USDA Putting Solar Panels on Chicken Coops

Agency announces $63 million for solar projects for farms

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) is spending millions on green energy projects for farms, including putting solar panels on the tops of chicken coops.

The federal agency announced Friday that its Rural Energy for America Program (REAP) will spend $63 million on solar panels and wind turbines for the farming industry.

One project, totaling $16,094, was awarded to Blue Sky Poultry, Inc., of Bainbridge, Ga., to “install a solar array on the roof of poultry houses.”

Other projects announced by the USDA included $18,000 for solar panels for a fruit farm in Ohio, and $19,750 for a wind turbine for a farm in Minnesota.

The majority of funding is going toward similar small projects. The agency is also financing larger solar projects through loan guarantees in the amounts of $3 to $4 million, and funding a $5 million project to turn wood into gas.

Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack said the $63 million in funding would “create jobs, reduce greenhouse gas pollution, and helps usher in a more secure energy future for the nation.”

The USDA pointed out that the Obama administration has spent more than $291 million in grants and $327 million in loan guarantees on green energy projects for farmers through the program since the president took office.

Via: WFB

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Ted Nugent: Jimmy Kimmel Should 'Get a Damn Life'

Rocker and avid hunter Ted Nugent defended the Minnesota dentist who killed Cecil the Lion in Zimbabwe, saying the hunt likely was legal and that such actions are needed to thin the heard and make way for younger populations.

The dentist, Walter Palmer, has been in hiding since word of the kill was reported in the media last week.

Nugent, appearing Sunday on "The Rita Cosby Show" on WABC in New York, said he is dubious of media reports that the lion was lured out of a sanctuary because of the number of untrue statements the media has made about him in the past.

If he could talk to Palmer, Nugent said, "I would say I'm sorry that our society has become so dumbed down and so soul-less, as to threaten you and your family's lives, because you killed a lion that needed to be killed."

Cecil was an older lion by standards in the wild, and his removal made way for the next group of cubs, Nugent said. He compared the killing to hunting for deer or other animals in the United States.

"If we stopped one deer season in any state in America the number of highway casualties, insurance and agriculture compensation and dead human beings would go through the ceiling," he said.

The biggest problem, Nugent said, is that the animal was given a name, which tends to humanize it. But naming wild animals is actually a disservice that robs the animal of its nobility and is the true "criminal act," he said.

"These are wild, magnificent creatures. They’re not petting zoo animals. They’re not cartoons," Nugent said.

The rocker also had little sympathy for fellow celebrities who have decried Cecil's killing.

Jimmy Kimmel got choked up on his show talking about the lion, and urged people to donate to conservation. 

"I would say, 'Jimmy, get a damn life.' Maybe you should cry a few tears for all the millions of aborted babies who Planned Parenthood are selling their organs," Nugent said. 

Further, Zimbabwe's longtime leader Robert Mugabe has killed tens of thousands of his citizens in his decades-long rule, he said. "Did Jimmy Kimmel cry about that?"

Nugent also mocked Mia Farrow, who tweeted out the dentist's address. 

"So she doesn't know that the sushi is dead?" he asked.

Nugent did admit to Cosby that he doesn't know all the details of the hunt, and that if anything illegal did take place the guides and the hunter himself should be held accountable.

Nugent said he plans to talk to Palmer himself once things quiet down. 

Via: Newsmax

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For African immigrants, St. Paul starting to feel more like home

Related: The economic impact of African communities in St. Paul.

From a former medical clinic within St. Paul's Bandana Square, members of Minnesota's Cameroonian community organize a Scrabble tournament, lawn tennis and career mentoring programs while debating the fractious politics of their home country.

Some bear physical scars that tell of their political activism in Central Africa.

There's similar energy brewing near Dale Street and University Avenue, where the city's sizable ethnic Oromo community gathers in a converted church for summer cookouts, teen dance shows and college-readiness classes. Members of this community, too, have shed blood and lost loved ones while speaking out for basic rights.

In a one-story storefront a few light-rail stops down the road, the Eritrean community runs a third cultural center dedicated to yet another growing segment of the African immigrant population in St. Paul -- and they also have stories to tell about war, upheaval and progress.

Thousands of African immigrants have landed in Minnesota after fleeing political persecution or civil war in their home countries. Others have been lured by the opportunity to continue their education at the University of Minnesota or accept jobs at major employers such as the Mayo Clinic and IBM.

After decades of their numbers growing, they've pooled money to establish permanent community spaces where they can break bread and celebrate their language, culture and faith. Several are in St. Paul.

Economist Bruce Corrie isn't surprised. Corrie, a professor at Concordia University in St. Paul, believes the state's African population produces $14 million in philanthropy within Minnesota each year, on top of $150 million in annual remittances to countries in Africa.

