Treatment facility shut down; investigation continuing

Vicki Rosen, the EPA's Community Involvement Coordinator, sent out another email today with more info concerning this week's drinking water contamination incident in Scottsdale and Paradise Valley.

From the email -

Hello CIG,

I learned a few more bits of information regarding the failure(s) at the MRTF. Specifically, this deals with the legal relationships between EPA, the State of Arizona, the County, the Participating Companies (PCs) and the AZ American Water Co.

EPA and the State of Arizona signed a Consent Decree (CD) with the PCs, not the water company. The PCs are responsible for extracting and treating groundwater contaminated with TCE. The PCs chose the water company to do this, but the PCs are not responsible for the operation & maintenance of the plant. EPA has no direct authority over the water company under the CD.

The AZ American Water Co. is subject to the Safe Drinking Water Act (SDWA) which EPA has delegated to the State and the State has delegated to the County. All three entities (fed, state, county) may take enforcement action against the water company. The PCs are not subject to the SDWA.

She went on to explain that the affected treatment facility (Miller Road Treatment Facility, or MRTF) has been shut down until further notice while an investigation is conducted. It will not be brought back online until the various regulatory agencies involved (federal, state, and local) believe that the plant will be operated safely.

In addition, depending on the outcome of the investigation, the operator, Arizona American Water, and the "PCs", or participating companies (Motorola, Siemans, and GlaxoSmithKline) could face financial penalties arising from the incident.

Note: The PCs are the companies responsible for the groundwater contamination, either because they dumped the solvents improperly, or they acquired the companies that did.

Later!

Signs of improvement in Scottsdale/P.V. water contamination levels

Really quick update on the water contamination issue affecting Paradise Valley and parts of Scottsdale -

According to a news report on Channel 12's ten o'clock news, test results show that the TCE contamination levels are down to acceptable levels, however, customers shouldn't drink or prepare food with tap water until they have been told by EPA, state, and Arizona America Water officials that the tap water is safe for consumption.

The system still needs to be flushed.

Channel 12's report from their 5 o'clock news - Water company leaked contaminated water before (no mention of test results in this particular report)

Arizona American Water's press release of 17 January here.

The Three Amigos vote against HOPE

Coming soon to an upscale multiplex near you (no poor people allowed, other than those working there for minimum wage)...Jeff Flake, Trent Franks, and John Shadegg in "Three Amigos." Watch as these three soon-to-be out of work actors pretending to be public servants fight against public works projects that help the poor and middle classes...


Today, the U.S. House of Representatives considered and passed H.R. 3524, the HOPE VI Improvement and Reauthorization Act of 2008. The Act authorizes grants to housing agencies to "revitalize severely distressed public housing developments." (CBO analysis)

Well, the House, except for Jeff Flake (R-AZ6), Trent Franks (R-AZ2), John Shadegg (R-AZ3), and 127 other Republicans.

Note - the final vote for passage was 271 - 130. All of the Democratic members of the AZ delegation and Rick Renzi voted in favor; the aforementioned Flake, Shadegg, and Franks voted against.

Before voting against HOPE, the three amigos supported four failed amendments that would have gutted or at least weakened the impact of the underlying bill. They voted for -

...the Neugebauer Amendment, which would have change the requirement that housing units demolished under a HOPE grant be replaced on a one for one basis to requiring the one-for-one match only if the units were occupied immediately prior to demolition. This is important in places like New Orleans where there are efforts to condemn public housing facilities and replace them with fewer, but larger, for-profit units. With a single stroke, this plan both inhibits the return to N.O. of poor black residents and generates greater profits for developer. (failed 181 - 227)

...the Sessions Amendment, which would have maintained HUD's authority to issue "demolition only" grants. Hmm..."demolition only"...that's an interesting concept for a bill that is supposed to be about renewing and revitalizing public housing. (Failed 186 - 221)

...the King Amendment, which would have barred using HOPE funds to pay for wages mandated by the Davis-Bacon Act (aka - prevailing wage.) I suppose this could be something of an improvement for Rep. King (R-IA). Normally, he spends his time railing about foreign immigrants. It seems that he is setting his sights a little higher now - the American skilled worker. (Failed 136 - 268)

Did I mention that King called the prevailing wage law "racist"?? What a schmuck.

