Midwest // Current TV

2 book reviews: traumatized midwesterners & Satan in Sweden

My examiner.com article about my NY Journal of Books reviews of Dan Chaon’s... more

davidfcooper
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Right-Wing Media Attack Secret Service For Commissioning New Cost-Effective Buses

August 16, 2011 1:31 pm ET
Right-wing media attacked President Obama for traveling on buses that reportedly cost $1.1 million each on his bus tour through the Midwest. But Secret Service officials have said the buses will pay for themselves over time [and have also said there has been "demonstrated need for [the buses] for some time" [http://www.npr.org/blogs/itsallpolitics/2011/08/15/139652118/a-different-kind-of-party-bus-for-obama]; additionally, the buses will be available to the eventual Republican nominee during the 2012 election, as well as future presidents.
Drudge Hypes Cost Of Tour: "Armored Buses Cost $2.2 Million." On August 15, the Drudge Report posted a series of links [http://www.drudgereportarchives.com/data/2011/08/16/20110816_020417.htm] about Obama's bus tour beneath a picture of one of the armored buses, including a link to an April 21 Politico post about their then-projected "$2.2 million" cost: [Drudge Report Archives, 8/15/11]
AFP: "The Service ... Reason[ed] That The Initial Total Outlay Of 2.2 Million Dollars For Two Buses Would Soon Pay For Itself Over A Projected 10-Year Lifespan." An August 15 Agence France-Presse (AFP) article stated:
The US leader swept onto the campaign trail Monday with a sleek and even sinister looking set of wheels with blacked out windows worth $1.1 million.
The shiny, black armored bus, bristling with secret communications technology, with flashing police-style red and blue lights on the front and the back, made its debut on Obama's three-day tour of Minnesota, Iowa and Illinois.
The vehicle was commissioned by the Secret Service, which has always hired buses for election campaigns and retrofitted them to provide suitable protection for presidents and rival party nominees.
But the Service decided to commission its own vehicles, reasoning that the initial total outlay of 2.2 million dollars for two buses would soon pay for itself over a projected 10-year lifespan. [Agence France-Presse, 8/15/11, via Google News]
Secret Service Spokesman Ed Donovan: "The Reality Is That We're Overdue For Having This Type Of Protective Asset In Our Fleet." From the April 21 TPM article:
"We've never been fully comfortable with the security provided by a bus we lease and then try to retro-fit," Secret Service spokesman Jim Mackin told TPM.
"This would be just like other vehicles we're adding to our fleet," Mackin said. "We'd use them for the campaign, but they're not for campaign purposes. They would be part of our fleet -- just like our limos, just like our follow-ups, just like our emergency vehicles."
[...]
"The reality is that we're overdue for having this type of protective asset in our fleet," Secret Service spokesman Ed Donovan told TPM. [Talking Points Memo, 4/21/11]
Donovan: "Designing Our Own Vehicle Really Gave Us A Level Of Security Which We Don't Get When We Lease A Bus." The TPM article further stated:
[Donovan said,] "We've had protectees in buses since at least 1980, Ronald Reagan, Gov. Reagan, was in a bus during the campaign. It's overdue because designing our own vehicle really gave us a level of security which we don't get when we lease a bus."
In the past, the Secret Service has enhanced the security features of buses leased by presidential campaigns, and they say having their own secure buses that can be used during campaign trips just makes more sense.
"If we have a candidate who has leased a bus and we're going to be protecting that candidate, we're going to look to enhance the security of that vehicle," Donovan said. "This is just the next step, and as I said, something that we're overdue for." [Talking Points Memo, 4/21/11 http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2011/04/obama-to-use-new-secret-service-bus-on-campaign-trail.php]
Donovan: "We Have Demonstrated The Need For These Buses Going Back To 1980." The August 15 AFP article stated: " 'We have demonstrated the need for these buses going back to 1980,' said Ed Donovan, a Secret Service spokesman, recalling the days when future president Ronald Reagan stormed the country by bus." [AFP, 8/15/11, via Google News http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5g2Jxv8XiM1FRcsCIM9Nvz_X5z0iA?docId=CNG.5546416fb2b33bb880d4246e81a40a68.6c1]August 16, 2011 1:31 pm ET Right-wing media attacked President Obama for traveling... more

Judgian12365
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2 months ago
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S&R Fiction: “Theodore Roosevelt’s Eyebrows,” by Teresa Milbrodt

To live in North Dakota you must like driving. You must value a landscape where there... more

hoosierdaddy
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3 months ago
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Rewritten Headlines: Muammar al-Gaddafi to Cancer

Tony D rewrites the news so you don't have to read it.