Abdullahi Ali reads the Koran at the Oromo Community Center in St. Paul on Thursday, May 28, 2015. (Pioneer Press: Scott Takushi)

At least 73,000 African immigrants call Minnesota home, according to the 2008-2012 American Community Survey, or 111,000 with children included. Advocates say they wouldn't be surprised if the real number was double that figure.

The immigrants represent at least 25 countries in Africa, making Minnesota home to the ninth-largest African community in the country.

Roughly 60 percent come from East African nations such as Somalia and Ethiopia, and 25 percent from West African countries such as Nigeria and Liberia. The rest hail from throughout the continent. About one in five immigrants in Minnesota is African, according to the U.S. census.

In late May, Corrie released a 45-page report -- "The Economic Potential of African Immigrants in Minnesota" -- at the Snelling Cafe, not far from Snelling and University avenues, an area he's dubbed "Little Africa" because of the many immigrant-run businesses.

Via: TwinCities.com

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Yay Obamacare! Health Insurance Companies Seeking Big Increases, 20 To 40% (Or More) In 2016

But we’ll be saving $2500 on premiums, right?

Washington- Health insurance companies around the country are seeking rate increases of 20 percent to 40 percent or more, saying their new customers under the Affordable Care Act turned out to be sicker than expected. Federal officials say they are determined to see that the requests are scaled back.

Blue Cross and Blue Shield plans — market leaders in many states — are seeking rate increases that average 23 percent in Illinois, 25 percent in North Carolina, 31 percent in Oklahoma, 36 percent in Tennessee and 54 percent in Minnesota, according to documents posted online by the federal government and state insurance commissioners and interviews with insurance executives.

The Oregon insurance commissioner, Laura N. Cali, has just approved 2016 rate increases for companies that cover more than 220,000 people. Moda Health Plan, which has the largest enrollment in the state, received a 25 percent increase, and the second-largest plan, LifeWise, received a 33 percent increase.Washington- Health insurance companies around the country are seeking rate increases of 20 percent to 40 percent or more, saying their new customers under the Affordable Care Act turned out to be sicker than expected. Federal officials say they are determined to see that the requests are scaled back.

Via: Weasel Zippers

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MICHELLE O TO GO: Food trucks deliver school lunches to students during summer break

PAUL, Minn. – Government-sponsored food trucks will be stalking students this summer with the goal of giving out thousands of “healthy” free lunches officials don’t trust parents to provide.

Officials at St. Paul public schools recently announced they’re working with the local food bank Second Harvest to dispatch a mobile food truck to expand locations offering students free lunches during the summer. Last year the district supplied 71 locations, and the truck will help to add another 10 to 15 in 2015, KSTP reports.

The district’s director of nutrition services, Stacy Koppen, said the truck will drive around to different locations between 10:30 a.m. and 5 p.m. to help feed the city’s needy youngsters. The truck will track down students at “spots like suggested basketball courts or fields where kids like to play,” according to the news site.

The very expensive-looking specially rigged step van features a billboard with grinning teens alongside the message “Kids and teens: Get your free meals here.” The district apparently didn’t offer the details on how the new program is financed, or how much the truck cost, and the news station didn’t bother to ask. School officials said the truck will be manned by volunteers.

Koppen said the district serves 29,000 lunches a day during the school year, but only 6,000 a day during the summer, so officials reasoned a truck is necessary to make sure students aren’t starving.

“Time and again, we such a steep decline that we wonder, ‘Where are these children going? Are they getting the healthy, nutritious food they need for their health and academic success?’” Koppen told KTSP.

“We want to make sure that when children return to school for the next school year, that they are at the optimal health status and that they are ready to learn,” she said, adding that the free food is available to all, not just low income kids.

Via: EAG

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Don’t Believe Voter Fraud Happens? Here’s Some Examples

In the interest of helping out the editorial writers and pundits of media outlets who don’t think voter fraud occurs, I wanted to note just a few recent cases (and readers interested in seeing almost 200 more such cases can do so here.):

