How does your garden grow in WYO?

Slowly....

Victory garden: Sunday morning update

I can look out the window of my home office and monitor my garden's progress. A few minutes ago, I was outside on this fine Sunday morning monitoring it in person, noting that the spinach and leaf lettuce seeds have sprouted in abundance and many will be pruned. I bought summer squash seedlings and only one survived the transplant. Wonder what happened there. Three zucchini plants have sprouted and already are making plans to take over my back yard and possibly the neighborhood. Strawberry and broccoli seedlings seem to be doing fine. Tomatoes are to be in steady-state, not yet flourishing yet not dying. I fear they don't have enough sun, and I may have to excise some of the dead and dying branches from my oak tree. The oak was here first and used to be the site of a homemade swing until the rope broke and I took over the playground for my garden. But as with all mature things, the tree is losing some of its vitality and needs a trim and a booster shot.

Meanwhile, I water my lawn as it's my designated watering day (Sun., Tues., Thurs.). I have a good lawn, a green lawn, and that would be great if I was a goat. We do use the lawn to play catch (both of our kids home for the summer) and for the annual Fourth of July bocce ball tournament.

My father would have liked my lawn, although too many dandelions in it for his taste. His lawns were fine specimens, even in Florida, where bugs the size of lawnmowers lurk. He was an ornamental gardener, something you can do year-round in Florida. He and his wife even volunteered at their local Catholic Church, whipping its garden into shape with hard work and prayer. Drive by St. Brendan's on a spring Saturday and you'd see a swarm of retirees, trowels and clippers in hand, addressing the landscape with the same vigor they brought to 7 a.m. mass every weekday morning. They were probably more energetic with the gardening, as attending mass is mostly a passive exercise. I think that's still true.

In my master plan, I shrink my backyard lawn by increments. First it will be the north and south margins where the grass will give way to rocks and hardy plants. I already have rock gardens and my veggie garden on the west side which butts up to the porch. My daughter and I will plant a berry garden on the east side between the shed and the compost pile. The lawn then will become a bocce pitch and a manageable greensward which will need little attention and water.

That's the gardening news from Cheyenne, Wyoming, this final day of May.

Now what's this I hear about a possible frost advisory on Tuesday? Say it ain't so, weatherpeople.

Why is this man smiling?

He's happy for all the reasons you might expect -- and some you could only imagine.

Major happiness reigns in the wingnutosphere now that Dick has a Facebook page. The comments are a hoot.

Go to Richard Bruce "Dick" Cheney at http://www.facebook.com/home.php?#/pages/Richard-Bruce-Dick-Cheney/33820388138?v=feed&story_fbid=82345136733.

Watch what you say. He and his minions at the mountain redoubt outside Jackson are tracking every word.

Health insurers pay execs handsomely by denying our medical claims

America's top-ten for-profit medical insurers pay their executives handsomely. That's one reason they so fiercely oppose a single-payer health care system for the U.S.

Nyceve on Daily Kos did a roundup of executive pay along with some choice comments like this:

"...keep in mind the for-profit health industry exists for only one purpose, to generate profits for shareholders. In order to do so, this industry collects premiums and then it delays and denies medical care--think you're insured, think again. The situation is so bad that doctors are in revolt. They are sick and tired of fighting the insurers for every treatment, every medication and every test."

Nyceve found the top ten insurers' compensation numbers at the Fierce Healthcare site. I located the CEO of my health plan, CIGNA, and was not too shocked to see that he has profited enormously by delaying and denying the claims of me and my fellow state workers in Wyoming. Here are the sordid details:

H. Edward Hanway, CIGNA
Total Compensation: $12,236,740
Details: Hanway took a significant pay cut from 2007 to 2008, due mainly to a drop off of more than $11 million in his non-equity incentive plan compensation. Still, his base salary of $1,142,885 surpasses that of Aetna's Williams, and is supplemented by just over $3.6 million in option awards, and just over $820,000 in non-qualified deferred compensation earnings. Also, nearly $21,800 in "other compensation" included the use of a company car with a driver, in-office meals, and emergency assistance services relating to medical exams.

Get all the details at http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2009/5/26/735411/-Health-insurance-industry-CEO-salary-survey,-stay-calm-for-this

Question: Why aren't the Democrats in Congress pushing harder for a single-payer plan?

