That's the sound of the men, women and children working on the chain gang ...

That's the sound of the men, women and children working on the chain gang ...





March 5, 2012




By Julie Kay Smithson propertyrights@earthlink.net




Begging the late, great Sam Cooke's pardon, the classic song he and Charles Cooke co-wrote may soon be revised to reflect twenty-first century servitude.

With barely a whimper, America -- and many other world nations -- has joined a march that is reminiscent of this great 1960 pop song. Those in charge of "fiscal spending" have been so eager to skim AMAP (as much as possible) under several guises, have created a scenario eerily similar to Great Depression days.

Today's unemployed may not 'ride the rails' -- after all, the heavily subsidized railroads no longer pass through rural neighborhoods where kindhearted folk dare share meals with hobos whose presence may signal something far more ominous than a simple meal in the offing.

As the number of acres planted to food- and fiber-growing crops in America shrinks -- but is expected to grow more per acre to feed/shelter more consumers per acre -- the regulatory burden on America's farmers, ranchers, lumberers, etc., increases exponentially. The average age of resource providers is, itself, aging, as America's youth seeks another means of making a living, one that barely resembles the dreams and goals of just a generation or two ago.

Like the doctor of old, who did not specialize in any one facet of medicine, but who practiced most -- resource providers no longer "just farm" or "just ranch." Instead, many of today's rural families boast several children and grandchildren with a variety of college degrees in many areas of expertise. Just managing the farm finances means having a savvy set of eyes trained on that one area of knowledge. Another might be the health and well-being of the farm's livestock. A third could be the marketing arenas in which the farm competes.

Meanwhile, in distant Washington, D.C., the wheels of government still grind. Unfortunately for many, those wheels seem to be forcing the outsourcing of natural resource utilization to other countries, countries whose bar is not set by federal agencies enforcing legislation like the "Endangered Species Act," "Clean Water Act," "Clean Air Act," etc.

One example is Energy Recovery, Inc., whose March 5, 2012, article, touts two major mining plants in Chile where "The mining industry in Chile is growing. We are pleased that, to date, ERI has been selected for the vast majority of desalination projects in Chile for mining applications." http://www.wateronline.com/article.mvc/ERI-Wins-Two-Desalination-Contracts-For-Major-0001

As the American tax base is further eroded by land leaving the tax rolls -- in the form of more national parks and other non-producing resource areas -- American camels (taxpayers) feel the straw burden steadily increasing, expecting them to 'take up the slack.' There is little wiggle room left.

"The news" reports almost daily of the staggering number of homes in foreclosure, their owners set out like non-paying renters. Where does this leave a growing number of people -- who owe debts, but no longer have homes, jobs, etc., to show for their labors?

Enter the modern-day version of the chain gang -- low-wage, little-or-no benefits jobs that are snapped up by those in dire straits, needing "almost any job" just to keep the wolf pack from the rented door. Plastic -- in the form of credit cards -- has been made so easy to use that record numbers of people are now ball-and-chained to the owners of their cards.

Is there a cure for this situation and the ever-mounting debt burden impinging upon every man, woman and child, and all "future generations"? I believe in miracles, though these hurdles may seem insurmountable. One requirement is to learn how to climb from that hole in which many of us find ourselves. It seems simplistic, but the sage advice: "Stop digging!" is a great start. People do not need government to coddle them and wrap them in unrealistic safety measures. Instead, people need to dust off those overtaxed brains and engage them in optimistic, independent, 'strait and narrow' goal-setting. We do not need a 'nanny state.' We need far less than we've come to think is required in our lives.

One excellent way to show the difference between continuing down the slippery slope to "future third world country" is to make two lists. One list shows the things we actually need. The other -- and the one most painful to face -- itemizes the things we merely want, or thing we must have.

The old Sam Cooke song may be easy to sing along with, but it's not a scenario we'd want to live. In the fifty years since the song, "Chain Gang," first hit the radio airwaves, we've been on a collision course with that chain gang. It's time to decide whether to put our entire families to work on the 'chain gang' -- or to learn to live a different, better way.


