State police investigate arrest of Arkansas reporter

On Monday, Bill Lawson, a reporter for the Maumelle Monitor, set out to cover a house fire. While walking toward the fire with a camera, he was stopped by Arkansas State Police Trooper Thomas Weindruch (at left in a flash photo by Lawson) and handcuffed so that he faced away from the fire, the Monitor reports. The Monitor is a suburban Little Rock weekly with a circulation of 3,200.

"Bill Lawson, 59, a reporter and photographer for the Maumelle Monitor, said Trooper Tom Weindruch arrested him and placed him in handcuffs at the scene of a chimney fire on High Timber Drive about 7:50 p.m. Monday," John Lyons wrote. "Lawson said Weindruch kept him in handcuffs for about 30 minutes before releasing him. Weindruch issued Lawson a citation ordering him to appear in Sherwood District Court on Feb. 26 on the charge of obstructing governmental operations."

Lawson said that firefighter Perry Hopman saw him and told Weindruch that Lawson was not a problem. “I believe my exact words were, ‘He’s not bothering us. He’s no problem at all,’” said Hopman, who is the son-in-law of Dennis Byrd, publisher of the Maumelle Monitor and chief of the Arkansas News Bureau. (Read more)

The Monitor ran a first-person account from Lawson in its Wednesday edition. Arkansas State Police are investigating the arrest, reports Editor & Publisher. A conviction on the misdemeanor is punishable by up to 30 days in jail and a fine up to $100. (Read more)

Senate passes its version of the Farm Bill, 79-14

At 3:30 p.m., the U.S. Senate passed the Farm Bill, or its version thereof. The vote was 79-14, very close to the 78-12 vote to limit debate on the measure. The bill, H.R. 2419, now goes to a conference committee with the House.

Sen. Tom Harkin of Iowa, floor manager of the bill, announced that fellow Democratic Sens. Joe Biden of Delaware, Hillary Clinton of New York, Chris Dodd of Connecticut and Barack Obama of Illinois, who have been busy running for president in Iowa and elsewhere, would have voted for the bill had they been present.

"It is a good bill for rural America and for farmers and for everyone who eats food in this country," Harkin, chairman of the Senate Agriculture Committee, said after the bill passed. But the outcome disappointed those who wanted a lower limit on payments to individual farmers, such as Ferd Hoefner of the Sustainable Agriculture Coalition. "It's just sad that a majority no longer counts for much in America's democracy," he told Dan Looker of Successful Farming, referring to the fact that 56 of 100 senators supported a lower limit -- four votes short of the 60 that has become standard for passage of significant legislation in the Senate. For a list of votes on that measure, from the Center for Rural Affairs, which supported it, click here.

Hoefner said the vote fell short partly because some senators "who had supported payment limits for the 2002 farm bill changed their votes this year," Looker reports. "Hoefner was surprised to see a no vote from two other Democrats on the ag committee, Senator Debbie Stabenow of Michigan and Senator Ken Salazar of Colorado. Stabenow voted for payment limits in 2002. Salazar wasn't in the Senate then but he campaigned for payment limits." (Read more, via Agriculture Online)

"The Bush administration continues to oppose the farm bills passed by both the House and Senate," reports Peter Shinn of Brownfield Network, while noting that Acting Agriculture Secretary Chuck Conner "didn't specifically renew the threat of a Presidential veto." (Read more) Conner said the Senate bill is "fundamentally flawed" and major changes must be made in conference or "We are no closer to a good farm bill than we were before today's passage." He added, "Farmers deserve a farm bill that is free of budget smoke and mirrors and tax increases. The measure passed today has $22 billion in unfunded commitments and budget gimmicks, and includes $15 billion in new taxes -- the first time a farm bill has relied on tax increases since 1933." (Read more)

UPDATE, Dec. 15: For our money, no mainstream journalist reports the Farm Bill better than Dan Morgan, a contract writer for The Washington Post and a fellow at the German Marshall Fund of the U.S. For his comprehensive story in the Post, click here.

Fish farms endanger wild salmon off Canada coast

Fish farms are bringing nearby wild salmon populations dangerously close to extinction, according to a new study published in today's issue of the journal Science. It found that the farms bring young wild salmon into contact with parasitic sea lice and that could mean a 99 percent collapse in some populations over the next four years.

The study used data from the Broughton Archipelago, a group of islands about 260 miles northwest of Vancouver. Here, young salmon must travel past miles of fish farms to reach the sea. Along the way, they pick up the sea lice. Adult salmon can handle the parasite in small amounts, but the thin-skinned young are especially vulnerable.

“If nothing changes, we are going to lose these fish,” lead author Martin Krkosek, a fisheries ecologist from the University of Alberta, said in a news release. “Salmon farming breaks a natural law,” said co-author Alexandra Morton, director of the Salmon Coast Field Station, located in the Broughton. To read the full report, go here.

Senate removes timber payments from energy bill

Before passing an energy bill yesterday, the U.S. Senate removed a section "that would have extended for four years payments to rural counties that once depended on federal timber money to fund schools and libraries," reports the Mail Tribune of Medford, Ore.

"A House bill approved last week would set aside more than $1.5 billion to compensate 700 rural counties in 39 states — mostly in the South and West — that were hurt by federal logging cutbacks in the 1990s," the paper recalls. "The counties lost money when the government restricted logging in national forests to help preserve the spotted owl and other threatened species. Timber payments added $23 million annually to Jackson County coffers."

The timber deal "was dropped in final negotiations Thursday as Senate Democrats agreed to remove tax breaks for a wide range of clean energy industries from the energy bill," reports the Mail Tribune, in a staff-and-wires report. (Read more)

Rising cost of hay puts pressure on livestock

Last month we wrote about how drought and other extreme weather had created a shortage of hay throughout the country. The prices for hay are still rising, and farmers in places such as Connecticut are feeling the effects, reports the Norwich Bulletin.

The costs of hay have risen "at a rate comparable to oil, making it a rare commodity in the last few months," Dustin Racioppi writes. As a result, the Connecticut state legislature has earmarked "several million" to help farmers, Racioppi reports.

In the area around Norwich, some farmers have been forced to sell of their entire herd of cattle to get back in the black. Another has started buying hay from Canada, but at $275 a ton, the price is still far higher than it used to be. And at one stable, the owner has cut back services and can now only provide "rough boarding" — essentially just the stall — so that owners must purchase food, hay or bedding for the horse. (Read more)

Illinois High School Association sues Illinois Press Association, newspapers, over athletic photos

The Illinois High School Association and the Illinois Press Association have been fighting over photo rights for high school championship events for the past few months. In November, the IPA sued the the IHSA over a new policy that restricted the rights of newspapers to sell photographs taken at championship events. A few weeks later, we wrote that photographers from five newspapers had been barred from the state's football title games by the IHSA. Last week, the IHSA filed a counter suit against the IPA, reports the National Press Photographers Association.

"The IHSA has filed a counter suit in Sangamon County Circuit Court in Springfield asking a judge to declare that IHSA has the exclusive right to sell photographs taken at high school sporting events, and the right to impose limits on how newspapers use photographs, and for permission to restrict newspapers' access to IHSA games if editors and publishers fail to comply with IHSA polices," NPPA reports.

The counter suit names IPA, the Journal Star in Peoria, The State Register-Journal in Springfield, and The Northwest Herald in Crystal Lake, and asks for at least $50,000 in damage payments. (Read more)

Forest Service says proposed Virginia power plant would threaten wilderness area in North Carolina

The U.S. Forest Service says a proposed power plant in southwest Virginia could reduce visibility and the air quality needed by some plants in a scenic gorge in northwestern North Carolina, reports Keith Strange of The Coalfield Progress in Norton, Va.