Plant your victory garden with seeds of hope

Last summer, I labeled my three tomato plants and one wayward pumpkin plant a "victory garden."

The term actually meant something during World War II. For many, growing your own was a necessity. Food was rationed for the war effort and gardening meant that you and your family and neighbors would have fruits and vegetables. "Victory," of course, had a symbolic meaning, as in victory over Germany and Japan. Growing beans and corn and squash was not only necessary but patriotic too.

Calling my minimal patch a "victory garden" last year spurred me on to work as hard as I could for victory in the November elections. I would tell myself to water the tomatoes and then hit the neighborhoods for presidential candidate Barack Obama or U.S. House candidate Gary Trauner or U.S. Senate hopeful Nick Carter or local Dems running for the state legislature: Lori Millin, Jim Byrd and others. My victory garden symbolized potential victory over McCain-Palin and Cynthia Lummis and tired old Repub non-ideas. The larger the plants grew, the closer we got to the election and the more effort I invested in the cause.

The harvest -- such as it was -- was in by early November, and it was a mixed bag. Wyoming went for McCain-Palin and the Repub slate for U.S. House and Senate. Lori Millin won in a squeaker (early projections said she lost) as did Jim Byrd. Katherine VanDell was defeated.

Still, we had a major victory in Pres. Obama.

So where's the "victory" in Victory Garden this year? In Wyoming, you are dedicated and lucky if you get anything to grow at all. It's not the bugs. But it is the altitude (6,200 feet), the short growing season, the wind, the hail, late or early frost, the anemic soil, etc.

This year, I'm going all out with a real garden. Dug up a patch of soil east of the backyard covered porch. Dumped into it multiple wheelbarrows of humus from the compost pile. Mixed it all up real good. Built furrows. Surrounded it with a fence to keep out the dog. Bought some garden soil and mixed it in. Last weekend bought some of my plants at the annual plant sale put on by the excellent Cheyenne Botanic Gardens. Selections were made quickly due to the fact I didn't wear my parka on a foggy 42-degree spring morning. Signs all over urged us not to plant before Memorial Day. The next day, more than a week before Memorial Day, I planted. I was expecting the skies to open up and dump ten feet of snow on me. Or for an Oz-like twister to drop out of black clouds and carry me and my seedlings off to Nebraska.

But my daughter Annie and I got the plants in the ground and seeded the rest. We put in three mounds of squash and zucchini seeds. Planted some marigolds in several strategic places. Some pole beans on the side yard. We dug up some of the pumpkin plants that seem to grow just fine on their own. We settled back and contemplated the fruits of our labors. Well, I dreamed about the fruits and veggies of my labors.

I'm not a johnny-come-lately to gardening. I've had gardens in Central Florida, Denver and Fort Collins, Colo., and at our old house in Cheyenne. I like growing things, especially if I can eat them later. I'm a cook too, and preparing dinner is more rewarding if I can use my own produce. That's also a victory.

Gardens have become a huge fad as millions jump on the "locavore" bandwagon. Growing and eating locally is very big. Farmers' markets bloom everywhere, even in Cheyenne which now has at least two. Old-time gardeners in the neighborhood find their skills in demand, especially by their Yuppie neighbors striving to be part of the new trend. Some of them dig up their front yards and plant their gardens there. "Look at me," they say, "I am locavore with a capital L." They can also Twitter -- or blog -- their accomplishments without leaving the garden.

What the hell. Let everyone grow gardens. In the front yard, in the back yard, on the roof, in containers on their porch, in community gardens. It's good for you and good for the planet. It teaches patience and persistence. You become an amateur horticulturist and meteorologist, all at the same time.

My garden this year is a victory over complacency. A tribute to Mother Nature -- and to Michelle Obama's White House garden.

Now let us pray. No hail! No hail!

New Cheyenne studio and gallery plans sneak preview on May 25

This invitation comes from my Wyoming Arts Council colleague, Camellia El-Antably, and local artist and arts teacher Mark Vinich:

You are all invited to the Sneak Preview opening of Clay Paper Scissors Gallery & Studio.

We will have a Sneak Preview show of work by the studio artists: Laura Skoglund, Jon Gilbert Beach Dawson, Abi Peytoe Gbayee, Mark Vinich, Mary Keane and Camellia El-Antably.

