Prototype Noem-catching device to help her make more committee meetings

Freshman Rep. Kristi Noem was really, really proud to be a second-string replacement pick for the Agriculture Committee seat vacated for her by fellow Tea Party-fave and farm subsidy beneficiary Rep. Steven Fincher. But she hasn’t been doing much on the Ag committee. South Dakota Democratic Party chairman Ben Nesselhuf finds documentation establishing Rep. Noem’s attendance at just four out of twenty Ag committee and subcommittee hearings:

Of six conservation subcommittee meetings, there’s a record of Noem attending only one, Democrats say. A record shows her at a livestock meeting. That came April 26 when she was being profiled by a network news channel. Of nine full committee meetings, there is record of her in two.

Even if she was missed by the video cameras, or only attended parts of meetings — which is common for members of Congress, experts maintain — Noem has appeared in transcripts once, Nesselhuf said [Jonathan Ellis, "Attendance in Congress in Question," that Sioux Falls paper, 2012.05.13].

Why might Kristi be skipping so many Agriculture Committee hearings?

10. Too busy clubbing in California.
9. Grueling travel schedule and non-stop town hall meetings.
8. Still getting lost in Longworth Building.
7. The whole idea of going to Congress was to get away from the farm.
6. Do you know how long it takes to do this hair?
5. Kassidy and Kennedy are “too cool” now to play board games, so Kristi has spent weeks casting stunt doubles for the new “Monopoly” ads.
4. Farm Bill amendments? But “I have to work on this paper! It’s due tomorrow!“
3. Still waiting for chairman to send copy of Ag committee mission statement.
2. Noem needs to keep her head down on ag policy, since her pro-government stance on farm subsidies and crop insurance makes her look really bad with her arch-conservative base.
1. Meeting? What meeting?

Commenters, I welcome your additions to the list.

Public Utilities Commission candidate Matt McGovern has more expertise on energy policy issues than his opponent Commissioner Kristie Fiegen did when Governor Dennis Daugaard handed her the job in 2011. Now McGovern may have discovered a non-energy wedge issue that may give him a leg up on Fiegen.

Democratic PUC candidate Matt McGovern (left) receives the endorsement of farmer Ray Martinmaas at a press conference in Sioux Falls, 2012.04.26. Photo from SD Democratic Party.

Yesterday Ray Martinmaas publicly endorsed McGovern for PUC. Martinmaas farms near Orient in Faulk County. He’s a Republican. And he’s mad at the Republicans on the PUC and in Pierre who let the Anderson Seed Company set up shop in Redfield and post a meager $100,000 bond before going belly up and costing him and dozens of his fellow farmers.

Anderson Seed got going in part thanks to funding assistance from Pierre. One of Governor Dennis Daugaard’s first official acts was to cut the ribbon at Anderson Seed’s official opening in January 2011. The sunflower seed processor may already have been in financial distress at that time. Anderson Seed went out of business two months ago, leaving Martinmaas out $47,000. His losses are part of $2.6 million Anderson owes to numerous area farmers. The PUC considered trying to seize the company’s remaining assets but backed off, declaring that the company has no grain left to seize and that seizing any other property would be complicated by Anderson’s sale to another company and by potential environmental problems at the Redfield facility. Now the PUC is limiting its efforts to recovering Anderson’s $100,000 bond, which clearly wasn’t enough to cover the risk it posed to South Dakota farmers.

Martinmaas thinks the PUC didn’t do enough to protect farmers from Anderson Seed’s failure:

“If Kristie Fiegen and the other commissioners had been doing their job, this would not have happened. We need new commissioners who will protect farmers and consumers, and I’m happy to endorse Matt McGovern,” Martinmaas said. “We’ve got to clean house.”

…“I don’t care if you’re a Republican or a Democrat, an Independent or a member of the Tea Party, we need new commissioners on the PUC,” Martinmaas said. Matt McGovern will be an independent voice on the commission, Martinmaas said, because he doesn’t accept campaign contributions from lobbyists or the utilities the PUC regulates ["Republican Farmer Ray Martinmaas Endorses Matt McGovern for South Dakota Public Utilities Commission," South Dakota Democratic Party, press release, 2012.04.26].

