According to the Rutland Herald,

Entergy has lawyered up. Entergy Nuclear has hired a Washington, D.C., law firm to assist the company in its internal investigation over whether company officials lied to state regulators last year over the existence of radioactivity in buried pipes, which appear to be the source of increasing levels and types of radioactivity leaking at the Vernon reactor.

 This lawyering up comes after weeks of appearances and disappearances surrounding the aging plant.Underground pipes said by officials not to exist, proceeded to make their existence painfully evident to everyone.  

In a twist on this disappearing/reappearing process, Baruth’s Vermont Daily Brief points out that Vermont Yankee’s Chief engineer David McElwee has vanished from the iamvy.com feel-good webpage where he once appeared. McElwee said of the underground piping "We have none. Since this is not an item active in the review of … recommendations, we consider this issue closed,"    

Also performing a reappearance is Governor Douglas’ support for Yankee. After a week of criticizing the power plant operators, the Douglas team is back on point in their support for re-licensing.      

UPDATE: In a release on Thursday, Mr. Bindon’s son, Stephen Bindon, wrote, “Trijicon has proudly served the US military for more than two decades, and our decision to offer to voluntarily remove these references is both prudent and appropriate."  

These reference numbers 2COR4:6 and JN8:12 are biblical passages from the New Testament and unbelievably are intentionally stamped inside the tritium illuminated rifle sights supplied to the US military by defense contractor Trijicon.

Both bible passages deal with light in reference to the illuminated rifle sights.  The UK is deciding what to do about the sights but New Zealand military will remove the stamped inscriptions.  

Trijicon confirmed to ABCNews.com that it adds the biblical codes to the sights sold to the U.S. military. Tom Munson, director of sales and marketing for Trijicon, which is based in Wixom, Michigan, said the inscriptions "have always been there"; and said there was nothing wrong or illegal with adding them. Munson said the issue was being raised by a group that is "not Christian." The company has said the practice began under its founder, Glyn Bindon, a devout Christian from South Africa who was killed in a 2003 plane crash.

 2COR4:6 "For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ." Second Corinthians 4:6    JN8:12 "Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life."  Book of John 8:12  

The Trijicon company says "Guided by our values, we endeavor to have our products used wherever precision aiming solutions are required to protect individual freedom." They received a $660million long-term contract to supply sights to the Marine Corps.    

It is reported that Muslim groups reacted angrily Wednesday after it emerged that the US military in Iraq and Afghanistan were using rifle sights inscribed with coded Biblical references. The Muslim Public Affairs Council (MPAC) called on US Defense Secretary Robert Gates to immediately withdraw from combat use equipment found to have inscriptions of Biblical references.    

Worldwide, by the early 2000s, 300 million 20-foot containers were moved by sea each year, with over a quarter of those shipments coming from China. It has even been predicted that, at some point, container ships will be constrained in size only by the depth of the Straits of Malacca;one of the world's busiest shipping lanes;linking the Indian Ocean to the Pacific Ocean. This so-called Malaccamax size constrains a ship to dimensions of 470 m in length and 60 m wide (1542 feet by 197 feet).  

The millions of containers used to ship the wealthy world’s products may now be used to house the poor. Intermodal shipping units (metal shipping containers) are widely being considered as potential housing pods. Emergency housing for use in disasters such as Haiti’s recent earthquake and even longer term housing uses are being explored.  

I guess we should be pleased that a secondary use can be found for the ubiquitous symbol of world trade. It is a practical, well intentioned reuse of these containers but is this the best we can do for the chronically poor nations of the world?  Wealthy nations should put some thought into changing this system that litters the globe with giant metal boxes, only to hand them down to the poor for housing after discarding them.  A university press release this week touts this container industry funded effort.  

Many Caribbean countries import more containers than they export, which leads to the surplus of containers in those nations.

“The project has a double mission: to address the local need of providing adequate housing for people in need while solving a global problem of recycling – giving purpose to empty containers that would otherwise be discarded,” said a Clemson University professor involved in the container  industry funded project.

As part of this research, the group is studying the cycles of natural disasters by looking at the larger picture through mapping and logistics to understand how containers move, available surpluses and ultimately coordinating the cycles of natural disasters with the ebb and flow of container supplies worldwide.

Vermont legislator Tim Ashe has taken notice of the potential portal to conflict of interest that may open in the last year of the Douglas administration. From the Times Argus:

A Senate committee will begin today to consider a bill that would prevent the state's commissioner of public service from working for any state-regulated utilities for five years after he leaves office.

Speaking about the bill O’Brien said “It’s sad” but offered no noticeable pledge not to take future employment with those he now regulates.

"Given its extreme importance there can be no question that our lead enforcement agent be unencumbered by any future conflict," Ashe said.

