Theresa Gandhi - HerStory

Letters to President Obama March - November 2009

2009-11-22T22:07:00.000-08:00

The following are a series of letters I wrote to President Obama this past year.
Not included is a letter to Secretary Chu to please read "The Cult of the Atom" before any new nuclear power plants are approved. It's a history of how the rush to build new power plants uncovered many expensive design flaws that were ignored. Not to mention the 147 year back log of repacking the decades of stored nuclear waste at Hanford. The delays and impossibility of safely storing deadly radioactive wastes may never be solved. It's one of those design flaws that will cost lives and the good health of many for 10,000 years and more. This is a topic I’ve following for decades as a Hanford Downwinder.
I attempted to keep each letter on just one topic. So many of today’s challenges are interlinked that a single issue solved would not resolve the issue. Example: until corporate agriculture gives up mono crops and pesticide use health care costs will continue to go up and global warming will not be able to be solved.
Along with letters to President Obama I wrote and called Congress on these issues.
President Obama did send me a generic Global Warming snail mail but did not address my major issue, i.e. HAARP heating the sky and causing extreme Artic ice melt. President Obama has disappointed me in his choices. I have let him know and offered a different choice.
Swine flu and complications have taken three months out of my life this year. I am still weak from losing 40 pounds and gained another named disease to add to my list.
You never know what one letter can do. A letter to Donald Trump on making peace profitable he turned into a full page ad in the New York Times.
I hope the following inspires you to also communicate especially if you have expertise in an issue where decisions by those in power are being made.
Theresa Marie Gandhi
November 22, 2009

Mahatma Gandhi traded for Peter the Great as Obama Hero

2009-11-22T21:59:00.000-08:00

President Obama:
“As you have given me the privilege of communicating with you – I am laying my heart bare. If you find me speaking without reserve and if you think that I seem to transgress the limits that courtesy imposes upon me, pardon me for the liberty I may be taking. If nonviolence is to be evolved in individuals or societies or nations truth has to be told, however harsh or unpopular it may appear to be for the moment.”- Mahatma Gandhi, my great grand uncle by marriage.
Your decisions, actions and appointments have left your heroes and moral progressives aghast and disappointed. Unless you have given up and replaced Mahatma Gandhi, Martin King, Jr., and Cesar Chavez with Peter the Great, Napoleon and Genghis Khan as your heroes you are incongruent.
In 1983 I was offered $30,000,000.00 to launch a campaign that would result in my being President of the USA. I have given thoughtful consideration of the challenges and policy decisions and how specifically my administration would govern. I have explored how to incorporate the principles that Jesus Christ, Mahatma Gandhi, Martin Luther King, Jr. and others lived that We the People may fulfill the destiny of our American Republic that you lead.
Step one is to Walk your Talk. In this you have failed in so many ways. By not Walking your Talk you dishonor your spoken word, stated heroes, adopted Tribe and a destiny that is yours to choose.
Examples: Cap and Trade Congressional Corpracratic Welfare to dirty Coal dooms our oceans: specifically all shell fish, i.e. 1 billion seed oysters were killed from deep Carbonic Acid Ocean water coming on shore. The Ocean’s carbon dioxide saturation is past the tipping point. The foods that sustain Salmon and Whales like shrimp and krill will disappear. Oceans are dying.
Health Care: Insurance and Big Pharma get bigger profits we get poor care, mandatory insurance payments and high drug costs. Corporate Agriculture detrimentally impacts our health and Global Warming. War with no Peace you are flunking or thinking of you as just another Bush bent on the destruction of our Republic would not come often to mind
I have sent my many constructive communications to you on several topics. Posted @ www.tmgandhi.blogspot.com. I had hoped my decades of study, experience and some wisdom could contribute knowledge to you missed by your education, life experience or advisors. Thank you for your letter and for cutting back on HAARP.
I had attended Rep. Norm Dicks Health Care Town Hall Meeting with 1,100 others sharing air just before I got deathly ill with Swine Flu and complications. I had asked Norm: “Why are Stakeholders writing, the so called, Health Care Bill (I had read.) but no Medicaid or Medicare Clients were asked or allowed to participate?” He had no answer. I’d gone door to door for Norm in the 1970s. Because of 2,900,000 MREMS of Hanford’s radiation at birth I’ve been on Medicaid since 1993. An RN my whole life has been about surviving an ongoing death threat.
Apparently placing my Hope in you to lead us into a healthy nonviolent future is not wise. Your stated heroes had connected their hearts with their minds, faced their inner demons and with heart felt compassion inspired others to follow to make changes.
Mr. Obama even though you have dashed my hope in you so many times I will keep you in my prayers that you may know in your heart the inner Presence of a Loving God.

Theresa Marie K. Gandhi, Reverend
Universal Church of the Master, Church Charter 775
www.tmgandhi.com tm@tmgandhi.com
November 22, 2009

Mr. Obama You have Lost my Vote

2009-11-22T21:54:00.000-08:00

Dear Mr. President,
You have lost my vote! Your promise to Big Pharma that they would not be required to negotiate prices for drugs that Medicare, Medicaid or a Public Option would pay dooms Health Care Reform. This rip off will inflate the cost of these programs without increasing care. This is Corpracratic pay back. Just like Senator Baucus.
Medicaid reductions of $300 million could have easily come from Big Pharma instead of care for those least able to pay will suffer for what will be denied
My hope is dashed as Big Pharma will feel no pain financially but many families and old people will continue to choose between Prescription Drugs and food or heat. Continuing to pay 70% more than other Nations do for Big Pharma products hurts all Americans. $2,000.00 to $4,000 more per person in “Medical Costs” contributes to Insurance Corporations being able to pay $23 million for a CEO. Obscene profits allow current stakeholders to spend $500 million to buy votes, media and Town Hall disruptors.
This is not really Health Care but Medical/Insurance/ Pharmaceuticals getting only as much Reform as stakeholders’ profits will allow. Just like the Clinton Reform it was only about who got to profit.
The root causes of many diseases are not looked for. The War on Cancer is a failure because the focus is not on building healthy bodies and sound minds. When I was told I had two years to live in 1987, I was referred to an Internist, a Neurologist, a Cardiologist and a Gynecologist but no one who looked at my whole body. I surrendered to God and asked for a Miracle.
Gerry Goh, M.D., 4th generation Acupuncturist, herbalist and FBI M.D. treated me and in 1993 he declared me brain tumor and cancer free. His treatment was not covered by my “Medical Insurance Plan.
In 1977 I was denied surgery by Group Health. A private surgeon spent two and a half hours doing surgery and I spent ten days in the hospital. I would have died from sepsis. Trained as a Registered Nurse I knew the risk and paid a very heavy price.
President Obama your choices of Michael Taylor at FDA/Monsanto and Agriculture Secretary Vilsack, pro GMO/Monsanto insures that status quo pesticide use will destroy the health of millions and cost hundreds of millions of dollars to treat..
Mr. President you sold out. With a heavy heart and angst I quit as there is no hope.

Former Democratic Precinct Committeewoman; Delegate to Washington State Democratic Convention; Volunteer Democratic National Headquarters 1980 and fourth generation democrat. Democrats and Republicans, like you, are Corpracrats so I quit,
Theresa Marie K. Gandhi

250,000 percent mark-up on drug prices are Obscene!
As we have revealed in past issues of "Life Extension," a significant percentage of drugs sold in the United States contain active ingredients made in other countries. In our independent investigation of how much profit drug companies really make, we obtained the actual price of active ingredients used in some of the most popular drugs sold in America.
The information below speaks for itself.
Celebrex 100 mg Consumer price (100 tablets): $130.27
Cost of general active ingredients: $0.60 Percent markup: 21,712%;
Claritin 10 mg Consumer Price (100 tablets): $215.17
Cost of general active ingredients: $0.71 Percent markup: 30,306%;
Norvasec 10 mg Consumer price (100 tablets): $188.29
Cost of general active ingredients: $0.14 Percent markup: 134,493%;
Prevacid 30 mg Consumer price (100 tablets): $44.77
Cost of general active ingredients: $1.01 Percent markup: 34,136%;
Prilosec 20 mg Consumer price (100 tablets): $360.97
Cost of general active ingredients $0.52 Percent markup: 69,417%;
Prozac 20 mg Consumer price (100 tablets): $247.47
Cost of general active ingredients: $0.11 Percent markup: 224,973%;
Tenormin 50 mg Consumer price (100 tablets): $104.47
Cost of general active ingredients: $0.13 Percent markup: 80,362%;
Vasotec 10 mg Consumer price (100 tablets): $102.37
Cost of general active ingredients: $0.20 Percent markup: 51,185%;
Xanax 1 mg Consumer price (100 tablets): $136.79
Cost of general active ingredients: $0.024 Percent markup: 569,958%; and
Zoloft 50 mg Consumer price: $206.87
Cost of general active ingredients: $1.75 Percent markup: 11, 821% .
Since the cost of prescription drugs is so outrageous, I thought everyone I knew should know about this. (...) Well we all know the drug companies make obscene profits but little did I know just how obscene they really are when it comes to ripping off an ever increasing number of sick people in the world.
August 8, 2009

One billion Ocean Shore Canaries are dead.