...and the Capito Amendment, which would have removed the mandatory 'green' building standards and made them optional. (Failed 169 - 240)


It's obvious that these three have given up any pretense that they represent the interests of their constituents.

People don't matter to them as much as ideology does.

...OK, OK - Shadegg represents Paradise Valley, which doesn't need HOPE as much as it does clean drinking water. :)

Final note: to those of you who object to the appellation "Three Amigos" for Flake, Franks, and Shadegg, that perhaps that's a little to harshly partisan, keep this in mind -

I could very easily have nicknamed them the "Three Stooges."

Later!

Update on the contaminated water in Scottsdale and P.V.

Edit to update the update:

As stated toward the end of Ms. Rosen's email, Congressman Mitchell *was* briefed by the EPA on this matter and learned the following -

- TCE levels were four times the maximum contaminant level (approximately 20 parts per billion; 5 ppb is the maximum contaminant level), and

- Arizona American Water Co. customers in Scottsdale and Paradise Valley may have been exposed to those levels for up to 16 hours.

After learning these facts, Mitchell said “I have urged the EPA to conduct a full investigation. This is the second TCE incident at the same facility in three months. That’s not normal, and that’s not acceptable.”

Stayed tuned for more updates...

End edit...

Vicki Rosen, the EPA's Community Involvement Coordinator for the North Indian Bend Wash Superfund site just sent out this email to the NIBW Community Involvement Group (CIG). It has some of the details on what happened at the treatment facility in Scottsdale.

The email -

Hello CIG members,

You may have already read about this week's failure at the MRTF in the newspapers, but this note is to let you know what EPA knows so far about what happened.

Yesterday (Wed. Jan. 16), Jamey received a call from Dennis Shirley, consultant to the Participating Companies (PCs), advising that there had been another release. Jamey immediately informed all the appropriate people at EPA, but it was late in the day so that's why this message wasn't sent sooner.

This is what we got from Dennis:

The release was discovered yesterday by Arizona American Water at 6:30 am. A blower on Tower 3 (which treats water from well PCX-1) had shut off. That shutoff could have happened as early as the day before (Tues, Jan. 15) at 2:30 pm. There may have been 16 hours when untreated water entered the system.

Athough controls were supposed to be in place that would shut down the system in such an event, this did not happen. Untreated water containing TCE was discharged into the drinking water system. Sampling has found that levels of TCE at approximately 20 parts per billion (ppb) were distributed into the system. Sampling continues at the point of entry and throughout the system.

The MRTF was immediately shut down as soon as the failure was discovered. It is currently not operating.

AZ American Water and the PCs went into response mode and notified all customers who would have gotten that water; this was done through a reverse-911 system of phone calls to each household telling people to not drink the water. People were also told that free bottled water would be available at a particular location.

Top managers at AZ American Water have supposedly already briefed Congressman Harry Mitchell directly.

This is what we know so far. EPA is consulting with a number of parties to assess the situation and what should be done. In the meantime, almost all of our NIBW team is out of the office until at least next Tues (Jan. 22). Jamey is spending time with his brand new baby boy (their first), so it may be a while before you hear directly from him. I'm actually out of the office today having just had minor surgery, and I will not be in tomorrow either. If I get any emails from any of you, you may not get a response until next week. Monday is a federal holiday.

I will be back in touch with everyone as we learn more. We will also start to look at when we can get together in person to discuss these important issues.

Vicki

Note: I've got a call out to AZ American Water, but since my workweek starts tomorrow, I may not be able to follow up until Monday (or Tuesday because of the holiday.) Check the news, the City of Scottsdale's website, the Town of Paradise Valley's website, or AZ American Water's website for updates.

Later!

