24 yeas - 16 Neas - AGIA Passes

AGIA yes.

There was a call for reconsideration and the vote changed to 28 yeas 12 nays.

AGIA Hearings On-Line Now

You can listen to the legislator is debating AGIA still now this evening. You can watch or listen here:

http://www.ktoo.org/gavel/stream.cfm

click on watch or listen. You can use windows media player.

They should be voting before they go home tonight, unless the anti folks stall this long enough to prevent a vote.

7:09 - Recessed until 8:15pm

8:20 - People are back in the chambers, but the sound is background music. They aren't back in session yet

8:26pm - they are back on - Rep. Samuels

8:33pm - Rep.Ralph Samuels has gone through all the failed business projects that the State of Alaska has invested in. Now he's saying that Trans Canada's interests are only to take care of their shareholders. They have no interest in our State Interests. Trans Canada needs the gas in their hub. We're going to guarantee them a price in their hub instead of negotiating them on the cost of the gas.

It would be interesting to make a list of the predictions these legislators are making so we could see who was right down the line.

Samuels: The oil companies are making business decisions and we're making a political decision. Time is on our side now. We can wait. No customers, No Credit, No pipeline.

Gardner: I want to clarify. Eagle River rep said TC will go to the FERC and try to get the highest price they can, but so will all the others.

Seaton: Some are forgetting why we're in this position we're in now. We could see declining oil production that would lead to huge budget gap in a few years. We have money now because of high oil prices. The probability is that oil prices will fall back down and before we get a project going we'll be looking at budget deficits. So were here. Stranded Gas Act problem was that we had to prove it was stranded. The process we're in got us around that big hurdle. We now have a licensee who guarantees...??? ...we don't have to prove anything.
What is the difference between AGIA application and DEnali? The must haves: Denali people didn't like the must haves. They put them in their powerpoint, but when we asked them here, if they would commit to expand if there was nominated gas, etc. He said no we can't do that - goes back to owners - Conoco and BP. That's the point that makes the most difference to us. Why would C and BP say they want to spend all this money to ship someone else's gas? They wouldn't. Of all we talked about the only thing that was different - they didn't want an open pipeline and rolled in rates. These companies are shipping every day in Canada that have rolled in rates. What's the difference between ehre and Canda? Ak has the upstream. We'd be left with a monopoly pipeline producer group. That's why we're here - the must haves.

Cissna: I wasn't going to talk, but I've had so much time I wrote a long speech. One of my early Alaska jobs was working for an independent oil company and got to learn about oil companies very well. What I learned - saw the huge power of people who came to the state. These huge multinational corporations saw us as tiny weak player. That was 40 years ago. That power was nothing then. Also, see how Alaskans have grown more and more dependent on oil and federal money and separation of government and the people. We've become like dependent people do. We don't see the choices we could make, we got locked into how things are. What I see with AGIA - we have many issues going down hill as we focus on one thing - our relationship with these multinational corps. AGIA brings a card into the picture. It makes a statement about our being sovereign. ARe there problems? I gotta tell you. We have huge problems no matter because Alaska is very small. AGIA gives us one card that we can play here. We have a chance to really take some control. I think this is the chance to do something really good for the state.

Coghill wrap up.