795 words.

My Official Public Comments on what is misnamed "Klamath Restoration Draft EIS/EIR"

My Official Public Comments on what is misnamed "Klamath Restoration Draft EIS/EIR"





November 15, 2011




Julie Kay Smithson, property rights and natural resources researcher, 213 Thorn Locust Lane, London, Ohio 43140. propertyrights@earthlink.net




It is said here: http://klamathrestoration.gov/home that "This is the official website of the Department of the Interior, and other federal and state agencies that are involved in carrying out obligations set forth in the Klamath Hydroelectric Settlement Agreement, including the Secretarial Determination on Klamath River dams. Use this website to stay up to date on issues surrounding the Secretarial Determination and the environmental analysis that will be conducted pursuant to the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) and the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA)."


Instructions for submitting "feedback" (one can only believe that "feedback" is synonymous with "comments") are located here: http://klamathrestoration.gov/Draft-EIS-EIR/feedback


Any schemes to remove any of the four dams on the Klamath River -- in Oregon and/or California -- are just that: schemes. If there were any validity to claims touted by those involved in CLOSED DOOR 'negotiations' regarding the Klamath Basin and its four dams, those claims were rendered null and void by the few years of secretive and selective clique of "interested parties" involved. The very fact that -- in order to "have a seat at the table" and be included in these highly suspect "negotiations" -- one had to agree "in principle" to the scheme, makes it more rotten than Denmark! While those living and working in the Klamath Basin may, by virtue of their proximity to the "forest," not be able to see it for the "trees," I am in Ohio and can clearly see the intent of these schemes, and the power behind them, pushing the Trojan horse at the gates of economic independence as though the power brokers were merely arriving for an afternoon tea!


Nothing that seeks to destroy the entire economy and culture of the Klamath Basin for the past hundred years, can be called an "agreement" or "agreements." Both the "Klamath Hydroelectric Settlement Agreement" (208 pages) and the "Klamath Basin Restoration Agreement" (378 pages) are nothing more than stalking-horses: decoys. Neither settles anything other than which fox gets to dine in the hen house first! Even the number of people originally adamantly against any such things as would steal their ability to do one or more of the following: own and utilize private property as they have done so in the past; have a home, job and future in the Klamath Basin that is of their own accord; raise their families and contribute to a vibrant place in the Pacific Northwest through the fruits of their endeavors; rest and die in peace, knowing that their families, friends and co-workers will have a place, too, in their beloved Klamath Basin; grow and harvest food and fiber in the Klamath Basin, whether it be the plethora of food crops, fish, timber, minerals, livestock, or hunting/fishing opportunities that abound -- have been ground into the dust of the Basin by the forces aligned against their very existence.


Rocket science is not needed to know that the people of the Klamath Basin -- living and working in this area of northern California and southern Oregon -- are good people with multigenerational experience and expertise. No one coming from distant Washington, D.C., Portland, Oregon, or Sacramento, California, governmental locations, has any right to erase promises made to good people, war veterans and their families. No one anywhere has the right to sway people by the mirage of promises made, knowing that the intent is to rid the Basin of its very lifeblood. NO ONE. The Klamath Basin is a wonderful place to live, work, farm, ranch, hunt, fish, etc. -- not in spite of its inhabitants and private property owners, but BECAUSE OF THEM!  



I look askance at people who have been downtrodden by this sham, which purports to somehow be a good thing for anyone or anything in the Klamath Basin. From the farmers and their families to the livestock, animals, wildlife and waterfowl of the Klamath Basin, these "agreements" bode ill for the entire Klamath Basin. An ill wind blows upon the Klamath Basin, and the thought that one "secretary" of a federal agency -- who obediently does the bidding of his bosses and lets people think of him as a "rancher" -- plans to make a "secretarial determination" about the four dams that have been part of the underpinning of the Klamath Basin's economic independence and freedom for almost a hundred years, makes my stomach turn. Ken Salazar is not an expert on the Klamath Basin, its dams, people, water, flora, fauna, and economy!