Harry Mitchell contacts the EPA regarding the latest TCE/drinking water issue in Scottsdale

The letter that Congressman Mitchell has sent to Wayne Nastri, EPA Regional Administrator in San Francisco (which covers AZ) [typo corrected by me]:

Mr. Wayne Nastri
Regional Administrator
Environmental Protection Agency
75 Hawthorne Street
San Francisco, CA 94105-3901

Dear Regional Administrator Nastri:

I am seriously concerned about the continued failure to protect against the emission of trichloroethylene (TCE), a suspected cancer causing chemical, into the drinking water that serves portions of Scottsdale.

According to local media reports, residents were alerted yesterday about a malfunction at a water-treatment plant on Tuesday, January 15, 200[8] that may have sent elevated levels of TCE into certain drinking water supplies.

I first brought the TCE emission issue to your attention in November, when, after a previous TCE emission, the EPA failed to notify the public until weeks afterwards.

You assured me then, both by letter and by phone, that steps were being taken to guard against TCE emissions. Attached, for your convenience, are copies of our previous correspondence.

I would appreciate an opportunity to speak with you about this by phone as soon as possible.

Thank you for your prompt attention.

Sincerely,

Harry E. Mitchell
Member of Congress

Note: the text of Harry Mitchell's earlier letter can be found here.

Don't drink the tap water in certain parts of Scottsdale and P.V.

...It's deja vu all over again, but they seem to have worked out the whole "communicate in a timely manner" problem, anyway...

The number of hits on this blog exploded today, and most of the hits were on the posts I wrote on contaminated drinking water in Scottsdale (here, here, and here).

The vast majority of the hits were from the Scottsdale/Phoenix area, though a few came from much farther away.

My curiousity was piqued, to say the least, but had no idea why so many people were suddenly interested those (relatively) old posts.

Then I came across this article from the Arizona Republic's website -

Tap-water ban hits parts of P.V., Scottsdale

Residents in Paradise Valley and parts of Scottsdale were told Wednesday not to drink their tap water.

A water treatment plant for Arizona American Water malfunctioned Tuesday possibly sending elevated levels of TCE or trichloroethylene into the water supply, said Arizona American Water spokesman Todd Walker.

As the article noted, the problem occurred at the same treatment facility as October's problem, the treatment facility at Miller and McDonald in Scottsdale.

From the City of Scottsdale's press release on today's malfunction -

Water company's notice has no link to Scottsdale municipal water system

A private water company serving about 4,700 businesses and households in Paradise Valley and a portion of Scottsdale notified customers Wednesday evening not to drink tap water until 5 p.m. Friday.

The company is not associated with the City of Scottsdale system, and its system is separate from the Scottsdale municipal system serving about 88,000 customers.

The company’s service area within Scottsdale is generally north of Jackrabbit Road, south of Indian Bend Road and west of the Arizona Canal. It also serves some neighborhoods north of Camelback Road and west of the Arizona Canal. Arizona American serves about 1,200 Scottsdale customers. (Map of service area withinScottsdale, pdf/313kb/1p)

The Arizona American Water press release can be found here.

...Not the kind of press coverage that Scottsdale's elected leaders and their 'friends' in the Scottsdale Chamber of Commerce want to see with the Super Bowl (and the thousands of tourists spending millions of dollars that come with it) two and a half weeks away...

Housekeeping note

I've added the blog of my coworker, Michael. He's a musician from Tempe and writes a blog about his music, specifically his work on the drums.

It's called "Michael's Prog Drum Blog".

Don't worry, his music is more creative than his title. :))

Anyway, his latest project is learning an exceptionally complex piece by Frank Zappa, The Black Page.

I've read all of his posts, and given my lack of musical talent/training, I still understand almost all of the prepositions and definite articles. :)

However, he's a good guy, and Zappa was, to use a normally misused word, a genius. Michael's blog is worth a read, though it will help if you have something of a musical background.

Later!

Ahhh...Congress is back in session...

...and the House Republicans are already in mid-session form...

They're already hard at work safeguarding the interests of big business and blaming workers for everything.

Today, they were "fighting the good fight" for mine owners as House Democrats worked to address mine safety in the aftermath of the recent spate of deadly mine disasters, such as Crandall Canyon in Utah and Sago in West Virginia.