At issue are Dominion Virginia Power's proposed Virginia City Hybrid Energy Center and the Linville Gorge Wilderness, along the Blue Ridge Parkway, which some have called "the Grand Canyon of the East." That's an exaggeration, but it's a great place, as we found when we took this photo in June 2006.

Pisgah National Forest Supervisor Marisue Hilliard said in a Dec. 4 letter "that sulfur dioxide emissions from the plant could have a detrimental effect on plant life in the Linville Gorge," Strange writes. "Hilliard said that the 3,369 tons projected to be emitted annually by the plant would violate the federal Clean Air Act." (Read more)

UPDATE, Dec. 20: Dominion and the Forest Service agreed on mitigation measures, under which Hilliard said the agency's concerns “should be fully addressed to our satisfaction.” (Read more)

Bid to lower farm subsidy cap falls short in Senate

The U.S. Senate voted 56 to 43 today to limit farm program payments to $250,000 per producer, but that was four votes short of the 60 needed to for passage, under a bipartisan agreement to avoid filibusters.

Without the change, sought by small farmers, environmentalists and international development groups, the limit will remain $360,000. However, the bill "would require payments to be tracked to each individual, end the practice of collecting subsidies indirectly and eliminate 'commodity certificates' that can be used to evade the $360,000 a year limit set in 2002," reports Charles Abbott of Reuters. (Read more)

Key to the amendment's defeat were senators from states that grow rice and cotton. "Cotton and rice interests [said] their producers stand to lose more than that in a year if a crop goes bad," writes Bob Meyer of Brownfield Network. "A similar amendment passed the Senate back in 2002 when the current farm bill was being debated only to be removed in the conference committee." (Read more)

A final Senate vote on the bill is expected Friday.

Booming immigration in some Iowa counties makes it a major issue for the presidential caucuses

In 1851, the five-year-old state of Iowa created Buena Vista County, naming it for a great battle of the Mexican War. Now some call the county seat of Storm Lake "Little Mexico," because it has recently become home to many Hispanic immigrants. Similar influxes in other rural areas, scattered across the state, have made immigration a big issue for voters in the state's Jan. 3 presidential caucuses.

The irony of the county's name was lost on The New York Times, which has a story today in which Monica Davey reports from Storm Lake as the epicenter of the immigration issue in Iowa. The story is accompanied by excellent maps with graphic representations of the county-by-county impact of immigration. Here's one:Davey writes, "The nation’s struggle over immigration may seem distant in states like Iowa, hundreds of miles from any border, but the debate is part of daily life here, more than ever now as residents prepare to pick a president. Nearly all of more than two dozen people interviewed here last week said they considered immigration policy at or near the top of their lists of concerns as they look to the presidential caucuses next month. And yet, nearly everyone interviewed said that none of the political candidates had arrived at a position on immigration that fully satisfied them. In real life, they said, the issues surrounding immigration, both legal and illegal, were far more complicated than bumper sticker slogans or jabs on a debate stage or even the carefully picked language of campaign policy papers." (Read more)

As noted here 11 days ago, the weekly Storm Lake Times is pro-immigration. "Thousands of immigrants have worked in our town’s two meatpacking plants, working hard, hoping for a better life for their children, sending money home to Mexico and other nations to help their families left behind. They build businesses and churches, they add color and richness, they learn English as they can and they help an isolated rural community grow and prosper," wrote Art Cullen. "Yes, we need secure borders. We need to know just who is living and working in Storm Lake. We also need workers in our meatpacking plants as the first generation moves up the economic ladder. If we don’t cut the meat here, be assured that the meat will get cut somewhere else and those jobs are lost to us. What we really need is to open up the immigration quotas to fill our low-skilled, medium-skilled and high-skilled job shortages." (Read more)

Church-driven Huckabee surge draws eyes of some who want to keep the tax-exempt out of politics

Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee has gained the lead in polls of likely Republican caucus-goers in Iowa, "driven largely by an eleventh-hour rally of Christian activists behind the Republican’s candidacy, and that’s certain to draw attention from tax sleuths and others," reports Jeanne Cummings, the money-and-politics reporter for Politico.com. We think it should also attract the attention of rural reporters, who are often in a better position to detect such violations of the law prohibiting political activity by tax-exempt organizations.

"The two cases should put a host of Iowa church officials on notice as they join a coalition of home-schooling families working to secure a headline-grabbing, first-primary victory for the former Arkansas governor," writes Cummings, formerly of The Wall Street Journal and the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. "Thus far, Huckabee has been endorsed by more than 60 Iowa pastors."

“We will be watching it very closely,” Rob Boston of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, told Cummings, who notes the group "has filed two complaints with the IRS accusing Huckabee’s religious backers outside Iowa of violating their tax-free status. The California pastor who used church stationery to endorse his fellow Southern Baptist minster urged his flock "to pray for the deaths of" the AU officials who filed the complaint against him.

"A second complaint, filed against Jerry Falwell Jr., accuses the son of the late Moral Majority founder of violating Liberty University’s tax status by using the school’s resources to announce his endorsement of Huckabee, a former Baptist preacher," Cummings writes, noting that the group "is also monitoring Democrat Barack Obama’s latest round of church visits in the African American community." AU issued a release Tuesday questioning an Alabama group's plan to distribute in churches material promoting Democrat Hillary Clinton.

The IRS increased its monitoring of church political activity in 2004. "No church lost its tax status, but 42 were found to have broken the no-partisan-politicking rules and received advisories about their activities," Cummings notes. "Last year, the IRS received 237 complaints about illegal politicking by churches and charities, which led to about 100 investigations." Cummings goes on to detail the boundaries between allowable and illegal activity. (Read more)

Meanwhile, author Todd Gitlin has eight questions, many of them related to religion, that reporters should ask Huckabee. It's the first in a series for Columbia Journalism Review. Next: a set of different questions for Obama. Click here.

UPDATE, Dec. 12: Seema Mehta and Stephanie Simon of the Times write of Huckabee, "One of his premiere battalions is a tight network of Christian home-schooling families who view the campaign as a civic -- and educational -- duty." (Read more)

Huckabee, seeking Cuban American votes in Fla., switches stand and now supports Cuban embargo

When Mike Huckabee was governor of Arkansas, the nation's seventh most rural state, he opposed the trade embargo of Cuba, as did many in agriculture and other industries. Now, as a surging candidate for president, he has changed his position -- in a transparent appeal to Cuban Americans in Florida, one of the biggest prizes in the contest for the Republican nomination. (Associated Press photo)

"Rather than seeing it as some huge change, I would call it, rather, the simple reality that I'm running for president of the United States, not for reelection as governor of Arkansas," he said yesterday in Miami, where state House Speaker Marco Rubio, a Cuban American, endorsed him. "I've got to look at this as an issue that touches the whole country."

"Huckabee's statement reflected one of the most dramatic reversals by a major presidential candidate on the issue that has defined U.S.-Cuba policy for nearly half a century," because he lobbied President Bush in 2002 to end the embargo, write Beth Reinhard and Laura Figueroa of The Miami Herald. "Huckabee's conversion also surprised the Arkansas Rice Growers Association, which represents the state's top agricultural industry. Cuba is one of the largest potential U.S. markets for rice in the world." (Read more)

Huckabee pleaded for his rice farmers in lobbying Bush, notes Peter Wallsten of the Los Angeles Times. "It was a change of heart sure to please hard-liners among the Cuban exiles who could make up 10 percent or more of the electorate in Florida's crucial Jan. 29 Republican primary," Wallsten writes. "But it also reflected the latest move by a once-obscure candidate now grappling with how to transform a burst of momentum into a sustainable bid for the White House." (Read more)

Farm Bill debate finally begins in the Senate

The U.S. Senate is finally debating the Farm Bill, touching off a furious, last-minute siege of lobbying and editorializing on the five-year plan for agriculture, nutrition, Rural Development and other rural programs. Officially titled the Food and Energy Security Act of 2007, it also includes sections on biofuels. Debate began after an agreement that the Senate would consider 20 amendments from each party. Sen. John Thune, R-S.D., said this afternoon that only 14 percent of the $288 billion projected cost of the bill is for production agriculture. He said 9 percent for conservation (most of which is payments to landowners) and 67 percent for food programs.