Vote coming up 8:49pm

8:50
Rep. Coghill - let me tell you why I'm going against some of my friends and for AGIA. Over the years we've had oils. We've given out leases. Those who got the leases were the winners. Our life has been prosperous because of those leases. We picked some winners to do those leases and we began.
Here we find ourselves again with those leases not being produced. Timing and econonocs paly a big role.
When we put out the rfa based on conditions we set up. If nobody showed up - I would have said, a competitive process, we asked too much. But Trans Canada showed up. We picked the winner based on the application process we put forward. Is that picking a winner? As far as TC and their credibility? Yes. But getting it all done? No, because no gas going to market. We're picking someone who will work with us to get us to market. We have to pick a partner. we're defining who's at the table and what they look like. Aligns 1) what we think the state should have getting the oil to market. 2) gets us lined up with a pipeline dealer who knows how to do this.
Some people called this buying something. It has costs and rewards. Rewards for us, knowing what it will cost to get our gas to market at reasonable terms. Negotiating complete? No. STill have to find alignment. I think our case stronger knowing who the pipeline builder is and how they get to their costs. Or we could wait for the producers who have their leasers - owners of lease, of oil, of pipe - going before FERC. Who are we then? We aren't surrendering our ability to tax etc. - we know at least one part of what's going to hapen is agreed upon. That's good. ARe we getting at tax deal right away? I don't think so. Still under negotation. If you go in under position of strength, you have a little more....
Some people spoke elequently about why we shouldn't own it - and some spoke eloquently against owning. This just gives us a good partner that helps us understand things we don't know. This forces information out into the open. Should they walk out because it wouldn't work with us, we get the work project so we can see all the costs. It might be worth it for us to walk out sometime. But not looking for way out. How do we get the parties lined up to get Alaska guys sold for value beneficual to us, the oil companies, the pipeline, and the customers. There may be better ways to do this, but this is the best we have available.
Through a competitive process we got ourselves a good partner who can help us get that alignment we need to be successful. I hope you join me in granting this license so we can go together in a certain timeline with a certain product for the benefit of Alaska.

Voting now

Sky's Family Flies Home to Juneau

Sky's little sister got the ok to leave the hospital today. Everyone was happy. Here Dad shows her off after having fed the baby while Mom is packing her stuff.










After finishing the bottle, she looks pretty contented.











And after getting outside for the first time in her life, she also had her first car ride. First to our house, then a second ride to the airport and home to Juneau.

Short Hatcher Pass Walk Before Blogger Fundraiser

There was a party in Wasilla to help raise money to send the official Alaska blogger representative to the Democratic Party - Linda at Celtic Diva who invited Alaska Real to join her. Since we were going to drive all the way out to the Valley, we decided to go a little early and get some quality nature time in Hatcher Pass, one of my faorite spots.

Naturally we left much later than we planned, but we got a little time lazing on the rocks at the main river and then went for a short hike.

There were lots of flowers out, including this monks hood.

Everything was so lush and green. Who could landscape something this amazing?

Labrador tea.

Blue bells

Near the top we found flowering skunk cabbage.

Looking back down and across the valley.

We crossed a short bridge.

Cow Parsnips

Wild delphiniums

Green, lush, thick green, wherever you looked.

Except for the dots of color of the flowers - wild roses here.

A fiddlehead fern just budding - ready for picking and eating.

By the time we got to the fundraiser, I had used up my need to take pictures. I figure there were enough other bloggers there to document the event. But there were many luscious looking cakes for auction. This is the least ymmy looking, but I couldn't resist the interesting color coordination.

And when we made it back to Anchorage, I couldn't resist this shot of the rainbow welcoming us home.

Bugs, Boleta, Barbecue, and a Tacky Green Russula

Sky found a lady bug on the deck yesterday. He's here from Juneau while his new baby sister gets strong enough to go home. Pam, at Grassroots Science had written about lady bugs, something she heard on NPR:

Calling all kids! Cornell University wants you to find and photograph ladybugs. John Losey, a professor of entomology at Cornell University, hopes children will help document ladybug populations around the
country. Some native species are dwindling, while exotics are on the rise. To participate in the project, go to the Lost Ladybug Project Web site or send an e-mail to ladybug @ cornell . edu

So I decided to take a picture. The bug wouldn't hold still, but this one on M's hand gives a sense of the color, spots, and size.



Then he found this dragon fly, who did hold still. It was only afterward that we saw it was eating some other bug with little wings. It looks to small to be a fly. Not sure.




