the question. Rather risk and policy issues predominate, as with the waste disposal question, as the major uncertainties. Moreover the cost and scale of an efficient and safe reprocessing operation are such that present capacity worldwide might suffice and new entrants into that market are deterred by regulatory and economic barriers.
With all of that as background, the Times reports, here, about France and it latest efforts:
FLAMANVILLE, France — Here on the Normandy coast, France is building its newest nuclear reactor, the first in 10 years, costing $5.1 billion. But already, President Nicolas Sarkozy has announced that France will build another like it.
Flamanville is a vivid example of the French choice for nuclear power, made in the late 1950s by Charles de Gaulle, intensified during the oil shocks of the 1970s and maintained despite the nightmarish nuclear accidents of Three Mile Island and Chernobyl.
Nuclear power provides 77 percent of France’s electricity, according to the government, and relatively few public doubts are expressed in a country with little coal, oil or natural gas.
With the wildly fluctuating cost of oil, anxiety over global warming from burning fossil fuels and new concerns about the impact of biofuels on the price of food for the poor, nuclear energy is getting a second look in countries like the United States and Britain. Even Germany, committed to phasing out nuclear power by 2021, is debating whether to change its mind.
France is way ahead. Électricité de France, or EDF, is in talks to buy British Energy, for about $24 billion, to renovate Britain’s nuclear plants and build new ones. The French have already contracted to build a third-generation European Pressurized Reactor of the Flamanville type — the world’s safest and most powerful — in Abu Dhabi and China.
There is pride in French exceptionalism and in the technical skill that has produced an industry with no major accidents. In a recent op-ed article in Le Figaro, for example, Yves Thréard boasted: “France hasn’t any oil, but she knew how to exploit a rich idea. In the whirlwind of globalization, civil nuclear power became a weapon, commercial and political, that allowed the country to remain at the avant-garde in the concert of nations.”
A senior aide to Jean-Louis Borloo, the minister of ecology, sustainable development and planning, said that France “sees a wide trend developing” toward more use of nuclear energy.
“A lot of countries realize that with the rising price of fossil fuels and energy, and the climate emergency, nuclear can be part of the solution,” said the aide, who spoke anonymously under the rules of his ministry.
He said that France’s choice for a “closed fuel cycle” — reprocessing used nuclear fuel to recover plutonium made in the reactors so it can be reused — was safer. “This way, nuclear energy can bring a lot — it’s CO2-free energy.”
Mr. Sarkozy said that each European Pressurized Reactor that “replaces a gas-powered electricity plant saves two billion cubic meters of gas each year, and each E.P.R. replacing a coal plant means cutting 11 million tons of CO2.”
France generates half of its own total energy, up from 23 percent in 1973, despite increased consumption.
Electrical power generation accounts for only 10 percent of France’s greenhouse gases, compared with an average of 40 percent in other industrialized countries, according to EDF.
France has 58 operating nuclear reactors, the highest number of any nation besides the United States. In America, where nuclear construction has been moribund, there is also new interest. At the moment, 19.4 percent of the electricity generated in the United States is from 104 nuclear plants, according to the Department of Energy.
The Nuclear Regulatory Agency has in hand or expects applications to build 34 reactors, of which seven are European pressurized water reactors of the Flamanville type — and, unlike current American reactors, allow output to vary to meet fluctuating demand.
The Flamanville reactor is based on a French-German design, which itself is based on an earlier Westinghouse design. EDF has an American partner, Constellation Energy, to sell the new model as a joint venture called UniStar Nuclear, which has already ordered some of the larger parts for one reactor. Ironically, its main competitor is Westinghouse, now owned by Toshiba.
[... Recent minor accidents have happened.] The government, Areva and EDF have played down the accidents. Mr. Borloo said there were 86 category-one nuclear incidents in France in 2007 and 114 in 2006. Mr. Borloo’s aide, pointing to the Authority for Nuclear Security, said the Tricastin “microevent” showed that “our system of security is extremely responsive and transparent, and that the media and public opinion needed a training period to understand how the system of nuclear security works in France.”
Still, there is continuing nervousness. Sales of bottled water increased, and even a nearby appellation of local wine, Côteaux du Tricastin, is exploring whether to change its name, according to Henri Bour, who runs the local wine council.
A prominent French anti-nuclear lobby, Sortir du Nucléaire, is pressing to phase out nuclear power, which it considers too dangerous and too expensive because of the need to manage nuclear waste. The group wants a “sustainable transition” to renewable energy options like solar, hydro and wind power. Last year, on the 21st anniversary of the Chernobyl meltdown, 30 protesters at Flamanville blocked entrances and chained themselves to cranes.
There have also been some construction issues. In April, the Authority for Nuclear Safety criticized some of the welds and the quality of the concrete work at Flamanville, but work resumed in June. Philippe Leynié, the site manager here for EDF, said the problem involved missing pins on the metal rebar and was not serious.
Nonetheless, an IFOP opinion poll conducted for Le Monde after the Tricastin leaks showed that 67 percent of the French considered it vital to keep nuclear power in the country’s energy mix, compared with 52 percent in 2002. Only 27 percent judged the risks of nuclear energy to be the most worrying, compared with 50 percent who thought global warming was the predominant risk. In 2002, 33 percent worried most about nuclear risks and only 20 percent about global warming.
For Flamanville, though, a village of 1,780 people, nuclear power has re-energized the town. There are no pretty beaches here, just granite cliffs above a cold sea. For hundreds of years, the village lived off the granite, cutting and selling it, shipping it first by boat, then by railroad. Flamanville granite, said Mayor Patrick Fauchon, was used to pave the Place de la Concorde in Paris.
But by the middle of the 19th century it became too expensive compared with other sources, and the village survived by digging iron from an undersea mine, said Mr. Fauchon, who has been mayor since 1983. “It was always a company town,” he said.
But the mine closed in 1962, and the population of the village dropped to 1,150 people. When the idea of a nuclear plant arose, in 1975, there was considerable debate. But residents voted for the nuclear plant, which meant new jobs.
The excerpt is lengthy, but the article has more detail. It sounds as if the siting was equivalent to putting something like that in Minnesota's Iron Range, where paranoia over tomorrow's job base generally outweighs worry over risks and consequences.
"Atoms for Peace," is what the nuclear power industry in its infancy was called, when first envisioned during the Eisenhower years, and promoted by the government then to counter the prior history of the industry as entirely for war-ending and cold war military purposes.
Finally, if you care to see what part of a multi-billion dollar power plant construction site looks like, in the process of being built, the Times provides this photo (click it to enlarge):
_________UPDATE__________
Of the Google returns on nuclear fuel reprocessing, two promising links are here and here; with an interesting PBS Frontline item, here; and Heritage Foundation weighing in with opinion, here.
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