My gut feeling -- which stood me in good stead for the twenty-seven years during which I drove semi-trucks safely on America's highways -- is that these schemes are the death knell of the Klamath Basin as those that love this special, blessed place now know it.



Rather than allow themselves to be litigated into extinction or cowed by such a wooden decoy with a bellyful of armed forces, I pray for those in the cross hairs of these "agreements" to realize what is happening in time to stop it. How? Stop it the same way you would stop any trespasser trying to steamroller what rightfully belongs to you.


Would you allow someone to steal your home? Children? Car? Bank account? Family history? Future? How is this scheme any different? It is all of these things, and more.





I may not live or work in the Klamath Basin, but its potatoes, horseradish, and other crops contribute to my health and well-being. Its people are my friends. Its history is part of my country's history. I depend on its economic and cultural health as I depend on my nearby neighbors' efforts to grow, harvest and market what may look to some like items on store shelves, but that, to me, look like freedom and heritage! Stop the destruction of the Klamath Basin via the very real reason that Ken Salazar and his “interested parties” have no right to steal your -- or my -- future! Tell him so! You would not venture into the part of Colorado owned by him and his kith and kin and tell them that you were going to make a “determination” that would put them immediately out of reach of the property rights, past, present and future that they'd built!


1,070 words.

We Still Need You, Klamath Farmers

We Still Need You, Klamath Farmers


March 7, 2010


By Julie Kay Smithson propertyrights@earthlink.net


Nine years after the historic call for help emanated from Klamath Falls, Oregon -- a call answered by Americans from all walks of life and places as distant as Ohio, over 2,200 miles east -- another crisis looms. Those in positions of power are grinning from ear-to-ear at "historic signing ceremonies." They chortle with glee at how their "collaboration and "consensus-driven stakeholder process" has been "inked."

Those few letter writers who continue to stand against the removal of the four dams on the Klamath River -- and the three Oregon elected officials who've never wavered in their stand to protect the promises made to those on the Klamath Project -- are being marginalized by a media that seems to have had its loyalty bought and paid for.

The voices of the original lottery winners have been largely silenced by age and death, but their descendants' voices may have been silenced by deceit and coercion.

No dictionary perused online or in hard copy has yet to yield synonyms tying words like "independence," "versatility," "freedom," "property rights," "resource utilization," etc., to "collaboration," "consensus," "stakeholder," etc.

There are some situations where agreement between factions can never be reached. One such situation was the lords and serfs of Europe. Those that chafed under the heavy hand of the land-LORDs had few options and none that involved remaining in their native lands. A small number of these moxie- and hope-filled, courageous souls set out from "the other side of the pond" on a journey to America, a place about which they had heretofore only known in dreams. The perils known to these immigrants were many -- from dying aboard ship from a wide variety of maladies, not the least of which was malnutrition, dysentery, etc., to surviving the journey only to perish before emerging from the indentured servitude which had purchased their passage to a new land.

The settling of America was fraught with untold dangers. Starvation happened to pioneers. So did dying of thirst or succumbing to fevers and diseases for which there were no easily-procured remedies. Getting to America's eastern shore was tough enough. Making it all the way to Oregon required many more of God's blessings and much privation. The Western Migration required something in the way of promise in order to lure men to leave their safer, but poorer, homes in the East. Those married men that made the journey had to scrimp and save in order to book passage for their families to join them. Single men had to first conquer places -- "stake their claim," as it were -- before they could dream of marrying and raising families. Viewing old photographs of these settlers is looking into faces made tired and old by the demands made to simply survive.