"With voting set to start Tuesday, some pending amendments already appear to be long-shot statements of principle," reports Michael Doyle of the McClatchy Co. Washington Bureau. "An early and important test of Senate reform sentiment will come on an amendment putting a $250,000 limit on the amount of federal payments a couple can receive. The current limit is $360,000." (Read more) "The Bush administration has threatened to veto the Farm Bill unless Congress delivers more cuts to the number of wealthy farmers included in the programs," notes Elliott Blackburn of The Lubbock Avalanche-Journal. (Read more)

The Washington Post urged senators to consider its "Harvesting Cash" series about farm subsidies and Rural Development programs. "This painstaking journalism by Dan Morgan, Gilbert M. Gaul and Sarah Cohen identified $15 billion in government waste that had escaped the notice of executive branch investigators, the Government Accountability Office and congressional committees," a Post editorial said. (Read more) "What should happen in rural development is not part of the editorial," notes the Daily Yonder.

Potentially harmful levels of weedkiller atrazine showing up in streams in Missouri and Indiana

"Atrazine, the second most widely used weedkiller in the country, is showing up in some streams and rivers at levels high enough to potentially harm amphibians, fish and aquatic ecosystems, according to the findings of an extensive Environmental Protection Agency database that has not been made public," reports Juliet Eilperin in The Washington Post.

"The analysis -- conducted by the chemical's manufacturer, Syngenta Crop Protection -- suggests that atrazine has entered streams and rivers in the Midwest at a rate that could harm those ecosystems, several scientific experts said. In two Missouri watersheds, the level of atrazine spiked to reach a 'level of concern' in both 2004 and 2005, according to the EPA, and an Indiana watershed exceeded the threshold in 2005."

The watersheds were not named, but those in Missouri are in the northeast part of the state. Sygenta toxicology chief Tim Pastoor said those two monitoring sites were prone to excessive runoff for various reasons, including vegetation clearance by a farmer. "Syngenta sales agents and local corn growers are trying to reform the practices of the farmer," Eilperin reports. EPA won't release the analysis because Sygenta claims some of the data are proprietary. The Post got the records from from the Natural Resources News Service, a Washington-based nonprofit group focused on environmental issues. (Read more)

Banks, rural electrics, economic-development groups try to keep young people in rural Iowa

In Iowa, "Banks, rural electric cooperatives, economic development groups and governments are striving to stem the outflow of young talent and economic vitality," reports S.P. Dinnen of the Des Moines Register. "Just 29 of the state's 99 counties gained population between 1970 and 2000, and that trend continues. So, these groups are coming up with tax breaks, housing options and other incentives to try to stem the brain drain."

Some examples:

Hampton State Bank offers a 3.99 percent home loan to anyone who graduated from a Franklin County high school and moves back home. Brian Lubkmen and his wife, Kirsten, above, are using the program to finance a geodesic-dome home. In Greene County, "Economic development and housing groups are joining with employers to make a $1,000 relocation package available to people who move there. Community programs also are building spec homes that can be ready for occupancy as soon as someone is recruited to work."

Greene County's economic-development director is Jefferson Herald Publisher Rick Morain, former president of Iowa State University’s Community Vitality Center. The center, which gets $250,000 a year from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, is an outgrowth of concern by rural newspaper publishers. Through the Iowa Newspaper Foundation, they realized the need for "a broad-based statewide organization to help rural communities," Morain said at "Health, Wealth and Wireless: Issues and Stories for Rural Iowa," a workshop held in Des Moines in May by the foundation, the Center for Rural Strategies, the Main Street Project and the Institute for Rural Journalism and Community Issues.

Presidential candidates need small-town values and solutions for small-town problems, columnist says

The first presidential caucus and two of the first three primaries occur in states with disproportionately rural populations, but "There are few small town economic issues being discussed," even though most presidents grew up in small towns, columnist Don McNay writes in the Richmond (Ky.) Register and other Community Newspaper Holdings papers.

"Small-town populations are getting older and their young people are moving to big towns for jobs. Large factories are moving to foreign countries and nothing is replacing them. Is anyone candidate talking about the small towns? If so, please let me know. I hear more debate about rooting for the Boston Red Sox than saving the beauty of small town life. I don't hear anyone talking about rural drug addiction and the dangers of Oxycontin."

After noting his recent column about Rudy Giuliani's work to keep makers of Oxycontin out of prison, McNay writes, "Oxycontin is a primary contributor to the decline of rural America. A whole generation of young people are addicted, dying, neglecting their children and not able to hold a job. For some reason, Oxycontin has been a small town problem. The drug is not as popular in urban areas. Thus, it is ignored by the national media and national candidates. It's more fun to argue about the Red Sox."

McNay, left, writes that a friend commutes 50 miles from his rural home to a large city because, as the friend said, "There are big-town values and small-town values." And that sets the stage for his closing argument: "Small-town people are used to accountability. Everyone knows each other and what they do. At my peak weight, I tried to buy a box of donuts. The grocery clerk looked at the donuts and said 'Aren't you the guy who writes about dieting for the newspaper?' I put back the donuts and got serious about weight loss.

"I laugh at all media attention given to Giuliani and his mistress sneaking off to their fancy love nest. If Rudolph had lived in a small town, he wouldn't have been able to get away with cheating on his wife. Everyone would have known about the affair immediately. . . . Living life in public makes you think before you act. It's a moral compass that candidates need to have. I've been touting small-town candidates like Mike Huckabee and John Edwards. I don't know if they have a plan for rural America but they have a sense of what rural life is like. I want a president who grew up knowing that if they cheated on their spouse or cheated on their diet, someone would hold them responsible." (Read more)

Southwest Va. county starts cleaning out sinkholes

For eons, human beings have treated sinkholes as natural trash bins, where something no longer needed or wanted could be put out of sight, out of mind. But not out of nature's way. Sinkholes are created by water eroding away limestone, so they're open doors into underground drainage systems, which resurface as springs or well water. The workings of such karst areas were not widely understood until modern times, and some people still don't appreciate it.

In rural Virginia, about half the residents still get their water from springs or wells, according to Bill Keith, a district conservationist with the Department of Agriculture’s Natural Resources Conservation Service. He showed up in The Coalfield Progress this week, in a story about Wise County litter control officer Greg Cross (operating the backhoe in photo by Richard Jessee) starting a tough job that few local governments are willing to tackle: cleaning out sinkholes.

"Wise County workers, along with helpers from Buchanan, Dickenson and Russell counties’ litter control departments and inmates from the regional jail in Duffield, pulled several truckloads of twisted, rusting metal out of the sinkhole and away from the valley’s water table," Jodi Deal reports. "Removed from the sinkhole were three vehicles, including an old Volkswagen Beetle and a 1958 Chevy. Workers also found countless eroding gas tanks, mattresses, box springs, water heaters and other large items. Putting those kids of items — particularly the cars and gas tanks — in a sinkhole is very dangerous behavior, Bill Keith explained." (Read more; subscription required)

Post finds trouble in USDA Rural Development loans

A U.S. Department of Agriculture loan program to create jobs in rural areas "has endured nearly $1.5 billion in losses while backing almost $14 billion in guarantees to private banks," reports Gilbert Gaul of The Washington Post. "Actual losses are almost surely higher," but the Post couldn't total them because USDA "refuses to disclose losses on loans to individual companies, even after they go out of business."