2009-11-22T21:45:00.000-08:00

Is ACES (HR2454) and U.S. Senate a Danger to Global Warming Solutions?
The American Energy and Security Act of 2009 ACES (Voted 219 - 212 in House) is an embarrassment and our Congressional Representative should know what you think. If made into a law with out significant changes in the Senate it will cause you, President Obama, to be very embarrassed before the Global Community of Nations and Tribes that will gather in Copenhagen this December for COP15 - Global Warming Treaty making.
ACES gives billions of dollars of Cap and Trade pollution permits to the Coal Industry; guts enforcement by the EPA; and does not require, nor give enforcement power to require the changes that are necessary to be made sooner rather than later. The valuable Cap and Trade permits given for “free” will most likely drive the next Wall Street coup d’etat.
Later is too late as the tipping point has already been reached in the Pacific Ocean. We’ve been told the oceans will be dead in forty years. To solve the interwoven problems some American “Sacred Cows”, like coal, diesel – ubiquitous petroleum products and corporate chemical agriculture will need to be open to changes that must be made to avert immediate unthinkable consequences.
One billion oysters, “Shore Canaries”, are dead! Deep ocean water have since 2005 been saturated with carbon dioxide thus turning the normally alkaline ocean waters into Carbonic Acid. Driven by northern winds the deep acid ocean waters have washed ashore killing One Billion Seed Oysters. This acid ocean water will kill shell-fish and shrimp, a major food of Northwest and Alaskan Salmon.
The Great Pacific Ocean Garbage “Patch” is 60’ deep, the size of Texas and made up mostly of petro-chemical products. Ghost reefs made up of petro-chemical fishing nets and ropes trap and kill massive numbers of the ocean’s multiple species. For the first time the Dead Zone from the Mississippi River’s Agra-biz chemical runoffs reaches all the way to the bottom of the Gulf and is huge. Dead Zones are found around the planet as lack of oxygen kills all life.
The quality of our common future and the least of us depend upon what we do:
Because our oceans are dying; our food growing seeds and soils are poisoned; as are the aquifers our foods use to grow. Every half hour an Indian farmer drinks ¾ cup of RoundUp® by Monsanto to commit suicide. Monsanto in charge of food production in India is a huge disaster. It may happen here, as President Obama has appointed Michael Taylor a former Monsanto Executive as EPA Food Safety Czar.
Because the Health of all earths’ peoples and species are at risk unless major public policy choices are made that will be very difficult, require sacrifice and a new paradigm; Because so many have given us the tools, wisdom, compassion and courage to know that we can made a difference;
Please made a law that puts into place mandates, enforcement and real incentives that will promote the changes that are needed to be made in public policies worthy of you, our Global Leader, representing we the people to set a strong moral example to the gathered world leaders in December in order to create a Global Warming Treaty that agrees to make changes to stop the harmful practices that contribute to Global Warming.
War contributes a huge amount of polluting particulate matter in Earth’s skies, waters and our air. It consumes almost 50% of our petroleum use and is a huge contributor to Global Warming. Nano particles of depleted uranium are now circulating the globe with deadly radioactive dust. 3.6 million watts of electricity used by HAARP to stretch out the ionosphere and direct associated war making programs are contributing to generations of problems yet to come from technologies impacting our atmosphere on a regular basis and this can not be good. Today we experience severe weather more often than ever before. Common sense says there’s a link.
Please Mr. President, we are counting on your leadership as the Corpracratic Congress is unable to get beyond self interest of corporate donors and make hard choices for the survival of humanity and the oceans. Are you able to rise above being the first to spend a billion dollars to be President?

Thank you.
7-27-09

Lobbyists Paying to Write Health Care Their Way

2009-11-22T21:36:00.000-08:00

Dear President Obama,
The Senate Finance Committee has secured their personal fortunes and sold out the American public. Trying to get bi- partisan support from Corpracrats is futile and unwise. The following no longer represent the people only the Corporations that have bought them off. This way of conducting the people’s business needs to change.
There are 100 members of the Senate, but these six, inexplicably, seem to be holding all the cards when it comes to health care.

So you probably won't be surprised to learn that all six have taken a huge amount of money from the health insurance industry and Big Pharma.* The following Senators should be shunned and charges brought against them:
Senator and Lifetime contributions from Insurance/Pharma
Sen. Max Baucus (D-MT)
$1,203,205 (I heard $3.4 million.-tmg)
Sen. Jeff Bingaman (D-NM)
$206,297
Sen. Kent Conrad (D-ND)
$442,165
Sen. Mike Enzi (R-NV)
$342,228
Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA)
$702,595
Sen. Olympia Snowe (R-ME)
$161,706
TOTAL:
$3,058,256

These six senators — who, by the way, represent only 2.74% of Americans — are writing bad policy, and they're doing it while they take money from the very companies who stand to benefit the most.
I read HR3200’s Public Option and it must stay in. $23 million to an Insurance executive could cover a lot of people with excellent care. “Free Market” Profiteering does not belong in what should be not-for-profit care giving.
If I had surrendered to Group Health denying me surgery that saved my life in 1977 I would have been dead three decades ago and a lot of people would be worst off for my not doing what I have with my life. If I had not taken desperate measures to live I would be a US Senator today or at the least working in the Senate.
Sincerely outraged at Profiteers,
Theresa Marie K. Gandhi
July 30, 2009

Obama Monsanto's Talyor FDA Food Czar

2009-11-22T21:29:00.000-08:00

Dear President Obama and White House Folks,
I thought maybe you understood how the Monsanto products, i.e RoundUp, etc. are linked with a number of diseases: erect penile dysfunction, testicular atrophy, cancer, Parkinson’s disease, etc. because these products are endocrine disruptors and feminize males. Herbicides, pesticides and products designed to kill make for sick people who incur major health care expenses. GMO seeds like RoundUp Ready are even worse. I have over 1,800 files proving the link between herbicides (sometimes called pesticides), that is Monsanto products that according to peer review scientific studies are linked with several diseases.
Demark has banned their products because they migrate into the water table.
The following news tells me your knowledge and that of your Cabinet is either lacking or you have a very dark agenda.
According to "The 100 Year Lie" by Fitzgerald testicular atrophy is up 600% since these products of Monsanto came on the market. Fitzgerald has created a time line of diseases and their increase and chemicals created. Monsanto's products are directly connected to over $100 million in health care costs.
If this is bad enough YOU put Monsanto in charge of "Food Safety".
“In a Tuesday afternoon press release, the FDA announced that Michael Taylor, a former Monsanto executive, had joined the agency as “senior advisor to the commissioner.” If the title is vague, the portfolio (pasted from the press release) is substantial—a kind of food czar of the Food and Drug Administration….” www.Grist.org clip from Tom Philpott on “Monsanto’s Taylor FDA Food Czar”.

Monsanto Runs the FDA?
Monsanto, Monsanto
evil and mean
lies and hides
truth from sight
by might of law
with no oversight.
With corporate folk
guarding the gate
closed and shut
truth hid and gone
with no oversight
as profits are the pride
truth must hide.
Health takes a slide
millions will die
as Monsanto’s guys, run the FDA
truth hides, out of sight
as Congress and Cabinet are bought off
with no oversight, to stop a blight.

July 9, 2009
© Copyright Theresa Marie K. Gandhi February 23, 2006

Sky Shield of Barium -Aluminum Very Bad Idea

2009-11-22T21:18:00.000-08:00

Professor John P. Holdren, Director Office of Science and Technology
Executive Office of the President, 725 17th St., Room 5228
Washington, D.C. 20502

Dear Director Holdren:
It has come to my attention that the Global Warming crisis has opened up a discussion on ways to possibly geo-engineer the climate as a potential emergency option. You should ask to be briefed on a planet wide program to spray barium, aluminum oxide, and other chemicals at high elevation that expand to create a cloud cover from horizon to horizon after multiple passes from the military planes at high elevation since 1998. Some pilots have gotten bored with just straight back and forth to fill the sky and instead make huge horizon to horizon tic-tac-toes grids. A sunny day becomes overcast.
I have witnessed this happening in four states. Polarized sunglasses make the cloud cover look like oil slicks. Not so with con-trails. Videos, books and web pages have shared captured images with several million people. Heavy chem-trails (common name confirmed with tests) were observed everyday for more than 45 days at a time. During this time no rain or snow fell. Drought records were broken in state after state. Even during the monsoon season spray equaled no rain.
There are several unintended consequences (or maybe not) of this ongoing eleven year program. Several countries have reported and recorded chem-trails. Chem-trails are showing up in films and on television as it is hard to have days when the sky is clear.
Laboratory tests have confirmed the presence of barium which does not occur naturally or normally. The pH of soils is being changed and crops are acquiring unexpected problems as farmers are perplexed as to why this is happening.
Even if this is part of HAARP; the Navy’s RFMP military program; the Air Force controlling the weather; or biological tests of DAARPA the consequences are too high.
Ongoing chronic and acute illnesses have resulted with physicians stumped as to what is causing a new syndrome. This has increased health care costs. Specifically a nationwide epidemic increase in cases of nose bleed, asthma, allergies, pneumonia, upper respiratory symptoms (that last and last) and a noticeable increase in arthritis symptoms. The chemical changes on the planet create conditions detrimental to health because it creates conditions just right for harmful mold and fungus. Not to mention the link between aluminum and the epidemic of memory loss, Alzheimers, and dementia.
Attached are articles by just two of the investigators that have reported and recorded the “mystery” program patented by Eastland.
Rather than trying to patch a problem why not get to the root and stop what is causing the problem? Prevention is always less expensive than a maybe solution. I have a few ideas on probable solutions. I’ve been discussing Global Survival with world leaders since 1983.

