Organized Crime

it is time for the state to act to protect the health and the rights of the citizens of Pennsylvania rather than looking out for big business and their bottom lines.

– Doug Shields who represents the 5th Council District in the City of Pittsburgh

image: Adbusters

more photos from the rally to restore sanity

Click to enlarge, and then click to zoom.  It’s fun!  See the myriad people and signs.

 

The National Gallery of Art

 

 

 

“Dude, can I bum a smoke?”

 

 

 

 

 

 

FRACKED DRY

Over the next thirty years, given the present technology, 500 billion gallons of water will be retired underground in Pennsylvania through the process known as horizontal fracturing.  This is according to email discussions I have had with Penn State’s Marcellus Center for Outreach and Research

500B is equivalent to 68 Harvey’s Lakes, or 263 Huntsville reservoirs, or 200 Wallenpaupacks (a relatively shallower but more expansive body of water).

This water will no longer be available for human use.  It will lurk in the shattered caverns below.   This dispersed sea will be waiting for a flaw, a break, an errant burst of pressure…

In a recent email from the Marcellus Shale Coalition titled, In the Know on H20, the industry relates:

Well, consider this: All told, the Susquehanna and its surrounding watershed convey more than 26 billion gallons of water through the Commonwealth every single day.

500B is over nineteen times this amount.   Nineteen days of water flow gone forever, Nineteen days of flow, desecrated, banished, and waiting… Can we afford it?

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The industry will tell you they are going to develop “better” technology. I question they can do it without water. I will research this more.

I will post the calculations and assumptions and caveats under separate cover.

The 500B could go lower, it could go higher.  But I suspect 5ooB is on the low side.

The 500B is Pennsylvania only! What about the amount of water being retired throughout the United States, Canada, South America, Australia, Africa, Asia, and Europe?  How many tens of trillions?

Add to this, the global warming trend – and it will be unintentional suicide by corporate paradigm.

Photo:Times Leader

two stories of violence

Here are two recent stories of very violent incidents, involving out of state gas drilling employees. The victims include all taxpayers.

I was reluctant to post these stories for fear some readers might think I am trying to generalize about all drillers. That is not my intent here. It is merely to illustrate some grisly particulars in an already recognized trend:

In a press release from Rendell’s office in Harrisburg, state police Commissioner Frank Pawlowski reported more arrests and incidents involving drugs, assaults and illegal weapons in northern Pennsylvania, where much of the drilling into the Marcellus Shale is taking place in the state.

“More and more, it seems the police reports coming out of the northern tier include arrests because of drug use and trafficking, fights involving rig workers, DUIs and weapons being brought into the state and not registered properly,” Pawlowski said.

“We’ve even encountered situations where drilling company employees, who have been convicted of a sexual assault in another state, come here to work and do not register with our Megan’s Law website.” (see news article here)

Also,  see: Police chief: Gas drilling causing increase in crime locally

Gas industry worker charged in Pa. stabbing death
By Jason Whong November 5, 2010, 9:25 pm
pressconnects.com

CHARLESTON TOWNSHIP, TIOGA COUNTY, Pa. — A gas industry worker from Texas has been charged in the Thursday night stabbing death of a local man from whom he rented a room.

Pennsylvania State Police in Mansfield arrested Billy Holden Landry, 49, of Liverpool, Texas. He is charged with criminal homicide and aggravated assault in the death of Shawn Charles Miller, 44, of Cherry Flats Road in Charleston Township, east of Wellsboro.

Police were called just before 11:30 p.m. Thursday to 158 Cherry Flats Road, where Miller rented two upstairs bedrooms to Landry and another gas industry worker.

Miller had no pulse when medics arrived, according to a criminal complaint against Landry filed in District Court in Wellsboro.

Miller was pronounced dead at the scene by the Tioga County Coroner’s Office.

Police said the men were arguing before the stabbing.

Kimberly A. Hess said she witnessed the argument at the home that her mother, Connie Everitt, shared with Miller, Everitt’s boyfriend of 13 years. Miller rented the two upstairs bedrooms in the three-bedroom home to “oil-riggers,” she said.

Hess said she spent the night on the couch and was awakened by Miller asking Landry and the other man, Mike Helton, to be quiet.

“They were drunk, and one had a girl over, and they were all just rowdy and making noise,” Hess said.