This is the latest Post report on the foibles of USDA's Rural Development programs. Gaul delivers a devastating summary: "More than three decades after the loan program was created, USDA officials still don't know whether it works. Funds have gone to firms that have hired foreign workers instead of Americans. Millions more have gone to failing and bankrupt businesses. Most of the jobs are not new. Many are low-tech and low-wage."

There's a lot more, and it's not a pretty picture. "In some cases, creating a single job costs hundreds of thousands of dollars," Gaul writes. "Three-fourths of the jobs that the USDA attributes to its guaranteed-loan program are 'saved,' not new, a Post analysis found. ... Thomas C. Dorr, USDA undersecretary for rural development, did not dispute The Post's findings." He told the paper, "We are making a legitimate effort to deal with all of these issues." (Read more)

Farm Bill deal doesn't mean passage will come soon

Senate leaders agreed Thursday night on how to handle the Farm Bill, "but that won't necessarily translate into a quick Senate vote on the measure," report Peter Shinn and Tom Steever of Brownfield Network. "A new farm law could still be months away."

The deal calls for 20 amendments from each party, many more than had been suggested. "As the Senate begins taking up individual amendments, regional, rather than partisan interests, are expected to drive the debate," Brownfield reports. "For example, one of the amendments Senators will debate would impose a $250,000 hard cap on farm program payments. The amendment is co-sponsored by Iowa Republican Chuck Grassley and North Dakota Democrat Byron Dorgan, both long-time champions of tighter payment limits, and both from states were such limits are popular. But payment limits are not popular in the South, where cotton and rice growers, who tend to be larger than Midwest corn, soybean and wheat farmers, argue their capital intensive crop production practices necessitate a generous safety net."

American Farm Bureau Federation lobbyist Mary Kay Thatcher told Brownfield that she expects the Senate to pass the bill before Christmas, but "I still think you're betting more on March, maybe April," before it can get through a House-Senate conference committee and avoid a veto from President Bush, whose administration has called the bill too expensive.

Maine paper, then AP, report on suicide of Iraq vet

Local news media can tell many stories others cannot. Since the war in Iraq, they have taken on one of the toughest: the suicides of American soldiers while they are overseas or after they return home. Editor & Publisher has highlighted the newspapers that have addressed the issue, and the Sun Journal, a 34,000-circulation daily in Lewiston, Me., is the latest to do so.

Daniel Hartill, a reporter from the Sun Journal, wrote an in-depth article about one local veteran's story who took his own life on Thanksgiving. The article has been picked up by The Associated Press, which reported in October that at least 147 soldiers had committed suicide while serving in Iraq and Afghanistan, and that at least 283 combat veterans who left the military between the start of the war and the end of 2005 had taken their own lives. To read the AP story based on Hartill's reporting, go here.

Companies putting computer work into small towns

A few weeks ago, we wrote about some American companies that are using home-based customer service agents instead of sending those jobs overseas. Northrop Grumman Corp., a global defense and technology corporation, is taking that step further by opening information-technology centers in seven small towns, reports the Los Angeles Times.

The L.A.-based company picked Corsicana, Tex., and six other small cities, including Lebanon, Va., and Helena, Mont., reports the Times' Peter Pae. The employees at these centers will "develop software and troubleshoot technical problems for clients hundreds or thousands of miles away," he writes. "It costs Northrop about 40 percent less to have the work done in Corsicana than in Los Angeles – savings similar to what would be achieved by sending jobs overseas."

Pae also points to moves by Accenture and Dell Computer as other examples of companies picking up on this trend. The big winners are the small towns because these white-collar jobs can diversify the local economy and have inspired some growth, such as in Corsicana. (Read more)

In a rural Iowa town with few immigrants, immigration's a big issue; statewide, too

"Strangers are rare" in Iowa Falls, population 5,000, 97 percent of it white, reports Louise Roug of the Los Angeles Times. But to many in the town, and the state as a whole, "Illegal immigration is the top issue in the presidential primary race. To them, it's about fairness and jobs."

Among Iowans who told a Des Moines Register pollster that they were likely to attend one of the nation's first presidential caucuses on Jan. 3, 81 percent of Republicans and 67 percent of Democrats consider immigration a key issue," Roug reports. "The issue also has come to dominate the national campaign discussion" in the past week or so.

"Many of the candidates have linked immigration to domestic security," Roug writes. "But in Iowa Falls, where most of the jobs are in construction and residents are older and poorer than the state average, the issue is located squarely in the pocketbook." (Read more)

Study boosts Pa. plan to give all high-schoolers a laptop, but rural schools question long-term cost

A program to give a laptop computer to every high-school student in Pennsylvania "is making students more engaged in class but favors richer schools," educators and advocates for rural and small schools told state legislators this week, reports Christina Gostomski of the Harrisburg Bureau of The Morning Call in Allentown.

"Officials from the Pennsylvania School Boards Association and the Pennsylvania Association of Rural and Small Schools said the program, which does not have a dedicated source of funding, threatens to saddle school districts with large laptop maintenance bills and favors richer school districts that can afford those costs," Gostomski writes.

Gov. Ed Rendell wants every high school to have the program by 2009, "but the program has been contentious and might face a fight for survival in the annual budget battle," The Morning Call reports. The program cost $20 million last school year and $90 million this year. It currently serves 356,000 students.

A study by researchers at Penn State "reported that teachers spent less time on lectures and more time working with students in small groups," Gostomski writes. "The study was based on classroom observations and student and teacher interviews. It did not address any changes in student achievement, but a second study is expected to look at student learning." (Read more)

Deal preserves federal payments to rural schools, local governments in national-forest areas

Rural counties that have relied on national-forest logging to fund schools and other public services would get "a ramped-down, four-year extension of the Secure Rural Schools and Community Self Determination Act [in] the final version of the energy bill," which President Bush may veto, reports Jeff Kosseff of The Oregonian.

Congress passed the 2000 act "to provide safety-net funding to make up for declining timber revenues that the federal government had long shared with rural counties. Oregon has received more than half of the money in the past," Kosseff writes. "The compromise bill would gradually reduce the program's total funding by about 15 percent a year from the 2008 to 2011 fiscal years. It also would spend about $350 million to fully fund another federal payments program, known as Payments in Lieu of Taxes, which is important to states such as Nevada, home to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, and Montana, home to Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus." (Read more)

Lawmakers struck by trip to mountaintop-removal coal mines in Ky.; one says state limits are coming

Efforts to limit the mountaintop-removal strip mining of coal in Eastern Kentucky got a boost yesterday as members of the state House budget committee toured mine sites and talked to opponents of the controversial practice, who "think people in Frankfort don’t care. That may have changed Monday," writes Ronnie Ellis, state-capital reporter for Community Newspaper Holdings.

The committee chairman, Rep. Harry Moberly, D-Richmond, told Ellis that committee members were struck by what they saw and heard. “It was very moving,” Moberly said. “It’s one thing to hear it in testimony but it’s another to see it up close and the people who are directly affected by it.” (Photo by Charles Bertram, Lexington Herald-Leader)

Moberly represents a Bluegrass district that drinks from the Kentucky River, which flows from the eastern mountains and has long had much sediment from coal mining. So does Rep. Don Pasley, D-Winchester, who has twice sponsored a bill to ban the disposal of mined material in streams and watercourses, a practice necessary in almost all mountaintop-removal mining. The bill has failed to get out of a House committee dominated by coalfield legislators, but "Moberly said what lawmakers saw Monday will inspire them to pass Pasley’s bill," Ellis reports. (Read more) For more detail, on both sides of the issue, click here for a report from the Institute for Rural Journalism and Community Issues.