The opening will be on Monday, May 25 (Memorial Day) from 5-8 p.m. at 1506 Thomes, Suite B and is open to all. Please come down and see us!Clay Paper Scissors still has a studio opening. If you are interested in seeing it, please contact Camellia at claypaperscissors@gmail.com. Located in the historic Asher building on the corner of 15th and Thomes, Clay Paper Scissors offers studio space for artists, a gallery which will have changing exhibits and classes for all ages.

Artists interested in participating in the Gallery, but not studio space, may join as an associate. We will also have individual memberships for those interested in classes, openings, etc. At present, Clay Paper Scissors is open by appointment only.

FMI: claypaperscissors@gmail.com

Summer reading: "Paris Trout"

Took me 21 years to discover Pete Dexter's novel "Paris Trout." It won the National Book Award in 1988. The book is set in a small Georgia town in the 1950s and concerns a particularly heinous race-based murder, something on the order of the Emmett Till killing which Lewis Nordan translated so well into his novel "Wolf Whistle." I do like the work of those southern writers.

Dexter isn't exactly a southerner. He did spend a few years in Florida, but that was in the Yankee part of the state in Palm Beach County. He set his 1995 novel "Paperboy" in redneck north-central Florida along the St. John's River. This isn't far from where I lived in the late 1960s, the same era as the setting of "Paperboy." I'm now reading "Paperboy."

Dexter could live on an island in the Pacific Northwest for all I care. He does now. But he brought to life the fictional residents of Cotton Point in red-clay Georgia. That's all that really matters.

"Paris Trout" is a great novel. The title character operates a store and pawn shop in Cotton Point. He's a miser and a bully and a racist. He does have a soft spot for his old mother, though. Paris Trout's racism is so matter-of-fact that it might be hard for young people to understand, especially if they've never lived in the South. He and his thug friend, Buster Devonne, go to Damp Bottoms to collect a debt from Henry Ray Boxer, a young black man. When the family objects to Paris Trout's presence, Paris and Buster go on a shooting spree that leaves Henry Ray's mother wounded and a 14-year-old black girl dead.

Paris sees nothing wrong with his actions. That's the heart of the story. He lives by his own rules and that might be fine if the rules possessed any semblance of humanity.

I may have to read through all of Pete Dexter before my fever abates.

If credit cards were outlawed, only outlaws would have guns -- or something like that

The "Room for Debate" section in today's New York Times batted around the new law allowing people to carry loaded guns in national parks and wildlife refuges. A broad array of opinions were displayed on the question "Guns in Parks -- Safe, Scary or a Sideshow?"

Personally, I think it's a scary, unsafe sideshow. But nobody asked me. The NYT did ask Wyoming writer, hunter and dog lover Ted Kerasote. He's against loaded firearms in parks -- and he's a gun guy. He wrote this in "Pack pepper spray, not a pistol:"

... Living within Grand Teton National Park, I see this all the time: a deer gunned down by the side of the road, its antlers chopped off; a moose waylaid just inside the park boundary; a coyote shot as it watches a car go by. These killings are perennial, often remove spectacular, genetically fit individuals, and create one more enforcement burden for park rangers.

Allowing visitors to carry loaded firearms in national parks and wildlife refuges, as legislation just passed by Congress does, will only make such poaching worse while making a ranger’s job more risky. And I don’t say this as some bleeding-heart liberal with an anti-gun agenda. There’s a rack of rifles and shotguns in my shed and, during Wyoming’s hunting season, I shoot an elk, an antelope and a variety of game birds — food for me and mine during the ensuing year. I’d be the last person in the world to outlaw guns.

... pepper spray is a far better deterrent than a .44 magnum, especially in the hands of the inexperienced. I’ve now used it to turn a charging moose, dissuade a cantankerous bison and send a bear scurrying. The animals had a coughing fit, and I a scare, a far better outcome than guns often produce.

That wasn't the only Wyoming reference in the article. That's appropriate, since we have tons of guns and lots of national park land. The NYT article opens with a photo of a grazing bison with a picnicking family in the background. The bison does not appear to be armed, but you never can tell. The picnickers may be packing heat, but seem most interested in gnawing sandwiches.

As a counterpoint to Ted's article, David B. Kopel, research director of the Independence Institute in Golden, Colo., begins his article this way:

“What works in Chicago may not work in Cheyenne,” the presidential candidate Barack Obama often said when discussing gun policy. President Obama has put his principle into practice, signing a bill which, besides changing the laws about credit cards, repeals an inappropriate federal regulation.

