Holy cow! EPA exposed to be using aerial surveillance on Midwest feedlots

From Omaha.com, more indications that the EPA is out of control. I’m beginning to think the EPA is an enemy of the citizens of the United States with behavior like this. I guess we’ll need genetically engineered cattle with built in camouflage now.

Image: free wallpaper from scenicreflections.com

EPA told to come clean on feedlot flyovers

By Joe Duggan

WORLD-HERALD BUREAU

LINCOLN — A spy in the sky over Nebraska and Iowa has gotten under the hides of some livestock producers and their representatives in Washington.

The Environmental Protection Agency’s aerial photo surveillance of livestock feeding operations in both states flew under the radar for nearly two years.

But now the flyover program, conducted to help enforce the Clean Water Act, has prompted a demand for answers from all five members of Nebraska’s congressional delegation.

The delegation delivered a joint letter Tuesday to EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson, listing 25 questions about the legality of the surveillance and the privacy rights of business owners. Although the letter stopped short of calling for an end to the flyovers, the two senators and three representatives want to know more about their purpose.

“Nebraskans are rightfully skeptical of an agency which continues to unilaterally insert itself into the affairs of rural America,” Rep. Adrian Smith, R-Neb., said in a statement.

EPA representatives in Washington, D.C., did not immediately return messages seeking reaction. A spokesman for the agency’s Region 7 office in Kansas City said he was not authorized to comment.

In 2010, Nebraska had 862 concentrated animal feeding operations and Iowa 1,607, making them the two leading livestock states in Region 7, says the agency’s website. The region also includes Kansas and Missouri.

The livestock operations fall under an assortment of state and federal regulations intended to protect streams and aquifers from animal waste pollution, which can occur in the form of runoff from feed lots and discharges from manure lagoons.

The two-page letter was written at the urging of the Nebraska Cattlemen, an industry group made up of cattle producers.

“The frustration for livestock producers really is just the idea that the government has resorted to spying on facilities,” said Kristen Hassebrook, the group’s director of natural resources and environmental affairs.

Full story here. h/t to WUWT reader “Neo”.

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June 2, 2012 6:30 pm

Reblogged this on 323 Archery Shoot and commented:
..I’m only re-blogging this because I REALLY WANT A CAMO COW now….

Greg Rehmke
June 2, 2012 6:33 pm

Ghostbusters is available on Netflix streaming. Much of this evil EPA guy seems to get edited out for the various TV broadcasts. But Netflix streams the full version in HD. Few movies have better portrayed the arrogance (and incompetence) of government power than “WALTER PECK, junior E.P.A. administrator.”

Barbee
June 2, 2012 6:47 pm

Now that there’s no more need to patrol our border(s)-what else are we to do w/ all that Taxpayer funded equipment?

Gary Hladik
June 2, 2012 6:48 pm

Are they flying black helicopters?

Insufficiently Sensitive
June 2, 2012 7:01 pm

Calm down. It’s just the nomenklatura keeping track of the kulaks.

aharris
June 2, 2012 7:22 pm

It’s just flyover country. Who would possibly notice?

Owen in Ga
June 2, 2012 7:47 pm

It’s called flyover country by the coastal “elites”, so the EPA thought that was a directive.

Curiousgeorge
June 2, 2012 7:54 pm

Y’all do know that there is an incestuous relationship between the EPA and the UNEP don’t you? Specifically, a certain MS Fraenkel is UNEP North American Regional Director. Formerly worked as senior policy advisor in the Office of International Affairs within the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, among other influential political positions. http://www.unep.org/Documents.Multilingual/Default.asp?ArticleID=5732&DocumentID=411&l=en
I’m pretty certain she and goodolwhatshername running EPA these days get together to discuss ‘things’ on a regular basis. We all know UNEP and EPA have nearly identical goals. Sustainability and all that.

Eve Stevens
June 2, 2012 7:57 pm

I always figured the EPA as an enemy of the people since their political decision, not based on science, on DDT. That was 40 years ago.
BTW, back from the Bahamas and evidently June is too soon to come back to southern Ontario.