Sky was a regular explorer of our backyard and soon came up with this boleta. It was perfect. The recent rains had stimulated a lot of mushrooms, but such a beautiful boleta.








Sky wanted to keep it and we wanted to barbecue it - since the coals were already hot. He wasn't too happy when I sliced it up and put it on the grill. It was more than delicious.





But he found some more mushrooms. Looking at my mushroom field guide, I think this is a tacky green russula. There were five or six. Says "good" under edible.








Here are the gills.

Thinking Clean

Sky's baby sister was born two weeks ago prematurely. She's at the Newborn Intensive Care Unit at Prov. We went to visit the other day. Before you can go into the room, you have to put all your stuff into a locker and scrub your hands up to your elbows for two minutes. Then someone takes you in.

OK, this gets your hands clean, but what about your clothes, shoes, face, hair? What it really did was make me think about clean and dirty. Even though I'd just scrubbed up, I didn't want to touch anything. I looked at the door knob, all the surfaces, and thought, is that clean? I didn't want to hold the baby. What if I breathed bad stuff on her? What if she got infected from something on my shirt?

I did take the baby, who felt so very light, and held her while the tube of milk emptied through her nose. There was a mixup - Mom had planned to breast feed her, but for some reason this was set up. The baby doesn't have to work so hard this way I was told, but it seems so wrong for a baby to feed through a tube in her nose.

I'd left my memory card connected to the computer so no pictures. Was my camera clean enough to touch with my newly scrubbed fingers anyway?

And I'm still thinking about how dirty everything is. Making me stop and wash my hands for two minutes had a powerful effect on my awareness.

Makers and the Owner's Manifesto

My family didn't buy a lot of stuff, but they saved to buy good stuff, then kept things forever. Long time readers of this blog know that we finally bought a new washing machine last year when our 32 year old Maytag gave out and that I was pretty excited to find automaticwasher.org, a site dedicated to keeping old washers and driers alive.
Our first VW van lasted almost 25 years. Our Sony Triniton television is going on 33 years now - though it's having problems now which means we hardly watch any tv. I still have my Pentax camera that I bought in 1971, though it's been mostly sitting on the shelf since I finally went digital two years ago.












So when I caught this short piece from Day to Day on NPR about Mr. Jalopy my ears pricked up. [Once you get past all the intro stuff (about 1:15) you hear the story.] Everything about the story twitched some critical part of my being.

For example, one of the most visited posts on this blog was inspired by the Victor Lebow quote on how we had to be changed culturally, from humans to consumers. I like things that work, that are made well, that last. So everything about this show felt right.

My time in Thailand over the years has shown me how the rest of the world takes our discards and makes them live again. We've become so disconnected from the source of the things we depend on, that most of us couldn't function if we suddenly had to make our own environments. That's not good. There's nothing wrong with having fantastic technology. But there is something wrong when we have no idea how the things we depend on - food, clothing, shelter, music, transportation, etc. - are created and get to us and where they go afterward.

For all those reasons, I liked this interview. One part of the interviewe covered The Owner's Manifesto which I'm quoting below.

From Makezine.com:

If you can't open it, you don't own it: a Maker's Bill of Rights to accessible, extensive, and repairable hardware.

By Mister Jalopy

The Maker's Bill of Rights

• Meaningful and specific parts lists shall be included.

• Cases shall be easy to open.

• Batteries should be replaceable.

• Special tools are allowed only for darn good reasons.

• Profiting by selling expensive special tools is wrong and not making special tools available is even worse.

• Torx is OK; tamperproof is rarely OK.

• Components, not entire sub-assemblies, shall be replaceable.

• Consumables, like fuses and filters, shall be easy to access.

• Circuit boards shall be commented.

• Power from USB is good; power from proprietary power adapters is bad.

• Standard connecters shall have pinouts defined.

• If it snaps shut, it shall snap open.

• Screws better than glues.

• Docs and drivers shall have permalinks and shall reside for all perpetuity at archive.org.