Respectfully,
Theresa Marie K. Gandhi
July 1, 2009

Red Alert 1 billion Oysters killed by Acid Ocean shorewaters

2009-11-22T21:11:00.000-08:00

June 16, 2009
Acid Ocean killing Billions of Shellfish – Red Alert!
Dear President Barack Obama
Thank you for your June 2nd letter.
One billion dead seed oysters from acid ocean waters are a huge Red Alert.*
In 1980 I assembled a bibliography of the “Economic Viability of the Marine Resources” for Puget Sound. Seed oysters were a huge contributor to the potential of hundreds of millions of dollars in 1970 dollars is a reality now. The Japanese in the 1970s were buying wild seed oysters from Washington to grow on rafts producing 15,000 pounds of protein per surface acre. * Clip of front page article in Seattle Times follows.
Carbon dioxide absorption capacity of the North Pacific has hit a “tipping point”. Now acidic ocean waters are being pulled from deep waters onto Washington and Oregon shore waters where for the past four years seed oysters are no longer able to grow. The same problem can dissolve the shells of a primary food source of Pacific Northwest Salmon. Chinook salmon are already listed as an Endangered Species. Farm raise salmon hurts my liver. The signs are dire. One billion dead seed oysters (the canaries in the ocean) have delivered a very dire warning!
The Corpracrats (democratic and republican) representing vested interests of their corporate contributors are standing in the way of taking the actions that will be needed to solve the problem of the oceans becoming acidic. In the mean time the oceans have less than forty years before they are dead maybe even sooner for major parts of it. No coal is ‘clean’. So called plans for making coal clean burning are decades away thanks to Congressional Corpracrats rewarding major contributors with free Cap and Trade vouchers, delayed compliance dates, etc.
My life’s focus has been on finding solutions to the major challenges we are facing today. Married to a relative of Mahatma Gandhi I researched and wrote how specifically to apply the principles of M.K. Gandhi. I strategized with world leaders on global survival at Oxford, etc.
From your actions and appointments it is apparent that there are gaps in your education and among your advisors on how specifically to solve the many difficult and different challenges that are linked together and need to be solved at the same time.
Not since the 1980 Global 2000 Report to President Carter in three volumes has anyone addressed multiple problems and their relationship. It was the first and only report by any national government on the economic, demographic, resource, and environmental future of the world. It sold over 1.5 million copies in eight languages. I bought a copy and read it. The Japanese had it translated and formed a commission to study how to avert the problems for our common future that the report revealed. Ask President Carter about it. Please read it or delegate an update of the thirty year old report. Comparing the two could provide justification to make major changes.
There is a way to solve the ‘energy crisis’ along with all of the linked challenges but you dismissed the internet writers’ third most asked question of you without thought or investigation. (Contrary to your statement that you didn’t like to comment on issues that you had not studied.) I have been assembling an economic briefing packet for your consideration of a solution that could solve several problems and bring in huge amounts of money (several trillion in 10 years). Over 500 economists agree with me, some from Harvard. It is comprehensive and referenced.
Do you want to know what would solve the challenges of: 1) Global Warming: 2) Agra-biz contributing to huge increases in medical costs; logging of the last 3% of old growth forests for toilet paper; reduce crime and the cost of prisons; and produce jobs for millions of people?
I await your reply and request for the briefing packet on how specifically to solve a number of critically linked challenges. Would you like it digital, via mail or both? Is there a general systems policy staff member to address it too specifically?

Speaking and working for Our Seventh Generation,
Theresa Marie K. Gandhi
www.tmgandhi.com tm@tmgandhi.com

Obama Global Warming from HAARP not Addressed

2009-11-22T20:57:00.000-08:00

June 16, 2009
Global Warming from HAARP not Addressed
President Barack Obama:
Thank you for your June 2nd letter in response to my communicating to you my concerns about Global Warming. The form letter signed by you most likely by one of those signature machines I saw at the Religious Broadcasters Convention is appreciated.
You did not respond to a very important issue that I raised, i.e. HAARP.
In Gakona, Alaska, HAARP using 3.6 million watts of electricity is sending focused beams to the ionosphere to heat and bow it for over the horizon targeting for a number of uses. When the USA, Russia and other countries use these technologies it puts a huge amount of energy into our weather system. Common sense says this has contributed to Extreme Severe Weather Events. Extreme Arctic Ice Melt is happening and again common sense would say there is a link to heating the Artic sky.
For more than just common sense Dr. Nick Begich, Senator Begich’s brother, has written extensively with footnotes and patents of the technology used by the HAARP system. Also noted in one of Nick’s book is a quote from the Air Force calling for the ability to control the weather as a “Force Multiplier”. Ask Dr. Nick Begich or read any of his books from www.earthpulse.com.
As Commander-in-Chief I can understand your belief in the need for such a system but HEATING THE IONOSPHERE CONTRIBUTES TO GLOBAL WARMING and is not smart. Always unintended consequences happen as with HAARP and Global Warming.
Major Ed Dames, former trainer for the military, teaches remote viewing. He and his team have tasked and “seen” the atmosphere with “Swiss cheese” rips from pole to pole. Could HAARP have done this?
Dumping millions of tons of chemicals high in the sky has not solved the root problem of Global Warming. Unless the chem-trails are also a part of HAARP. Instead the barium, aluminum and ? chemicals are changing the pH of food crop soils and the oceans world wide. I have witnessed since 1998 the chemical-trails being laid down in grid patterns in four states and then spreading out and clouding the sky. I know it is very wide spread. Ask Major Ed Dames. His oath of secrecy prevented him from saying more but “no comment” often speaks volumes.
Could you please call together the other Nations that are using the HAARP technology and get everyone to agree to STOP HEATING THE SKY?
If not could you please explain why?

Speaking and working for Our Seventh Generation,
Theresa Marie K. Gandhi
www.tmgandhi.com tm@tmgandhi.com

A Missile for a Stone -A Jewish State but no Palestinian Home

2009-11-22T20:52:00.000-08:00

President Obama, Commander-in-Chief;
American made weapons paid for by the billions the US gave Israel were used recently to kill 1419 Palestinians, more than 400 children and left thousands seriously wounded without adequate medical care, shelter or food. Many more will die from the US made genotoxic D.I.M.E. weapons that took so many children’s legs and left 100% rapid causing deadly cancer toxins embedded within their bodies that kill within weeks or months. Many died from burning to death from the insides from white phosphorous. Fourth generation nuclear weapons, i.e. DU weapons, creates ceramic nano particles upon explosion invading bodies in various ways. (DU weapons are killing American Armed Forces warriors that use them.)
Eight Israelis were killed by Palestinians, five were killed by friendly fire but Israel gives the Palestinians credit for killing all thirteen.
Your marriage to Israel needs full disclosure. We are watching your actions because your speaking has lost credibility as your words don’t always match your actions. Please walk your talk. Please get all the facts before you make a decision as it has been very apparent that corporate truth is your truth but not really the whole truth.
I’m preparing a number of well researched briefings for you on a variety of topics. In the mean time:

A Missile for a Stone - a Jewish State but no Palestinian Home!
The roots of war, in a Jewish town
is fear from the camps, spread all around
in Gaza strip, on the West Bank
are refugee camps, filled with Jewish hate.
Locking up Moslems, who hate
as Nazi atrocities, become Jewish bait
as what is feared, is dished out hate
that feeds and grows, as hate feeds hate.
Containing it, won’t stop hate
to lock up a lie, it just doesn’t die
but festers and grows
and kids who throw rocks
at US tanks and US planes
armed with missiles, with electronic brains
shoots down kids, who throw stones
because where they live, is surrounded by hate.
For decades they went, petition in hand
to courts with laws, in every land
but Jewish fear and an Israeli state
sealed the words, out at the gate
no way, no reason, no court, no law
would go against, illogical Jewish law
of a right to exist, as a Jewish State
a right not given, to Palestinians of late
so a third world war, brews and grows
from fear instilled, a long time ago
so an eye for an eye, a missile for a stone
a Jewish state, but no Palestinian home.

