Tell TransCanada: Stop your dirty pipeline land grab

Dear Friends,

The arrogance of TransCanada is shocking, even for an oil company.

Even while the White House has delayed the process for assessing a required permit for the Keystone XL, TransCanada is suing landowners who won't sell their land in its preferred pipeline path.

It's wrong for TransCanada to expect landowners to accept permanent damage to their land for the Keystone XL pipeline. It's doubly wrong to threaten these landowners and force them to comply for a pipeline that the company doesn't even have permission to build!

I just signed a petition calling out TransCanada for this astonishing land grab. Learn more and sign here:

http://act.credoaction.com/campaign/tc_eminent_domain/?r_by=31202-3451380-6CECKUx&rc=confemail 

Windy and Festive Day

Windy and festive describe what it was like Occupying Rapid City today on the corners nearest the fountain at Main Street Square.  The conversation was interesting and the traffic in the street remained about the same as other protest Saturdays.  Lots of people were out walking, on their way to enjoy the activities and entertainment at the Square; many passers by offered words of encouragement, telling us to keep up the good work.  Today’s protest emphasis was on promoting shopping with local and small businesses.  A gentleman from the Dakota Soda Company came out and served us free hot chocolate.  It was a much appreciated and tasty treat on a chilly blustery afternoon, many thanks to him.  One gentleman turned to me and told me to “get off his square.”  I thanked him and told him “same to ya.”  I doubt very much that he has any idea of why we are there or what it is that we are advocating.  Maybe next time he’ll be able to stop and chat.

Santa came by and he brought several attendants along with him on a Rapid City Fire Department ladder truck.  He was very busy too and did not have time to talk with us, although I don’t believe any of our group asked him too.  Two of Santa’s reindeer and his slay were getting a workout just north of where we had congregated.  A local radio station van was parked nearby, but we didn’t get to talk to them either.  A young lady with a very nice camera and tripod came by and took pictures and/or video of the activities of Main Street Square and later she came back and recorded some scenes of our protest.  She did not identify herself to me, so I have know idea if we will ever see the fruits of her efforts.

The shadow of the Alex Johnson Hotel reminded me that it was time to seek out a place to warm up a bit after another good afternoon Occupying Rapid City.   

Occupy Rapid City Vision Statement

Occupy Rapid City is a grassroots movement formed in solidarity with the Occupy Together movement worldwide. Activists from Rapid City and the Black Hills area converged on October 15th, 2011 in support of the global movement, and they continue to demonstrate their support for addressing economic and political issues.


Occupy Rapid City is a working group in which local activists discuss and enact solutions for addressing issues that affect us all. Group activities include activism on and off the street including free speech and assembly, promoting education and ideas for social change, and teach-ins in which participants share and discuss topics of relevant interest.


We are a movement coordinated by general consensus among participants. The group meets weekly to discuss the progress of the wider Occupy movement, and to plan for upcoming activities and activism.


Our concerns include the excess influence corporate entities have over governments and the political process, the moral and economic consequences of war, and the decline of economic equality and prosperity due to failed or corrupt political and economic policies.


Occupy Rapid City’s focus is on increasing public awareness of these issues in addition to promoting feasible actions for social change. Current efforts include strengthening the local economy by promoting credit unions, community banks, and small businesses, and boycotting the exploitative and damaging practices used among Wall Street corporations.


This is an evolving, open group that will continue to emerge with new ideas and goals for the general promotion of positive social change…

"Inside Job" to be shown at the Elks Theatre

Nov. film “Inside Job”

POSTED BY HEARTLANDFILM ⋅ NOVEMBER 20, 2011

Elks Theatre, 6:30 p.m., Monday, Nov. 28. All seats $5.00.

Directed by Charles Ferguson. Starring Matt Damon, William Ackman and Daniel Alpert.

Takes a closer look at what brought about the financial meltdown. Source: IMDb.com

This scathing expose should be enough to alarm people all over the political spectrum. – Roger Moore, Orlando Sentinel

This is a compelling documentary that will have you leaving the cinema absolutely seething. – Simon Reynolds, Digital Spy

Inside Job tackles the mess head-on with a kind of bitter pragmatism, reconstructing the system that failed and circling its weak spots. – Tim Robey, Daily Telegraph

120 minutes. 2010 release. Rated PG-13 for some drug and sex-related material.

Occupy movement still hard for some to define

            In a recent report from South Dakota Public Broadcasting, a respected, former politician and political observer said that the Occupy movement was beginning to form an agenda, implying that the movement has not been focused.  Is a group unfocused because it has have numerous, equally important, political or social issues that concern the group?  Apparently so, if you listen to the descriptions or explanations of the Occupy movement provided by any number of news and political commentators in the media today.  These pontificators claim to represent the voices of much of what passes for political thought in the world.  These self proclaimed expert observers vocalize or write about political and social issues and they are used to finding convenient pigeon holes to put people and groups of people into simplified, definitive categories.  By categorizing people and groups, their views on issues are replaced by simplistic, generalized labels that effectively mask the underlying issues.

