While projected numbers show the Spirit Lake Committee for Understanding and Respect and the Fighting Sioux Ballot Measures committee should surpass the 13,500 signatures required to “Repeal the Repeal” of the law protecting the Fighting Sioux name and logo before the Feb 7th deadline; petition organizers continue to plan signature events statewide to ensure enough cushion on the referendum, and build towards the 27,000 signatures required to place a measure on the November 2012 election to enter the Fighting Sioux name in the state constitution.

Below are a list of events upcoming this weekend through early next week:

Saturday, Feb 4th

Fargo

Advanced Auto Parts Monster Jam at the Fargodome
1800 N. University
Sign on the way in the East Entrance
Two shows- 2:00pm and 7:30pm

Saturday, Feb 4th

Grand Forks

Mardi Gras Party at the Crosstown Lounge
308 DeMers Ave
5:00pm to close

Please also bring a stuffed animal for the Grand Forks Fire Department. They provide these to children for comfort during fire and rescue calls.

Saturday, Feb 4th – Sunday, Feb 5th

Bismarck

Disney on Ice at the Bismarck Civic Center
315 S. 5th St
Sign on the way in the 5th and Bowen Entrance
Three shows Saturday- 11:30am, 3:30pm and 7:30pm
One show Sunday- 1:30pm

Saturday, Feb 4th – Sunday, Feb 5th

Minot

Pool and Dart Extravaganza at the Holiday Inn Riverside
2200 E. Burdick Expressway
Stop in during event hours

Saturday, Feb 4th – Monday, Feb 6th

Devils Lake

Mr and Mrs J’s Restaurant
318 Highway 2 E
Stop in during normal restaurant hours

Old Main Street Cafe
416 4th St NE
Stop in during normal restaurant hours

Minot

Homesteader’s Restaurant
2501 Elk Dr.
Stop in during restaurant hours

Monday, Feb 6th

Minot

Pringle & Herigstad, PC Law Firm
2525 Elk Dr
Stop in during normal office hours

Information on petition activities can be monitored at Facebook, Twitter, and at www.savethefightingsioux.com.

I posted earlier today that this was a possibility, now Minot State University has posted this on their website:

Due to concerns of appropriate timing, Minot State University President David Fuller has rescinded the request for support of facility enhancements to Herb Parker Stadium and the MSU Dome from the Minot City Council agenda Monday (Feb. 6).

“With the encouragement of many people, organizations and City Council members, we believe we presented a sound proposal to improve two of Minot’s strong community facilities. We are grateful for this support,” Fuller said.

“While it may be disappointing to our supporters, by withdrawing the MSU facility enhancements proposal, we believe we are proceeding in the best interest of our community. Our region has some difficult challenges ahead; MSU will continue to partner in meeting those challenges.”

Put another way, Minot State University got caught trying to slip their hand in the cookie jar at a time when the city’s resources should be focused on recovering from last year’s flooding, and while they’re not a bit sorry about it they’re going to pull their hand away. For now.

But you can bet that, at some point in the future when they believe there’s less scrutiny, they’ll try for it again.

Republicans, with North Dakota Senator John Hoeven leading the way, are pushing to pass legislation asserting Congress’ authority to approve the Keystone XL pipeline. After all, the Constitution gives the Congress the power to regulate international trade, not the President alone.

In response, Democrats are throwing up more roadblocks, including legislation that would block the export of any oil transported on the pipeline if it is allowed to be built.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Democrats unveiled legislation on Friday that would block export of any oil transported by the Keystone XL pipeline, as they challenged claims that the delayed project would boost U.S. energy security. …

Democrats sponsoring the bill blocking exports of oil and refined fuels from Keystone said their measure would ensure that Americans benefit from the pipeline if it is constructed.

“Without my bill this pipeline will not do a thing to enhance the security of our country,” said Congressman Edward Markey, an outspoken opponent of the pipeline, at a House energy committee hearing on the project.

The bill would allow waivers to the rule if the president certifies that selling the fuel to other countries would not increase imports of fuel from hostile countries and would not raise costs for U.S. consumers.

This is a silly law, mostly because Keystone pipelines already transport millions of barrels of oil from Canada into the United States every month. The Keystone XL pipeline is just an expansion of an existing pipeline system, as you can see on this map from TransCanada:

So are the Democrats saying that oil through the Keystone XL part of this system would be banned from export, but not oil from the existing parts?

Could they be more petulant?

Maybe it’s time for Democrats to be honest and just admit that they don’t want the Keystone XL pipeline built because they want to destroy the oil industry, or at least hamstring it, thus clearing the way for their utopian visions of a world powered by solar panels and wind turbines.