During consideration of H.R. 2768, the S-MINER Act (Supplemental Mine Improvement and New Emergency Response), House Republicans, led by Buck McKeon (R-CA), opposed every safety improvement as too onerous for mine owners and operators. In fact, the only 'safety improvement' that they supported (and supported strongly, at that) was an intensive drug testing requirement for mine workers.

Guess it's more fun to play "blame the victims" than it is to "govern responsibly."

Many of the Republican opponents of increased mine safety cited this Washington Post article from Sunday that chronicles a growing trend in West Virginia's mine country - painkiller addiction.

The Republicans so strongly favored increased drug testing they twice tried to wedge it into the bill, once in this amendment proposed by Joe Wilson (R-SC) (starting on page 2 of the .pdf) and in their standard 'motion to recommit with instructions', proposed by Mark Souder (R-IN).

The Wilson amendment also sought to water-down implementation of safety measures, substituting secrecy, studies and commissions for refuge chambers with emergency air supplies, flame-resistant conveyor belts, and transparency.

Note: The Wilson amendment failed by a vote of 188 - 229; the motion to recommit failed by a vote of 197 - 217, with the AZ delegation splitting along party lines for each vote.

In the end, the House passed the S-Miner bill by a vote of 214 - 199, with the AZ delegation again splitting along party lines.

As could be expected, the White House has threatened to veto the bill.

AP coverage here.

...I know that in this election year, the presidential campaigns are getting most of the attention from voters and the MSM (hey, even I think it's easier to focus on 10 or so candidates for 1 office than it is to focus on more than 900 candidates for the 468 House and Senate seats up for grab this year), we all need to remember that those seats are just as important as the Presidency, and those races are far more easily affected by local activists.

Whether it's for Harry Mitchell, Gabrielle Giffords, Raul Grijalva, Ed Pastor, Bob Lord, John Thrasher, or one of the Democrats looking to replace Rick Renzi (R-Mantech) in CD1, volunteer where you can, contribute where you can.

Presidential Preference Election early ballots are arriving...

at least here in Maricopa County.

Just as a reminder -

My post on the Democratic ballot for the presidential preference election is here and the AZ Secretary of State's listing of all of the Democratic candidates is here;

Sonoran Alliance's post on the Republican ballot here and the AZ SOS's listing of the entire Republican ballot is here.

Early ballots in Maricopa County can be requested from the county recorder's office here; early ballots must be requested by January 25th and returned by 7:00 p.m. on February 5th (that's not "postmarked by" either - the ballots must be turned into the county recorder's office or at a polling place by the time polls close at 7.)

Pima County requests here; Pinal County here; Coconino County here; Yavapai County here; La Paz County - mail or phone request only; Yuma County - mail requests; Gila County here; Mohave County here; Apache County - phone request; Navajo County here; Greenlee County - mail-in request form here; Cochise County - no info regarding early ballots on the county recorder's website; Santa Cruz County - also no info available; Graham County here.

Contact your county recorder's office for specific questions and deadlines (all of the deadlines should be same statewide though.)

In all Arizona counties, to receive an early ballot for the presidential preference election, a person must be a registered voter in that county and be registered in the party of the ballot they are requesting.

Later!

P.S. - With Governor Bill Richardson's withdrawal from the race, I'm voting for former Senator John Edwards - even if he wasn't on the right side on most issues, especially economic issues, pieces like this Reuters article illustrate why he stands out from the rest of both parties.

IT's official - the American justice system is a wholly-owned subsidiary of mega-corps

....the only thing that has changed is that they aren't even trying to hide it any longer...

Average Americans buy their houses on an installment plan, one monthly mortgage payment at a time. That way, the near-term financial pain is lessened while they invest for their long-term financial security.

Large corporations have learned the lesson - they buy judges one dividend payout or stock split at a time. That way, almost nobody notices the ongoing (and ever-growing) mortgaging of the justice system as they invest for *their* long-term financial security.

From AP via Yahoo! News (emphasis mine) -

Conflict of interest tanks worker's case

By PAUL ELIAS, Associated Press Writer Mon Jan 14, 6:15 PM ET

SAN FRANCISCO - For years, Braxton Berkley was exposed to chemicals while helping build top-secret military planes at Lockheed Martin's storied Skunk Works plant. He says those chemicals made him ill — but his case reached a dead end at the state's highest court.