© Copyright Theresa Marie K. Gandhi 3/3/2002

War Profiteering in an Illegal War -a poem

2009-11-22T20:46:00.000-08:00

War profiteering in an illegal war
is truly sinful – shall I tell you more?
War not declared by Congress it’s said
is not a war as the media says.

Economic stimulus two such words
hiding lies way too big for words.
Money so huge and for 15 years back
goes back to the bad boys
the corporate thugs – General Motors
GE, Enron, Chevron/Texaco and yes
IBM – how could you guess
that Alternative Minimum – a retroactive non-tax
means Corporations pay less than zero - which is no tax
but corporate welfare to global giants
who can now hide profits outside of our land.

Never before but now legal it is
to hide corporate profits overseas.
Just the lost tax money admitted the 1st year
would be $12 billion no longer there.

Jews died with ease with IBM punch cards to tell
Nazi killers how to organize well
gets back $1.4 billion – IBM won’t tell.

In the millions – hundreds that is
General Motor $833, $671 to GE
$572 to Chevron/Texaco and $254 for Enron
hundreds of millions to stimulate greed.
Congress passed it and the Senate at night.
We must speak up and stop this blight
as an economic stimulus funds corporate flight!

Sent to President Obama 5-23-09

* “In the councils of government we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial (Congressional) complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist. Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of the huge (Congressional), industrial and military machinery of defense with our peaceful methods and goals, so that security and liberty may prosper together.” - President Eisenhower 1/17/1961 General Eisenhower farewell address, Congress was also to be feared but was edited out at the last minute. I would add Corporate Agriculture, Big Media, Insurance, Medicine and Pharmaceutical Corporations that put profit above the greater good.

© Copyright Theresa Marie K. Gandhi August 8, 2008

Obama -Why listen to me -Suggestions

2009-11-22T20:39:00.000-08:00

President Obama,
I support your budget and please do not listen to the money washed republican Corpracrats. There are democratic Corpracrats you need to also be careful of. President Eisenhower edited out the word Congressional when he warned us of the military industrial congressional complex. And please, trickle down does not work. Please bury it.
Why would you listen to me? Ever since being offered an internship with Senator Warren Magnusson in the early seventies I have educated and prepared myself to be a United States Senator. In 1980 while volunteering at Democratic National Headquarters so that Ron Reagan would not win I got a bill out of committee. In 1988 I got a law made making October 2nd a National Day of Recognition for Mahatma Gandhi and shook hands with President Reagan in the Oval Office. Since 1982 I have researched, applied and taught the moral and political thought of Mahatma Gandhi with a focus on how specifically to achieve inner and world peace. Staying on truth and being non-violent in thought, word and deed is a passion and moment to moment experience for me. As an ordained minister knowing the constant Presence of God makes life worth living and is a gift to be used wisely. In 1983 I married a relative of Mahatma Gandhi.
Thank you for being open to communications from us common folk – some of us are wise and can see from afar the forest of unwise advice and even lies you have to weave your way through to find truth and wisdom. Our history of Presidents is filled with grievous attacks on those with the courage to make changes that took power from the powerful. I know you are one who can with the backing of common Americans as your constituency implement the changes that could restore and invigorate our Republic. Keep talking to us to let us know what you are doing and why and what we can do to help you.
I, like you, don’t speak unless I know the issues and know that I can back up what I say with reliable sources, references, peer reviewed scientific studies and have a probable solution to contribute to the challenge.
I campaigned for you by telling over 500 friends, family and fellow social justice activists to tell five people to tell five people, etc. to vote for you. Three Bush coup d’etats ended by blackmailing Congress that if they didn’t submit and give money to Wall St. martial law would be declared. And GW Bush signing an Executive Order authorizing 10 million uses of sonar that could kill the last marine mammal was too much. Another time I’ll communicate some of my Comments on the U.S. Navy NWTRC draft EIS/OEIS 2008. They and other examples of my work with photos can be found on my blog via my web page; www.tmgandhi.com.
Of IMMEDIATE CONCERN.
1. When you put the foxes who robbed the hen house in charge of designing, rebuilding and installing anti-theft procedures I knew we were in big trouble. The coup d’etat from the power elite bankers worked and America could be forever under the thumb of a powerful cabal. It’s not too late to get rid of the foxes. Will you?
2. Only you can request the State Department or Department of Commerce in preparation for COP15 in Copenhagen in December establish a Working Group on Global Warming and its relationship to ionospheric heaters, i.e. Star Wars. HAARP uses weapons of mass destruction technology that can be used for modifying the ionosphere over very large areas for "over-the-horizons" telecommunications disruption, creating computer errors and perhaps even creating negative biological effects. What is known from other government documents, HAARP planning documents and International Red Cross documents is that what is possible with these new systems could have global catastrophic consequences. The HAARP system intends to beam 3.6 million Gig watts of effective radiated power of high frequency radio energy into the ionosphere and then use it as a weapon or at the least control the weather as a “force multiplier”. This energy drives extreme weather and creates climate disruption on a scale never seen before. Humanity and the continued existence of the west coast plus…. depends upon your considered thought, decision and action in this regard.
When you heat the sky to bow it to control and target over the horizon Extreme Ice melt occurs and temperatures have risen at least 4 degrees in Alaska, home of HAARP. Talk with Senator Mark Begich of Alaska about the work his brother Nick has done in researching and writing books about the patents, capability and implications of the technology that is online in Gakona, Alaska. I’m sure you have been briefed about the military uses of this technology but not the probable grievous harm.
Studying the history of geo-political strategic military actions I understand the need to have a security system on our northwestern frontier that can monitor the skies of the whole planet. The collateral damage could be the elimination of all artic ice sooner than we could possibly imagine. The perma frost is turning into swamp and the ripples could go around the world.
President Obama we need your leadership to admit what we, the Soviets and other countries are doing in the artic and in space and decide for the sake of humanity, the global coastal residents and our seventh generation to solve the issues that have gotten us to the present but may prevent us from having a future.
3. As a radioactive Hanford downwinder in the future I will communicate with you my research on the history of the Atomic Energy Commission, fourth generation nuclear weapons, i.e. Deplete Uranium and the poison gas created upon explosion. My bread board held up the drafting table where the Enola Gay was modified to be able to carry the bombs to Japan.
4. The USDA is one of the biggest contributors to the ill health and high medical expenses of Americans. Corporate farming is making Americans obese and malnourished at the same time. Your Secretary of Agriculture will not understand this link nor will he enable healthy organic farming that produces mineral rich wholesome alive and healthy food. My care giver son grows organic food so I may live. Please do not sign H.R 875 “The Food Safety and Modernization Act” into law. It is poorly written and makes it harder maybe impossible for organic family farms to stay in business. Monsanto is a bad actor and needs to be examined.
5. Can you please make sure that the State Department, the Military, law enforcement, prisons and schools teach conflict resolution techniques developed by Mahatma Gandhi, Martin Luther King, Jr., and Cesar Chavez and used by Assistant Secretary General Robert Muller? After 40 years in the United Nations he became the Chancellor at the University of Peace in Costa Rica but was only paid $1.00 a year with no support staff. Could you please fund the University for Peace and the U.S. Peace University? Or could you ask the United Nations to do so? Learning non-violent conflict mediation is very important if peace is to be possible.
Before we marched across America in Operation SALT March in 1984 I learned from Ford Motor Company that Peace is a threat to National Security. This should not be so.
Thank you for your kind consideration of the issues I have raised. I would like to shake the hand of the President with the courage to tackle and solve the challenges I have touched upon today. I hope you will be open to receiving my questions and suggestions in the future.

With sincere thanks for your being President,
Theresa Marie Kothari Gandhi
Whidbey Island Chemically Injured Network
Whidbey Island No Spray
Green Party of Island County
March 26, 2009

Navy Requests to "Take" Kill or Strand Marine Mammals 650,000 times

2009-08-19T00:05:00.000-07:00

August 17, 2009
By Electronic Mail

Michael Payne, Chief
National Marine Fisheries Service
Permits, Conservation and Education Division
Office of Protected Resources
1313 E – W Hwy
Silver Spring, MD 20910-3225

Re: 0648-AX88 NWTRC request Marine Mammal Take Permit rule change.

Chief Michael Payne:

I submitted 24 pages of comments on the NWTRC EIS/OEIS. 5,300 characters documented Navy’s sonar Taking kills 700 - 4000 endangered marine species a year. Navy expert said new sonar is felt for 300 miles.

Two dead whales near Olympia June 2009 were found after residents felt a pulse (sonar?) that knocked out electricity & locked doors. A sonar test at PSNS locked every car on auto row. In the 1,068 page NWTRC EIS nowhere were effects to shore populations from Puget Sound to San Diego of the Navy’s sonar frequencies going past the littoral mentioned. If 215 decibels of sonar explodes marine mammal brains at 180 decibels what does it do to humans?

