Jim

That's a respectable time. It took us about 3 hrs longer rt but we started from the lake near the trail and had some major detours on the glacier and ugly melt-out slabs to downclimb. Ha! but we did make a week of it and got up Maude, TFJ, and Fernow. Good job, that one is a bit of work to get to.

Actually it was under UN guard. Until we got there and promptly forgot about it(?).

This from the woman who calls a democratic opposition "Traitors". I'm glad she has found such an honerable profession.

R&D costs are high for drugs, but the money makers are the fad-of-the-week drugs for social anxiety, hearburn, an erections. How much do you think the drug companies spend on advertising, sponsoring medical junkets, and giving out samples and perks to docs to get them to push their wares. The recent medicare bill shows what influence the drug companies wield. Great clause in the bill NOT allowing medicare to negoiate rates based on their bulk buying power. Wonderful.

So I pulled the tube out of the closet hoping to find a summary of the day's Tour events. I managed to find a sports show but they covered the annual Coney Island hot dog eating contest but not the Tour! I don't have cable, but some of my friends do. So is there a nightly half-hour summary of the Tour on some cable show somewhere, or when is the whole stage broadcast?

Jamal's case I'm not impressed with, seems like he's guilty to me. But an eloquent guilty guy. Pielter's case is quite a bit more shakey. For starters pick up a copy of "In the Spirit of Crazy Horse" by Peter Matthisian. He was sued by the Govenor of ND and by the Attorney General of the state for libel for pulblication of the book - they lost. There was quite a bit of fishy business being conducted on the Ogola Souix Reservation by the FBI and the State back then. Peilter may be guilty of some criminal activity, but from what I've read the state's murder case was lame. And you have to look a the judge's actions in that case. They previously lost the cases of the two other defendants and so had to rachet things up for the Peilter case. Do a bit of research on this one, and please, not the internet.

Both

I think that is a good point. We don't want to use the barbarians as a yardstick (meter stick for Dru) on how we conduct ourselves.

Did anyone catch his testimony in front of the prison abuse Congressional Panel? He just flat out denied to release the justice department memo to the White House regarding the justification of torture. The panel members, Republicans and Democrats were seething! They asked him if he was refusing on the grounds of Executive Privilege or if the documents were classified. He refused to answer their direct questions and went on about his opinions. One of the members cut him off and said the panel wasn't interested in his opinion - what was the legal justification. He refused to answer the question. WTF? This is the head of the justice dept. The documents finally were leaked a couple days later. Sen. Bidden made an excellent point while trying to get Ascroft to answer. He said the US doesn't torture prisioners because we want our service men and women treated decently. He added he wanted his son, who is in Iraq, protected under the treaties we have signed. Ascroft is an arrogant SOB. He'll be out soon enough.

Had a fun ski in the Tatoosh after several cancelled weekends. Scrambled up Castle Peak for the view. One friend had his couple of snow-boarding kids along and they had a blast. Good thing to do on Father's day. Saw two parties of three walking up between Pinnicle and Castle all roped up(?). Practice for something. They had helmet on in the parking lot.

Maybe they think Canada is OK because they don't fund dictators all over the world or hire thugs to implement the latest coup.

Whew, thanks, it does not appear that my friend was up there. Someone gave me the number of the rescue hotline (thank you) and they give the climbers from the missing party there. Hopefully they've got the parties figured out correctly of who is who. But since the party awaiting rescue has a cell phone it looks like this is likely. The hotline said they are calling off the rescue efforts because of hazardous conditions. Will still look for missing person (assumed deceased) via helicopter.

Unfortunate but true. While the Bushies are good at this the lack of critical analysis by most Americans is appalling.

I saw a previous note that someone stated that one of the deceased climbers was a North Cascade climbing ranger. Does anyone have any information on this? A friend of mine has one of these postions and I've not been able to contact him. Hopefully his in the hills doing his job.

No - that title would likely be "Girls Gone Wild in Tongass"

The U.S. House of Representatives approved a bipartisan measure late Wednesday night to end federal funding for logging roads in Alaska's Tongass National Forest. Sponsors say the amendment, if approved by the Senate, will save taxpayers $35 million, the amount the Forest Service estimates it loses annually on Tongass timber sales. Critics see it as a backhanded attempt to shut down the Tongass timber industry. House lawmakers approved the amendment to the Interior appropriations bill on a 222-to-205 vote. The measure would bar the Forest Service from spending any money next year on designing or building new logging roads in the 17-million-acre temperate rain forest in the Southeast panhandle. The Forest Service and the timber industry say new roads are needed to reach old-growth stands located in remote reaches of the Tongass. Logging opponents say the Forest Service has a huge maintenance backlog and can't take care of the existing roads. (06/17/04) Anchorage Daily News House Votes to Limit Tongass Road Subsidies (06/17/04) EMS

If that last essay is an example of "experts in the field" I'd suggest you cast a wider net.

I din't think it possible to have "clash of clivizations", "..fall like dominos", "Great Caliphate", Jimmy Carter, "Great Jihad", and other sweet nothings in the same essay. Bravo! Great piece of satire!

A miniature statue of David for the living room? Cute.

Here's a good example of the crap that is constant under the Bushies. They are always looking for opportunities to toss out agreements that have been hammered out by opposing groups in favor of the resource extraction industries. There is no balance in this administration. http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/opinion/177937_woods16.html

Heck, you can hike in via Anette Lake trail head to Siver Peak right off I90. Done that for a quick morning of skiing when time was short.

Good luck. I'd like to hear about it when you return. Pictures always liven up the TR.

ML - good luck on trying to keep a logic train on track. FYI here's a report, a little dated but still good, on unpotected lands in WA. http://www.pacificbio.org/pubs/wa_rdls98.pdf

I'm not involved in the wilderness activist community, just a scientist so I don't know the history of unprotected parcels well. But I know the Dark Divide area in the Gifford Pinchot NF is arout 100,000 acres, roadless, and currently unprotected. The Wild Sky area near Stevens, and a decent parcel just on the north side of I-90 (whose name I can't remember). Your generally assessment is correct. In the Pacific NW there only remains about 3% of the old growth that was once available. The vast majority of that is on public land. That's why marbled murrelets population numbers are still tanking. And yes, the major concern of land managers and scientists of the Healthy Forests Iniative is that it is being used to log commercial grade timber in unprotected roadless areas. The process is pretty involved, but under the Rare and RARE II studies federal agencies identified areas for potential future designations as official roadless areas, taking into consideratins areas that should be used for harvest, recreation, sensitive species, yadda. The Bushies have used every obstruction and foot-in-the-door policy they can think of to dismantle these designations. They are not a very insightful bunch. They're mission is resource extraction no matter what the cost.