“It’s time now to clear the air and as Republican candidates continue to falsely accuse the president of wanting to transform America into a European socialist state, I’ve been particularly surprised that they haven’t targeted one of this country’s most popular industries,” said MSNBC’s Martin Bashir. “An industry that has not only adopted the essential elements of Socialism, but is proud of it! It’s an industry in which all 32 franchises share profits for a common cause. The industry, of course, is the National Football League.”

This argument is more than a little specious. First of all, the NFL is a voluntary enterprise, not a government. The players and owners who participate in the league do so of their own free will. The revenue sharing system is something agreed upon by all parties as part of a collective contract. Those who don’t agree to the contract are free to walk away.

This is different from when the government redistributes wealth, which isn’t voluntary at all and is affront to our property rights (among others).

Second, the NFL should be seen as one business, not a conglomerate of independent factions. It operates much like any other corporation in America. It has its CEO (the league commissioner), its board of directors (the team owners), and its labor (the players’ union). The NFL moves revenues around within itself, under contracts agreed to by all parties involved, in the same way some major corporation might use revenues from one of its most profitable divisions to prop up another division that has smaller margins.

I wouldn’t even call that socialism. It’s just a business moving around its assets to produce the best, most profitable product. That’s capitalism. It certainly isn’t the same thing as saying that a prosperous businessman in Ohio has to give a portion of his salary to a college drop out in California because the latter doesn’t want to provide for himself.

The money is beginning to flow for buyouts of property along the Souris River in Minot, Burlington and Ward County in general according to this report from KX News:

What’s interesting, though, is that this buyout program is referred to as the “voluntary” buyout program, which has interesting legal implications.

If property owners participate in a voluntary government program to purchase their property then it’s not an eminent domain taking. And if it’s not an eminent domain taking, then the state can bypass certain procedures and requirements that are mandated under the law. These requirements are covered by 54-01.1 of the North Dakota Century Code (read it here).e

If the state government (or any political subdivision thereof) wants to build a road or a school or something on your property, they’re required to not only buy it from you at a fair price but compensate you for moving expenses and ensure that there is other housing available for you to move in to. In other words, the eminent domain process gives the property owner certain rights that aren’t necessarily available through a voluntary program.

Now, maybe the terms of this voluntary program are just fine and equitable. Maybe property owners are getting a fair deal. That being said, property owners may want to consult the law (and perhaps legal counsel) before opting for a voluntary program as opposed to asserting their rights under eminent domain law.

It may be a quicker, less costly process for the government to obtain property through a voluntary program as opposed to eminent domain, but property owners should be aware of what their rights are before selling out to the government.

The Susan G. Komen Foundation (the founders of the pink ribbon campaign against breast cancer) caused a stir recently when they announced that they would no longer accept grant applications from explicitly political pro-abortion group Planned Parenthood. Ostensibly the reason was because Planned Parenthood is currently under congressional investigation, but even beyond that it’s a move that makes sense for the Komen Foundation.

After all, the Komen Foundation is a-political and about as non-controversial as you can get. Everybody wants to cure breast cancer, because everybody loves boobies. Planned Parenthood, on the other hand, is one of the most controversial groups in the nation. The Komen Foundation could only stand to be hurt from their association with the abortion mill operators, and Planned Parenthood wasn’t exactly doing anything to help fight breast cancer anyway.

But after the Komen Foundation made its decision, Planned Parenthood rallied the pro-abortion crowd for a full-on political assault, and today the Komen foundation announced that they were reversing their decision.

Some are saying that this means the Komen Foundation will continue to fund Planned Parenthood (I still can’t figure out why they were funding the group to begin with), but that’s not entirely accurate. The Komen Foundation will continue to consider grant applications from Planned Parenthood.

The group is reserving the right to say no to those applications. And at this point, after the way Planned Parenthood went on the war path, why would they give the group any money?

The Komen Foundation is better off limiting their exposure to Planned Parenthood, and focusing their resources on groups that are actually doing something about breast cancer.

Well, actually it was never settled, but you get the idea. After years of trying to persuade us that we had to stop emitting carbon, like, yesterday or we would all be doomed to heat death — okay, that’s hyperbole. What they really wanted was the U.S. to sharply curb CO₂ emissions (and damn the economic effects) and introduce global food rationing. So, I guess it wasn’t that hyperbolic after all.

Anyway, after all the handwringing, it turns out that the warming trend we’ve heard so much about ended in 1997.

Meanwhile, leading climate scientists yesterday told The Mail on Sunday that, after emitting unusually high levels of energy throughout the 20th Century, the sun is now heading towards a ‘grand minimum’ in its output, threatening cold summers, bitter winters and a shortening of the season available for growing food.

Solar output goes through 11-year cycles, with high numbers of sunspots seen at their peak.