NMFS has proposed a rule that would allow the Navy "to take" –harass, injure or kill marine mammals 130,000 times a year for five years for 650,000 acoustic assaults. Even within the 1.3% of the NWTR area that is the Olympic National Marine Mammal Sanctuary. There should be a 300 mile safe zone around the Sanctuary.
Why would you allow this violation? This is contrary to your stated Mission Statement.

There are major stressors on marine mammals: only 1.7 of 13 million sockeye returned to the Fraser River; Carbonic Acid ocean water killed a billion seed oysters and can dissolve salmon and thus marine mammal food sources. Together global warming and Navy sonar could cause mass extinction of marine mammal species.

If the Navy’s request of the “whole mango” is allow by NMFS how will you justify the extinctions? What is your back up plan to recreate marine mammals after they are gone? Please uphold your mission, protect marine mammals and deny the Navy its request for Take permits.

Theresa Marie Gandhi
Educated to protect earth and ocean species for our 7th generation.
P.O. Box 437, Clinton, WA 98236

Attachments: Northwest Training Complex –Comments submitted March 9, 2009
Marine Mammals Deaths and Naval Hubris – submitted March 9, 2009

cc: Rep. Rick Larsen
Senator Maria Cantwell
Senator Patti Murray
Various Media

Comments on NWTRC Navy's 1,068 EIS/OEIS

2009-08-18T23:59:00.000-07:00

Commander, U.S. Pacific Fleet
Kimberly Kler, Environmental Planner
Naval Facilities Engineering Command Northwest
1101 Tautog Circle, Suite 203
Silverdale, WA 98315-1101 360-396-0927
http://www.nwtrangecomplexeis.com/NtrcCommentForm.aspx
March 9, 2009

Theresa Marie K. Gandhi
Whidbey Island Chemically Injured Network
P.O. Box 437
Clinton, WA 98236 tm@tmgandhi.com