McGovern has an interesting and perhaps unexpected issue here. Martinmaas himself has questioned why the Public Utilities Commission is involved in regulating grain elevators in the first place. But operations like Anderson Seed are indeed part of the PUC portfolio. The failure of Anderson Seed opens the door for McGovern and his supporters to expand the PUC campaign from the usual arcanities of electricity and telecom regulation to the broader issue of crony capitalism of the Daugaard administration.

Incumbent Fiegen will now have to rise to the challenge of defending her failure to protect South Dakota farmers like Martinmaas from the bad business practices of a company given privileges from her boss and benefactor in Pierre.

Agriculture Secretary Walt Bones is boosting the state’s propaganda effort to force local governments into line with the state’s “Get Big or Get Out” ag-industrial policy. For years, South Dakota has given preferential treatment to massive concentrated animal feeding operations. That policy has driven numerous small operators out of business, concentrating agricultural wealth and fostering resentment among West River agriculturalists.

Undaunted, Secretary Bones announces a marketing effort to get counties to back off on zoning regulations that hinder big livestock operations:

The South Dakota Department of Agriculture is going on the offensive to grow the livestock industry in the state.  State Ag Secretary Walt Bones says counties need to become more livestock friendly.  As a result his agency is working on a plan that will among many things improve the image of the industry among decision makers on county commissions and zoning boards.

Bones says they’re focusing on four areas including improved communications, using the media to gain public trust in the livestock industry and increased education of decision makers ["SD Developing Comprehensive Livestock Marketing Plan," WNAX Radio, April 2012].

When Walt Bones talks about “education”, he really means marketing. Secretary Bones has already been using (abusing?) his official position to persuade local boards to support the state’s preferred CAFO clients. Earlier this month he surprised the Davison County Planning and Zoning Board by dropping in to urge them to approve the Jackrabbit Family Farms’ proposed 5400-head sow facility south of Mount Vernon. (Davison County Commissioners, facing a packed house of opponents who like breathing and proponents last week, postponed a decision until May 1.) Secretary Bones also intervened in a Water Management Board hearing last summer on Michael Crinion’s proposed mega-dairy in Hanson County (a process now sent back to square one by circuit court).

When Walt Bones talks about education, he also appears to be talking about spreading false information. In response to the Food and Drug Administration’s call for voluntary restrictions on non-therapeutic use of antibiotics in livestock (a practice CAFOs can’t live without but which causes serious public health concerns), CAFO operator Bones says limiting antibiotics is bad for agriculture:

He cites European agriculture as an example where restricting production methods has hurt livestock industries without resulting in a demonstrated reduction in drug-resistant bacteria.

“It has not been effective. It has not done what they wanted to do,” Bones says. “Denmark used to be one of the leading pork producers with top genetics, top production. Their swine industry is just fading because of some of the production restraints put on them” [Peter Harriman, "FDA Calls for Voluntary Restrictions on Use of Antibiotics in Livestock," that Sioux Falls paper, 2012.04.11].

The Danes take exception to Secretary Bones’s hogwash:

This is a blatant case of deliberate misinformation, unfortunately something we often experience in this area. Your readers need to know the following three facts:

1. Denmark is the biggest exporter of pork in the world; we only have 5 million human inhabitants, but through the efficient production of a population of 20 million pigs, we actually now export more pork than the U.S.

2. Danish pork production has increased dramatically since the ban of antibiotic growth promoters through more efficient animal management.

3. Denmark produces pork with — at average — eight times less antimicrobials per kilogram of pork produced than the U.S. (and most other big pork producers).

We hope this important debate in the U.S. can continue with sober — and truthful — information, also from good experience abroad. Denmark has learned much from the U.S. over the years, not the least in the veterinary area. For once we can give some good experience back — but only if the facts are reported truthfully [Jørgen Schlundt, "Letter: Denmark's Swine Industry Is Thriving," that Sioux Falls paper, 2012.04.17].

Secretary Bones can’t get his facts straight about antibiotics and the global swine industry. We shouldn’t trust him to “educate” local officials on livestock and zoning issues that directly affect their citizens.