Moberly told Cassondra Kirby of the Herald-Leader's Eastern Kentucky Bureau, "I don't feel we can stop mining coal. But I think we should do everything we can to make sure the mining of coal doesn't affect the quality of life in those areas." Rep. Charlie Siler, R-Williamsburg, a coalfield lawmaker, told Kirby, "I think a compromise has to be sought in order for Kentucky to move forward in the area of energy. We need to preserve those mountains that don't need to be bothered. But we have to contend with the fact that some mountains are going to have to come down."

The tour was conducted by Kentuckians for the Commonwealth, a social-justice group that opposes mountaintop removal and asked the panel to visit the region during a debate on a coal-to-synthetic-fuels bill last summer. Kentucky Coal Association President Bill Caylor told Kirby that the committee should see both sides of the issue. "He said he would have liked to take legislators to the top of a reclaimed site to show them the view," Kirby reports. "He said legislators also should see the Hazard hospital, as well as several subdivisions in Perry County -- all of which have been built on flat land created by mountaintop mining." (Read more)

Senate leaders say Farm Bill vote could come soon

There's still a chance the Farm Bill might reach the Senate floor this year, reports Dow Jones Newswires. Majority Leader Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., said a compromise could bring the bill to a vote in the three weeks left before the Senate goes on vacation again, Bill Tomson reports.

"I think we're at the point where we should be able to do a farm bill by unanimous consent," Reid told Tomson. Even if a vote is taken, the bill would still need to go through a Senate-House conference committee before it could reach the White House. (Read more)

Reid, did not say when the vote could take place, notes Charles Abbott of Reuters. Minority Leader Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said negotiations on the amendment process were still ongoing. "There are a lot of people that would like to pass the farm bill, on both sides," Sen. McConnell said at a briefing. "That usually produces the kind of environment in which things are possible." (Read more)

Deal could reopen Russia's markets to U.S. beef

Four years ago, the appearance of a case of mad cow disease in the United States prompted Russia to ban U.S. beef. In the time since then, Russians now have a taste for more expensive cuts of meat, and a new deal could reopen that market to U.S. beef, reports The Wall Street Journal.

Sparked by rising oil revenue, Russia's economy now allows for the purchase of more than one million metric tons of beef in 2007, a sharp jump from the 640,000 tons bought in 2001, reports Bill Tomson. Restrictions have made trade with Russia difficult, but the new deal could change that. Without U.S. imports, Russia has not been able to meet demand.

"The new agreement that U.S. and Russian negotiators have been working on for months is said to be compliant with international guidelines laid out by the Paris-based World Organization for Animal Health, or OIE," Tomson writes. "In May, the OIE granted the U.S. a favorable "controlled risk" rating for the way it protects cattle and the human food supply from BSE, a disease that can be transmitted to humans through consumption of tainted meat." (Read more; subscription site)

Oregon paper doing big series on invasive species

For an excellent example of environmental reporting, check out the work being done by The Statesman Journal in Salem, Ore. In September, the state-capital newspaper began a 10-month series investigating the impact of invasive species on the state.

This month's focus is on aquatic plants (at left in Statesman Journal photo by Diane Stevenson) that take over lakes and streams after being discarded from aquariums. Henry Miller reports on the spread of the plants and the state's fight against them.

In the first two installments of the series, the 50,000-circulation newspaper offered an overview of this "biological pollution" and then coverage of invasive mammals. The series has a great presence online, and its site includes searchable databases, photo and video galleries, as well as educational materials.

West Virginia, Kentucky dentists urge states to require dental examinations for school children

Studies have linked oral hygiene to overall health, yet in many places there are gaps in dental care. In West Virginia, a task force of dentists says the state must take action to address an "oral health care crisis," reports The Charleston Gazette. Similar calls are coming from Kentucky, which competes with West Virginia for the dubious distinction of the state with the poorest oral health.

The West Virginia Dental Association says up to 40 percent of the state's children never see a dentist, the Gazette reports. “We see rampant decay,” Dr. Carol Buffington, a member of the task force, told reporter Eric Eyre. “We are in an oral health-care crisis in the state of West Virginia.”

The group recommends that the state legislature require kindergarten students, second-graders and sixth-graders to show proof that dentists have examined them. The group also wants Medicaid expanded to cover low-income adults beyond emergency dental procedures and to increase reimbursements to dentists. To pay for this, the group recommends increasing the state soft-drink tax. (Read more) The Kentucky Dental Association, which has long tried to get a sponsor for legislation requiring a dental exam for enrollment in kindergarten, has secured one.

In a case of squatters' rights, Colorado couple wins in court but not in local opinion

Adverse possession is part of the fine print -- in the law, not a deed -- that comes with property ownership. In short, it means that if you don't use it, you might lose it. In October, a retired judge and his wife in Boulder, Colo., invoked the rule, sometimes known as squatters' rights, to claim part of a neighboring vacant lot — property owned by their neighbors, reports the Los Angeles Times. A judge awarded Richard McLean and Edith Stevens the land since they had used it — unknown to the land's owners, Don and Susie Kirlin — for the last 20 years, reports DeeDee Correll.

"The doctrine of adverse possession, which says a person can gain possession of property after using it without challenge by the owner for a certain length of time, isn't a new or obscure legal doctrine," Correll writes."Still, its application in this case has the residents of this university town fuming." Don Kirlin said the seized property is worth about $1 million, and that he thought it was joke when he heard about the case. Many in the community took the Kirlins' side. There was a protest outside the property that drew 200 people, and state legislators are considering changes to the law, Correll reports.

Rules about adverse possession vary from state to state and can require five to 30 years of uninterrupted used to be invoked. California requires five years of use and the payment of property taxes at the same time. Kentucky requires 15 years of unchallenged use. (Read more)

Shakeouts seem to be starting in biofuels industries

"Mergers and a bankruptcy last week in the ethanol business reveal an industry that is consolidating," write Bill Bishop and Richard Oswald in the Daily Yonder. "Will there be room for rural communities and local investors to profit from biofuels?" That question may take a while to answer, but it seems likely that the ethanol and biodiesel industries are starting shakeouts in which big producers will swallow up smaller ones, which often have local investors.

"The big news in rural business over the past week, to us at least, was the rapid-fire consolidation in the alternative-fuels business," Bishop and Oswald write. "VeraSun Energy Corp. made a deal late last week to purchase the smaller U.S. BioEnergy Corp. in an all-stock deal that could make the combined companies the largest producer of ethanol in the United States by the end of next year. Archer Daniels Midland Co. produces the most ethanol now and expects to gin out 1.34 billion gallons by the end of next year. The larger VeraSun, however, would be producing over 1.6 billion gallons by the time 2008 finishes. ... The deal is widely seen as the most prominent example of consolidation in what had been a rapidly expanding industry. But recently there has been a glut in ethanol production and per-gallon profits have dropped dramatically."

The Yonder notes that construction has stopped on a locally owned ethanol plant being built in Rock Port, Mo. That could be "a signal of how hard it may be for rural communities and small investors to participate in the prosperity generated by renewable fuels produced from farm raised feed stocks," Bishop and Oswald write.