Howdy Kimberly,
The three documents plus this one I submit as my “Comments on Northwest Training Range Complex EIS/OEIS Draft December 2008” Document three and four are references for statements made in document one and two. In the specific “Comment” document I have used italics for my statements and underlined my recommendations. Material taken from the EIS/OEIS Draft is in quotes with section and page number noted. I am qualified to make these statements because of: a year of college organic chemistry; eight years of immersion in “best available science” on toxic chemicals in the environment; marine species and humans. I have hundreds of documents on this topic that have been used to make comments on several draft Environmental Impact Statements. Official Comments have been submitted by this writer on topics related to: herbicides for roadside vegetation control; Salmon Plan for WIRA 6; Island County Critical Areas and Wetlands regulations and U.S. Department of the Interior’s BLM EIS to apply thousands of pounds of herbicides to one million acres in Western States for Fire Suppression.
Reading the draft EIS/OEIS has raised my blood pressure as I experience incredibility, disbelief, skepticism and even outrage at the hubris of Former President Bush, his Secretary of Defense, the Commander, U.S. Naval Fleet and those who assembled the draft NWTRC EIS/OEIS.
The Navy’s analysis of the potential environmental impacts to the human environment that “may” result from the U.S. Navy’s Historical “No change” Alternative of ongoing practices; Proposed Actions of the preferred Expanded Alternatives and proposed increased naval activities within a greatly expanded NWTRC are severely lacking in comprehensive credible science. “Science” referenced and references are found to be old and inaccurate when compared to “best available science”. Assumptions, declarations and statements extrapolated from the “science” referenced are thus found to be inaccurate. This means that historical, ongoing and preferred expanded alternatives will expose marine species, habitats, aquatic life and near shore inhabitants, i.e. people, too much greater harm than claimed by this EIS/OEIS draft. I found “scientific” studies lacking credibility with inaccurate conclusions. Whales that wash up dead on the beaches of Whidbey Island, there of been several, have to be disposed of at a hazardous waste facility. The draft writers’ assumptions that toxic chemicals and hazardous wastes from training activities and operations would not experience bioaccumulation up the food chain to human consumption marine species and marine mammals are not based on “best available science”. Southern Puget Sound Orca Whales are one of the most toxic burdened species on the planet.
As a Hanford Downwinder born north along the Columbia River in 1946 I had to research radiation in all it forms in order to overcome death by cancer from exposure to radiation. Department of Energy - DOE # TCDF58 is my number as part of the dose reconstruction project having received a minimum of 2,900,000 MREMS in my sixty three years. My greatest exposure came before birth and for the first two years of life. As part of a family and community cancer cluster I scattered my 41 year old brother’s ashes after he had tightened the bolts of a nuclear reactor in a submarine with paper booties for protection. Of the four out of six in my immediate family experiencing cancer, three are dead.
Radiation’s “No Apparent Danger” is not true. The NWTRC EIS/OEIS Draft referencing a thirty-five year old report: “Ecological Considerations of Depleted Uranium Munitions” assembled at Los Alamos, NM weapons laboratory before the most recent generation of DU weapons were used in combat and could not possibly addresses the issues raised after nineteen years of use. Nor could claims made by the U.S. Navy or any branch of the military on the “harmlessness” of deplete uranium weapons be credible. Testing large particles of uranium does not and can not be used to say what the pulverized matter created by use of these weapons would do to humans or aquatic life. Depleted Uranium weapons are fourth generation nuclear weapons and their use violates several international treaties, conventions and agreements. (See www.GulfWarVets.org)
Depleted “nano particles” of exploded Uranium, which forms a poison gas, are not less harmful just because large particles in another form had tested so. These are some of many government and military lies told in the “Name of National Security”. (See “Experts on Radiation, document 3 of 4).
The mists of exploding DU weapons into nanoparticiles are no where referenced in this NWTCR Draft EIS/OEIS. One thirty-five year old of two references used large particles of uranium in the studies referenced. If they had studied the poison mists of nanoparticiles of DU the results would have been kept secret. Military and government agents have threatened those whose investigations showed extreme cancer risk from the nanoparticiles with loss of job, homes burned and lives were threatened. Radiation experts, Japanese investigators and medical personnel were denied entry into Iraq.
I’ve prepared a six page abstract of “Experts in DU Radiation Effects” including the professional credentials of the researchers, doctors and investigators. Studies on the nano particles of tungsten are probably rare or lacking. And it maybe that the DU bombs vaporized to date that are greater than or equal to the fall out of 83,000 Hiroshima sized bombs also contained tungsten, I don’t know. The radioactivity trail of the uranium was easier to track.
“Marine Mammal Deaths and Naval Hubris” backs up the validity of my statements regarding marine mammal’s deaths with references. Data provided by the draft EIS/OEIS and a document search regarding the multiple “takings”, i.e. killing, of marine mammals with the use of mid-frequency active sonar use are cited.
These two documents are included as part of my comments for a total of four documents submitted as my Comments on the NWTRC EIS/OEIS draft. (Identified as document 1 of 4 TmkG.)
“Best available science” is often not considered if it is not looked for. Washington State Department of Transportation -WSDOT proved that in their EIS process by only considering comments from Chemicals Corporations on implications or effects of potential harm for humans and aquatic species of their products. Ignored were hundreds of “best available scientific studies” proving the link between the chemical formulations used and their endocrine dysfunction aspects on species exposed. Many of the chemicals in the formulations have been linked with the feminization of males, decreased sperm counts species wide and linked with erect penile dysfunction, testicular cancer in humans and a number of other terminal diseases. Island County had the scientific findings put before them until they stopped using all herbicides for roadside vegetation control.
WSDOT ignored the endocrine dysfunction “peer review scientific studies” submitted that resulted in the Secretary of Transportation requesting an EIS process to look at issues I had raised. Washington Toxics Coalition submitted eighteen pages addressing all of the issues ignored in the EIS and WSDOT, like the Navy is likely to do, deemed the comments “too comprehensive and complete” to be dealt with. The comments were not included in the final EIS document but rather the claim was made that WSDOT was taking care not to harm humans or the environment.
Including a report of a process of framing an EIS so as to not honestly examine very valid issues of potential harm done by WSDOT is not unlike what the Navy is doing with the current NWTRC EIS/OEIS draft. This puts the entire integrity of the process of securing a final NWTRC EIS/OEIS by the U.S. Navy in the column of dishonesty conducted with a lack of valor.
I am skeptical that the Navy will heed the implications of “best available science” because of my experience over seven years in dealing with WSDOT that held itself “an island onto itself”. It took five years of work by a small group of Whidbey Island citizens using “best available science” that resulted in WSDOT now using 30% less toxic chemicals on all State Routes. 2008 use of herbicides is a 70% reduction from the highest amount used in 1993.
It appears that the U.S. Navy does not honor the concept of a Sanctuary nor do they think they are subject to many current laws and international agreement regarding Olympic Coast National Marine Sanctuary - OCNMS. Instead the Navy WANTS every square nautical miles of the 122,440 and have secured a permit to kill, “take” marine mammals if when and where they so choose even from a small part of the totally vast NWTRC area. The OCNMS is only 1.3% of the 122,440 square nautical miles but the U.S. Navy must have even this small part.
Like the claim the Navy is making based on inappropriate scientific studies that no harm will come to humans, marine species, their habitats or the environment. This reasoning lacks Common Sense.
The Endangered Species Act carries fines against anyone, agency or government body who harms the habitat of Chinook salmon or salmonid at $15,000.00 to $25,000.00 per fish. As all of Whidbey Island near shore is Chinook habitat it is especially applicable to this draft EIS proposal. A lawsuit against the Navy for a massive fish kill from a small sized explosion off of NAS Whidbey using one of its smaller bombs does not bode well for endangered Chinook salmon. This fish kill was witnessed. How many are not?
Chinook, Coho, Sockeye, Atlantic, Chum salmon and Steelhead Trout with eight additional species of salmon are listed as Endangered. An additional twenty-five are threatened as the salmon population supports the whale populations which are in serious decline with eighteen marine mammals species listed as Endangered Species. This delicate balance for so many species of marine mammals that are close to tipping into extinction will surely be harmed and extinction hastened by the Navy’s proposed “Preferred Alternative”, its activities and insistence on using the 1.3% of 122,440 square nautical miles of the Olympic National Marine Mammal Sanctuary. Marine mammals and populations of fish in the tens of thousands will be eliminated because naval personnel lacked the will to figure out a way to not do so. This is embarrassing.
I know the Strategic Military Thinking that mandates the U.S. Navy carry out a mission as directed by the Commander in Chief, President Obama. This current draft that we are discussing was started when President Bush held that position. The whole process is flavored with the same hubris President Bush used to fabricate intelligence to take our valued troops to war against a country that had not attacked us on 9-11. Over 500,000 of those very same veterans wounded mentally or physically are currently homeless and denied health care by denying the link between military service and harm. (See www.GulfWarVets.org.)
In the Navy’s EIS scoping process the issue is that inappropriate scientific studies are being use to imply no harm will come to marine species and environment, humans and their environments. Thirty-five and fifty year old reports of studies are so out of date that the use of them as references to validate statements within the NWTRC EIS/OEIS contributes to the hubris that the Navy only need to carry out the form but not the substance of a valid look at what could and will in fact harm marine mammals, aquatic life and degrade the environment so valued by residents of the states impacted.
If it is true and is allowed to stand that President G.W. Bush signed an Executive Order authorizing the National Marine Fisheries Service to issue an LOA authorizing 10 million uses of the U.S. Navy’s new sonar through 2014 contrary to the Marine Mammals Act ensures the Death of The Last of Earth’s Whales and Marine Mammals. The hubris of authorizing the elimination of multiple marine species is a violation of multiple International Treaties, Agreements, Federal law, Federal and State Court decrees and laws of other Countries and their Court’s rulings is unacceptable.
The Navy has committed critical errors of omission of “best available science”, obvious obfuscation of data input and study parameters with the results of science based upon inadequate or comprehensive understanding of the true facts. This disregard of the implications of the effects of these toxic chemicals for multiple species generational integrity is unacceptable. Even if the makers of these agents of death had to fabricate or misdirect research efforts to gain approval and if this was done in the “Name of National Security” no one outside of “Need to Know” would be allowed to “Know”.
Manipulation of science has been done in the past by various aspects of government and the chemical industry. The only lawsuit filed against the Manhattan Project was to protect duPont Chemical Ltd of liability for killing a goat and all life on a New Jersey farm with a fluoride release from their plant making it for atomic bombs. Dr. Harold C. Hodge, chief of fluoride toxicity studies for the Manhattan project became the leading national proponent of fluoridating public drinking water. Dr. Hodge was sent to New York University at Rochester to fabricate science to prove fluoride harmless. Fluoride is not harmless. Reference “Project Censored” USC -Sonoma.
The ultimate result of shortening the lives of those who will be exposed to the toxic exhaust; weapon fragments; radioactive nano particles; salt water columns and bottoms littered with very toxic chemicals, hazardous waste and other byproducts of the U.S. Navy conducting training activity is unacceptable. No valid scientific studies were conducted to prove the assumptions that these materials will not harm marine life.
This lack of ingenuity, creative thinking, innovation and alternatives is disappointing given the good intentions of the majority of our military service naval commanders, officers, service men, women, support staff and support industries. Where is the American can do to preserve life? Has the expectation of acceptable collateral damage of innocents been woven into the military thinking of those we expect to protect us from enemies foreign and domestic?
I do not dispute the mandate given to the U.S. Naval Commander, U.S. Pacific Fleet. I was raised with patriotic pride as the step-daughter of a Korean War Navy veteran; daughter of thirty year Coast Guard cook; sister of brother serving the Navy for six years. My nephew, 20+ years with Army Special Forces has been in Iraq since 2003. I am the grandmother of an Air Force Registered Nurse in Germany and second cousin to Robert Hanley, a former Commander in the Sixth Fleet. I have the highest regard for the U.S. Navy and all who serve our country whether by water, air or land.
I do object to the process, road blocks with the comment computer and limited notice among other issues. Did you confer with Vice President Cheney on how to keep the process secret? The Senators and four Congressmen from Oregon would probably agree as they have written to the Secretary of the Navy to extend the Comment Period to April 11, 2009. They did so citing inadequate notice, restricted comment time and inadequate public meetings. Thank you for extending the comment time if not to April 11 at least to March 11th.
My remarks are limited as I have only had time to read one and one/third volumes. Based upon what I have read and combined with what I know and am providing is but a small part of that knowledge.
I request that there be no expansion beyond the mis-named “No Action” Alternative and that the Navy go back, examine and re-evaluate assumptions being made. I do not know if the Navy ever did a scoping process for the “No Action Alternative” or produced a properly reviewed EIS/OEIS or are attempting to grandfather in what is already taking place. Further investigation of the potential impacts of operating in near proximity to Endangered Species using technology that harms and kills are needed to be carried out by independent “best available scientific studies”.
Knowing that harm and death occur, having gone to the trouble of getting an exception not granted any other organization or government body; knowing that Endangered Marine Mammals follow Endangered salmon through, about and within the NWTRC Study Area activities should be suspended in the areas of sensitivity mid April through mid October. Areas of sensitivity are the traditional ocean to rivers path ways used for hundreds of years by resident aquatic species.
Unless and until recommendations made by Howard Garrett of the Orca Network, the National Resources Defense Council along with the Organizations that signed their submission, Conservation North West and my objections and questions can be addressed on the inadequacy of the NWTRC EIS/OEIS Draft training should stop and or be limited within 300 miles of the Olympic National Marine Mammal Sanctuary. Until these recommendations and questions can be address as submitted by the above organization no expansion should be allowed. Until recommendations can be put into place and appropriate training can be given to Sonar personnel all training should be suspended in critical areas rather than use technology that the Navy knows kills multiple Endangered Species.
Unless you can clone Clark Kent/Superman to be a look out with super sight and listening with super hearing for species that seeks not to be found to be present on sonar duty on all vessels the U.S. Navy should stop “takings” of multiple Endangered Species. How would a “look out” work on submarines? No human can detect marine mammals that are 200 to 300 miles away that are in sonar harm’s way. Current sonar technology does kill and its effects are heard much further than the draft EIS/OEIS admits. A Navy sonar expert has research that shows the sonar is heard 300 miles and maybe more from its source. This was not mentioned in the EIS/OEIS draft.
Please find the will, intelligence and ingenuity that the U.S. Navy is known for and find a way that training can occur and Endangered Species are not “taken” in the process. When did it become okay to kill, harm or damage that which the U.S. Navy is mandated to protect? The lives, environment, way of life and economic violability of multiple communities along the West Coast and within Puget Sound depend upon each of you to find a way to both protect and defend our quality of life. This means living in harmony and without harming our varied marine species, especially those that are threatened and or endangered.
For my part I will continue to communicate to the President, Secretary of State and United Nations members to find non-violent ways to achieve peace and justice. And I will pray that no person serving his Country in the Military will have to kill or be killed. And that no marine mammals ever again come within 300 miles of Navy sonar – an impossible hope.
Please remember that no member of any aquatic species has ever sought to “take” the life of anyone in the U.S. Navy. Please find a way to not have to “take” their lives.
I agree with the Comments submitted by the National Resources Defense Council, Organizations who signed on to their comments, Conservation North West. Please implement their recommendations along with the very intelligent and knowledgeable comments and suggestions made by Howard Garrett.
Please answer the questions I have raised. Please check out the complete reports I have referenced in my two supporting documents.
Thank you for the opportunity to be a part of this process in submitting my four part comments to the NWTRC EIS/OEIS Draft December 2008. I will be sending copies of these documents to my Congressional Representatives, President Obama, other organizations and the media.