We are now at what should be the peak of what scientists call ‘Cycle 24’ – which is why last week’s solar storm resulted in sightings of the aurora borealis further south than usual. But sunspot numbers are running at less than half those seen during cycle peaks in the 20th Century.
Analysis by experts at NASA and the University of Arizona – derived from magnetic-field measurements 120,000 miles beneath the sun’s surface – suggest that Cycle 25, whose peak is due in 2022, will be a great deal weaker still.

There’s a plaintive cry from some bitter clingers — where on earth did I get that phrase from? — that any reduced solar output will more than be compensated for by man-made global warming.

The problem with that argument is that we’ve been hearing for years that the earth is warming. It turns out that wasn’t true. We’ve been hearing for years that the “science is settled”. It turns out that it was only settled to the extent that “scientists” with a political agenda attempted to blacklist any scientists who disagreed with the International Panel on Climate Control and manipulate data that didn’t fit those politics.

And of course, it must be asked: if human actions were artificially warming the planet then it must be true that the only reason global temperatures have remained steady since 1997 (rather than dropping) would be due to those actions. So, drastically reducing carbon emissions would precipitate global cooling. Following that train of thought leads to some unexpected and unwanted destinations for certain political factions, I daresay.

Oh also, it isn’t global warming; that phrase is so passè. It’s global climate change. So, all the handwringing over whether the planet is warming or not isn’t important. What is important is that humans are destroying the planet! (Seriously, I see that a lot.)

My reply to that is to ask a couple of questions:

1. At what point in history has the climate of the earth been unchanging? (If you answer anything other than “never”, you’re wrong.)

2. If humans went back to a period of history before the industrial revolution — heck, if every human and machine disappeared off the face of the earth tomorrow — do you believe that earth’s climate would settle into some ideal state and remain static for eternity? (Because if not, then I’ll need more than the word of some obviously compromised “scientists” to work for either the permanent regression of mankind or its complete destruction. Also, you might want to think about question 1 before you answer.)

Now, with the revelation that the trumpted warming trend stopped fifteen years ago, I have another question:

If it turns out that we are headed for another “little ice age“, would you support increased CO₂ emissions in an effort to stabilize the climate?

(Crossposted from Pocket Jacks)

Accuracy in Media sent their cameras down to an Occupy Wall Street protest and asked some basic questions most of us learned the answers to in our grade school civics courses. Could the occupiers answer them?

Not so much:

Earlier they set up a table at an occupy wall street full of applications for jobs. Did they garner a lot of interest from the self-proclaimed 99%?

Not so much:

(via Ace)

Earlier I posted about the small drop in the unemployment rate being more due to a shrinking job poll (with participation in the labor markets by Americans hitting a 30-year low) than any real economic gains. Jim Pethokoukis calls the unemployment figure “phony,” and for good reason. Both the real unemployment rate, and the underemployment rate, are still growing:

Once again, the civilian labor force participation rate has declined, from 64 percent to 63.7 percent in a single month. Since January 2009, it has declined from 65.7 percent, resulting in approximately 4.7 million people no longer being counted towards the unemployment rate. If they were included, the real rate of unemployed working age adults would be 11.01 percent, and the underemployed would be 17.6 percent.

Overall, that includes the 12.7 million people that BLS says are actually unemployed, and then 4.7 million who have given up looking for work, plus another 10.5 million who can’t find full-time work. All together, there’s 28 million working age adults who simply cannot find work in the Obama economy.

Yet, according to President Obama speaking in Virginia today, “The recovery is speeding up.”

“Do not slow down the recovery we are on,” he said, taking aim at Congress. “Don’t muck it up.”

If this worsening economy is the President’s idea of success, I’d hate to see what he thinks a failure is.

Despite already facing a $21 billion shortfall in its Medicaid program, the State of Illinois is pushing to implement Obamacare’s expansion of the state-run program:

On Monday, Illinois’ Department of Healthcare and Family Services sought a waiver from the federal government to implement ObamaCare’s massive expansion of Medicaid in Cook County two years early.

But as we’ve already reported, the ObamaCare expansion is going to cost the state more than $10 billion by the end of the decade. The Supreme Court will decide this summer whether or not the expansion is even constitutional, and state law even prohibits expanding the program until at least 2013.

This is yet another facet of Obamacare that often goes overlooked. Beyond the expense to the federal government, a good deal of the law includes expanding state-level health care programs, chief among them Medicaid. This will be an enormous new cost the states will be stuck paying for.

With many of the states facing already facing abysmal, debt-ridden budget situations this is hardly a good thing. Illinois’ push toward this expansion of Medicaid is particularly crazy given that Illinois, behind perhaps only California, has one of the worst budget situations in the country.