• Ease of repair shall be a design ideal, not an afterthought.

• Metric or standard, not both.

• Schematics shall be included.

Sun Makes Brief Appearance in Anchorage

I try to listen to all the advice about how to stay healthy. I value life and hope to live a healthy one as long as I can. I had no interest in smoking, so that wasn't ever a problem. I do watch my diet and eat mostly, but not completely, vegetarian. I stay away from high cholesterol foods. I exercise regularly, but never had an interest in things like marathons or other extreme activities. I believe pain survives in the process of natural selection because it tells us to stop doing things that are bad for us.

But I do ignore the medical literature in some areas. I know coconut oil is high in cholesterol - but there is no way I will give up Thai food. Since coconuts aren't an animal source of cholesterol, I'm counting on future researchers finding out that it has different properties from animal fat cholesterol, and may even prolong life.



But the other advice I ignore big time is to stay out of the sun. Having grown up at Southern California beaches, I had no choice but to think of a sun tan as desirable and any chance I get to lie out in the sun, I take. I've learned, of course, growing up in the sun, how to slowly roast my skin so it gets just red enough that it will turn brown overnight without burning. I do use sunscreen when I know I'm past that safe point. And I wear hats to keep my bald head from burning. But sunlight is essential for Vitamin D. And this addiction to the sun helps me understand how cigarette smokers and alcoholics can rationalize their addictions. We can all feel superior to people with weaknesses we don't have, but it is the weaknesses we do have that help us empathize with others who aren't perfect either.

So today was one of the few times this summer (as you can tell from the picture, though the sunny parts of the picture are also badly overexposed) that I could indulge and I did. :)

Techno Evil - UAA Email Phishing Scam

Here's a reason why it pays to do things that improve your critical thinking skills. Some people would argue that people who fall for computer scams have only themselves to blame. But we all have times of vulnerability - we're tired, busy, distracted, too trusting. Some people just do not have the cognitive skills to see through these things. There are lots of people out there - fetal alcohol syndrome folks - for example - who appear to function ok, but whose reasoning and judgment abilities are physically damaged.

So, I'm sure there will be some UAA email account holders that fall for this scam. Additionally, a lot of students are going to be pissed at the university for threatening to cut off their email in seven days. This is a total FRAUD.

Here's the email:

From	")'>UAA UPGRADE TEAM *BETA*
Sent	Saturday, July 19, 2008 9:31 am
To	Undisclosed recipients: ;
Cc
Bcc
Subject	Confirm Your University of Alaska Anchorage Web-Mail Account

Confirm Your University of Alaska Anchorage Web-Mail Account

Dear uaa.alaska.edu Web-Mail Account User,
This message is from uaa.alaska.edu Web-Mail messaging center to all uaa.alaska.edu Web-Mail Account users. We are currently upgrading our data base and e-mail center. We are deleting all unused uaa.alaska.edu Web-Mail Accounts. You are required to verify and update your Web-Mail by confirming your Web-Mail identity. This will prevent your Web-Mail account from been closed during this exercise. In order to confirm you Web-Mail identity, you are to provide the following data;

Confirm Your Web-Mail Identity Below;

First Name:...................
Last Name:...................
Username : ...............
Password : ................

Warning!!! Any uaa.alaska.edu Web-Mail Account user that refuses to verify and subsequently update his/her Web-Mail within Seven days of receiving this warning will lose his/her Web-Mail Account permanently.

Thank you for using uaa.alaska.edu!
Warning Code:VX2G99AAJ

Thank you in anticipation for your co-operation.

Sincerely,
Web-Mail Service
University of Alaska Anchorage


Scam watch offers the following list of warning signs for phishing scams:

• You receive an email claiming to be from a financial institution. This message may seem to be from your bank or from a bank that you don’t have an account with. The email contains a link which leads you to a website where you are prompted to enter your bank account details.
  This is scamming a university, not a financial institution.
  