I love it when a guy named Bones tells me to eat the assorted remnants of cattle. South Dakota Ag Secretary Walt Bones has added his voice to the cries of South Dakota officialdom urging Americans to keep eating the recycled livestock leavings, also known as “pink slime” or “lean finely textured beef.”

The State of South Dakota has also used our tax dollars to promote Eldon and Regina Roth’s commercial product with this official fact sheet, which says pink slime progenitor Beef Products Inc. has never made anyone sick. This official South Dakota fact sheet/advertisement also suggests that the intense reprocessing of livestock leavings at BPI may indeed prevent the need to crowd thousands more water-guzzling, corn-demanding, richly pooping cattle into industrial feedlots.

I will grant that fretting over the actual chemical and tissue content of the many of the things we eat is a sure route to indigestion, if not starvation. I still like a good hot dog, and I will dwell in happy ignorance of the horrors that lead from “Oink!” to “Pass the ketchup!”

The South Dakota fact sheet gets the attention of the University of Michigan’s Risk Science Blog, which focuses on the dreaded ammonia content of pink slime beef. UM’s Andrew Maynard digs up a 1973 nutrition paper that lists the ammonia content of a whole bunch of common foods. The results—hold your nose:

Based on Rudman D. et al. (1973) Ammonia Content of Food. American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, Vol 26, 487-490. Prepared by Andrew Maynard, Risk Science Blog, 2012.04.12

By the 1973 numbers, unless your diet consists entirely of bananas, cereal, celery, and grits, you’re eating ammonia. Modern pink slime beef has about double the ammonia content of 1973 ground beef, but onions, mayo, ketchup, and lots of cheeses still out-ammonia BPI’s recaptured beef waste.

If you really think about it, everything you eat is just a few chews away from becoming barf and poop (yeah, enjoy your breakfast). Astronauts drink recycled urine, and soon, if we keep pouring our water into fracking, so will we. If you want to critique pink slime as gross, you have to do more than shout, “Oh my God! Ammonia!” You need to prepare a much more thorough critique of industrial agribusiness. So pass the ammonia ketchup and mayo… and that old copy of The Unsettling of America.

Here’s a round-up of research not being conducted at a South Dakota university run by Monsanto executive board member David Chicoine:

Monsanto’s flagship herbicide Roundup damages mouth cells and DNA:

To reflect occupational exposure, human buccal epithelial cells were exposed to glyphosate and Roundup for 20 minutes only at concentrations from 10 mg/L to 200 mg/L.  The Roundup formulation used for the experiments contains 450 g/L of glyphosate and should be diluted according to the manufacturer’s instructions to 1–3 % before use (final concentration 4 500–13 500 mg/l). The researchers found some significant effects with 10-20 mg/l, equivalent to a 225–1 350-fold dilution of the spraying solution [Eva Sirinathsinghji, "Glyphosate Toxic to Mouth Cells & Damages DNA, Roundup Much Worse," Institute of Science in Society Reports, 2012.03.28].

Dr. SirinathSinghji also finds Roundup kills kidney cells. Spanish researchers are finding glyphosate, Roundup’s main active ingredient, showing up in 41% of groundwater samples. In one study, German researchers found glyphosate in all urine samples tested at five to twenty times the tolerable concentration established for drinking water.

Meanwhile, Monsanto is launching a massive experiment with new drought-resistant biotech corn in South Dakota and across the Great Plains, even as scientists warn in a March 5 letter to the EPA that Monsanto’s biotech corn is losing its resistance to corn rootworm. The Environmental Protection Agency has already declared, contrary to Monsanto’s assurances, that Monsanto’s program for monitoring possible cases of resistance is inadequate.

None of the corn experts signing that March 5 warning letter are from South Dakota State University.

Update 15:49 MST: In related news, Mr. Mercer notes that the South Dakota Biotechnology Association will host a research poster session at its annual summit on October 25. Proposals are due May 15. Research proposals on the hazards of Monsanto products are surely welcome.

Hat tip to Nathan Johnson!