Hess said she heard a voice from upstairs taunting Miller and asking him to come upstairs.

Miller remained at the bottom of the stairs and asked them to “shut up, be quiet,” she said.

Hess said the men came downstairs, one with a knife, as Everitt tried to keep the men apart.

Everyone was “eventually pushed down on top of Shawn,” Hess said, as the fight moved toward the television.

“There was a candle that got broke, and I seen blood coming … from Shawn’s wrists, from the top of his hand, actually. And I thought it was from the candle getting broken,” she said.

Miller took a few steps, then fell over. “That’s when we realized he had gotten cut … right below his chest,” Hess said, as she traced a line across her abdomen with her finger.

Landry and Helton left immediately afterward, she said. “They left without their shirts on or anything. They didn’t grab their bags or nothing.”

Just after midnight, Landry went to state police in Mansfield and told the dispatcher that he wanted to speak with a trooper “about a situation he was involved in,” according to the complaint.

Landry told the dispatcher that “two females had beat him up” and that he had stabbed a man “in self-defense,” according to the complaint.
Related

When a trooper interviewed Landry, he said he was protecting himself and that “nobody should take a beating and not protect themselves.”

Police found Helton after 5 a.m. Friday in a trailer in Richmond Township, sleeping in a pair of blue jeans “stained throughout” with blood, according to the complaint.

Helton told police the blood on his pants probably came from Miller, according to the complaint.

Police were unable to say Friday night whether Helton had also been charged in the stabbing.

On Friday afternoon, Landry told police he was hit in the head with a candle and knocked to the ground during the fight and was held down as Miller punched him repeatedly in the face, according to a court document.

Landry told police he removed a knife that was sheathed on his belt and cut and stabbed at Miller, and, as he was driving his truck later, he discarded the knife, according to the complaint.

On Friday afternoon, Hess sat in her home in Wellsboro and described Miller as a nice man who treated her “like his own daughter.”

“I just hope that they get what they deserve. They need to rot in jail,” she said.

Bar fight, black eye leads to Buckeye’s arrest
BY MIichael J. Rudolf (Staff Writer)
thetimes-tribune.com
Published: November 4, 2010

TUNKHANNOCK – A 25-year-old former gas worker from Ohio was extradited to Wyoming County on Wednesday to face charges related to an Oct. 23 bar fight here.

Tunkhannock Police traveled to Ashland, Ohio, to pick up Nathan A. Milam, who is accused of beating another man with a pool cue during a fight at Beagles Pub, East Tioga Street.

According to the police complaint, Patrolman Dustin Cokely responded to a reported fight and found another man outside, bleeding heavily from his face, with his eye and nose swollen. Police learned the victim had fractures near his eye and nose.

The man told Patrolman Cokely that he was playing pool with three other people, including Mr. Milam, but did not know their names. Asked what started the fight, the man said he missed a shot, then someone hit him.

Patrolman Cokely went into the bar and spoke with several patrons, none of whom had ever seen Mr. Milam. A woman told Patrolman Cokely she saw Mr. Milam strike the victim, then run out the back door. The witness gave police a description. Patrolman Cokely said an anonymous caller contacted state police later that day to say Mr. Milam had been dropped off in Binghamton, N.Y., planning to take a bus to Ohio.

Dave Wenzel, a supervisor for a gas drilling contractor. told police he saw Mr. Milam shooting pool. A few moments later, he heard a loud crack near the pool table, and saw a man on the ground covered with blood.

Borough police picked up Mr. Milam in Ohio, where he waived extradition. He is charged with aggravated assault and simple assault, disorderly conduct and harassment and is in the Wyoming County Correctional Facility in lieu of $25,000 bail. A preliminary hearing is set for Wednesday in Tunkhannock.

Somewhat random thoughts on the election

The Democrats deserved it. There was no “change”. From the very beginning it was clear. If it were really change: Pelosi would have jettisoned Murtha – and O’Bama would have fired Geithner. If it were really change, the Inauguration would have been more modest.

And the notion of the Jonas Brothers hiding in the White House to surprise Malia and Sasha O’Bama on their first night there, is patently elitist.

Leadership is not trash talk or spin, photo-ops or junkets. It is first and foremost, setting example.

The Democrats and the Republicans have turned into a professional wrestling act. They attack and boast. Good versus Evil. We suck it up like adolescents. It seems we are stuck in a culture based on immaturity.