I'm not sure what gun laws are in Chicago. Much more restrictive, I expect, than they were in Dillinger's day. Cheyenne law stipulates that everyone, from a day-old infant to a 100-year-old granny, must carry a loaded firearm at all times. This was the Wild West, after all, and some of that tradition remains in our free-form gun laws and our petrified legislature. When Dick Cheney was a greenhorn state legislator, he inadvertently shot himself in the foot while proposing legislation to tar-and-feather all Wyoming Democrats -- if any could be found. On Inauguration Day 2009, did you see Cheney being carted out of D.C. in a wheelchair? Don't blame his short-circuiting electronic heart. It was his old foot wound acting up. That and his rheumatiz.

David B. Kopel also had this to say:

The old regulation had prohibited defensive gun possession or carrying in national parks. Thanks to the new law, the federal rules about guns in national parks and wildlife refuges will be the same as the laws of the host states. So in Manhattan, where handgun carry permits are reserved for diamond merchants, the political-social-celebrity elite and a few other favored groups, there will not be a mass of people carrying guns at the Theodore Roosevelt Birthplace, on 20th Street. (This result might have appalled Teddy Roosevelt, a N.R.A. member who as president carried his own revolver for protection.)

Teddy Roosevelt, of course, hunted in Wyoming after he shot all the game in the Dakotas. It's a well-known fact that he shot the last jackelope in Converse County. There's a statue to that jackelope in downtown Douglas, but not a single statue of the old Rough Rider. Teddy would be appalled.

As a counterpoint to that p.o.v., Kristen Brengel, director of legislative and government affairs at the National Parks Conservation Association, offers this:

In about nine months, guns will be allowed to be carried loaded throughout national parks if the state they are in permits guns in that state. After the amendment takes effect, visitors to national parks such as Yellowstone in Wyoming will begin to see guns visibly displayed in vehicles or being carried. Visitors to monuments and battlefields including Gettysburg National Military Park and Mount Rushmore will also now also be able to carry guns if the site is within a state that permits them.

Hikers in the back country will have a different experience. I will probably be discouraged from many hikes if other visitors are walking around openly carrying guns. Frankly, it is threatening to see a person hiking with a gun when it isn’t hunting season.

Because Wyoming already mandates gun-toting, I'm on trails all the time with a well-armed and well-regulated citizenry and I don't mind. I have a gun, my wife has a gun, my kids have guns, my dog has a gun, my tomato plants have guns -- we're all happy gun owners. Nothing untoward is going to happen to us while we enjoy nature's bounty. We will face down any threat, be it animal, mineral or human.

Meanwhile, I ask again: what does all this have to do with lowering credit card interest rates?

Read the entire NYT story at http://roomfordebate.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/05/22/guns-in-parks-safe-scary-or-a-sideshow/

LarCoDems meet at IBEW Hall May 26

This comes from Laramie County Democratic Party communications director Dave Lerner:

Dear Laramie County Democrat,

The next meeting of the Laramie County Democratic Party will be this Tuesday, May 26, at 7 p.m. at the IBEW Hall. Remember, we are NOT meeting at the Plains Hotel! The IBEW Hall is at 810 Fremont Avenue, which is on the north side of Nationway in Cheyenne.

Laramie County Democratic Party Agenda

1. Call to Order - Mike Bell
2. Presentation by Mike Bell
3. Election for VP
4. Minutes from April meeting
5. Treasurer's report
6. Coalition Activities - Mary Lou Marcum
7. Fundraising activities - Terry Barbre and Betty Jo Beardsley
8. Web site development - Dave Lerner
9. General Discussion of Issues (ie, Budget cuts, Health Care, Recycling)

We hope to see you there!

Good news: Senate passes credit card reform. Bad news: All credit card holders must wear loaded guns

New credit card bill passed 90-5 today in the U.S. Senate. It includes some much-needed restrictions on credit card companies.