            The pigeon hole categories are labeled as black or white, right or left, good or evil.  What does the Internal Revenue Service, Netflix, insurance companies, Visa Card, Facebook, most political pundits, and countless other data collecting or data interpreting entities have in common?  They like to keep track of what people and groups of people are doing by identifying trends.  Trend predictions are developed by observing how many people like a certain thing, how often do people buy certain things, how do people in target markets react when they hear certain words, what kind of movies have people watched in the past; polls, purchase records, movie rentals, everything people do that can be quantified and measured.  All these observations of repetitious behavior tend to indicate what can be expected from individuals and groups in the future. 

            What a bother it is when you have a group of people that don’t follow the normal trends.  It makes it difficult to pigeon hole a group of people that forms together because they share ideals and concerns on a wide variety of issues.  This group of people appears to be able to do what America’s elected politicians cannot; this group has come to a consensus large group of issues and they are taking action.  Those that would like to vilify this movement have not figured out how to give the movement a simplified, attackable, negative label.  The group is too diverse since it really does encompass the majority.

            Something else is very bothersome about this Occupy movement.  They don’t rely on fear as their unifying force.  On the contrary, they prefer to rely on optimism and hope that they can bring about a better society by voicing the concerns that many in society have been afraid to admit.  There is something wrong with the current level of wealth disparity in world.  There is something wrong with the degree of corporate influence on government.  There is something wrong in many areas of society today and it should not be allowed to continue and, at some level, everybody knows it.  The majority of society (the 99%) just hasn’t realized that it doesn’t have to be this way.  The Occupy movement’s focus has been on raising society’s awareness of the many things that are wrong with the social and economic conditions around the world.

            Don’t wait for the poll numbers, think for yourself.  Stop defending the politicians you voted for and start demanding that they come to a consensus on ways to bring about wealth parity and ways to curb the unfair influence and power of large corporations on governments and the worldwide society or get out of the way and let somebody else do it.  Public opinion has to overcome the power of money.

Job Creation Incentive

Politicians talk about providing incentives for job creators or reducing tax burdens for job creators.  Why should reducing taxes provide incentive to create a job?  In the not too distant past, my business partner and I hired some people to help us complete our project contracts.  Apparently, the act of hiring people made us job creators.  Interestingly, a reduction in our tax burden did not enter into the decision to hire help.  Actually, a tax increase was expected because we anticipated greater business revenues, which we hoped would result in greater profit for my partner and me.   

This type of job creation was expected to be good for our business.  Our employees expected to earn money to pay their bills and enjoy their chosen life styles.  The taxes that we paid contributed to the tax revenues of local, state, and federal governments.  It isn’t as though we enjoyed paying taxes, but we expected to pay them and accepted this as contributing members of our society.  We didn’t become wealthy from out endeavors, but we did seem to be making a living from the arrangement.

With the help of our employees, we were able to take on projects that my partner and I could not have done with the same ease, speed, and efficiency without the help of our employees.  Not always, but some of the time our company showed a profit over our cost of doing business which probably resulted, at least some of the time, from the efforts of our employees alone.  This is a normal occurrence and it would seem to be the greatest incentive to expand the work force of many businesses.

Business owners and employees don’t just contribute to tax revenues; obviously, they contribute to the economy at large by paying for housing, buying groceries, buying cars, etc.  This demand for goods and services creates business opportunity which results in demand for labor (more jobs).   The taxes generated by this economic activity can then be used to provide public goods and services like roads, parks, libraries, police services, fire protection services, schools, military defense, etc.

When tax reduction is offered as incentive to create jobs it does benefit the general economy in the way just described.   A bigger slice of the pie has been allocated to one group of people at the expense of others in the economy.  Some tax break legislation does not even require proof that new jobs were actually created.  Unfortunately, many times it is only the wealthiest people in our society that are able to benefit from the tax breaks offered as incentives to create jobs.  Corporate lobbyists have convinced politicians that only large corporations can improve the economy and that the public, the 99%, must pay to make this happen.

Consider why businesses exist.  Most small businesses exist for the purpose of providing a living income for their owners.  Profits beyond the living income or living expenses are secondary to the purpose of the business.  Large corporations exist to create profits beyond expenses.   Which type of business benefits our economy the most, one that pays its own way or one that requires society to pay it to operate?

Bank Transfer Day in Rapid City

It was a considerably cooler at the Main Street Square location of the Occupy Rapid City protest on Saturday, November 5.  The participants didn't appear to mind the cooler temperatures; many of them were focused on their planned march to two big bank branch locations.  After some very good soap box speeches, protesters began to move in the direction of the banks.  A short pause in front of the US Bank location allowed for the group to collect some stragglers.  At the Wells Fargo bank location some marchers expressed their discontent with treatment they received as Wells Fargo customers.  Bank fees and interest rates caused these customers to seek redress from the bank for these increased and unfair charges.  However, it was the manner in which the bank handled the petitions of these customers that resulted in the withdrawal and movement of their deposits to credit unions.

On this chilly November day the bank responded to the marchers by calling the police department to have them deliver the message that protesters would be arrested for trespass, should they return to Wells Fargo property.  One of the protesters asked the messenger police officer if she would be arrested for trespass since she, at least for the moment, was still a Wells Fargo customer.    Although the police responded with several cars and police officers, there was no confrontation between the police and the protesters.  Several of the protesters thanked the messenger police officer for her service and consideration.