June 2, 2012 8:25 pm

Eve Stevens says:
June 2, 2012 at 7:57 pm
I always figured the EPA as an enemy of the people since their political decision, not based on science, on DDT. That was 40 years ago.
BTW, back from the Bahamas and evidently June is too soon to come back to southern Ontario.
=======================================================================
I’ve never been there, but from what I’ve heard, any month is to soon to come back from the Bahamas.
If the Hockey Team is right, maybe the Bahamas will come to me?

Tom in South Jersey
June 2, 2012 8:34 pm

The chill in the atmosphere is that our government is no longer of the people and by the people. It sees itself as distinct and separate from the average citizen. In many ways it has become an occupying force. Possibly this is from too many decades of occupying nations abroad. Regardless, the government of the US is paranoid over it’s own people and has forgotten that the people are supposed to be sovereign and self governing. Part of the problem is that all aspects of life are now regulated at the local, state and federal levels. The average person has no idea how many regulations and laws there are, but they can rest assured that at any given moment they are in violation of any number of them. This situation has turned us all into criminals, and therefore the government has developed an “us versus them” attitude. It will only get worse as people begin to circumvent what it sees as absurd laws and demand the right to buy 32 ounce soft drinks, thereby reinforcing the governments perception that the people can not be trusted.

old44
June 2, 2012 9:14 pm

Almost in the same league as the Australian Labor Party sending an F111 to spy on the Tasmanian dams in the 70’s

Zip
June 2, 2012 10:39 pm

“I’m beginning to think the EPA is an enemy of the citizens of the United States…”
Just beginning?

MattA
June 2, 2012 11:21 pm

What have the ranchers got to hide? – the epa is welcome to fly planes over my home as many times as it want to make sure I am not violating regulations. Simply because I dont believe CO2 causes warming does not mean that I think industrial level meat producers have anything other than their own interests at heart.
If we expect all data from climate scientists to be available for open review. I equally expect open examination of industries by the EPA. Then let results be published and archived where all can see them.
What have they got to hide?

June 2, 2012 11:50 pm

David S says:
June 2, 2012 at 4:36 pm
“America takes another step towards totalitarian dictatorship as government becomes bigger,more powerful,and unaccountable. The solution to this is small government and Ron Paul would have been the man to make it happen.”
That be why he was lied about and if possible ignored. By the very folks who reminded us almost daily of President Reagan. Who wouldn’t bad mouth a fellow Republican.
I like your comments, we must demand responsible government, preferably smaller and more affordable. Also…
http://m.townhall.com/columnists/charlespayne/2012/05/30/stealing_from_the_poor__for_their_own_good
Found this to be very thought provoking.

June 3, 2012 1:01 am

The Worldwide Wacky Fraud mafia, WWF, are busy conning the Australia industry organisation to enter into one of its sustainable roundtables for beef. WWF Australia on its web site tells us how it plans to police whatever meaning of sustainability it comes up with. You guessed it from above in this case by satellite
http://www.wwf.org.au/our_work/people_and_the_environment/transforming_markets/sustainable_beef_industry/
BTW the USA industry organisation NCBA has already signed up with WWF.

Myrrh
June 3, 2012 2:37 am

Luther Wu says:
June 2, 2012 at 4:32 pm
I’m waiting for:
“Well, if they aren’t doing anything wrong, why should they care?”