A shakeout also seems likely in the biodiesel industry, which "is struggling to cope with soaring soybean-oil prices, a glut of production capacity and a poorly developed distribution system," reports Nancy Cole in the Arkansas Democrat Gazette. "The entire biodiesel industry is confronting difficulties, said Jenna Higgins, communications director for the National Biodiesel Board, the industry trade association based in Columbia, Mo." In a long story, Cole reports biodiesel companies shelving construction plans and going into bankruptcy. (Read more)

As coal mining increased, safety agency cut staff

Between 2002 and 2006, the number of coal-mining operations nationwide increased by 9 percent. At the same time, the number of federal inspectors was cut by 18 percent" by the U.S. Mine Safety and Health Administration, writes Ken Ward Jr. of the Sunday Gazette-Mail in Charleston, W. Va.

"The result? Agency officials never conducted more than 150 required inspections at more than 100 underground mines across the coalfields, according to a government audit. MSHA officials not only missed required inspections, but they misled agency managers — and the public — about inspection completion rates."

As reported before on The Rural Blog, the worst problem was in southern West Virginia, "where 85 percent of the missed inspections occurred, according to an audit by the Labor Department’s inspector general," Ward writes. "In MSHA District 4, which covers southern West Virginia, the inspector general found missed inspections at 85 of 165 underground mines. . . . The staffing situation was worst in Southern West Virginia, where MSHA had just 0.44 inspectors per MMU," or mechanized mining unit. (Read more)

Rural caucus-goers will outnumber urban ones in Iowa, campaigns say; new polls drive new tactics

As Sen. Barack Obama and former Gov. Mike Huckabee took narrow leads in polls of Iowa caucusgoers, supplanting Sen. Hillary Clinton and former Gov. Mitt Romney, The Washington Post reported that rural voters are expected to have disproportionate influence in the Jan. 3 caucuses. "Campaign officials describe the pool this year as typically older, more likely to be rural than urban, and more inclined to pick a candidate based on practical issues such as electability rather than on ideological grounds," Peter Slevin and Shailagh Murray report.

The latest Iowa Poll for The Des Moines Register, conducted Nov. 25-28 (results in Register chart), found women shifting from Clinton to Obama, Thomas Beaumont reports: "Obama leads with support from 31 percent of women likely attend the caucuses, compared to 26 percent for Clinton. In October, Clinton was the preferred candidate of 34 percent of women caucusgoers, compared to 21 percent for Obama. Women represent roughly six in 10 Democratic caucusgoers. . . . Other troubling news for Clinton included a sharp decline in support from members of union households, where she was the preferred candidate with support from 34 percent in the October poll. In the new poll, Clinton is third among union households with 21 percent." The poll's margin of error was 4.4 percentage points, so both leads were statistically insigniifcant.

The poll of Republicans "shows Huckabee, a former Baptist minister, leading Romney 38 percent to 22 percent among those who consider themselves born-again Christians. In October, Romney edged Huckabee 23 percent to 18 percent among people in that group, which accounts for one-half of all likely caucus participants." But Register columnist David Yepsen cautions, "Huckabee should be concerned about his turnout operation. He's thinly staffed, and Romney has the better organization. Look for Romney to start pouring everything into Iowa to stave off an upset loss that could derail his entire candidacy." (Read more)

Huckabee, speaking at the Cheshire County GOP holiday party, aired tonight on C-SPAN's "Road to the White House," played up his rural roots. He said he was the first in family to graduate from high school, and on his mother's side, was "one generation removed from dirt floors and outhouses." He also recalled using Lava soap: "I was in college when I found out it's not supposed to hurt when you take a shower." Huckabee will appear on the renewed "Don Imus Show" on RFD-TV at 7:30 a.m. CST Tuesday, its second day back on the air, reports Michael Shear on The Trail, the Post political blog: "When Imus was forced out, many politicians and former guests said they regretted their appearances on the show and said they would no longer be guests if he returned to the airwaves. Huckabee was not one of them. From the beginning, he said Imus had made a mistake and should be allowed to move on." Huckabee told USA Today earlier this year, "He's continued to have me on his show when I said stupid things. . . . What Imus said was wrong, but he seems genuinely sorry." (Read more)

UPDATE, Dec. 3: Romney shifted gears over the weekend and scheduled a speech this Thursday on religion, reflecting the possibility that his Mormon faith is giving him trouble with some voters, perhaps especially with rural people unfamiliar with the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. At an "Ask Mitt Anything" town-hall meeting at Kirkwood Community College in Cedar Rapids, telecast on C-SPAN, a male questioner who appeared to be about 65 said, "Your religion is a concern to many people. I'd like to hear your answer to that question." Romney replied that Americans should not base their vote for president "on where a person goes to church," quoted Abraham Lincoln on "political religion" of the nation being support for the rule of law and the Constitution, and mentioned the constitutional provision that there shall be no religious test for public office. For a take on new tactics by Romney and Clinton, who is now questioning Obama's courage and integrity, by Peter Nicholas and Peter Wallsten of the Los Angeles Times, click here. For a Post story by Anne Kornblut on the Clinton-Obama developments, click here.

Weekly Iowa editor calls for thought on immigrants

As immigration became the leading issue in the Republican race for president, thanks in part to an undue emphasis by CNN in its recent YouTube debate, a weekly newspaper editor in Iowa asked his readers to step back and think about the issue and how it has affected their community and state for the better.

"Thousands of immigrants have worked in our town’s two meatpacking plants, working hard, hoping for a better life for their children, sending money home to Mexico and other nations to help their families left behind. They build businesses and churches, they add color and richness, they learn English as they can and they help an isolated rural community grow and prosper," wrote Art Cullen of the Storm Lake Times.

"Yes, we need secure borders. We need to know just who is living and working in Storm Lake. We also need workers in our meatpacking plants as the first generation moves up the economic ladder. If we don’t cut the meat here, be assured that the meat will get cut somewhere else and those jobs are lost to us. What we really need is to open up the immigration quotas to fill our low-skilled, medium-skilled and high-skilled job shortages." (Read more)

Most of the Times' Web site is only for subscribers, but access to the editorial comes to us by way of Offenburger.com, which adds a brief biography of Cullen, right, and his paper: "Art Cullen, 50, is editor of the Storm Lake Times, a twice-a-week newspaper serving the diverse and growing community of Storm Lake, which in the 2000 Census topped 10,000 for the first time in the town’s history – while all other county seat towns around it continued to decline in population. Cullen grew up in the community when it was nearly all-white. He went on to St. Thomas College in St. Paul, Minn. In his journalism career of nearly 30 years in Iowa, he first served as editor at the Algona Upper Des Moines and Kossuth County Advance, then managing editor at The Daily Tribune in Ames, and news editor/editorial page editor at the [Mason City] Globe-Gazette, before returning home in 1990 to help his brother John Cullen launch the Storm Lake Times. John Cullen is the paper’s publisher."

Iowa ag chief seeks $22 million to fight animal odor

Iowa's new agriculture secretary wants to spend $22 million over the next five years to find ways to control livestock odor. Bill Northey told a gathering in Fort Dodge that "Livestock producers are interested in odor-fighting technologies," which would be voluntary even if the state Legislature approves the plan, Bill Shea writes for the Fort Dodge Messenger.

"This offers a chance to really address the science behind it and get some stuff on the ground," Northey said at Iowa Central Community College, the day after he unveiled the idea before a state legislative committee. "The plan, he said, is to set up odor-fighting technologies on farms across the state and then assess how well they work," Shea reports. "He said he hopes to have some results to share with farmers after the first year of the program."

Two techniques Northey expects to be tested are vegetative buffers and biofilters, which "place natural substances such as wet bark near the ventilation fans of animal confinements. He said the wet bark reduces odor by 40 percent to 70 percent, but requires farmers to install bigger fans. . . . Currently, there are no state laws to regulate odors from livestock confinements." (Read more)

The plan got a salute from the Storm Lake Times, which said in an editorial, "For years the state has tried to deny that we have a problem, but now we are acknowledging that we have work to do at the state level. . . . This could be the first major step in ending the bitterness and division that has plagued rural Iowa for more than a decade." (Read more)

N.D. farmers lose lawsuit to raise hemp, but DEA set to allow research in state 8 years after request

Two North Dakota farmers who sued to end the federal policy that regards hemp as marijuana lost in court yesterday, but in the meantime, the Drug Enforcement Administration ook a step toward allowing North Dakota State University to conduct research on industrial hemp.

