[Vision2020] Rep. Hart Logged State Land for Home

Mon Oct 11 10:11:53 PDT 2010

If this so called "first potentially habitable exoplanet" as the NASA
release phrased it, has three to four times the mass of the Earth, as they
indicate, the gravity would be much more powerful than Earth's, creating
serious technical difficulties for human habitation on the surface.  But
given that this planet is in the "Goldilocks' zone," as it is
sometimes poetically phrased, not too hot or cold, in theory liquid water
could exist on the surface, and some form of life, which is what the NASA
release means by "habitable," even if humans could not settle the planet.

You wrote "Maybe we should take care of our rare, habitable world."

I'm relieved you wrote "maybe" indicating some doubt about the issue... If
you phrased it more dogmatically, perhaps like "We must take care of our
rare, habitable world." you might open yourself to having derogatory labels
lobbed your way, like "eco-fascist," "environmental extremist," "hippie tree
hugger," "socialist eco-nut,"  "climate change fraud conspiracist" and so
forth...

But we do not know how rare "habitable" planets are, in the scale of our
galaxy, with billions of stars.  One of the scientists involved in the
discovery of Gliese 581g, Steven Vogt, is quoted in the NASA release that
"...planets like this must be really common."
------------------------------------------
Vision2020 Post: Ted Moffett