I’m surprised you had to wait seven hours..
David S says:
June 2, 2012 at 4:36 pm
“America takes another step towards totalitarian dictatorship as government becomes bigger,more powerful,and unaccountable. The solution to this is small government and Ron Paul would have been the man to make it happen.”
There’s only one reason this is happening, because they can, and they can because they have unlimited supplies of money to make it happen. Nothing’s going to change until that changes and it’s not going to happen by piecemeal defunding of departments or tweaks to legislation, they’ll just create something else to replace them, it will happen when all Americans get together for the final battle for their independence..
..you’re the only ones with a history in this battle.
The rest of us have been in thrall for so long we don’t even know there could be battle, or are so recently manipulated we can’t see there’s a curtain to draw back.
The funding for all this comes from the Banking Cartel who create money out of nothing. Literally out of nothing, by the stroke of a pen or now, by a stroke of a key. All your taxes through the IRS, all of it, every cent, doesn’t go to the Government, it goes to pay interest to the Banking Cartel which owns the Federal Reserve, a private bank, which has taken over control of your money supply since 1913 and sells notes to your government at interest. Notes your government should be printing debt free, without interest. This is fraud on a grand scale against every American taxpayer. The IRS is its private company collection arm of the privately owned Federal Reserve, it is not a Government department.
http://www.iamthewitness.com/books/Andrew.Carrington.Hitchcock/The.History.of.the.Money.Changers.htm
There are two things that every American should know, that the American nation came into existence by a revolt against the central banking system of England, and, that in 1913 the central banking cartel in England took it back. The Federal Reserve is their private bank just as is the Bank of England, deliberately named to con the people about its real owners, not the people, but a banking cartel of money changers who control governments. Voting for one man to make a change isn’t going to work because they can always game the system, it needs a change of consciousness to get rid of all those in government in cahoots with the banking cartel, the Federal Bank, and a return to debt free, no interest notes produced by your government for you – see conclusion on that link for Milton Friedman suggestion for the changeover.
From the history link above:
“1694
The Charter of the Bank of England (1694)
Following a costly series of wars over the last 50 years, English Government officials go, cap in hand, to the money changers for loans necessary to pursue their political purposes. The money changers agree to solve this problem in exchange for a government sanctioned privately owned bank which could issue money created out of nothing.
This was deceptively named the, “Bank of England,” for the sole purpose of duping the general public into believing it was part of the government, which it was not.
Like any other private corporation the Bank of England sold shares to get started. The private investors, whose names were never revealed, were supposed to put up £1,250,000 in gold coins to buy their shares in the bank, but only £750,000 was ever received. Despite that the bank was duly chartered and began loaning out several times the money it supposedly had in reserves, all at interest.
Although the Bank of England’s private investors were never revealed, one of the Directors, William Paterson, stated,
“The Bank hath benefit of interest on all monies which it creates out of nothing.”
Furthermore the Bank of England would loan government officials as much of the new currency as they wanted, as long as they secured the debt by direct taxation of the British people. The Bank of England amounted to nothing less than the legal counterfeiting of a national currency for private gain, and thus any country that would fall under the control of a private bank would amount to nothing more than a plutocracy.”
These are the people the Americans fought against for independence, independence from the money system the bankers put in place which gave them carte blanche to create money out of nothing and make the people pay them interest on it by their taxes.
Which you have had back since 1913.
“764
Benjamin Franklin
Benjamin Franklin is asked by officials of the Bank of England to explain the prosperity of the colonies in America. He replies,
“That is simple. In the Colonies we issue our own money. It is called Colonial Scrip. We issue it in proper proportion to the demands of trade and industry to make the products pass easily from the producers to the consumers. In this manner creating for ourselves our own paper money, we control its purchasing power, and we have no interest to pay no one.”
As a result of Franklin’s statement, the British Parliament hurriedly passed the Currency Act of 1764. This prohibited colonial officials from issuing their own money and ordered them to pay all future taxes in gold or silver coins. Referring to after this act was passed, Franklin would state the following in his autobiography,
“In one year, the conditions were so reversed that the era of prosperity ended, and a depression set in, to such an extent that the streets of the colonies were filled with the unemployed … The colonies would gladly have borne the little tax on tea and other matters had it not been that England took away from the colonies their money which created unemployment and dissatisfaction.
The viability of the colonists to get power to issue their own money permanently out of the hands of King George III and the international bankers was the prime reason for the revolutionary war.”
Control of America’s money system will change hands 8 times since 1764.”
Time for the final showdown? I heard a few days ago that the 100 year 1913 charter for the Federal Reserve runs out at the end of this year. If this is true, then it becomes easier to take them out.
The Federal Reserve controls the booms and busts by manipulating money supply, making it freely available for the booms, withdrawing supply for the busts:
“1891 The money changers spent the last decade creating economic booms followed by depressions, so that they could buy up thousands of homes and farms for pennies on the dollar. They were preparing to take the economy down again in the near future, and in a shocking memo sent out by the American Bankers Association, which would come out in the Congressional Record more than twenty years later, the following is stated,
“On September 1st 1894 we will not renew our loans under any consideration. On September 1st we will demand our money.
We will foreclose and become mortgages in possession. We can take two-thirds of the farms west of the Mississippi, and thousands of them east of the Mississippi as well, at our own price … Then the farmers will become tenants as in England … ,”
1891 American Bankers Association, as printed in the Congressional Record of April 29, 1913.”
And,
“1907 During the early 1900’s, the money changers were anxious to advance their business of setting up another private Central Bank for America. Rothschild, Jacob Schiff, the head of Kuhn, Loeb and Co., in a speech to the New York Chamber of Commerce, stated, or rather threatened,
“Unless we have a Central Bank with adequate control of credit resources, this country is going to undergo the most severe and far reaching money panic in its history.”
J. P. Morgan
They put Rothschild agent, J. P. Morgan at the forefront of their charge. Interestingly J. P. Morgan’s father, Julius Morgan, had been America’s financial agent to the British, and after Julius’ death, J. P. Morgan took on a British partner, Edward Grenville, who was a long time director of the Bank Of England.
This year was the year of the money changers attack. J. P. Morgan and his cohorts secretly crashed the stock market. They were aware that thousands of small banks were so vastly over extended, some only had reserves of 1% under the fraudulent fractional reserve principle. Within only a few days, bank runs became commonplace across the nation.”
Fractional Reserve – this is the fraud of creating money out of nothing, don’t be fooled by such explanations as in wiki – that this means banks can lend out 90% of their money, it is the creation of that 90% out of nothing.
Imagine if you could put your salary into an account and could magic it up by a factor of ten..
That’s why they can buy up the world. This is fraud. Not only have they stolen your money through the IRS collecting your taxes, they owe you all the money they have stolen plus compound interest, plus a penalty for the fraud.
Time to bankrupt the bankers?

