Yesterday in Southern Vermont the Department of Homeland Security’s Federal Emergency Management Agency and Vermont officials conducted a drill required to be done every other year to determine readiness for a nuclear emergency. The task of the radio active plume team in an actual emergency would be to sample air and take radio active samples to determine if when and where people would be evacuated.

Here are some key parts from the TA article that may give the feel of this learning exercise.I am not certain how the official quoted here comes the conclusion that “It was great from our end “.

• ..they couldn’t pull down a strong cell phone signal to relay information back to headquarters …….

• …resort to contacting people on their private cell phones at the center in Brattleboro to find out what was wrong…

• …resorting to the phone of an official observer of the drill…

• …They were directed to a road off Route 142, which none of them could find on a map…………..

• …faulty digital interface from One Communication of Hartford, Conn……….

• …The radio had been tested repeatedly at their staging area in Dummerston, but now it failed to work………

• ….At Route 5, again there was no radio and no cell phone service.

• …told them to drive around until they found better reception.

Barbara Farr, Vermont’s director of emergency management, said after the daylong exercise that alternative routes of communication were established, using radios and the town’s fax machine.

“The good thing is we always have built-in redundancy,” she said. “It went great from our end,” she said, a view echoed by Entergy

http://www.timesargus.com/arti…

In the summer, blooms of toxic algae have forced the state of Vermont to warn people to stay out of parts of northern Lake Champlain but today Governor Douglas  will  host Lake Champlain fishing derby . The second  annual Lake Champlain International Governor’s Cup fishing derby proceeds will go to the Lake Champlain Fisheries Recovery Initiative and the Lake Champlain Next Generation Fund.

But the important question on most Vermonter’s minds must be;Who baits the Governor’s hook this year ? A year ago it was  Fish & Wildlife Commissioner Wayne Laroche who was given the task. Will the Governor dare to yield to pressure and bait his own hook ?

http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb…

http://www.burlingtonfreepress…

The Free Press environmental reporter’s blog last week noted with some surprise that the Douglas administration, which usually bombards her with press releases, had almost slipped by a proposed rule change to allow ATVs on state land. The reporter notes that the rule had been filed two weeks prior and she only heard about it from a skeptic. “I do find it curious, in light of the divisiveness of the issue, that the Agency of Natural Resources wrote the rule after meeting only with the folks in favor, the All-Terrain Vehicle Sportsman’s Association.

     The paperwork with the proposed rule outlines the potential economic benefits without discussing the environmental risks (beyond possible increased greenhouse gas emissions).”one skeptic is quoted as saying in the blog.

Today’s paper has a long article telling both sides of the issue.

The proposal criteria would allow Natural Resources Secretary Jonathan Wood for the first time, to designate ATV trails on state land. However it mentions nothing of the way the ANR handled the rule change proposal and glides effortlessly into a fair and excruciatingly balanced telling of both sides……

of the impassioned debate across a deep cultural divide.

On one side stand those who love the internal combustion engine and want to enjoy Vermont’s countryside from the back of a machine. Nearly 16,000 ATVs were registered in the state last year.

On the other side are those for whom motorized off-road travel spells trespassing, environmental damage and interrupted peace.

Kind of surprised that the soft opening the Douglas administration’s ANR gave this initiative isn’t a major a part of the story.  The views of each of the two groups that have a dog in this fight and the fact that the ANR quietly tried to slide this proposal out is news that should make it into the papers. Doesn’t it promote a false sense that this is  being weighed fairly by the state if the facts mentioned in the blog are left out of the article? If something is true and relevant in the reporter’s blog why not true and relevant for the same reporter’s article?

http://www.burlingtonfreepress…

http://www.burlingtonfreepress…

Here is a follow up of sorts to a recent diary and an interesting news item and on Liberty University’s decertifying the campus Democratic Club last month. Americans United for Separation of Church and State took notice and took action requesting that the IRS examine the University’s tax exempt status. Liberty Union has now done the same to Americans United claiming they are an “arm” of the Democratic Party.

Questioning Liberty University’s Tax-Exempt Status

…..Americans United  Spokesman Joe Conn explained that  a private university “can do almost anything it wants” in terms of favoring one viewpoint over another, “but it can’t be partisan” in the political sense of favoring one party or candidate over another. The group often sends similar letters to the IRS during presidential elections when churches take political stands or endorse candidates.

The university is firing back by questioning Americans United’s own tax status. “AU has essentially become an arm of the Democratic Party,”wrote Mathew Staver, chairman of Liberty Counsel and dean of the university’s law school. Staver told the IRS that Americans United is itself partisan because it objects mainly when churches support Republican candidates.

Spokesman Joe Conn said his organization is “not quaking in our boots” about losing tax-exempt status. “We are very rigorously non-partisan,” he added, noting in that in recent months the organization has criticized the Obama Administration for its faith-based initiative.