More than the average person I know the importance of a well trained and mission ready Navy. I have studied extensively U.S. Strategic National Security theory and tactics; the moral and political thought of Mahatma Gandhi; participated in 1988 at Oxford as part of the Secretariat of the Global Forum on Human Survival of Religious and Parliamentarians on Human Survival; attended the Global Forum on Survival in Moscow in 1990; am the former wife of a Mahatma Gandhi relative; six of my family have served in the military and I joined the Veterans of Foreign Wars Auxiliary in 1970.
I support our troops and I believe that with the will to do so military personnel can do anything. Please create a win win and find ways to train without killing endangered species. The NWTRC EIS/OEIS Draft 2008 is a good beginning but does not represent the quality of work that I know the Navy can perform. I have given weeks of my life that I could have used to promote my just published book. A tenth surgery scheduled this month could be fatal. I have given above and beyond please do the same. Thank you.

Conclusion of Part 1 Introductory Remarks. (Attachment 1 of 2)
Part 2 Comments
Part 3 Experts in Radiation
Part 4 Marine Mammal Deaths and Naval Hubris. (Attachment 2 of 2)

Respectfully submitted,
Theresa Marie K. Gandhi
Whidbey Island Chemically Injured Network
Whidbey Island No Spray
Washington State resident since 1946
Veterans of Foreign Wars 2669 Auxiliary since 1970

Marine Mammal Deaths & Naval Hubris

2009-08-18T23:55:00.000-07:00

August 18, 2009 Attachment 2 of 2 to NMFS Comments
Abstract of articles assembled by and comments by Theresa Marie K. Gandhi.
The U.S. Navy is being sued for exploding ordinance in Puget Sound waters near NSA Whidbey, allegedly killing thousands of fish and potentially harming federally protected species such as Chinook salmon, Stellar sea lions, humpback whales and bull trout filed in U.S. District Court in Seattle on July 29, 2008 by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER) and the Wild Fish Conservancy. “Juvenile salmon and the food web of Puget Sound would be much better protected if the Navy would simply take the measures suggested by the government’s own scientists," said Kurt Beardslee, executive director of Wild Fish Conservancy.
LOS ANGELES (August 12, 2008) – The U.S. Navy’s use of low and mid-frequency active sonar will remain restricted to certain military training areas of the Pacific Ocean, according to an agreement approved by a U.S. district court in San Francisco today. The comprehensive agreement between the Navy and conservation organizations follows a court injunction issued early this year against the Navy’s Surveillance Towed Array Sensor System Low Frequency Active (LFA) sonar system, which blasts vast areas of ocean with harmful levels of underwater noise. In that decision, the court agreed with a coalition of organizations, led by the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), that the Navy’s proposed LFA deployment in more than 70 percent of the world’s oceans was illegal. A separate lawsuit challenging the U.S. Navy’s use of mid-frequency active sonar is currently under consideration in the U.S. Supreme Court.
“We don’t have to choose between national security and protecting the environment,” said Michael Jasny, senior policy analyst with NRDC. “Today’s agreement maintains the Navy’s ability to test and train, while shielding whales and other vulnerable species from harmful underwater noise.”
Under the agreement, LFA testing and training is limited to defined areas of the North Pacific Ocean, and the Navy must adhere to other protective measures, including seasonal and coastal exclusions that will protect breeding grounds and other important whale habitat.
In Hawaii, for example, LFA training cannot occur near the Hawaii Humpback Whale National Marine Sanctuary or the Papahanaumokuakea Marine National Monument, and is limited to waters beyond 50 nautical miles of the main islands, an area known to contain vital habitat for several unique marine mammal populations.
LFA sonar relies on extremely loud, low-frequency sound to detect submarines at great distances. According to the Navy’s own studies, the LFA system generates noise intense enough to significantly disrupt whale behavior more than 300 miles away. Scientists have observed that, under certain oceanic conditions, sound from a single LFA system could be detected across entire oceans.
“Limiting sonar use in breeding grounds and other key habitat areas is essential for the conservation of whales, dolphins, and other marine mammals,” said Naomi Rose, Ph.D., marine mammal scientist for The Humane Society of the United States (HSUS). “This agreement protects both national security and our most treasured natural resources.”
The lawsuit asserted that a permit issued last year by the National Marine Fisheries Service, allowing deployment of the sonar system around the world, violated a number of federal laws including the Marine Mammal Protection Act and the National Environmental Policy Act. The district court agreed, noting in particular that the government had failed to protect marine life with adequate mitigation measures as required by law. In 2002, this same court held a prior permit unlawful, after which NRDC and the U.S. Navy entered into a negotiated agreement that restricted LFA training from important habitat until last year’s permit was issued.
The coalition consists of the Natural Resources Defense Council, International Fund for Animal Welfare, The Humane Society of the United States, Cetacean Society International, League for Coastal Protection, and Ocean Futures Society and its president and founder Jean-Michel Cousteau.
The military employs two types of active sonar: mid-frequency and low-frequency. Low-frequency sonar travels enormous distances in seawater. During testing off the California coast, noise from SURTASS LFA, the Navy's main low-frequency system, was detected across the breadth of the North Pacific. By the Navy's own estimates, even 300 miles from the source these sonic waves can retain an intensity of 140 decibels -- a hundred times more intense than the level known to alter the behavior of large whales. Mid-frequency sonar is more widely used and has been associated with mortalities of whales.
But stranded whales are only the most visible symptom of a problem affecting much larger numbers of marine lives. In the darkness of the ocean, marine mammals and many fish rely on sound to follow migratory routes, to locate each other over great distances, to find food, to breed and to care for their young. Naval sonar has been shown to disrupt feeding and other vital behavior and to cause a wide range of species to panic and flee. Scientists are concerned about the cumulative effect of all of these impacts on populations of animals.
Numerous mass stranding events and whale deaths across the globe have been linked to military sonar use.
October 1989: At least 20 whales of three species strand during naval exercises near the Canary Islands.
December 1991: Two Cuvier's beaked whales strand during naval exercises near the Canary Islands.
The Canary Islands authorities have asked NATO to halt a naval exercise in the area, fearing it may be responsible for the death of 17 whales washed up on the coast of Fuerteventura and Lanzarote this week. NATO participants included the US frigate De Wert, which specializes in anti-submarine warfare.

May 1996: Twelve Cuvier's beaked whales strand on the west coast of Greece as NATO ships sweep the area with low- and mid-frequency active sonar.
October 1999: Four beaked whales strand in the U.S. Virgin Islands during Navy maneuvers offshore.
May 2000: A beaked whale strands in Vieques as naval exercises are about to begin offshore.
May 2000: Three beaked whales strand on the beaches of Madeira during NATO naval exercises near shore.
March 2000:.13 beaked whales that stranded in the Bahamas in after exposure to active sonar, seven died.
April 2002: A beaked whale and a humpback whale strand near Vieques during an offshore battle group training exercise.
September 2002: At least 14 beaked whales from three different species strand in the Canary Islands during an anti-submarine warfare exercise in the area. Four additional beaked whales strand over the next several days.
May 2003: As many as 11 harbor porpoises beached along the shores of the Haro Strait, Washington State, as the USS Shoup tests its mid-frequency sonar system.
June 2004: As many as six beaked whales strand during a Navy sonar training exercise off Alaska.
July 2004: Four beaked whales strand during naval exercises near the Canary Islands.
January 2005: At least 34 whales of three species strand along the Outer Banks of North Carolina as Navy sonar training goes on offshore.
2008: A federal court prohibits the Navy from conducting major mid-frequency sonar exercises in California without safety measures in place and rejects a White House bid to excuse the Navy from environmental compliance. The Navy petitions to appeal the decision and the case will go before the U.S. Supreme Court during fall 2008.
2008: A federal court limits the regions where low-frequency sonar may be used and deemed certain species-rich areas, such as the Galapagos Islands and the Great Barrier Reef, off-limits.
2006: Two years after an earlier exercise caused the stranding of 200 whales in Hanalei Bay, a federal court halts sonar use during the Navy's massive Rim of the Pacific (RIMPAC) exercise off Hawaii. The Navy agrees to additional mitigation to remove the injunction.
2006: After years of pressure from NRDC, the Navy begins to conduct environmental reviews and seek permits for mid-frequency sonar training off the U.S. coasts. The first review, for a proposed training range off North Carolina, is so heavily criticized that the Navy takes the unusual step of withdrawing it and starting from scratch.
2005: An NRDC-led coalition sues the Navy in U.S. federal court after years of attempts at constructive dialogue could not convince the Navy to take common-sense precautions during peacetime training with mid-frequency sonar.
2004: Responding to NRDC and other groups, a suite of intergovernmental bodies begins to take action on sonar. The European Parliament calls on its 25 member states to stop deploying active sonar without more information about the harm to whales and other marine life. ACCOBAMS, a European agreement for marine mammals, commits to develop guidelines for sonar and other noise-producing activities in the Mediterranean and Black seas. The World Conservation Congress of the World Conservation Union calls for international action.
2003: NRDC wins a major victory when a federal court rules illegal the Navy's plan to deploy low-frequency sonar through 75 percent of the world's oceans. The Navy agrees to limit use of the system to a fraction of the area originally proposed, and that use of low-frequency sonar will be guided by negotiated geographical limits and seasonal exclusions. Ongoing NRDC campaigns have made strides toward requiring the Navy to use proper safeguards when employing sonar.