Anne Flaherty reports this in an AP story:

If enacted into law as expected, the credit card industry would have nine months to change the way it does business: Lenders would have to post their credit card agreements on the Internet and let customers pay their bills online or by phone without an added fee. They'd also have to give consumers a chance to spare themselves from over-the-limit fees and provide 45 days notice and an explanation before interest rates are increased. Some of these changes are already on track to take effect in July 2010, under new rules being imposed by the Federal Reserve. But the Senate bill would put the changes into law and go further in restricting the types of bank fees and who can get a card. For example, the Senate bill requires those under 21 who seek a credit card to prove first that they can repay the money or that a parent or guardian is willing to pay off their debt if they default.... Under the bill, a cardholder would have to opt to be allowed to go over a credit limit. If customers don't agree and the bank authorizes a charge that would push them over their limit, the lender couldn't levy an over-limit fee. Another boon for consumers is limiting a practice known as "universal default," when a lender sharply increases a cardholder's interest rate on an existing balance because the customer is late paying that bill or other, unrelated bills. Under the new legislation, a customer would have to be more than 60 days behind on a payment before seeing a rate increase on an existing balance. Even then, the credit card company would be required to restore the previous, lower rate after six months if the cardholder pays the minimum balance on time.

This is good news for all of us who've been gouged by credit card companies, which probably includes 99.9 percent of all Americans.

One odd things about the bill, though. A provision was added at the last minute that allows people to carry loaded guns in national parks and wildlife refuges. The purpose of the amendment listed in the U.S. Senate's official record is this: "To protect innocent Americans from violent crime in national parks and refuges." Oklahoma Republican Sen. Tom Coburn proposed the gun measure as an amendment and it passed, 67-29.

What does this have to do with credit card companies? Some of us, even peaceniks, have been driven apoplectic by the credit card companies and their obscure rules. I do admit that it's a far cry from apoplexy to gunplay, but the latter has been contemplated.

So, if all this becomes law, expect to see lots of gun-toting westerners this summer in Yellowstone and Grand Teton and Devils Tower and Fossil Butte and Mount Rushmore and Dinosaur N.M. and Rocky Mountain N.P. and the wildlife refuge near you. A perfect time for threats of random gunplay in parks which have been reporting a downturn in visitors by Internet-absorbed Americans and by those strapped for cash by the economic downturn.

While this "gun-toting act" could backfire, it might add to the tourism numbers. Let's face it, tourists, especially the foreign variety, have become jaded by fake Old West gun fights in places such as Jackson and Cheyenne. They are looking for a more genuine experience. So what could be better than a real gunfight breaking out amongst two gun-toting citizens jockeying over the same RV hook-up? Better yet, two fellows decked out in Wranglers, Tony Lamas and Glocks get into a scrape over a woman at the Yellowstone Lake Lodge. They're told to take it outside and they do, much to the delight of a busload of tourists from Kyoto. They get it all on film and it's on YouTube within seconds.

That may be fine for tourists from overseas. For me, this makes a staycation look better and better.

Play the rhyme game with Mike Huckabee

Mike Huckabee, one-time Republican presidential candidate and old-time fundie, wrote a poem about Nancy Pelosi. Huck is so proud of it he posted it on his web site.

It's not bad, as poems go. But the rhymes are a bit predictible. Some writer friends and I like to play a game where we guess the rhymes in mediocre poems. You have to select mediocre poems because they're easier to deconstruct. It's a bit like Mad Libs without the clues. I suppose this could be a drinking game too. Guess wrong and you have to take a drink. Or maybe guess right and take a drink. You decide.

So give these rhymes a try. Some are easy -- and there are a few surprises. If you conjure up some celever rhymes that transform the poem, cut and paste it and put it in the comment section below.

Here goes ---

Here's a story about a lady named Nancy
A ruthless politician, but dressed very _____
Very ambitious, she got herself elected Speaker
But as for keeping secrets, she proved quite a "_______."

She flies on government planes coast to coast
And doesn't mind that our economy is _____
She makes the Air Force squire her in their military jets
There's room for her family, her staff, and even her ____.

Until now, she annoyed us, but her gaffes were mostly funny;
Even though it was painful to watch her waste our tax ______.
But now her wacky comments are no laughing matter;
She's either unwilling to tell the truth, or she's mad as a ______!

She sat in briefings and knew about enhanced interrogation;
But claims she wasn't there, and can't give an ___________.
She disparages the CIA and says they are a bunch of liars;
Even the press aren't buying it and they're stoking their _____.

I think Speaker Pelosi has done too much speaking;
And instead of her trashing our intelligence officials, it's her nose that needs ________.