Conn said Liberty University chancellor Jerry Falwell Jr. is following in the footsteps of his father, the famed preacher Jerry Falwell. In 1993, the late Falwell paid fines to the IRS for partisan activity in his “Old Time Gospel Hour” program.

http://legaltimes.typepad.com/…

Governor Douglas’s team is in the BFP today bemoaning the lack of business tax incentives in the budget .The poster child used is BioTek a Vermont based international company with offices in Singapore, China, India, Germany and the UK.

As he considers expanding, though, Chief Executive Officer Briar Alpert is wondering if he can justify doing it here.BioTek, a manufacturer of high-tech science tools that employs 230 people in Winooski, is working on the acquisition of a California company. That state’s research and development tax credits could lure BioTek to locate any expansion there instead of in Vermont, Alpert said.” The rational decision would be to do the expansion out in California,” Alpert said. That decision might be different if Vermont had the same offer, he said, but Vermont is one of only nine states without research and development tax credits.

However no mention is made in the article of how in January 06, 2009 approval of up to $692,854 for job creation incentives was given by the Vermont Economic Progress Council to BioTek Instruments. Inc. in order to support jobs in the knowledge based economy.

Also left  missing was  mention of  the nomination of BioTek for the Dean C. Davis Outstanding Business of the Year on May 11 ,2009 .The annual award named for the former Governor of Vermont, honors a Vermont business that shows an outstanding history of sustained growth while displaying an acute awareness of what makes Vermont unique. It was noted less than three weeks ago that, the company already has plans to expand the Winooski headquarters by 7000 square feet to include a state-of-the-art laboratory.  This expansion will secure BioTek’s brand in the industry and reputation for producing cutting-edge, innovative instrumentation and techniques.

http://burlingtonfreepress.com…

http://www.vermont.gov/portal/…

http://www.vermontbiz.com/news…

“The choices, I think, have been poor,” Douglas told the clearly like-minded gathering.

Business people did not have to encourage Governor Douglas to use the bully pulpit to make his case for vetoing the Vermont state budget, but they did it anyway.

Vermont Business magazine has the run down on part of the Gov.’s campaign to build support for his veto,but the accompanying poll shows a closer state than might be expected . At least as far as an online readers poll on a business friendly site can measure.

The Poll

If Douglas vetoes the state budget, it would be the first time in VT a governor has done so. If he does should the legislature

Override the veto to keep the budget as is ——–52%

Sustain the veto and work with Douglas to rewrite it ——–48%

Total votes: 44

http://www.vermontbiz.com/news…

Douglas loses ,Override wins in business magazine poll ! Meaning of win open to interpretation.………

If Douglas vetoes the state budget, it would be the first time in VT a governor has done so. If he does should the legislature

Override the veto to keep the budget as is………60%

Sustain the veto and work with Douglas to rewrite it…..40%

Total votes: 75

 The point of Shila Renee Mullins’s brain surgery was to remove a malignant tumor threatening to paralyze her left side. But Methodist University Hospital in Memphis also saw an opportunity to promote the hospital to prospective patients.

Healthcare is just a business after all .Our health care system needs to be fixed but maybe it is nothing a little marketing can’t cure.  Methodist University Hospital in Memphis Tennessee substituted a model for the real patient in the promo ads for the brain surgery broadcast. Maybe this is something that almost had to happen, hospital marketing one step beyond. But,should there be any, would the patient get the royalties? Any discount? What if the video goes viral,a performance bonus?  Will there be awards perhaps in the future for best doctor performing in a surgery webcast? Suppose the patient has the poor taste not to recovery as advertised?  Ethics ?

So, a video webcast of Ms. Mullins’s awake craniotomy, in which the patient remains conscious and talking while surgeons prod and cut inside her brain, was promoted with infomercials and newspaper advertisements featuring a photograph of a beautiful model, not Ms. Mullins.

This time, Methodist did not use billboards as it has with other operations, deeming this procedure too sensitive. But its marketing department monitors how many people have watched the Webcast (2,212), seen a preview on Youtube(21,555) and requested appointments (3).

“The goal is to further our reputation as well as to educate the community, who will ask their physicians about our care,” said Jill Fazakerly, Methodist’s marketing director.

In one unexpected marketing success, after Methodist advertised a coming brain-surgery Webcast, a man called, volunteering to be the patient. Methodist agreed. “He told Dr. Sills that if he was operating live on the Web, he must be pretty darn good,” Ms. Fazakerly said.

Brain Webcasts also “build business for our other departments,” she said.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05…

 Or the good oil years are behind us.Unless big things change energy wise the Arctic may face a new challenge. As the search for new oil and energy turns to the Arctic, the first interested   national or corporate entities on location with a way of supplying power for this remote exploration and extraction may also determine who controls dwindling energy resources. A race (or aggressive rivalry) of sorts may be underway between nations to be the first to build and put into use (deploy?) mini nuclear power plants.  The Russia government, private US and Japanese firms are exploring mini nuke power plants.

