Sunday, June 25, 2006

Stopping NYRI

Anyone who is a resident of a municipality that will be touched by the proposed NYRI Power Line has a RIGHT to Party Status in proceedings before the Public Service Commission, provided that they request same within 30 days of the filing of the application. (see DPS Regulations 85-2.11 (a)(10)). THE DUE DATE IS JUNE 30TH! Party Status allows you not only to file a statement, but also to directly participate in the proceedings, including presentation of evidence and cross examination of witnesses.

STOPNYRI.COM has a lot of information on the topic, including a nifty form that will generate a letter for requesting party status that you can print out and send in.

More information on NYRI is available from the Dept. of Public Service.

Capraro Technologies and Google have provided an Interactive Map where you can zoom in and see exactly where the line will be going.

This proposal is stoppable.

More Global Warming Hot Air . . .

You probably read this past week this or a similar article about Global Warming, proclaiming that the Earth is the Hottest It's Been in 2,000 Years.

This is nothing more than an attempt to repackage/rehab the "hockey stick" graph that has been discredited. The article reports nothing new. They say that if you repeat a lie often enough people begin to believe it . . . which is what seems to be going on here.

We've hardly had "stable temperatures for 2000 years" as claimed by the article. Fault Lines doesn't think they have resumed growing wine grapes in England as in Roman time, but if they have, clearly for a long time they were unable to. Fault Lines is also pretty sure farming has yet to be resumed on Greenland, as was the case around 1000, but then again, the human colony there was driven out by cold after a warm period. The hockey stick graph did not show these warm periods followed by cold ones.

Check out http://www.junkscience.com/Greenhouse/cause.htm for some commentary. Also go to the Junk Science main page and scroll down to the commentary about the recent news release.

Fault Lines still has its doubts.

Tuesday, June 20, 2006

In the Chips . . .

At least the Rome Sentinel is giving decent coverage to the emerging Chip Fab incentives story. An update is available on this from the Times-Union.

Compare this with the stories in the Utica Observer-Dispatch on June 9 and June 10 which mentioned nothing about (1) the potential number of jobs (about 1000) or (2) the potential $1 Billion in state incentives for a Saratoga County site or (3) the fact that the Saratoga County site is no where near being ready for a plant.

Marcy is ready NOW.

It should seems obvious from the Rome story that if NY wants to maximize its chances to land the AMD chip fab (over a spot in Dresden Germany) the incentives should be offered for the Marcy site, too.

Why does the O-D leave out the "meat" of this story????

Update 7AM: O-D finally has a story here. Better late than never, though all the pieces were there over a week ago. Interestingly, Sen. Meier is already coming up with excuses for a Saratoga County choice, but Fault Lines heard this one years ago when we questioned why no one seemed to be looking here. Apparently he has his marching orders. This seems to be the (Republican) "party" line that the O-D is only too ready shill for -- to purposely discourage people of the region from speaking up and demanding what we have actually earned: Our site is ready NOW. It's a guess when Saratoga County will be ready, if ever, because its proposed new water facilities will not be economical without participation of a reluctant Clifton Park Water Authority.

While Fault Lines disagrees with spending a million dollars a job (essentially turning these jobs into government jobs without the government service), if the state is going to lavish this money somewhere, it might as well do it where it will go the farthest: HERE IN MARCY.

Update 5PM: Now we learn (from the T-U) (from the O-D) (from the Ro-Sen) that AMD will be choosing Luther Forest, that Marcy would be a "back up," and that either site would work for AMD. Frankly, Fault Lines is disgusted with our local Republican leadership simply rolling over and playing dead on this because it is clearly the $billion in incentives that have made the difference -- incentives that WE are paying for on top of almost a Billion more that has been lavished on the Albany area for nanotech.

This area is always the bridesmaid, never the bride, because there is always some other region with more "clout." Our local Republican officials have shown themselves to be impotent in bringing home the bacon from Republican administrations . . . Something we will remind voters of when election day rolls around!

Wednesday, June 14, 2006

More Distractions . . . and Control . . .

Fault Lines previously commented about yoga, a special career/community service conference, a "grim reaper," and science research as examples of distractions from core education pursuits at local schools.

The latest "distraction" will be two new health clinics that will be run by the St. Elizabeth Medical Center at Kernan and Donovan schools. Where was the public debate before the School Board about this? How many more so-called services will schools be expected to perform?

"Kids won't have to leave school to see a doctor or get a prescription."

Nice . . . Will the kids' parents be part of the picture when "health care" is administered?

Add this to the "Safe Schools Healthy Students Partnership" and we've taken another step toward what commentator Lynn Stuter would call an "emerging socialist police state." Too strong a view? Perhaps
-- But consider that with health clinics in schools, the schools and their "partner" social service organizations would have unprecedented access to and be able to exchange highly personal information about students and their families ... ostensibly to offer "services," but also presenting opportunities for control.

Schools have been less than successfull educating our children, so we should expect even less success trusting them with our health. Fault Lines wishes that the schools would confine themselves to education, and leave healthcare to individual choice.


Sunday, June 11, 2006

Chips Ahoy! ... But will our Republican leaders lay down at Albany's direction?

It was nice to receive a bit of good news this week, that Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) is showing interest in the Marcy Chip Fab site. It's about time!

Four years ago we pointed out in frustration that a site in Saratoga County, Luther Forest, which hadn't even received local approvals and had a limited water supply, was receiving attention from several chip manufacturers, while our ready-to-go Marcy site was being ignored. We noted 2 years ago that people in Saratoga were opposed to their site. In spite of Marcy's shovel-readiness, and the lack of opposition here, EDGE seemed to be asleep at the switch, being less than aggressive in pursuing these potential customers. Personal communication with a county official about that time suggested that Albany wanted it that way.

Now, years later, we are competing with this same Saratoga County site. According to the Times-Union,
State officials are putting together a $1 billion package of incentives
to lure AMD to the Saratoga County site -- which still is not ready (water and road improvements are still in the planning stages). As we previously pointed out, Luther Forest is dependent on groundwater sources and would have to complete an extensive project to get water from the Hudson before it would be ready (which may never happen). Marcy, however, is ready NOW!

Again, politics rears its ugly head. Roe-Ann Destito, fortunately, is on top of this one, asking that any incentive package offered for Saratoga County also be offered here, BUT WHERE ARE RAY MEIER AND JOE GRIFFO ON THIS??? They should be asking for the same consideration. Are they "playing nice" with the Albany Republican leadership to further their own careers? It would only be fair for Marcy to receive the same incentive package, especially since the Albany area has already received hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars to develop nanotech.

The choice between Luther Forest or Marcy should be a no-brainer: Marcy -- because it's ready to go -- Luther Forest might never be ready.

Lets see if our Republican "leaders" speak up for their area and aggressively push Marcy .... or will they place their personal political ambitions first and remain mum?