If forced to believe whether the CIA and her colleagues in Congress are lying;
Or it's Speaker Pelosi whose credibility and career is _____.
I believe in the integrity of the men and women who sacrifice to keep us safe;
Not the woman who has been caught flat-footed, lying to our ____.

I say it here and I say it rather clear--
It's time for Nancy Pelosi to resign and get out of ____.

Comment period for "The Big Straw" extended until July 27

Wyomingites are calling it "The Big Straw."

It's the water diversion project cooked up by some guy in Colorado with the last ominous name "Million," as in "I want a million gallons of your water -- for starters."

Million and his entrepreneurial pals plan to divert water from the Flaming Gorge Reservoir in southwest Wyoming to the Front Range of Colorado.

U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is holding scoping hearings on the project. The Corps held what the Casper Star-Tribune called a "contentious meeting" on April 14 with the townfolk of Green River. The Green runs right through the town on its way to Flaming Gorge. Green Riverites are afraid that "The Big Straw" will turn the river into a rivulet and the gorge into a puddle.

Army Corps of Engineers project manager Rena Brand said the agency has extended its deadline for accepting public comments for inclusion to July 27. The input will go into an environmental impact statement that may take up to three years to assemble.

But how can anyonwe predict how much water will be flowing out of the Wind River Mountains and into the Green River Valley in the next decade?

Bill Sniffin, a columnist from Lander who ran for governor on the Republican side in 2002, said in a syndicated column today that experts have seen increased melting of the glaciers in the mountain range. Add a drought to that, and there may not be enough water in the Green for current users once the Corps makes up its mind. It was in Bill's column where I saw "The Big Straw" reference. I also saw it recently in The Denver Post.

Global climate change is a moving target.

Meanwhile, get yourself to one of these scoping meetings and see if you can carry on Wyoming's contentious reputation when it comes to water thievery.

Sunday Web Reading Roundup -- yee-hah!

Cheyenne's Joanne Kennedy Smyth writes about mirror neurons, empathy and writers.

Maureen Dowd: Dick Cheney as Snidely Whiplash (via Daily Kos).

Vincent Miller provides some perspective to this weekend's anti-Obama protests at Notre Dame in the National Catholic Reporter.

Former Jacksonian jhwygirl on Montana's 4&20 blackbirds gets the brain cells percolating with a haiku slam challenge .

Memorial Day gifts for the antiwar veteran (and non-veteran) at Iraq Veterans Aginst the War.

We pray that National Day of Prayer goes away

I take the liberty to reproduce parts of a letter to the editor published in the May 14 Casper Star-Tribune:

Editor:

On Thursday, May 7, Wyoming Christians took part in the National Day of Prayer in Cheyenne. The NDP theme this year? "Prayer...America's Hope," based upon Psalm 33:22, "May your unfailing love rest upon us, O Lord, even as we put our hope in You."

The Rotunda at the Capital was filled to almost overflowing with Christians, who, at noon that day, joined millions of their fellow countrymen across the United States in prayer for our nation.

(removed several paragraphs as they irritated me)

Although prayer is one of the most enduring paths to hope and change, and our nation needs a lot of both right now, the current inhabitant of the White House did not observe NDP. Mr. Obama's Press Secretary, Robert Gibbs, told his press club, "We're doing a proclamation, which I know many administrations in the past have done." But Mr. Obama did not invite any faith leaders to the White House, nor did he attend any of the events associated with NDP, as all of his predecessors for at least the past fifty years have done.

Does that tell us anything about our president?

ANTHONY J. SACCO, Pine Bluffs

Mr. Sacco, I have already written at length about the sham called National Day of Prayer. It sounds like a great thing, all of us "Christians" raising our voices in supplication to the God as conceived by Christians. However, Christians come in many shapes and sizes. I, for one, am a Christian and a Democrat and a fan of Pres. Obama. I do not chide someone for avoiding prayer, or for praying in a way different from my own method. I then would be as bad as the arrogant Pharisees that Jesus himself had so much trouble with.

When I discovered that the National Day of Prayer was just a Right-Wing Fundamentalist sham cooked up by James Dobson and his lovely wife of Focus on the Family fame, I realized what a crock this event was. You fundies have spent the past couple decades trying to remake the country in your theocratic vision. You failed miserably, and now it's time for the rational adults to take over.