U.S. District Judge Daniel Hovland "wrote that the problem facing state-licensed hemp farmers David Monson and Wayne Hauge needs to be addressed by Congress if they hope to ever grow the versatile crop which is used in everything from food and soap to clothing and auto parts," reports USAgNet. The farmers may appeal. One point of contention could be that Hovland "ruled that hemp and marijuana are the same, as DEA has contended for years. However, scientific evidence clearly shows that not only is industrial hemp genetically distinct from the drug marijuana, there are also absolutely no psychoactive effects from ingesting it," USAgNet reports.

Two weeks after the hearing in the case, DEA has sent a Memorandum of Agreement to North Dakota State "which, if signed by the school, would clear the way for industrial hemp research there," USAgNet reports. "NDSU filed an amicus brief in support of the farmers' lawsuit which highlighted the university's eight-year struggle to secure a license from the DEA to grow industrial hemp for research as mandated by state law." (Read more) "NDSU has been required by state lawmakers to study industrial hemp as an alternative crop but has been unable to get DEA permission," reports Blake Nicholson of The Associated Press. DEA's conditions are related mainly to security concerns. (Read more)

Kentucky adds 4-H agent-at-large with focus on science and technology

Across the country, groups are trying to get more students interested in science and math. The National 4-H Council hopes to do the same, and in Kentucky, Toney Earle has been named the state's first 4-H agent-at-large for science, engineering and technology programs. he will work in the almost entirely rural western end of the state.

Earle's major focus areas will include biotechnology, robotics, forces in motion, global positioning systems and geographic information systems, according to a University of Kentucky news release. Earle, formerly a 4-H youth development agent in McCracken County, moved into his new role at the beginning of October and works from UK's College of Engineering facility at Paducah.

The goal is to get more young people interested in the subjects of math and science — areas where American students are trailing their peers internationally. Over the next five years, the National 4-H Council wants to use the program to add 1 million new young people to the association in the next five years. Kentucky hopes to add 50,000.

"If we can get them interested in something related to engineering, then we can show them that they need to be concentrating on math and science," Earle said in the release. "It’s not just having fun with robots, for example. You have to know not only that it is fun but the why behind them. You’ve got to understand the science that makes them work.” For the news-release site, click here. (Releases are not posted immediately)

Renew Rural Iowa attracts funds, plans investments

Rural areas need more jobs, and a program in Iowa is showing signs it can help answer that problem. Renew Rural Iowa, a $3 million project of the Iowa Farm Bureau Federation, set out to "to find, mentor and fund job-creating businesses in rural Iowa," and after year it is drawing additional investors, reports Peter Shinn of Brownfield Network.

The initial $3 million has grown to a total of $22.5 million in funding, thanks to contributions of other companies. That money will be used to invest in 20 businesses that Renew Rural Iowa believes will create more jobs for rural Iowans. The project is a three-year initiative, but its directors told Shinn they are hopeful the project will be extended even longer. (Read more)

To find out more about Renew Rural Iowa, go here.

Strong seat-belt laws help reduce rural road deaths

Resistance to meaningful seat-belt laws is often stronger in rural areas, but states without such laws have more fatalities on their rural roads, according to a study by the University of Minnesota Center for Rural Safety.

"Of the 10 states with the highest percentage of fatalities in rural areas in 2005, none had primary seat belt laws, or laws that allow law enforcement officers to pull people over for not using their seat belts," the center said in a release. "In contrast, 13 of the 20 states with the lowest percentage of fatalities in rural areas had enacted primary seat belt laws." The map above reflects laws was they were in 2005; Kentucky, for example, has since passed a primary law.

The Federal Highway Administration says 57 percent of fatalities occur on rural roads (those located outside of areas with a population of 5,000 or more) though only 21 percent of the U.S. population is generally considered rural. Just over half of the fatal rural accidents involved a driver from a metropolitan area.

Cartoonist at Utah weekly resigns after plagiarism

Until recently, The Park Record in Park City, Utah, enjoyed a luxury few other weekly newspapers have — a prize-winning cartoonist. This week, however, editors of the 7,300-circulation paper said they had no choice but to ask for the resignation of that cartoonist, John Kilbourn, after a reader noticed similarities between a recent cartoon and one from Mad magazine, the newspaper reports. Kilbourn's drawing bore a strong resemblance to a cartoon titled "Bananaz" drawn by Mort Drucker for Mad about 45 years ago.

"Kilbourn, who has been drawing cartoons for The Record since April, 1997 said he believed he had made enough changes in the original to warrant re-running it with a different caption," according to The Record's staff report. "However, after receiving a fax of the original drawing from KPCW reporter Rick Brough on Tuesday, Record publisher Andy Bernhard and editor Nan Chalat-Noaker say they had no other choice than to ask for Kilbourn's resignation." The paper noted Kilbourn had won many awards from the Utah Press Association for his cartoons. (Read more)

When Brough saw Kilbourn's Nov. 14 cartoon — "a parody of the Ben Cartwright family in the TV western 'Bonanza' sharing a bathtub and poking fun at Park City officials for ignoring traffic problems on Bonanza Drive" — it reminded him of Mad magazine," writes Paul Beebe of The Salt Lake Tribune (which like The Record is owned by MediaNews Group). Brough searched his collection of issues of Mad and discovered Kilbourn's cartoon looked just like the Drucker cartoon from around 1962.

"It was pretty close to the original. What I should have done is put in an apology to Mort Drucker," Kilbourn told Beebe. "To be honest with you, it was really late at night. I kind of do these as a side job and didn't think of putting it in there." Kilbourn also draws for City Weekly, an alternative newspaper in Salt Lake City. (Read more)

Clinton: I'm trying to balance national, state and local news media needs in campaign

Sen. Hillary Clinton's keep-away game with journalists, one topic of a recent Iowa-related post here and on our home page, is a focus of a story in The Washington Post today by media reporter Howard Kurtz. "Reporters can generally get close enough to watch but no further, as if separated from the candidate by an invisible sheet of glass," he reported from Concord, N.H. (Associated Press photo: Cheryl Senter)

Kurtz wrote only about complaints from national and big-city reporters, the only ones he ever seems to care about. "Campaigns often brush off national correspondents in favor of local journalists, who tend to be less critical," he wrote. But when he finally got to ask Clinton a question -- just one question was allowed, he wrote -- she said local and state reporters have "a very big role to play" and "The balancing is really intense."(Read more)

Day-long seminar at SNPA Traveling Campus in Richmond will examine energy issues in the South

The Southeastern United States is one of the most fertile fossil fuel sources in the country. Energy prices are going up. There is continued talk of oil self-sufficiency and “greener” ways to use coal. And there are proposals in the area for new nuclear power plants after 30 years without such development. These and other changes facing the region’s energy supply will be the subject of a seminar at the Southern Newspaper Publishers Association Traveling Campus in Richmond, Va., Dec. 4-6. The program on "Covering Energy Issues in the South" will be a full-day segment on Thursday, Dec. 6, from 9:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. There is no cost to attend any sessions at Traveling Campus programs.

The seminar is aimed at journalists who cover energy, business, the environment and government, this seminar will feature some of the nation’s most respected experts on energy. Topics will include the future of coal as an energy source and what can be done to reduce its environmental impact; nuclear power plants; the world oil supply; and strategies to address climate change issues. For more details on the program, the distinguished faculty and other programs at the Traveling Campus, go to the Rural Calendar, here.