The California Supreme Court has refused to hear his appeal not on legal merits, but because four of the seven justices cited a conflict of interest because they controlled stock in oil companies that provided some of the solvents at issue in the case.

According to the article, because the case is a state-level one, with no federal issues to be resolved, there is no higher court available for the Mr. Berkley and the other Lockheed Martin workers to appeal to.

I'd argue that the utter corruption of a state's supreme court *must* be a federal issue, but what is the likelihood of finding a federal court that won't cite the same "conflict of interest" to deny the workers a fair hearing?

To be fair to the judges involved, because of the method used, it's possible that they noticed the purchase of their loyalty by the oil companies as much as a house would notice the purchase of its shelter by the average American.

A question for readers: I've been having trouble finding out exactly what chemical solvents the Lockheed Martin workers were suing over, and if they were the same as (or similar to) the chemicals that contaminate the North Indian Bend Wash Superfund site.

Anybody have any ideas in this regard? Thanks in advance...

Later!

Events calendar

Thursday, January 17 - Neighborhood Day at the Arizona State Legislature. From 11:00 a.m. - 1:00 p.m. the cities of Avondale, Buckeye, Chandler, Gilbert, Glendale, Goodyear, Mesa, Peoria, Phoenix, Queen Creek, Scottsdale, Surprise, Tempe and Tucson, and the League of Arizona Cities and Towns host this annual event where attendees tour the Arizona House of Representatives and the Arizona Senate, learn about the legislative process, speak to their legislators and more. Contact your city's neighborhood services department for more info.


Thursday, January 17 - The District 17 Democrats, the ASU Young Democrats and The Big Picture Film Series present the film "The Future of Food." This insightful documentary offers an "in-depth look into the controversy over genetically modified foods." 7:30 p.m. in Room 170 in ASU's Coor Building. Admission is free.


Thursday, January 17 - The District 8 Democrats are holding their monthly community program meeting. This month's program is a Presidential candidate forum with representatives of each campaign speaking on behalf of their candidates. For those who were silly enough to miss D17's forum last week ( :) ), this is a great opportunity to hear about the candidates before Arizona's presidential preference election (aka - the primary) on February 5th. The reception starts at 6:30 p.m., the forum starts at 7 in the Mustang Library, 10101 N. 90th St. in Scottsdale.

Note: There is room, and need, for good legislative candidates for the 2008 elections in LD8. This meeting is a good opportunity for interested Democrats to meet LD8's activists. LD8 is roughly Fountain Hills and Scottsdale north of Thomas Road.


Sunday, January 20 - The Maricopa County Democratic Party is holding its First Annual Diversity Awards Dinner, honoring Maricopa County Supervisor Mary Rose Wilcox (SD-5), Senator Leah Landrum-Taylor (LD-14), Representative Steve Gallardo (LD-13), Representative Robert Meza (LD-14) and Precinct Committeeperson Cheryl Hunter Schmidt (LD-15). The event starts at 6:00 p.m. at the China Chili restaurant, 302 E. Flower St. (Off 3rd St. two blocks south of Osborn), Phoenix. For more info or tickets call 602.298.0503.


Tuesday, January 22 - The Arizona Chapter of the National Jewish Democratic Council (AZNJDC) will be holding its monthly meeting at the Country Inn and Suites in Scottsdale. The address is 10801 E. 89th Pl.; the meeting starts at 7:00 p.m. On the agenda - a presidential candidate forum with representatives from each major campaign,


Thursday, January 24 - The "Help Is Here" bus from the Partnership for Prescription Assistance (a pharmaceutical industry alliance to help provide prescription medicines to needy patients) will be at two LD17 locations.

At 10:00 a.m., it will be at the Escalante Center, 2150 East Orange Street in Tempe;

At 1:00 p.m., it will move to the Paiute Neighborhood Center, 6535 E. Osborn in Scottsdale.

The bus will have on-site applications, mobile phones, and computer terminals, as well as assistants, to help people find out if they are eligible for help in getting the medicines they need.