The Klamath Project was a promise, from the federal government to the lottery winners / war veterans who sought to make a forever home in the Klamath Basin of northern California and southern Oregon. Both sides promised something. The federal government, in far-off Washington, D.C., promised the winners of these Project Lands water "in perpetuity" in exchange for the promise to transform unproductive high desert land into productive, thriving farm and ranchland. The high desert of this region presented its own brand of challenges. Not only was it dependent upon snowpack for irrigation water during the growing season, but it was also a place where the temperatures meant frost in virtually every month. Growing food crops was not as easy as it was for farmers in the Midwest, who had a more temperate, longer growing season and more abundant rainfall. The promise of water in exchange for the promise to wrest fertile food-growing was inextricably entwined. It was not possible to deliver economic prosperity through farming and ranching, without the promise of water "in perpetuity."

When did the government's promise of water get broken? That answer is not nearly as important as the fact that the promise WAS broken and continues to be broken, year after frightening, disheartening, soul-crumbling year.

Did the Klamath Project farmers ever break their promise? No. They never did. However, they can no longer raise food and fiber to feed and shelter America if the other promiser -- the federal government -- reneges on its promise. Now that four or even five generations of blood, sweat and tears equity have been willingly put into this place beloved to so many as simply "the Klamath," a government, with malice aforethought, has broken its promise and levied the ultimate fine upon the people of the Klamath Basin and Project: the cessation of agriculture, ranching and the vibrant economy of this most special place located in the high desert of the Pacific Northwest.

How can such a terrible death knell sound in such a place without the population raising a hue and cry the likes of which would carry clearly all the way to Washington in the District of Columbia? How, indeed. Language deception was truly a weapon of mass destruction, the likes of which is yet to be seen, but which is coming like a runaway freight train. Using words that these honest Klamath Project people had been taught to trust, their property rights -- in the form of their economic freedom and prosperity -- have been taken. Those drafting the "agreements" have an intimate, professional knowledge of how to word phrases, sentences, paragraphs, and binding agreements, so those whose rights are being "rurally cleansed" barely realize what is happening ... until it's a "done deal."

The volatility of the Klamath River -- sometimes a drunken sluggard filled with algae-growing warm water, sometimes a raging bull goring all in its flooding path -- needed damming. This place of temperature swings, inversion layers, frost and freeze, heat and drought, needed people with resilience, strength of character and the sticktuitiveness to make of the Klamath Basin a place that not only could feed itself, but could also feed much of a nation from its bounty. Klamath Pearl potatoes, horseradish, mint, onions, hay, beef, and so much more, were grown and harvested, supporting with quiet pride a place that began with a government promise and a lottery.

Perhaps none will dare call it a terrible crime, but crime it is, for in its wake, the "restoration agreement" will leave a place that once knew the caring and devoted hand of the farmer, the appreciation of the farmer's wife and children, who were able to buy yard goods and little luxuries -- and even college and businesses of their own! -- again barren and bereft of the fertile loins of the Klamath dirt, needing only water and hard, honest work to bring forth property rights and freedom.

A promise is a promise. A broken promise is a broken promise. Those who did not stand at the "A" Canal Headgates and drink in the sights, sounds and concentrated patriotism distilled in that place, can never know how great was the promise, how terrible the broken promise.

Surely at the last moment, more will see what has been done and move to rectify it. Surely God will once again smile on the Klamath Basin. Surely the promise must be made to stand and the promise breakers must not be allowed one more meal of Klamath Project-grown food.

Let them eat cake, but let them eat it somewhere else. They have no right to a piece of the pie that they never earned and never deserved.

Those brave farmers that voluntarily left the "A" Canal Headgates when 9-1-1 happened, kept their promise, even knowing the track record of other party that promised water for the Klamath Project "in perpetuity."

We in America need the Klamath Basin farmers, their friends and families to again unite. They have helped feed us, in America, for a hundred years. We cannot afford to have their voices -- and the Klamath Project -- silenced by broken promises. We need the food produced in the Klamath Basin, but perhaps even more, we need the backbone of those Klamath farmers, who quietly helped care for America, keeping their promise, for a hundred years.


1,351 words.