  
• The email does not address you by your proper name.
  There is no personal name at all.
  
  
• The email might contain typing errors and grammatical mistakes.
  Web-Mail is usually written webmail. And they left the 'r' off 'you' here - "confirm you Web-Mail identity' but otherwise it's pretty good.
  
  
• The email might claim that your details are needed for a security and maintenance upgrade, to ‘verify’ your account or to protect you from a fraud threat. The email might even state that you are due to receive a refund for a bill or other fee that it claims you have been charged.
  Here's where it gives itself away the most.
  
• it claims the system is upgrading
• it wants you to verify your account
• instead of offering a refund, it threatens to shut down your account in seven days
  

Cynics Unlimited has an even more detailed list with another sample phishing email. They define phishing this way:

Phishing, in practical terms, is an attack used by hackers to gain access to private information such as credit card numbers, social insurance numbers and user passwords. Rather than breaking down a physical or technological barrier, phishing is a social engineering attack where targets are typically duped into providing this information directly to false versions of legitimate websites run by the hackers. Personal information can then be used for fraudulent purchases, resale to third parties and even identity theft. While there are no universal statistics on the number or nature of phishing scams, most security websites agree on the following:“ (then comes their list of things to look out for).

Cuddy Family Midtown Park - Almost Ready

To get to the Peter's Sushi fire site the other day, I ran through the new Cuddy Family Midtown Park (CFMP). I say 'new' because although it's been there a few years, with a path and an amphitheater, now the speed skating rink is in, there's a couple of small lakes (ponds?), and it looks like lawn has been seeded. There's also an asphalt path that wanders around the edges of the park.
The northwest end - which you can get to from the Loussac Library parking lot was full of poppies this week.

There's a small amphitheater near the west entrance. It's been there a while and is already starting to look uncared for. There's a lot of potential for outdoor concerts and even some theater. But this is no Greek amphitheater.

Here's the west entrance at the end of 40th. Never heard of 40th? This is just south of 36th and C. Or just north of Tudor and C. The previous post puts this into a larger context.

This map shows you where the pictures were take from and the direction I was shooting. Google Earth is a little behind the times as you can see from the pictures. But you can also see the scrubby trees that were cleared to make this park. If I understand the function of bogs right, we've traded a natural water filter for lawns that will probably be fertilized and maybe pesticided. Or maybe the parks people have gone organic.

Here's a veiw looking toward Loussac Library not far from the east entrance off of Denali. This is off that new out of the way road into the Loussac parking lot. You can see the road barely in the upper right of the picture.


And here's a view of the tiny lakes, looking west from near the east entrance.



Finally, a panorama from the south side of the park near the back of Lowe's (on Tudor). This is three different pictures spliced together, so the right side is basically looking north and the left side more to the west.

This isn't one of those typical Anchorage parks where they chopped down a bunch of trees to add some playground equipment or sport fields. As I recall, uncertainly, this had some stunted bog spruce. There's still some of that green on the Google Earth map It looks like its going to be rolling lumps of lawn. Maybe they'll even put some trees back in. It's in a residential-free island surrounded by Tudor, C St., Denali, and 36th. So it's not a neighborhood park.

The speed skating rink will probably attract a certain crowd. There really aren't too many places to sit and watch the skaters - a few small benches. Sitting on the grass knolls might be good, but they'll be under snow and ice when there are skaters.

And there isn't a lot of parking. Well, there's Loussac's parking lot, but it's pretty full most of the winter. There's room for some cars down on the park end if there aren't too many people using the park.

Well, it's just in the beginning stages, so let's see what other amenities come in - picnic benches, covered table areas, seating near the rink, etc. And some trees maybe. It does look more like a Lower 48 Park than any other one I can think of. The water is artificial lakes, the lawn areas were sculpted, and the natural vegetation was nearly completely cleared out (except for the edges of the Loussac parking lot) and replaced by...well we'll have to see.