The campaign ads were despicable. They insult us all. If your solutions are so vapid or nonexistent that you have to throw mud, what kind of person are you? Certainly not a leader. None of you!

As far as the Marcellus Play, it is up to the citizens to demand a moratorium as the only sane plan. The politicos won’t do it on their own, the gravy train is too sweet.

At the Rally to Restore Sanity and/or Fear

We took mister NoFrack Sign along, hoping to raise some consciousness.  Also, we  knew there was always a possibility his image might make the national media.   At the very least, we thought him a conversation starter.

As we  walked to the National Mall, it became clear this event would include costumes, signs, and a festive sense of play.  The closer we got, the more we realized it would also to be well attended.

 

 

 

“I Screwed You All.  But Thanks for Blaming it on the Black Guy”

 

 

We were unable to get near the stage or jumbo-trons so we carried our sign along Constitution Avenue.  We were greeted by many call outs from New York, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia people.  We spoke with folks who were active in the fight, and we were formally interviewed by an area weekly.  People were constantly taking pictures of the sign and asking what it meant.  Many thought it was a reference to the television show Battle Star Galactica which, we were told, uses the word “frack” as a euphemism for the word  “f*ck”.   One guy even shouted out  “Yea, that’s right, stop using fake curse words!”

 

A Sierra Club member from New York State.

 

A mother and daughter from New Jersey.

A young man who inquired about the sign.

The crux of the matter.

 

 

Let freedom ring!

 

 

 

 

Gas Stock I – Defiance

Gas Stock was an act of defiance. It signals that despite the odds, the politicos, the Westmoreland Club, the silence of the Sierra Club, the co-opting of Penn State, the compromising of Penn Future, the dearth of lawyer support, the PUC, the lobbyists, the campaign contributions, the advertisements, the unemployment, the bankrupt governments (desperate to close their budgets), the SRBC, the DEP, the Oil and Gas Act, the Energy Policy Act of 2005, and on and on … the movement will not give up.

Clean air and clean water are our constitutional right:

The people have a right to clean air, pure water, and to the preservation of the natural, scenic, historic and aesthetic values of the environment. Pennsylvania’s public natural resources are the common property of all the people, including generations yet to come. As trustee of these resources, the Commonwealth shall conserve and maintain them for the benefit of all the people. -Article I of the Pennsylvania State Constitution, Sec. 27

Beyond that, we owe it to our children and grandchildren.

And to those of you who follow the Bible: remember, you are called upon to be stewards of God’s creation. Don’t let covetousness cloud your decisions – do the right thing. (God created a garden, not an industrial zone)

Even if

Even if one manages the drilling like an angel, and has the luck of God… even if, there are inspectors hanging from every rig… and ten feet of regulations at each worker’s side, even if… even if…

It will not change the inexorable facts that with each fracking: we retire millions of gallons of drinking water from the earth’s scarce supply, and we saturate the air with pollutants.  Also, we horizontally fracture miles of rock  below us, and fill those sharded caverns with a toxic slurry of brine, radioactivity, and nasty chemicals.  That is the present state of reality.  Even if we don’t want to believe it.

water is a closed system

This planet is a terrarium orbiting the sun. The flaming star casts a million terawatts of energy upon us each day. Earth has been given all that it needs. We will either thrive, or render this terrarium useless. We make our own destiny. It is insanity to let big conglomerates dictate the condition of this planet. And, it is cowardice.

Each fracking leaves approximately 4.5 million gallons of water sequestered beneath the earth – taken out of the water cycle – never to be replaced. For every 420 horizontal frackings, the equivalent of the Huntsville Reservoir is polluted and left underground (1.9 billion gallons). Water that has touched the lips of our ancestors, now gone from the equation.

Oh, we may see it again, but next time as a spoiler of our diminishing clean water supply.

I have no beef

I have no beef with the guy who signed a lease, thinking it was “safe”. Or the family who was desperate and overtaxed. I have no animosity for the one who was lied to and manipulated.

But I do have a big problem with the already wealthy guy who brought it here, and the insiders who parlayed their land holdings into a rape of our sensibilities. And all those who are riding the gravy train just because it is gravy. And all those who still refuse to do their homework.

Communities are about sensibilities, such as what works best for all. Isn’t that how democracy was born?