Saturday, January 26 - The Winter Meeting of the State Committee of the Arizona Democratic Party will take place at the Pilgrim Rest Baptist Church, 1401 E Jefferson St, Phoenix, from 9:00 a.m. until finish (the general session starts at 1:00 p.m.)


Later!

Quick update on Pearce's email

In my most recent post, I wrote of Rep. Russell Pearce's latest email misadventure. Paul Stiles, the author of the economics/stock market-focused blog, The Novice Bear. Mr. Stiles had taken issue with some of Pearce's assertions regarding the free markets and the economic effects of strict enforcement of immigration laws and mass deportation of illegal immigrants.


I asked Mr. Stiles to forward Pearce's email to me, and he graciously did so.


Mr. Stiles wrote a brief note - 173 words, including salutation and closing - to Pearce at Pearce's AZ House email address. While his note was certainly critical of Pearce, it was civil and succinct.


Pearce replied with a somewhat longer note - 1865! words, not including the salutation and closing because Pearce didn't bother with either one. Notwithstanding the lack of normal courtesy (no salutation or closing), Pearce's response wasn't uncivil per se, but it certainly wasn't succinct. His response was more than 10 times longer than Stiles' initial note.


Yet, buried within all of Pearce's assertions, nativist rhetoric, unsupported statistics, and more than a few self-congratulatory pats on his own back, was a complete absence of a response to Stiles' original criticisms.


Mr. Stiles wrote things like "[i]llegal immigrants are the epitome of free markets", "[y]our legislation is an artificial restriction on free markets and your state's economy will suffer for it", and "I cannot for the life of me why a legislator would deliberately shrink his or her own economy, especially one with such a rapidly ageing population."


Besides the material quoted in my previous post, Rep. Pearce responded with phrases like "[u]ntil the day I die, I will insist that 'illegal' is 'illegal' ", "ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION: Amnesty: Winning the Jackpot for Breaking the Law! Enforcement not Reform", and a laundry list of the various anti-immigrant legislation and referendum questions that he has authored or co-authored.

Other sections of Pearce's letter include a "myths and facts about HB2779 [Employer Sanctions Law]" piece, credited to Pearce, but reading like a press release (to be fair, though, I could easily see him writing such a press release.)

In my previous post, I wrote that Rep. Pearce's writing was "unprofessional." That may have been a mistake.

His writing is also lazy.

His reply to Mr. Stiles' correspondence not only was unresponsive to Stiles' criticisms, it actually read more like a 'copy and paste' mash-up of different nativist screeds and Pearce's campaign bio, only a small amount of which may have actually been written by Pearce himself.

I won't post the entire email here for two reasons -

1. At nearly 1900 words, it really is too long. In addition, it's loaded with the kind of grammatical errors that I make only when I'm writing at 2 in the morning after a long day (12 hours) at work.

2. It's utter crap. Not that I've never posted crap here before, but it's *my* crap. Not somebody else's.

Having said all that, if there is any significant demand for it, I'll post larger sections of the letter (though you can probably find most of his stuff on various white supremacist websites.)

Maybe Rep. Pearce could find the time to take a writing course to help improve his writing, perhaps at one of the community colleges that he wants to cut so desperately. He should do *something* to improve his writing, especially that which goes out under the auspices of his seat in the legislature.

I don't care if he embarrasses himself, but he's embarrassing the entire state with his written (and other) rantings.

To Russell Pearce's friends: Take his email privileges away. Immediately.

...Because he apparently hasn't learned the lesson contained in the whole "National Alliance" debacle from 2006...


As part of my research for blogging, I've created "Google Alerts" for news and blog posts concerning a number of AZ political types, including State Rep. Russell Pearce (R-National Alliance).

The last Pearce update brought to my attention a post from "The Novice Bear," written by Paul Stiles, someone who focuses almost exclusively on economics and the stock market.

In December, he wrote a post criticizing Pearce's opinion of the economic effects of deporting illegal immigrants.

Well, Pearce actually responded to that particular post (color me jealous - he never responds to my posts about him :)) ) in an email to the author.