Missouri newspapers stand by decision to withhold name of MySpace 'cyberbully'

Earlier this month, the St. Charles Journals of St. Peters, Mo., broke the story of Megan Meier, 13, who hanged herself after a relationship on MySpace.com ended. Her "boyfriend" on MySpace was actually a 47-year-old neighbor whose daughter knew Meier, but in reporting the story, the St. Charles Journals — which publishes several weeklies in the suburbs of St. Louis — have refused to reveal the identity of that woman. Since the story appeared Nov. 11, other media outlets, such as Fox News and The New York Times, have named Lori Drew (click here for the latest Times story), but the St. Charles Journals reporter and editor stand by the decision to keep the name out of print.

"We are sticking with it because the things that helped us make our decision haven’t changed," Dave Bundy, editorial director of the newspaper group that includes several community papers owned by Lee Enterprises, told Joe Strupp of Editor and Publisher. "We were concerned about the daughter [of Drew] and to what extent she was involved and dragged along with this." Pokin's stories can be found here.

The St. Louis Post-Dispatch, which, like the St. Charles Journals, is owned by Lee Enterprises, has revealed the name. But Steve Pokin, the Journal reporter broke the story after getting a phone call from Meier's great aunt, agreed with the decision to withhold Drew's name. "She is not being accused in a court of law, she is not being sued and our take is that we don’t run suspects unless charges are filed," he told Strupp. (Read more)

SPJ Sunshine Network will track open-government issues, candidate stands at local and state levels

The Society of Professional Journalists today announced its Sunshine Network, a group of volunteers to highlight open-government issues at local and state levels. The effort is designed to ramp up to Sunshine Week, an annual observance led by the American Society of Newspaper Editors and funded primarily by the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation. For the 2008 observance, to be held March 16-22, the theme is to ask candidates for president and other offices about freedom-of-information issues.

"Volunteers will identify key problems in their states’ freedom of information laws, develop three to five questions to be posed to state and local political candidates, and then encourage journalists and others to get candidates’ responses on the record," SPJ said in a release. “It is crucial that citizens know candidate positions on open, transparent government,” SPJ President Clint Brewer said in the statement. “The American people deserve to know whether politicians asking for public trust in each state believe government should be accountable.”

The effort is an extension of ASNE's national Sunshine Campaign, which has begun a work on a database of federal candidates' stances and statements on open government issues. SPJ has compiled other databases on freedom of information, including a state-by-state breakdown of access to prisons. (Read more)

Anniston Star's reporting helps inspire Alabama officials to seek inspection program for dams

After noticing stories on Kentucky's Wolf Creek Dam and its problems, Bob Davis, editor of The Anniston Star, wondered about the conditions dams in the newspaper's home state of Alabama. A few days later, the 25,000-circulation daily reported that Alabama is the only state that does not inspect its dams, and it does not even know exactly how many dams there are.

Since January, The Star has been following the story, and this week the Alabama Water Resources Commission passed a resolution asking for a statewide inspection program. To read a recent story on the situation, go here. To read a recent editorial about the state's dams, go here.

Davis wrote about the recent resolution and The Star's ongoing coverage on the Behind The Star blog, which offers an "inside look at the operations of The Anniston Star." (Read more)

Google pledges to get greener by pushing alternatives to coal-fired electric plants

The success of Google Inc. has seemed limitless, and now its executives hope to end the world's dependence on coal as a source of electric power. Executives of the giant firm, whose "server farms" use huge amounts of electricity, much of it generated by burning coal to drive steam turbines, announced Tuesday that they would be pouring hundreds of millions of dollars into a renewable energy initiative aimed at replacing coal power, reports the Los Angeles Times.

The plan is called RE<C, meaning "renewable energy cheaper than coal." The company is already getting 30 percent of the power for its Mountain View, Calif., headquarters, from solar panels on the roof (in Reuters photo by Kimberly White). (Read more)

This initiative will draw upon the resources of Google.org, the company's for-profit philanthropic subdivision that owns $2 billion in Google stock, reports The New York Times. Still, some on Wall Street worry that the move could be the only thing that slows the company, Brad Stone writes. “My first reaction when I read about this was, ‘Is this a joke?’” Jordan Rohan of RBC Capital Markets told Stone. “I’ve written off Google’s competition as a threat to Google’s long-term market share gains. But I haven’t written off Google’s own ability to stretch too far and try to do too much. Ultimately, that is the biggest risk in the Google story.” But after the announcement, Google's stock rose $7.57, or 1.1 percent, to $673.57, and Stone reports that Hewlett-Packard announced Tuesday it would be installing a 1-megawatt solar system at its San Diego plant and would purchase 80 gigawatt-hours of wind energy in Ireland. (Read more)

As Farm Bill amendments are sorted out, critics say it must do more to improve kids' nutrition

The number of amendments the Senate will consider on the Farm Bill "has been narrowed down, in principle, to about five amendments from Democrats and about 10 for the Republicans," reports Agri-Pulse. "A couple of additional amendments that are not considered germane to the bill may also be allowed." It remained unclear yesterday whether Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) would schedule debate for next week or later in December, Agri-Pulse reports. (Subscription site, but a free trial is available)

It also remains to be seen whether any of the Senate amendments will deal with complaints that some farm subsidies encourage unhealthy school lunches and overweight kids. Nicole Gaouette of the Los Angeles Times reports, "The $288-billion Senate bill would spend more on fruits and vegetables, but children's health advocates say that it still tilts much more toward subsidizing farmers than promoting healthful food. They say they are concerned about rising rates of obesity, diabetes and other diet-driven diseases. Organizations such as the President's Cancer Panel have directly linked agricultural policy and cancer."

Critics say the Farm Bill's support of crops such as corn and soybeans leads to more processed food in school cafeterias, which they say only adds to the nation's obesity problem. About 16 percent of children are obese, and that percentage is expected to jump to 24 by 2015. The Senate bill would expand a fruit-and-vegetable program for school lunches. (Read more) Meanwhile, Agri-Pulse reports on a school-foods report card from the Center for Science in the Public Interest, saying two-thirds of the states "have no or weak nutrition standards to limit junk-food and soda sales." Kentucky and Oregon had the best such policies. (Read more)

Health care from group set up to aid Third World prompts coalfield writer to urge health education

Recently, we ran an item about residents of Central Appalachia getting health care from a group that was created to provide care to the Third World. In The Coalfield Progress of Norton, Va., longtime Appalachian advocate Frank Kilgore, at attorney in St. Paul, Va., makes a similar reference in arguing for a big investment in health education to improve the region's poor health status.

"The term 'Third World' comes up often when the coalfield region’s health care system, economic see-saw and environmental degradations come into focus," Kilgore writes. "Our region’s health care statistics are still shameful, and the images of the huge crowds at annual Remote Area Medical health care events in the Virginia communities of Wise and Grundy are not acceptable in the world’s richest nation in one of the nation’s richest states."

Kilgore says there's plenty of blame to go around, but holds up a mirror for his readers: "The state of the region’s poor health statistics has many causes, most of them preventable. Coalfield residents, more than almost any other national sub-group, eat too much of the wrong foods, fail to exercise and go about abusing drugs, alcohol and tobacco at alarming rates. . . . We cannot allow another generation of coalfield youth to become national poster children for bad choices. The state governments of Virginia, Tennessee, Kentucky and West Virginia and federal agencies must make health education and preventative health care a priority in the coalfields and other under served areas. Thousands of lives and billions of taxpayer dollars in treatment expenses hang in the balance." (Read more; subscription may be required)