Public Service Commissioner O’Brien raised eyebrows in the past over the appearance of a close relationship with those he regulates when Entergy’s VP Thayer attended one of his Christmas parties. Entergy contributions in the past to Douglas have also drawn attention. VP Jay Thayer donated $ 2,000.00 to Gov.Douglas in 2008. Entergy also gave $5,000 to Governor Douglas for his inaugural Balls’ favorite charity. All of this raised questions about the distance this administration was keeping form Entergy Vermont Yankee. Most recently former Douglas administration Chief Mike Smith was in the spotlight for taking a high profile job with FairPoint Communications lobbying the legislature and his former colleagues  

 The finest example of the full flowering of corporate crisis management (as pioneered in the Tylenol tampering case) was in the sports pages Tuesday. Ari Fleischer, who helped Bush sell the Iraq War, is controlling the campaign to guide Mark McGwire through his steroid induced image problem.  

Some elements of contemporary crisis management as described in the book Damage Control are:  The blurring of the lines between news and entertainment and the rise of the Internet is making aggressive responses to corporate crises more important than ever, Dezenhall and Weber write. Businesses will have to function like modern politicians: communications targeted at sympathetic audiences and pre-emptive attacks on opponents who will seek to undermine companies are the new rules of the game.  

By a strange quirk, the Tylenol case is back in the headlines as well. Stories surfaced this week about James W. Lewis and his wife who have been under suspicion for the 1982 Chicago-area Tylenol tampering case. In this incident seven deaths were caused by poison laced Tylenol.  

The steps Johnson & Johnson used to mitigate the PR problem surrounding the poisoning is recognized as being perhaps the birth of modern corporate crisis management. Since then, events that could otherwise have been total disasters are seen as manageable crises that, with the correct spin, can be handled in a way which lessens or blunts the PR damage.  

Fleischer’s crisis management firm, spiritual heir to the lessons learned in the Tylenol case, has taken on Mark McGwire’s full frontal corporate media blitz.  

The one-day plan — coordinated over the past month by Ari Fleischer, a former White House press secretary who runs a crisis-communications company, and the St. Louis Cardinals, who recently hired McGwire as their batting coach  He did it all in one afternoon, starting with a statement that was distributed widely to the news media, and that came across the Associated Press wire at 3 p.m. The A.P. followed quickly with a story that featured an interview with McGwire, who subsequently spoke to numerous other news media outlets — including USA Today and The St. Louis Post-Dispatch; Tim Kurkjian and John Kruk of ESPN (both by telephone, not on the air); KTRS Radio in St. Louis; and The New York Times, before talking to Bob Costas live at 7 p.m. Eastern on  MLB Network.

IMG sports media management which represents Bob Costas has a joint partnership with Fleischer Sports Communication. Ari proves again that he can still control the pitches almost as well as back in the White House days.    

Fletcher Allen was looking for cost savings. They found a less expensive transportation package to replace their current one deemed too costly .They contracted with another company based on savings and not surprisingly this new company doesn’t pay health care for its shuttle-bus drivers as the other had.    

Quoted here from a good Free Press article, Fletcher Allen's spokesman tries nobly to explain the situation and earn his own salary, but maybe made it worse.  

“The suggestion that we require similar health care plans and wages among vendors bidding with us is well intended, but is unrealistic in today’s world,” said Mike Noble, the hospital’s spokesman. …“ We have to be watching our resources as well,” Noble said. “You’ll notice that there is a lot of discussion about the very high cost of health care, and we are very mindful of that and watch what we do.”

Today’s world in context: The CEO of Fletcher Allen, a non- profit makes a salary in the high six figure range,plus benefits in today’s world.    Medical bills in today’s world are behind more than 60 percent of U.S. personal bankruptcies in the United States.

At the end of December, Vermont’s homegrown climate change denier and spirit designate of Ethan Allen, John McClaughry had articles all over crowing happily about what he called the ‘Collapse of the Global Warming Scam.’ For evidence of the supposed fraud, he cited cherry-picked hacked IPCC (the UN’s Inter-Governmental Panel on Climate Change) emails and a British court ruling that the movie Inconvenient Truth needed corrections prior to being shown in schools.

McClaughry failed to explain the ruling thoroughly. In particular, the judge agreed with the main thrust of Mr. Gore’s arguments:

“That climate change is mainly attributable to man-made emissions of carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide (‘greenhouse gases’).” The British judge’s ruling took the time to note three main points of agreement with the movie’s premise: that global temperatures are rising and are likely to continue to rise, that climate change will cause serious damage if left unchecked, and that it is entirely possible for governments and individuals to reduce its impacts.

About the “scam’s” demise McClaughry wrote:

“But its good news for the inhabitants of Planet Earth, who will now likely be spared a new world energy government promulgating economically destructive mandates, taxes and rationing on the world's struggling economy. Not a moment too soon.”

However the CIA must take it seriously as it turns out a program that allows

intelligence satellites to be used to monitor the polar ice caps has been restarted after it was mothballed by the Bush administration.  