Apparently, the email is long and rather rambling, but the upshot of it was that Rep. Pearce blames all of AZ's economic woes on undocumented immigrants (ignoring little details like skyrocketing oil and gas prices, and plummeting home values).

The author quoted the email (it was too long to post). Here the quotes, from both the post and a comment on the post -

You should understand our "Sovereign" rights as a nation. The Rule of Law. The damage to America and Americans.26 AMERICANS DIE DAILY AT THE HANDS OF THESE "ILLEGALS" EVERY YEAR. 25 EVERYDAY, 12 BY STABBINGS AND SHOOTINGS AND 13 BY DUI AND OTHER RELATED CRIMES. APPARENTLY YOU AND OTHERS COULD CARE LESS ABOUT....AND OUR GOVERNMENT WILL SHED NOT ONE TEAR OVER THIS..THIS IS FROM A CONGRESSIONAL REPORT. (AZ Officers murdered, Officer Atkins, Officer Erfle, Officer Martin, Officer Eggle, and the list goes on!!!!$2 billion annually in Arizona to educate illegal alien children in K - 12.

{snip}

"I want you to know how I reverence the Constitution; this sacred document given to us by God through the Founders that sought inspiration as they forged this inspired document."

Mr. Stiles goes on to shred Pearce's basic contention about the effect of illegal immigration on violent crime, specifically murder rates (check out his graphs; they're eye-opening.)

The quoted sections of the email show Rep. Pearce to be not only a "one trick pony" in that nearly every fiber of his being is consumed by his obsession with immigrants, but that he is also a singularly unprofessional writer (hey, I'm not exactly the reincarnation of H.L. Mencken, but at least I don't overuse my CAPS LOCK button.)

To be fair, the quotes may be taken out of context, so I've asked Mr. Stiles to forward the email so as to post it in its entirety.

Somehow, though, I don't expect that will change anything. :)

Years ago, there was an anti-drunk driving ad campaign with the tagline "Friends Don't Let Friends Drive Drunk."

Pearce's friends should amend that to "Friends Don't Let Russell Email. Period."

Now that the primaries have started, the gloves are coming off...

...not that they were ever really on...

The lies and smears against have been floating around for a while, but now that primary season has started, the intensity and frequency of the attacks are increasing.

Today alone I received two emails forwarded by someone who is a coworker and friend.

The first perpetuated the lie that Senator Obama is a Muslim bent on destroying the U.S. from within; the second conceded that he is a Christian, but says that he is a 'bad' Christian.

Turns out that I'm not the only one on the receiving end of those emails.

Columnist/blogger David Sirota got one himself and wrote about it today, referring his readers to a Nation article from October regarding the right-wing smear machine in general (not just the attacks on Obama) and a TPMCafe piece concerning the Obama smear specifically.

I've sent my friend links to the two articles mentioned in the previous paragraph, and I'll be talking to her this weekend about the emails, so let me cite with the closing to Sirota's post, two sentences that perfectly sum up my feelings on the subject -

Look, I have my reservations about Obama's policy platform and ability to bring real change - but my reservations have nothing to do with his faith. The effort to smear him for his heritage and his faith are absolutely disgusting.

In the coming weeks, most of us will be voting; may we all base our choices on facts and the candidates' actual records and positions, not on lies, bigotry, and fear-mongering.

Ahh, yes - if civil liberties are taking a back seat to profits, it must be a day ending in 'y'...

...This is the best argument for *not* granting retroactive immunity to telecoms for helping the Bush Admin with its illegal surveillance of America - their motivation to help was always mercenary in nature...

...From AP via Yahoo! News -

WASHINGTON - Telephone companies have cut off FBI wiretaps used to eavesdrop on suspected criminals because of the bureau's repeated failures to pay phone bills on time.

A Justice Department audit released Thursday blamed the lost connections on the FBI's lax oversight of money used in undercover investigations. Poor supervision of the program also allowed one agent to steal $25,000, the audit said.

So what's worse here - the continued lack of fiscal responsibility on the part of the Bush Administration, or the fact that telecoms are directly profiting from Bush's contempt for the Constitution?

At least the telecoms can no longer claim to be motivated by patriotism when they sell out our civil liberties...