I grant you, prayer is a wonderful thing. It is one path to hope and change. There are many paths to hope and change. Last fall, some of us chose to pray for strength while we knocked on doors to get people to vote for a candidate of hope and change. We got what we worked and prayed for. Not everything that Pres. Obama does is what I envisioned. But it's a start -- and much better than what you fundies had in mind.

Amen.

Dust off that spring cowboy hat for Laramie Co. Democratic Grassroots Coalition event

The Laramie County Democratic Grassroots Coalition is celebrating spring's imminent arrival with a "Spring Hat Tea" on Saturday, May 23, 1-3 p.m., at Cheyenne's Historic Plains Hotel. Tickets are $10 apiece and refreshments will be served. Attendees are invited to wear their favorite spring hat. That goes for men, too, so dust off your spring cowboy lid (or UW ballcap) and come on down.

Featured speaker will be Wyoming First Lady Nancy Freudenthal speaking about "Taking Care of the Caregiver."

Mary Lou Marcum is looking for nutritious and delicious Democratic recipes for the Coalition's cookbook. Bring them on May 23 (deadline for submissions Aug. 1). If you have questions, contact Mary Lou at 307-635-3464 or windywyo@bresnan.net.

For more info about the "Spring Hat Tea," contact Karyn Knutson, 432-9157, or Katherine Van dell, 634-8449.

Cheyenne will be home of new Coal Gasification Tech Center

The University of Wyoming Board of Trustees announced Friday that it's pursuing a site in Laramie County on which to build the proposed High Plains Gasification-Advanced Technology Center. The site is located in the Cheyenne Business Parkway, in east Cheyenne just off I-80.

The site "will be home to a small-scale gasification system that will allow researchers to develop and validate advanced coal gasification technologies for Powder River Basin and other Wyoming coals," according to a UW press release.

Estimated cost of the project is $100 million, part of it coming from GE Energy (yes, that GE).

For information on the project, visit www.uwyo.edu/ge.

The new facility may look something like one of these:

Sarah Palin: "The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe"

The Anchorage Daily News, charged with keeping tabs on its peripatetic governor, reports that Sarah Palin is set to sign a book deal with Rupert Murdoch's Harper Collins Publishers. The exact amount of the book deal has not been announced, but it's sure to be a whopper. Then again, Palin has some whoppers to tell.

Here's an excerpt from the News story:

News reports this winter suggested Palin was pursuing an $11 million advance. She called that figure "laughable" in January but has never provided another. Palin has said she would give a portion of any money she makes from a book to charities although she hasn't decided how much or which ones.

Palin hired Robert Barnett, a Washington, D.C., lawyer who is one of the most powerful figures in book publishing, to negotiate the deal for her memoir. His past deals reportedly include $12 million for Bill Clinton's memoir and an $8.5 million advance for Alan Greenspan.

Barnett said in an interview Tuesday that HarperCollins was "first and fervent" in pursuing the Palin book.

This is a big reason why publishers have no money to publish real writers, such as some I know in Wyoming and throughout the Rocky Mountain West.

Instead, they publish crap by high profile people, books that people never read. However, they may buy a copy to put on their coffee table. They may also buy a copy if they can get it signed in person by the "author." I once did this with one of Newt Gingrich's books. I stood in line for two hours in a Bethesda Border's store and had the most interesting conversations. Not everyone was a Republican, as Maryland is as bereft of Repubs (except in Michael Steele's burg) as Wyoming is lacking in Dems.

I was able to utter a few comments about saving the National Endowment for the Arts as Newt scribbled his name on the title page. This may have been the reason that Newt helped salvage the NEA's literary fellowships when the big "Contract with America" cuts came down in 1994. Or maybe I'm being a bit grandiose. But I did read a bit of the book before I put it in the mail to my Dad in Florida. Not bad. The guy can write. He's a big name in the "alternative futures" or "spec-fic" sci-fi category.

But Sarah Palin? Which category will her book be in? Speculative pasts? Ridiculous presents?

Some funny book titles were suggested tonight on Keith Olbermann's show. "The Audacity of Hype" is a good one. Since Palin has said she's a C.S. Lewis fan, someone suggested "The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe." You have to think about that one a little bit.