The US plant is styled on a small stationary reactor similar to those used by students of nuclear power, known as Training, Research, Isotopes, General, Atomics or TRIGA. They are made to be buried and generate 25 megawatts. Hyperion, the New Mexico based US firm calls its reactor a “nuclear battery”.

The Russians have been more innovative. They designed a floating nuclear power station with two units that will produce 35 megawatts each and travel to where it is needed.

According to Moscow times The Russian power plant, which is being assembled at the St. Petersburg-based Baltic Shipyard by Energoatom, a subsidiary of Rosatom, is the first of seven floating nuclear power plants that the company plans to build, Energoatom head Sergei Obozov told reporters on Monday

http://www.themoscowtimes.com/…

There won’t be much to distinguish an FNPS from a regular ship, to an untrained observer. The first will be 472 feet long and 98 wide, weighing in at 21,500 tons. The two reactors inside can produce 35 megawatts each .Although ostensibly built to serve far northern towns like Vilyuchinsk, which lies off the Bering Sea near Alaska, the real purpose of the new design, which will potentially end up in dozens of plants, is to help Russia extend its reach into the Artic if and when it begins to drill there for oil and gas. The only kink in that plan is that the Artic is far from a settled issue, politically.

Energy prices will likely dictate how long it is until the Russia, as well as other countries including the United States and Canada, delay oil and gas exploration in the region. Serious entry into the Artic will come only after the half-dozen countries with a claim have fought it out amongst themselves – potentially dueling it out with another sort of nuke.

http://industry.bnet.com/energ…

For more on a possible Arctic oil scenario unreassuredly headlined   The coldest war: Russia and U.S. face off over Arctic resources

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/new…

( – promoted by odum)

We did get sunburned…

but at least it didn’t Ben Stein.

“It was an unusually trying year,” Fogel said in an interview after the commencement ceremony. “There were some ups and downs and those downs entailed some sacrifice and pain that will long be with us; but it was also a year of great achievement.”

No doubt.

Yesterday I watched my son graduate from UVM .We sat in plastic chairs on the soggy grass.

It was a surprisingly chilly spring day yet, much to our surprise, we got quite sunburned.

Governor Douglas naturally spoke. “The population grows old…” droned Jim and with his sales pitch, “…  we need young people”. After congratulating the students and to some extent himself (noting some of his cleverly named state plans and initiatives, some not yet initiated) he pretty much begged the new grads to stay in Vermont .For some audiences he runs the state down, for other crowds he attempts to build it up.

Next up was Howard Dean. He spoke; well, he spoke like Howard Dean. His message quite clearly and not unexpectedly was for the graduates to stay active in politics. (Politics broadly defined as everything from office holding to library committees and zoning boards.) Community. Dean noted the role young voters played in the Obama election and very forcefully said “Don’t blow it, stay involved! ” “Find the common areas of agreement and build on them”, he said.

Best of all (beside the weather, allowing for an outdoor ceremony) was the total lack of Ben Stein.

It was with great dread, a month or two back, that we all thought we would have to listen to Stein’s unique wisdom when he spoke at commencement.Luckily it evolved into a fine day after all, good luck to the graduates.  

http://www.wcax.com/Global/sto…

Enexus,just like FairPoint but with nuclear waste disposal issues? Vermont Yankee may yet wind up as part of six other nuclear plants owned by a brand new leveraged ,deeply in debt  shell company .As Governor Douglas’s veto of the decommissioning bill looms keep in mind that VY may soon be shuffled off to Enexus providing shelter  for it’s “parent” company Entergy .

Entergy is still persuing the spin-off that will add,as they say “value for their stake holders” but little to no added value to Vermonters.One wonders what hollow reassurances Entergy will offer to state regulators to gain what it wants.Just as FairPoint reassured the state’s DPS regarding it’s capabilities.

Entergy said it’s “prepared to seize opportunities that add value for our stakeholders.” The New Orleans power firm said it’s moving ahead with plans to spin off its Enexus non-utility nuclear business from its regulated utility business through a tax-free spin-off of the non-utility nuclear business.

On a conference call with analysts, Entergy officials said the company remains in discussions with regulators in New York and Vermont over the spin-off of Enexus. Regulators have asked for information on the strength of the Enexus balance sheet, the company said.

Vermont Yankee is a merchant plant that sells power on the open market

http://www.marketwatch.com/sto…

Entergy is currently in settlement negotiations with New York, said Richard Smith, Entergy’s president and chief operating officer

“We’ve done a lot of work with them over the last couple of months providing them really stressful scenarios around Enexus and how the liquidity is as strong going forward as it has been with Entergy in the past.”

The same goes for Vermont, said  Smith,

http://www.reformer.com/ci_123…