C.I.A. Is Sharing Data With Climate Scientists

The nation’s top scientists and spies are collaborating on an effort to use the federal government’s intelligence assets — including spy satellites and other classified sensors — to assess the hidden complexities of environmental change. They seek insights from natural phenomena like clouds and glaciers, deserts and tropical forests.

“That will be very important economically and logistically,” said Norbert Untersteiner, a professor at the University of Washington who “specializes in polar ice and is a member of the team of spies and scientists behind the effort,” arguing that Arctic thaws will open new fisheries and sea lanes for shipping and spur the hunt for undersea oil and gas worth hundreds of billions of dollars.

McClaughry may have declared the ‘Collapse of the Global Warming Scam’ a moment too soon, or perhaps for him it’s just part of the same conspiracy in the making. He may take solace that at least one Senator is not supportive of the CIA’s effort. When the CIA set up a small unit to assess security implications of climate change, Sen. John Barrasso (R-Wyo.) said the agency should be fighting terrorists, "not spying on sea lions."

Governor Douglas has amazingly declared himself to be free from political motivation!  From today’s Times Argus article about the dynamics of the upcoming legislative session;

Gov. James Douglas predicts that his decision not to seek re-election will simplify the politics of the legislative session. "The legislative majority has no reason to ascribe any political motive to anything I say or do," he said. "I hope it will mean legislators will act solely in the best interests of Vermonters."

“So he changed his skin then and there, and the Leopard was more excited than ever: he had never seen a man change his skin before…Oh, now and then you will hear grown-ups say, 'Can the Ethiopian change his skin or the Leopard his spots?' I don't think even grown-ups would keep on saying such a silly thing if the Leopard and the Ethiopian hadn't done it once — do you? But they will never do it again, best Beloved. They are quite contented as they are.” – From Kipling’s How the Leopard Got His Spots.

It is after all only a fable told to children.    

-or honest symbolism for Douglas’ tenure?  

Gov.Jim Douglas will have the “honor”of pushing the button that will blow up a wonderful landmark bridge. The bridge has fallen into disrepair as a result of government policies of poor planning and deferred maintenance. See the Richmond St. Bridge here in Vermont or check out Vermont State (pdf) bridge condition list.

— Gov. Jim Douglas will push the detonator buttons at 10 a.m. Monday that will bring down the Lake Champlain Bridge in two, closely timed explosions. The Governor's Office announced the ceremonial detonation Saturday in a news release.

The Crown Point Bridge, a structure that was inspected “rigorously” but these inspections failed to notice that concrete footings had deteriorated rapidly enough for an emergency closing.  

No doubt Douglas will talk about moving forward and new beginnings  rather than note that this bridge demolition is a symbol of  the pattern of neglected maintenance of our highways and bridges. Hundreds of people and businesses are burdened by the policies that lead to this closing. It’s a symbol of decline and failure, treating the bridge demolition as species of ribbon cutting is tone deaf.

The Washington Post and zombie Death Panel lies.The newspaper offers a stark reminder of the media landscape and political atmosphere that this crummy health care bill was born into. This highlights the problems for implementation and promised future upgrades to the legislation, should they actually ever be attempted.

The Death Panels were and are simply lies and the Washington Post article fails to mention that fact, instead referring to them only as controversial. The Pulitzer Prize winning non-partisan Politifact.com Truth-O-Meter run by the St. Petersburg Times awarded Sarah Plain’s death panel assertion its online biggest political lie of the year. Of all the falsehoods and distortions in the political discourse this year, one stood out from the rest: Sarah Palin’s Death Panel lie.  But  some prominent Republicans (including Vermont Gov. Douglas) didn’t clearly reject the death panel claim.

The Post’s Shailagh Murray reported on the Senate passage of the Health care bill which passed 60-39, not one Republican voted in favor.In her summary of why no Republican supported the bill:

Murray says One of the toughest critics, as the debate drew to a close, was Sen. Charles Grassley (R-Iowa), who last summer had spent months trying to craft a bipartisan reform package with Senate Finance Chairman Max Baucus (Mont.).  Grassley abandoned the quest after the "death panel" controversy erupted in August and the debate took a sharply ideological turn. The Iowa Republican said Wednesday that he concluded that Democrats were ceding too much authority over health care to the federal government, while failing to aggressively contain costs.

This August, the Washington Post’s own editorial page lambasted the Republicans’ Death Panel foolishness, not as a controversy to be debated but as the distorted interpretation it is. 'Death Panel' Sideshow Demagoguery obscures the value of end-of-life planning.

THE debate over health reform has veered into a peripheral and misleading discussion of whether it includes a scheme to pressure senior citizens into pulling the plug. The most extreme misrepresentation has "death panels," as former Alaska governor Sarah Palin colorfully put it, deciding who is too old or too disabled to merit treatment. This is a distorted interpretation, to say the least. The debate threatens sensible policy on end-of-life discussions and in the separate realm of reforming the health-care system.

 A recent GMD diary made note of VPR’s Cokie Roberts contribution to promulgating of the death panel lie.