John Marshall
June 3, 2012 3:08 am

The EPA is a cure far worse than the disease.

ozspeaksup
June 3, 2012 3:44 am

us govt has something like 30k drones either approved or waiting to be approved for flyovers in many states now.
recently a private? drone overflew a processing plant,
the film showed a red stream..
seems someonme diregarded health safety and clean water laws and diverted waste blood etc into a nearby river.
and while some jerks keep doing this, the EPA can use it against everyone.
that aside CAFOS are a rotten way to raise and keep any animal. a crowded stressful and foul way to make max profit with max discomfort to animals,..
and as for the DDT issue..well its an organophosphate and while it may help in Malaria areas it sure shouldnt be used widely., to everyone saying its safe? than how come its still showing up in people?

TonyO
June 3, 2012 4:06 am

Maybe they’re worried about cows with guns????

John Wright
June 3, 2012 5:08 am

Holy cow! It’s a bull, a beauty (didn’t you notice that, Pamela?). It’s now wallpaper on my new computer.

June 3, 2012 5:34 am

@MattA, do you have curtains on your windows? Why don’t you want government employees looking in your house? What have you got to hide?

Don B
June 3, 2012 5:35 am

Obama’s EPA will leave no stone unturned in its quest to run our lives.
For example, they fined a school bus company $500,000 for “excessive idling.”
http://downloadpolitics.com/showthread.php?28252-EPA-slaps-school-bus-co-with-500-000-in-fines-for-quot-excessive-idling-quot

Bill Tuttle
June 3, 2012 6:15 am

Robert of Ottawa says:
June 2, 2012 at 3:37 pm
Out of control indeed. I bet they also have more powers of siezure than the police.

Considering that the EPA operates under the aegis of the Justice Department, and considering that the Justice Department is currently run by Eric Holder — yeah, you’re right.

ferd berple
June 3, 2012 6:38 am

Myrrh says:
June 3, 2012 at 2:37 am
the Federal Reserve, a private bank, which has taken over control of your money supply since 1913 and sells notes to your government at interest.
========
It is surprising how few Americans are aware that their money is not controlled by their government.