Well, that’s depressing: a new report from Environment America ranks the Big Sioux River as having the 13th largest amount of toxic industrial pollution discharges in 2010. The sole discharger into the Big Sioux measured in this report is Smithfield Foods, John Morrell’s processing plant in Sioux Falls, which dumped 2.95 million pounds of yuck into the public waters past the Falls.

(Speaking of toxic discharge, the featured recipe on the John Morrell website this morning is bologna and egg breakfast burritos.)

In all of the surrounding states, only Nebraska has one facility causing more harm to waterways… and that’s the Tyson Fresh Meats processing plant pouring 4.62 million pounds of pollution into the Missouri River. I’m assuming this source is the Dakota City beef facility, for whose toxic discharges Tyson paid the feds a two-million-dollar penalty in 2009.

Surprising to me is the fact that even with all that Bakken-frackin’ oil activity, North Dakota saw much less toxic discharge into its waterways than did South Dakota, under a million pounds. Maybe South Dakota state government is putting us more at risk of polluted waterways with its pressure on local governments to approve giant hog farms than with its push to drill for oil.

Who says socialism doesn’t work? North Dakota operates the Bank of North Dakota (that’s a bank with .gov as its Web suffix) and the North Dakota Mill and Elevator Association, and they feel fine:

All state revenues are deposited in the Bank of North Dakota, which promotes agriculture, commerce and industry in the state. It was the first bank in the country to provide a federally insured low-interest student loan; it supports new farmers in a state that has some of the toughest laws in the country limiting corporate farms; and through partnerships with local banks, it guarantees loans to commercial and industrial enterprises that directly benefit North Dakota. Before he became governor and then a United States senator, John Hoeven, a Republican, was the bank’s president. A Socialist Republican? That’s weird.

The high-tech grain elevator and mill towering above the prairies in Grand Forks is one of the largest and busiest in the country. The North Dakota Mill and Elevator Association competes with private grain elevators and mills but receives no taxpayer money to give it an unfair advantage and, like the bank, the association returns much of its annual profit to North Dakota’s general fund. Isn’t that socialism? [Gretchen Dykstra, "Pragmatism on the Prairie," New York Times, 2012.03.30]

Perhaps living on the great northern tundra helps focus a community’s attention on practical policy more than ideology. North Dakota’s state bank and state grain elevator work. They are also socialism.

For over a year, I’ve maintained with a variety of evidence that building the Keystone XL pipeline will raise the price of oil and gasoline here in the middle of America. At the very least, empirical evidence says Keystone XL won’t decrease gasoline prices.

This morning, let’s look at the inverse: not building Keystone XL lowers the local price of oil:

The delay of the Keystone XL pipeline’s approval and completion is forcing distributors to take larger discounts than usual, according to a report from the North Dakota Department of Mineral Resources in Bismarck.

The North Dakota sweet crude price had a 30 percent discount to the New York Mercantile Exchange-West Texas Intermediate price , DMR director Lynn Helms wrote in the report last week….

“What’s occurring right now is there is quite a bit of congestion in the Cushing, Okla. and the Great Lakes area,” said Justin Kringstad, North Dakota Pipeline Authority director….

If the Keystone XL is completed it may help return discounts to normal, Kringstad said….

“The more we can debottleneck midcontinent and open up additional access for midcontinent barrels to get to the Gulf Coast, that’s going to raise the price of a barrel in the Great Lakes area and then in turn affect the North Dakota crude pricing,” he said [April Baumgarten, "Oil Express: Keystone XL Delay Increases Oil Price Discounts in North Dakota," Dickinson Press, 2012.03.31].

Now you have to read the Bakken-beholden local press carefully: “increasing price discounts” means lowering the price of oil. “Returning discounts to normal” means raising the price of oil.

Baumgarten does point out one significant problem with delaying the Keystone XL pipeline: with or without the pipeline, oil producers are still going to frack all the oil they can out of the Bakken and seek access to the market. Absent Keystone XL, oil producers compete with agribusiness for boxcars, making it harder to get crops and critters to market when the price is right. Of course, if farmers and ranchers focused on diversified local agriculture instead of industrial scale monoculture, they wouldn’t have that problem, would they?