• In McAllen, Texas, two campaign workers (known as politiqueras in local parlance) who bribed voters with cocaine, beer, cigarettes and cash during a 2012 school board election have been sentenced separately to serve eight and four months in prison, respectively. U.S. District Court Judge Randy Crane called this election fraud “terrible” and said that “our country requires that our voting process be clear and free of fraud for democracy to work … it’s dangerous for this to occur without consequence.”
• A couple in Le Sueur, Minn., was charged with felony voter registration fraud for lying about where they lived so they could vote in a school bond referendum in another town.
• A woman in Dothan, Ala., was sentenced to six months in prison for her part in a voter fraud scheme that got a city commissioner re-elected. She was the second of the four people charged to have been found guilty of voter fraud in the case, which may have involved more than 100 absentee ballots.
• Bronx politician Hector Ramirez has been arrested after a 242-count grand jury indictment charged him with a massive voter fraud scheme that involved tricking voters into letting Ramirez and his staff illegally vote their absentee ballots. The local prosecutor told the New York Daily News that Ramirez, who lost two prior tries at a state assembly seat, “made a decision that he was not going to lose, under any circumstance.”
• A state appeals court upheld a ruling voiding a 2013 commission election in Weslaco, Texas, in which dozens of illegal votes were cast in an election won by only 16 votes. The illegal votes included individuals falsely claiming to reside in the city and improper “assistance” that told voters who to vote for—a great example of how even a small amount of fraud can make a difference in close elections.
• In Philadelphia, the setting of the infamous 2008 New Black Panther Party voter intimidation case, four local election officials have been chargedwith casting multiple votes in the city’s 18th Ward in a precinct in which three of them didn’t even live and were not registered to vote. This case illustrates the importance of poll watchers, because it was a local poll watcher who saw what happened and brought it to the attention of the district attorney’s office. This is the same district attorney, Democrat Seth Williams, who indicted two Democratic state legislators last year for accepting bribes in exchange for voting against a voter ID bill after the Pennsylvania attorney general, Kathleen Kane, also a Democrat, refused to prosecute the case.
• On May 7, the Board of Immigration Appeals of the Executive Office for Immigration Review held that a Peruvian citizen who illegally registered and voted could be deported for violating federal law. Margarita Del Pilar became a permanent legal resident of the U.S. in 2004. She promptly applied for an Illinois driver’s license and registered to vote at the same time, then cast a ballot in the 2006 congressional election. When she applied for naturalization in 2007, she admitted in the INS interview that she had voted in an American election. Of course, if she had not applied to become a citizen, she could have continued to illegally vote with almost no chance of being detected.

This case of the Peruvian woman is just another example of how easy it is fornoncitizens to vote in our elections. And there are apparently some politicians who want to ensure that they can continue to do so without getting caught.

Via: The Daily Signal

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These are the Next Gay Marriage Battlegrounds

A wave of lawsuits have been filed in courts around the nation since the Supreme Court in June overturned much of the Defense of Marriage Act and California’s ban on same-sex marriage. The rulings effectively opened the floodgates to what has been a gradual push for marriage equality.

“The more people are winning, the more people are stepping up and wanting to become involved and move forward after,” says Evan Wolfson, founder and president of Freedom to Marry. “The more we make it real — the more places gay people share in the freedom to marry — the more people see with their own eyes families helped and no one hurt.” 

On Aug. 1, Minnesota and Rhode Island became the 12th and 13th states to allow gay marriage. New Jersey followed suit on Oct. 21, after a judge overturned the state’s ban and Gov. Chris Christie dropped his appeal of the ruling. Illinois became the 15th state (plus Washington D.C.) to approve gay marriage when lawmakers passed a bill on Nov. 5. Gov. Pat Quinn is expected to sign it into law Nov. 20.

(INTERACTIVE: A Timeline of the Gay Rights Movement)

So who’s next? Here’s TIME’s guide to the states most likely to legalize gay marriage in the months ahead.

Via: Time

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Sauk Rapids Graphic Artist Challenges National Security Agency

SAUK RAPIDS, Minn. (WCCO) – It was Edward Snowden’s revelations of domestic spying by the National Security Agency that hatched the idea — graphic artist Dan McCall would take the NSA’s emblem and create a new look with a funny twist.

“When I got finished I thought, this is pretty good – I thought it was fun,” McCall said.

Soon, he was having T-shirts emblazoned with the NSA logo accompanied by the slogan, “peeping while you’re sleeping.” Under the parodied emblem was the statement, “the only part ofgovernment that actually listens.”

What McCall meant as pure parody, apparently wasn’t very funny to bureaucrats at the NSA.

(credit: CBS)

While he calls it parody they call a violation of the spy agency’s intellectual property.

Via: CBS Minnesota

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Election Day: Ten State Ballot Measures to Watch

While elections for political office will likely get most of the media attention on Tuesday, 38 states will be voting on a combined 188 ballot measures affecting a host of major issues. Scribe has broken down 10 of those measures that will be worth watching as returns start coming in Tuesday evening.

Michigan – Proposal 2: This measure proposes a constitutional amendment making union collective bargaining a right. It also gives collective bargaining agreements the force of law, and invalidates any other state laws that conflict with those agreements.

Michigan – Proposal 3: As Scribe has reported, Proposal 3 would direct the state, through a constitutional amendment, to get 25% of its electricity from renewable energy sources by 2025. The measure is backed primarily by out-of-state environmentalist groups, while Michigan businesses have funded most of the opposition to it.