TonyDiGerolamo
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4 months ago
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Terrifying Video of the Deadly Indiana State Fair Stage Collapse

Absolutely gut-wrenching video of the Indiana State Fair concert stage collapse from... more

lordsbassman
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6 months ago
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5 comments

The promise of Iowa: an ArtSunday photoessay | Scholars and Rogues

So as I drove west into the sunset through central Ohio on I-80 that first December... more

hoosierdaddy
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6 months ago
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Midwestern chivalry is not dead

When I moved to Denver, Colorado from Western New York five years ago, several... more

hoosierdaddy
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6 months ago
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5 comments

Joplin, Missouri: 142 Killed by F-5 Tornado | Deadliest Recorded U.S. Tornado | New Videos | New Photos | New Updates

In Joplin, Missouri: '75% of the town is virtually gone'... more

EthicalVegan
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9 months ago
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213 comments

Violent tornado hits Midwest causing death, injury and destruction

A tornado flattened buildings, snapped trees and tossed tractor-trailers like toys as... more

JanforGore
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9 months ago
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67 comments

Survivor of dustbowl now battles a fiercer drought

While tornadoes and floods have ravaged the South and the Midwest, the remote western... more

JanforGore
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9 months ago
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5 comments

RadBall Takes Midwest By Storm!

A new sport RadBall is catching on in the Midwest! Watch the documentary to see what... more

brandonsound
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10 months ago
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The Ogallala aquifer running dry: U.S. farmers fear return of the dust bowl

It's the largest underground freshwater supply in the world, stretching from South Dakota all the way to Texas. It's underneath most of Nebraska's farmlands, and it provides crucial water resources for farming in Colorado, Kansas, Oklahoma and even New Mexico. It's called the Ogallala Aquifer, and it is being pumped dry.

Without the Ogallala Aquifer, America's heartland food production collapses. No water means no irrigation for the corn, wheat, alfalfa and other crops grown across these states to feed people and animals. And each year, the Ogallala Aquifer drops another few inches as it is literally being sucked dry by the tens of thousands of agricultural wells that tap into it across the heartland of America.

This problem with all this is that the Ogallala Aquifer isn't being recharged in any significant way from rainfall or rivers. This is so-called "fossil water" because once you use it, it's gone. And it's disappearing now faster than ever.

In some regions along the aquifer, the water level has dropped so far that it has effectively disappeared -- places like Happy, Texas, where a once-booming agricultural town has collapsed to a population of just 595. All the wells drilled there in the 1950's tapped into the Ogallala Aquifer and seemed to provide abundant water at the time. But today the wells have all run dry.

Happy, Texas has become a place of despair. Dead cattle. Wilted crops. Once-moist soils turned to dust. And Happy is just the beginning of this story because this same agricultural tragedy will be repeated across Oklahoma, Nebraska, Kansas and parts of Colorado in the next few decades. That's a hydrologic fact. Water doesn't magically reappear in the Ogallala. Once it's used up, it's gone.

"There used to be 50,000 head of cattle, now there's 1,000," says Kay Horner in a Telegraph report (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/83...). "Grazed them on wheat, but the feed lots took all the water so we can't grow wheat. Now the feed lots can't get local steers so they bring in cheap unwanted milking calves from California and turn them into burger if they can't make them veal. It doesn't make much sense. We're heading back to the Dust Bowl."

Learn more: http://www.naturalnews.com/031658_aquifer_depletion_Ogallala.html#ixzz1GLQaxFlnIt's the largest underground freshwater supply in the world, stretching from... more

JanforGore
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11 months ago
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Children of the City of Certainties, part 1: in 1954

In 1954, Des Moines, Iowa was a city in the way Midwestern cities were cities: 177,000... more

hoosierdaddy
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1 year ago
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Weekly Mulch: Why Energy Reform is on Shaky Ground

by Sarah Laskow, Media Consortium blogger Since national energy reform is on the... more

MediaConsortium
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1 year ago
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Weekly Mulch: Want to Combat Climate Change? Ignore Congress.

by Sarah Laskow, Media Consortium blogger Congress comes back into session next... more

MediaConsortium
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1 year ago
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Travel Bug Robert - Badlands National Park

Robert travels to the Badlands National Park in South Dakota. Whether you go camping... more

travelbugrobert
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1 year ago
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Take a tour of the H-D Museum’s ‘True Evel’ Exhibit

The Harley-Davidson Museum is celebrating the life of Evel Knievel through an... more

YourUpdateTV
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1 year ago
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Space Academy powered by BeatMaven.com Presents: ?WHATISSPACE? mixed by Justin Reed

Illmeasures in the house, errybody. Now, not only have these cats continuously... more

DoctorSpaceman
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1 year ago
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EPA Gives Corn-Based Ethanol a Big Thumbs Up

Farm state lawmakers and agribusiness have been hammering the EPA since it announced a... more

fordlyn
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2 years ago
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Most widespread white Christmas in at least 6 yrs; Dallas and Oklahoma City defeat all odds

Millions awoke to one of the most widespread snow covers on Christmas morning in at... more

stormchaser4850
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2 years ago
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