I've already had to scold Jeff Barth once for facilitating Republican baloney, on his support for the Keystone XL pipeline. Now Barth goes for a second dip in Kristi Noem's fantasy pool, saying he supports the Congresswoman's sideshow dust regulation bill:
"I am not one of those who would ridicule Noem on this issue," he said. "Dust is an issue for many businesses and local governments, not just farming. Those of us who drive on gravel roads learned many years ago to roll up your car windows as another vehicle approaches on a dry day.
"Who thinks banning gravel roads is a good idea?" he asked. "We should not regulate people out of business (mining, woodworking, smelting, concrete, farming, lumber, grain elevators and grain transportation) with our economy so weak" [Tom Lawrence, "Noem's Dust Bill Divides Politicians But Has Gained Ag-Group Support," Mitchell Daily Republic, 2012.03.02].
The ever unoriginal Dakota War College chortles:
It's always nice to see Democrats coming to their senses and agreeing with Congresswoman Noem. Especially when she is right to not trust the EPA, stick up for farmers, and advocate for jobs building a pipline.
Someone must have forgotten to tell Barth that before he can support reasonable, bi-partisan and intelligent policies, he must first win the Democratic primary vote where Kristi Noem is always wrong and never ever even remotely close to being right [some faker who hides behind a pseudonym, "Hey Jeff, Which Primary Are You Running In?" Dakota War College, 2012.03.06].
I don't expect any Democrat to retool his or her message based on what DWC says. But the Republican Establishment blog offers some stopped-clock wisdom. In the interview with Tom Lawrence, candidate Barth resorts to the same sort of fear-plying lies that the Congresswoman he wants to replace uses to persuade voters that her dust bill is more than a political distraction. Banning gravel roads? Please, Jeff, show me one document, one news report, one quote that says that's what the EPA is after.
Dust control is a genuine concern for local governments: see the spiraling costs McKenzie County (ND) has faced with increasing Bakken oil patch activity. Counties don't do dust control just to be pains in the neck; they do it because excessive dust genuinely threatens health and quality of life (see also here and here).
As with Keystone XL, Rep. Noem is using her fantasies about dust regulations as a front for her effort to let her big corporate donors do whatever they want. The dust regulations she wants to ban are products of her imagination. Everyone challenging Kristi Noem, Democrat or Republican, has an obligation to, yes, ridicule Rep. Noem out on her bogus stats and bogeyman arguments. On two significant issues, Barth is failing to do that.
I don't agree with the War College using the agreement between Barth and Noem as a reason to hooch. There are some issues that don't break down into partisan issues. And, frankly this is one (dust) in my mind.
Regarding Keystone, this is not a cut-and-dried issue for Democrats. I in advertently talked at lunch at a lunch counter with a Minnesota Democrat from the Iron Range who lamented Obama's position on Keystone. One of his lines was "This is good for working people. Who is this guy's (Obama) people? I thought we were his people."
I don't know Varilek. And, don't really know Barth (met only once) but have observed him over 20 years, especially as a County Commissioner. While there is little we agree on (maybe only dust and Keystone LOL), he reminds me of State Senator Gil Koetzle, a guy I disagreed with nearly all the time but always knew his heart was in the right place.
My point is too often we (conservatives and liberals) reduce issues to matters of ideology and remove practical application to real life.
Dust regs don't have to be a partisan issue. But when Noem's position is so deeply rooted in fantasy and fallacy, someone has to call her out. One would think the Democrats trying to unseat her would take on that challenge. Keystone XL, too, is an issue where Noem's arguments (130,000 jobs?!) are so fantastically wrong that someone has to stop her lies. That Barth facilitates both of those lies concerns me deeply. I will say the same of Noem's GOP challengers, if either of them ponies up enough signatures to run and starts repeating such nuttery.
Barth is presenting more of a problem for Democrats than a sollution. The dust bill is foolish and silly.
Pixie dust for sure. Too bad gay activists took the glitter bombs because we could throw fairy dust at Noem rallies.
While we quibble over whether "dust regulations" are something that merit discussion, the EPA continues to abuse its authority on a daily basis in cases like Sackett v. EPA.
The EPA arbitrarily (and falsely) claimed that private property owned by Mike and Shantel Sackett of Priest Lake Idaho was located in a "wetlands" area and thus they would not be allowed to build their home on the land they had recently purchased.
The EPA effectively undermined their personal property rights without providing ANY proof whatsoever that their land qualified for protected status under wetlands statutes.
You can view a short video of their story here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=40iHXAOjJ3U&feature=player_embedded
Nina Totenberg:
"Environmental groups fear that a Sackett win would allow major polluters to tie up the EPA in litigation, preventing meaningful enforcement of anti-pollution laws. They also point to similar provisions in other health and safety statutes.
Congress, they argue, intended compliance orders and the threat of big fines to force violators to change their ways, and they say that both the EPA and the courts have treated small violators far more benignly than the big polluters who are the major targets of the law."
http://www.npr.org/2012/01/07/144797552/when-property-rights-environmental-laws-collide
American lawns are biological deserts, unsustatinable monocultures where 40-60% of applied chemicals leach into waterways. Source.