On 10/10/10, Dave <tiedye at turbonet.com> wrote:
>
> Yeah but, that planet doesn't spin, the only habitable area is the twilight
> zone at the edge of day and night, not much room. (like the moon)
>
> Maybe we should take care of our rare, habitable world.
>
> Dave
>
>
>
> On 10/10/2010 05:17 PM, Ted Moffett wrote:
>
>  "Earth First: We'll Log the Other Planets Later" as the bumper sticker
> mocking the environmental group "Earth First" and environmentalist "tree
> huggers" in general, phrases it... "Wilderness: Land of No Use" is another
> gem...
>
> And a mere 20 light years away, the first potentially habitable planet has
> been discovered.  Those save the planet extremists should stop worrying...
> What's a mere 20 light years?  Humanity can just build star ships and
> move if we ruin the Earth!
>
> NASA and NSF-Funded Research
> Finds First Potentially Habitable Exoplanet
>
> http://www.nasa.gov/topics/universe/features/gliese_581_feature.html
>
> A team of planet hunters from the University of California (UC) Santa Cruz,
> and the Carnegie Institution of Washington has announced the discovery of a
> planet with three times the mass of Earth orbiting a nearby star at a
> distance that places it squarely in the middle of the star's "habitable
> zone."
>
> This discovery was the result of more than a decade of observations using
> the W. M. Keck Observatory in Hawaii, one of the world's largest optical
> telescopes. The research, sponsored by NASA and the National Science
> Foundation, placed the planet in an area where liquid water could exist on
> the planet's surface. If confirmed, this would be the most Earth-like
> exoplanet yet discovered and the first strong case for a potentially
> habitable one.
>
> To astronomers, a "potentially habitable" planet is one that could sustain
> life, not necessarily one where humans would thrive. Habitability depends on
> many factors, but having liquid water and an atmosphere are among the most
> important.
>
> The new findings are based on 11 years of observations of the nearby red
> dwarf star Gliese 581using the HIRES spectrometer on the Keck I Telescope.
> The spectrometer allows precise measurements of a star's radial velocity
> (its motion along the line of sight from Earth), which can reveal the
> presence of planets. The gravitational tug of an orbiting planet causes
> periodic changes in the radial velocity of the host star. Multiple planets
> induce complex wobbles in the star's motion, and astronomers use
> sophisticated analyses to detect planets and determine their orbits and
> masses.
>
> "Keck's long-term observations of the wobble of nearby stars enabled the
> detection of this multi-planetary system," said Mario R. Perez, Keck program
> scientist at NASA Headquarters in Washington. "Keck is once again proving
> itself an amazing tool for scientific research."
>
> Steven Vogt, professor of astronomy and astrophysics at UC Santa Cruz, and
> Paul Butler of the Carnegie Institution lead the Lick-Carnegie Exoplanet
> Survey. The team's new findings are reported in a paper published in the
> Astrophysical Journal and posted online at: http://arxiv.org
>
> "Our findings offer a very compelling case for a potentially habitable
> planet," said Vogt. "The fact that we were able to detect this planet so
> quickly and so nearby tells us that planets like this must be really
> common."
>
> The paper reports the discovery of two new planets around Gliese 581. This
> brings the total number of known planets around this star to six, the most
> yet discovered in a planetary system outside of our own. Like our solar
> system, the planets around Gliese 581 have nearly-circular orbits.
>
> The new planet designated Gliese 581g has a mass three to four times that
> of Earth and orbits its star in just under 37 days. Its mass indicates that
> it is probably a rocky planet with a definite surface and enough gravity to
> hold on to an atmosphere.
> Gliese 581, located 20 light years away from Earth in the constellation
> Libra, has two previously detected planets that lie at the edges of the
> habitable zone, one on the hot side (planet c) and one on the cold side
> (planet d). While some astronomers still think planet d may be habitable if
> it has a thick atmosphere with a strong greenhouse effect to warm it up,
> others are skeptical. The newly-discovered planet g, however, lies right in
> the middle of the habitable zone.
>
> The planet is tidally locked to the star, meaning that one side is always
> facing the star and basking in perpetual daylight, while the side facing
> away from the star is in perpetual darkness. One effect of this is to
> stabilize the planet's surface climates, according to Vogt. The most
> habitable zone on the planet's surface would be the line between shadow and
> light (known as the "terminator").
> ------------------------------------------
> Vision2020 Post: Ted Moffett
>
> On 10/10/10, Tom Hansen <thansen at moscow.com> wrote:
>>
>> "Hart said if the state doesn’t allow citizens to cut state
>> endowment-owned trees for their personal use, it should. 'I think there
>> should be a program for it,' he said. 'I think that the people of Idaho
>> ought to benefit from the lands.'"
>>
>> So . . . State Rep. Hart is suggesting that Idaho citizens clear-cut state
>> parks for personal gain.
>>
>> Courtesy of today's (October 10, 2010) Spokesman-Review.
>>
>> ---------------------------------------------------------
>>
>> BOISE – Idaho state Rep. Phil Hart stole timber from state land to build
>> his log home in Athol in 1996, according to court documents, and still
>> hasn’t paid a judgment against him for the theft. What’s more, the
>> property Hart illegally logged is school endowment land, meaning the
>> timber there is supposed to benefit Idaho’s public schools.
>>
>> Hart contended then – and still does today – that a loophole in state law
>> allowed him, as a citizen, to cut and take the logs, totaling nearly 8,000
>> board feet of timber. But three court rulings found that argument not only
>> wrong but unreasonable and “frivolous.” In court documents, the state
>> called Hart’s conduct “a blatant, unjustified trespass on state endowment
>> land that resulted in a substantial loss to the state’s school endowment
>> fund.”
>>
>> Hart, whose only opponent for a fourth House term this November is a
>> write-in candidate, did forfeit a $5,000 bond he had to put up for his
>> last appeal in the case. And he may have made a partial payment for
>> attorney fees; state records are unclear. But liens against Hart filed in
>> Kootenai County by the Idaho Department of Lands for $22,827 were never