Hilarious: The Daily Show explores academic excellence at Sun Devil U

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Poetry jam comes to the White House

It is probably safe to say that Tuesday’s event may well have been the first White House poetry jam, the fast-paced presentation of spoken verse that has become popular among young people in cities across the country.

So said Rachel L. Swarns in a post on the New York Times web site.

Poetry jam in the White House? That is cool.

The event included Hawaiian poet Jamaica Heolimeleikalani Osorio; Lin Manuel Miranda, the creator of the Tony-Award winning Broadway musical, “In the Heights;” husband-wife writers Michael Chabon and Ayelet Waldman; Chicago poet Maida del Valle; some guy named James Earl Jones; musician Esperanza Spaulding; Yonkers, N.Y., poet Joshua Brandon Bennett.

“We’re here to celebrate the power of words and music to help us appreciate beauty and also to understand pain,’’ Mr. Obama told the crowd.

Mrs. Obama urged her guests to “enjoy, have fun and be loose” as they absorbed performances from Hawaiian, Puerto Rican, Jewish and African American writers in an event intended to showcase the diversity of American talent.

This was just one of a series of events that the Obamas have put on at the White House to celebrate the arts.

Other events have featured bagpipers, mariachi bands, Irish fiddlers, Irish Poets (i.e. Paul Muldoon), and singers and musicians such as Stevie Wonder, Sheryl Crow, Earth Wind and Fire, Tony Bennett, and Fergie, the singer from the Black Eyed Peas.

Can't you smell that smell? It's a clunker!

One-time Denverite David von Drehle writes a funny piece in Friday's Time mag about the government's proposed "cash for clunkers" program. He considers all the angles in trading in his much-used minivan (i.e., "clunker") for cash. I won't give away the ending, but along the way, David lists some great resources for his fellow clunker owners. Read the entire article at http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1896663,00.html.

As always, I turned to the Tire Business web site for info about anything automotive (actually it was my first Google-inspired visit but I'll be back). The Tire Business article snagged the following info from government sources:

According to an Energy and Commerce fact sheet, the Cash for Clunkers program in the compromise bill would be authorized for up to one year and provide for some 1 million new car and truck purchases. Under the program, old passenger cars and light trucks must get less than 18 mpg. Motorists would be eligible for vouchers of $3,500 each if their new vehicles improve on the old vehicles’ gas mileage by at least 4 mpg (for passenger cars) or 2 mpg (for light trucks). For improvements of up to 10 mpg for cars or 5 mpg for trucks, the voucher would be $4,500.

I'm not certain if my minivan qualifies. It's a 2000 Dodge Caravan, which makes it more than eight years old. But it's a flex-fuel vehicle. It's rated for 16 mpg in the city and 23 highway for gas, for an average of 19. For E85, it's rated 12 city and 17 highway for a total of 13. If you add those together, I more than qualify. If you just consider the gasoline stats, I don't. More Googling may be in order.

If approved, I will accept a voucher for $4,500. I plan to buy an extremely fuel-efficient passenger car that's not a minivan. We don't need one anymore. Our son lives in Tucson and we don't expect him to return to Wyoming. Our daughter has plans to move in two years (after high school graduation) to attend college in a big city. My wife has her own Saturn, and refuses to ride in the minivan until I remove the "smell" from it. I don't smell the smell, but she does. She describes it as part McDonald's wrappers, part mildew, part Armor-All and part Fat Tire Amber Ale. I have to explain that last one. I do not drink and drive. However, I'm charged with recycling and sometimes have kept containers of empty beer bottles in the van for a couple weeks. During the summer, minivan parked in the hot sun, the tiny bit of beer left in the bottom of the bottles begins to re-ferment and adds a bouquet to the interior. I won't say it's an unpleasant smell, but my wife will.

For that reason alone I should get a voucher.

With the $4,500, I will attempt to buy a Chevy Malibu hybrid or possibly a Ford Fusion, both high-mileage alternatives. I'll stick to American-made cars, so that my stimulus will stimulate the correct places. I will have to say sayonara to my Canadian-made Dodge, which has served our family well on cross-country jaunts and camping trips since we bought it used in 2001.

Not yet sure how I'm going to get all those recyclables to the big blue bins at our local grocery store parking lot. I won't be able to save up two weeks worth since they all won't fit in the little trunk I'm sure to get with an efficient vehicle. I'll think of something.