Florida – Amendment 3: This constitutional amendment would establish a cap on state revenue, indexed to inflation and population growth. Any revenue exceeding the cap would be placed in a “rainy day fund.” Once that fund exceeds 10% of the prior year’s total budget, the state would be required to implement tax cuts paid for with revenues from that fund.

Florida – Amendment 6: This measure would prohibit the use of taxpayer funds for abortion services via a constitutional amendment, and would stipulate that Florida’s state constitution cannot be interpreted to provide broader rights to abortion than the United States Constitution.

Minnesota – Amendment 2: This constitutional amendment would establish a voter ID requirement in the state, requiring that all voters present a valid photo identification at the polls. A voter ID law was previously passed by the state legislature, but vetoed by Gov. Mark Dayton (D).

Colorado – Amendment 64: The proposed marijuana legalization would amend the state constitution to permit the “personal use and regulation of marijuana” for adults aged 21 and over. The amendment would also allow the cultivation, manufacturing, and limited possession and consumption of marijuana.

Florida – Amendment 1: This referred state constitutional amendment would “prohibit laws or rules from compelling any person or employer to purchase, obtain, or otherwise provide for health care coverage.”

New Hampshire – Amendment 13: A legislatively-referred constitutional amendment that proposes a ban on any new taxes “levied, directly or indirectly, upon a person’s income, from whatever source it is derived.”

Maine – Question 1: The language of the indirect initiated state statute would allow Maine to “issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples.” A bill legalizing same-sex marriage was repealed by voter referendum in 2009.

California – Proposition 37: The initiated state statute would provide for mandatory labeling of “genetically engineered food.” Among other concerns, the measure targets “misleading” labeling touting a product as “all natural” or using similar wording.

Via: The Foundry

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5 Effects Obamacare Will Have on Working Americans

Obamacare will certainly have a negative impact on every American, but here are five ways it will harm working Americans:

1. Two-thirds of American employees’ wages will decrease as employers deal with increasing costs. Heritage’s Drew Gonshorowski explains the results of an Urban Institute study: “The Urban Institute claims that mid-size firms will see spending per person increase by 4.6 percent, while large firms will see spending increases by 0.3 percent per person. According to the U.S. Census, this accounts for 65.1 percent of employees—or roughly 79 million—in the U.S. who are employed by medium- or large-size firms. The study suggests: ‘Any increase in employers’ health-related costs will be offset by decreases in other compensation—whether wages or other benefits.’ This means that individuals in mid- and large-size firms will receive less in take-home wages (or other benefits) and pay a greater proportion of their compensation to health care due to Obamacare.”
2. Loss of existing insurance coverage. Because of Obamacare’s high costs, experts predict that employers will stop offering employees health coverage, forcing employees into the new government-run exchanges. Although estimates vary, it is likely that millions of Americans will lose their current coverage. For instance, the non-partisanCongressional Budget Office estimates that between 5 million and 20 million Americans will lose employer-sponsored coverage, the American Action Forum estimates 35 million, and McKinsey, a consulting firm, estimates that 30 percent of employers will definitely or probably stop offering coverage after Obamacare takes full effect in 2014.
3. Premiums in the individual market are set to skyrocket. Obamacare’s new, extreme insurance rules and regulations will have dire effects on the cost of coverage that individuals and small businesses purchase on their own. As Forbes columnist and health policy analyst Avik Roy has pointed out in recent articles, “Obama adviser Jonathan Gruber has estimated that, by 2016, the cost of individual-market health insurance under Obamacare, relative to what it would have been under prior law, will increase by an average of 19 percent in Colorado, 29 percent in Minnesota, and 30 percent in Wisconsin. A prestigious actuarial firm, Milliman, has estimated that individual-market premiums in Ohio could increase by 55 to 85 percent.”
4. Full-time workers turned part-time to avoid the employer mandate. As Heritage predicted, businesses have already begun limiting the hours their employees can work, turning full-time workers into part-time workers, to avoid paying the employer mandate penalty or providing costly insurance coverage. For example, one of the nation’s 30 largest employers, Darden Restaurants, is experimenting with keeping employees under the 30-hour threshold established for Obamacare’s mandate. According to the Orlando Sentinel, “In an emailed statement, Darden said staffing changes are ‘just one of the many things we are evaluating to help us address the cost implications health care reform will have on our business.’”
5. The heavy burden of 18 taxes and penalties. Obamacare imposes 18 new taxes and penalties that will cost Americans over $836 billion between 2013 and 2022. These taxes will either hit consumers directly or be passed on through higher prices. For example, the infamous individual mandate to purchase health insurance will be imposed on 6 million Americans in 2016, many of whom are the working middle class. Nearly 70 percent of payers will be below 400 percent of the federal poverty level, and even those below the poverty level could be forced to pay the mandate tax.

Obamacare must be repealed in order to protect hard-working Americans from its harmful and far-reaching effects.

Via: The Foundry

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