>> lifted – and now they’re not enforceable, because more than five years has
>> passed since the judgment.
>>
>> Idaho’s school endowment lands are required by the state constitution to
>> be managed for maximum long-term returns for public schools.
>>
>> Hart said, “I think those logs got paid for several times over.”
>>
>> The original value of the logs he took from school endowment lands near
>> Spirit Lake was $2,443, but under state law, the penalty for stealing
>> state endowment timber is “treble damages,” or three times the value of
>> the logs – $7,328.
>>
>> Hart also was ordered to pay administrative costs the state spent to
>> determine the value of the stolen logs as well as the state’s attorney
>> fees and court costs after he fought the case three times over five years,
>> all the way to the state Court of Appeals. Those costs total $15,500.
>>
>> “There was a taking of timber that belonged to the schoolchildren. It
>> needs to be repaid,” said Idaho Attorney General Lawrence Wasden. “That
>> debt is valid. It’s a moral obligation, even if we don’t have the ability
>> to go after it and collect it. It’s a debt owed to the schoolchildren.”
>>
>> Hart argued in court – first with an attorney, and then in his two appeals
>> representing himself – that Idaho’s state Forest Practices Act had a
>> loophole. The act, which regulates logging on private and public lands,
>> exempted from a notification requirement the noncommercial taking of
>> timber for personal use. That clause has since been reworded.
>>
>> “It was something that was commonly done throughout Idaho history,” Hart
>> told The Spokesman-Review. “I had been told by actually a couple of
>> different people in the logging industry that this was at least a
>> historical practice.”
>>
>> However, as the Idaho Court of Appeals wrote in its ruling, “The fact the
>> (Forest Practices Act) rules did not require Hart to give notice to the
>> (Idaho Department of Lands) before stealing state timber does not mean
>> that he was authorized to take it.”
>>
>> The Appeals Court judges added, “We think it important to recognize that
>> the cutting of timber on state lands is a crime.”
>>
>> Hart argued in court that he was prompted to go after the state endowment
>> timber because a logger, whose name he couldn’t remember, told him it was
>> legal. He said a relative of the logger had confirmed that with a state
>> legislator.
>>
>> That logger “had many times in the course of his life … used trees for his
>> own personal use,” Hart told The Spokesman-Review. “It was a standard
>> practice years ago, and there are a number of old-timers in the logging
>> industry that, how should I say this, that had participated in that kind
>> of a practice … until, I guess, recently.”
>>
>> Hart added, “I know the Forest Service actually does have a program where
>> folks do that on a regular basis, because I know some people who have even
>> in the last few years accessed the federal program.” He also added, “The
>> Forest Practices Act says that one of its goals is to harmonize state and
>> federal policy, and it’s absolutely plain in black and white at the
>> federal level that this is an ongoing practice.”
>>
>> Though the U.S. Forest Service does have various permit programs that
>> allow people to take Christmas trees, firewood and other items from Forest
>> Service land, that can only be done under permit terms, and payment is
>> required. If someone just went into the forest and cut and took logs,
>> “that would be charged as timber theft,” said Jay Kirchner, forest public
>> affairs officer for the Idaho Panhandle National Forests in Coeur d’Alene.
>>
>> The one exception: The Panhandle forests have a standing order that people
>> can gather firewood within walking distance of their campsite for use at
>> that campsite without first getting a permit.
>>
>> On April 16, 1996, a neighbor of state endowment lands near Spirit Lake
>> heard machinery operating on the state land, and when she went to
>> investigate, the noise stopped. She got a license plate number from a red
>> pickup she saw parked there and called police, according to records
>> obtained by The Spokesman-Review under the Idaho Public Records Law.
>>
>> The Kootenai County Sheriff’s Department investigated and in August that
>> year reached the former owner of the truck, who reported she had sold it
>> in March to Hart, and that he had mentioned to her that he was building a
>> log home.
>>
>> Investigators found Hart’s building permit and, in September 1996, went to
>> his home construction site in Athol, where they found the missing logs.
>> Tire tracks on a tractor at the site matched tracks found at the site of
>> the theft, and a number of the logs were matched to the original stumps on
>> the state land.
>>
>> When sheriff’s investigators interviewed Hart, he told them he knew he’d
>> taken the logs from state land. The investigation report said Hart “stated
>> there is an Idaho code which allows a person to cut logs from state lands
>> to build one’s personal residence.”
>>
>> After several more contacts with Hart and state authorities, the sheriff’s
>> office turned the case over to prosecutors.
>>
>> Hart said if the state doesn’t allow citizens to cut state endowment-owned
>> trees for their personal use, it should. “I think there should be a
>> program for it,” he said. “I think that the people of Idaho ought to
>> benefit from the lands.”
>>
>> Idaho’s state school endowment lands are specifically for the benefit of
>> public schools, and logging on those lands is the main source of revenue
>> they generate. This year, Idaho’s schools got $53 million from the state
>> endowment, which included an extra $22 million payment authorized by the
>> state Land Board to help schools cope with a sharp cut in their state
>> general fund appropriation.
>>
>> -------------
>>
>> Court opinion against Rep. Hart.
>>
>>
>> http://media.spokesman.com/documents/2010/10/Hart-Court-of-Appea12390BC.pdf
>>
>> -------------
>>
>> Police report on Hart's log theft.
>>
>> http://media.spokesman.com/documents/2010/10/Hart-PoliceReport.pdf
>>
>> ---------------------------------------------------------
>>
>> Isn't this the same Idaho State Rep Phil Hart that owes back -taxes in
>> excess of $100,000?
>>
>> Why, yes it is.
>>
>>
>> http://www.spokesman.com/stories/2010/oct/01/harts-tax-woes-now-approach-1m/
>>
>> Seeya at the polls, Moscow.
>>
>> Tom Hansen
>> Moscow, Idaho
>>
>> "The Pessimist complains about the wind, the Optimist expects it to change
>> and the Realist adjusts his sails."
>>
>> - Unknown
>>
>>
>>
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