Naval Sonar Experts Know it Kills Marine Mammals:
Secures Exception to law to Kill, i.e., Take Marine Mammals within Sanctuaries!

July 2002 Surtass LFA was authorized for US naval use, despite having been responsible for the mass death of whales in the Mediterranean and off the Bahamas. Surtass LFA transmits signals as powerful as 215 decibels; a whale's eardrums can explode at 180 decibels. US navy says its use is vital in helping to detect super-quiet submarines.
Since 2002, the National Marine Fisheries Service and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the two civilian agencies charged with enforcing the Endangered Species Act, have urged the Navy to undertake alternative training practices to minimize damage to marine life, such as using bubble curtains or other containers to minimize blast impacts, or conducting the training in quarries, lakes or the open ocean rather than in the waters of Puget Sound.
Navy Requests LOA for Keyport Range Complex Extension
On July 3, 2008, the U.S. National Marine Fisheries Service provided public notice that the U.S. Navy has applied to NMFS for a five-year Letter of Authorization -LOA for the incidental harassment of marine mammals incidental to the research, development, test, and evaluation (RDT&E) activities within the NAVSEA NUWC Keyport Range Complex Extension. The Navy wants the LOA to cover the period September 2009 through April 2014. If granted, the LOA would be issued under the Marine Mammal Protection Act.
The Navy's application further explains that "the mission activities conducted within the Naval Sea Systems Command (NAVSEA) Naval Undersea Warfare Center (NUWC) Keyport Range Complex and the associated proposed extensions that could result in Level B harassment and possibly Level A harassment."

There are between 700 and 4,000 stranding events per year. Adding the stress of Surtass LFA that transmits signals as powerful as 215 decibels when a whale's eardrums can explode at 180 decibels. And Navy Sonar Experts reporting that marine mammals can hear these transmissions over 300 miles away the number of stranding events will raise and extinction will come faster. The justification for the probable extinction of multiple marine species is that the US navy says its use is vital in helping to detect super-quiet submarines.

This technology could mean the end of whales in our oceans in our lifetime.
Another issue not addressed within the draft EIS/OEIS NWTRC is the effect on the magnetic fields, magma and geological faults within a geologically active region. Repeated undersea sonic pulses from 20 # bombs and frequency penetration could unzip a huge volcanic ridge off the west coast from Vancouver Island south to Oregon.
It has been discovered that sound pulses fired into a similar Indonesian volcanic ridge for oil exploration unleashed the 2004 Tsunami.

Why does Truth need a Revolution?

2009-07-30T23:23:00.000-07:00

“God is Truth, Truth is God.” is a book by Mahatma Gandhi. For the past forty years my ongoing daily prayers give thanks for two things, many times a day: To know the Truth to my questions; and to Know the Presence of God. I see the Divine in every One and every Thing. I see Truth in all that I hear, see, read and know.
A dear friend and wise mentor told me of an experience giving a talk to a room full of Jesuit Priests. He told me: “I started out by making the statement that I did not believe in God. This caused a disturbance through out the large room and as gentlemen they continued to listen to me (this physicist) through to the end of my talk. I ended the lecture by saying; I don’t believe in God, I know God.”
Orest Bedrij has written and I have read (read my review on Amazon.com): “Celebrate Your Divinity: The Nature of God and the Theory of Everything”. He quotes hundreds of wise and holy people both ancient and recent who also understood that the Divine Creator, i.e. God by what ever name you call “him”, is within each of us, connects us and makes it insane to hurt, oppress or go to war with others who also have the Divine Spark within. A hope of Orest’s, and other physicists I’ve been privileged to know, is that when the math of physics discovers a Grand Unification Theory or a Theory of Everything it would prove the oneness of all and then this fact of truth, when known and understood, could stop all wars and injustice against each other and nature globally.
1983 I saw the movie “GANDHI”, read his autobiography: “My Experiments with Truth” and then found his book: “God is Truth, Truth is God”. I experienced a series of “ah haas” and “of course(s)”. I know that humanity has been given a process and a framework of principles to end conflict peacefully using nonviolence.
One of the effects of a life of health challenges with many surgeries I have been able to read thousands of books, foreign magazines and watch our Constitutional Democracy on C-span I and II. My reading focused on history, economics, the environment, governance, the spiritual teachings of all religions and to discovering the keys to achieving health in body, mind and for our health care system.
After an intense search to know God and listen for the Truth of my still small voice within I developed a discernment to know truth when I heard or read it and to also know when someone was not communicating Truth.
For decades I have known who would be President months before the election. In 2000 I was confused as I “knew” Gore would win but that Bush would be President. In January 1980 I “knew” Reagan would be President. I got active, represented Jefferson County at the State Democratic Convention. I “knew” that I had to go to Washington, D.C. to do what I could to prevent my “knowing” vision from happening. I have always been very concerned with the state of our world and have searched my entire life for the answers to our greatest challenges as humanity, in our time, faces extinction as have hundreds of thousands of species already.
The stack of untruths is huge, goes back more than a century and is so pervasive as to cause me great angst. I saw that the majority of Americans were too busy with their own lives and economic challenges to dig for the truth when fed fear and such refined lies. Tell a big enough lie over and over and it will be believed by a lot of people.
This century plus accumulation of lies created a foundation of belief systems as to be almost impossible to penetrate with just one truth about a specific issue. To accept a truth that could expose a greater body of lies seemed too overwhelming. My sister does not want to hear about humanity and earth’s major challenges and threats to continued existence even though not knowing could kill her.
A book title that gives us a clue is: “If You Meet Buddha on the Road Kill Him” Most individuals do not want to hear the truth, especially about themselves. Buddha’s Being reflects truth back to the one looking and the immediate inclination is to kill the truth speaker/revealer especially if that truth reflects a part of self that is in denial.
The past twenty-eight years it has been especially difficult to maintain hope as the stack of lies seemed to grow exponentially to climax in the loss of our principle founding documents upon which our Constitutional Democracy were founded. As the Constitution was redacted; the Bill of Rights shredded; Posse Comitates and Habeas corpus cancelled; International Treaties ignored; the Geneva Convention shredded and the gap between the wealthiest and the poorest became exponentially larger than ever before.
It was with alarm that I understood that the USA PATRIOT ACT and the Thought Crime Act* can name me as a home grown terrorist and thus an Enemy Combatant that could be disappeared upon the whim of the President or Vice President acting in his name as Dick Cheney has. My speaking truth to power by submitting official comments on behalf of salmon, Wetlands and Puget Sound to change government policies and communicating via prose, essays, letters to Editors and Congress is illegal.
The House voted 400 to 4 to approve the Thought Crime Act. I could not believe they are so ignorant of history’s lessons. Many have violated their oath of office for not defending or protecting the Constitution from threats foreign or (especially) domestic.
Impeachment is a cure our forefathers wove into the fabric of our Constitutional Democracy for just such a time when the Presidency became an all powerful Imperial Dictatorship holding its self above the law while at the same time deconstructing and ripping asunder the founding documents of our Democratic Republic.
For blocking the very process that could have restored our Constitution that has been ripped asunder I hold Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) in contempt of Congress and in violation of her oath to defend and protect the Constitution from all enemies foreign and Domestic by “taking impeachment off the table”.
After Apartheid, South Africa created the “Truth and Reconciliation” process to heal past harm so as to be able to forgive and go forward as a Nation. In our Nation the Multi-National Media and other Corporations stand in the way of truth being revealed as their profits depend upon truth not being known to maximize their profits. As we all know Profit is King in so called “Free Market Capitalism”. The WTO claims a Global Constitution based on trade’s profits that cancels national, tribal and local sovereignty.
In war Truth is always the first victim. To come to peace Truth must be spoken and that is a Revolutionary Act. To replace armies with conflict mediation trained Peacemakers will take a Revolution of Truth and We the People demanding that it be so.

“In an age of universal deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act.”
- George Orwell
© Copyright Theresa Marie K. Gandhi August 8, 2008

Yesterday's Words - Today Letter from Mahatma Gandhi

2009-07-27T11:00:00.000-07:00

Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi’s “Experiments in Truth” and life have guided me since 1983 to always “stay on spiritual truth” i.e. Satyagraha and to speak and act non-violently, i.e. Ahimsa.

“After I am gone no single person will be able completely to represent me.
But a little bit of me will live in many of you.
As you have given me the privilege of speaking to you I am laying my heart bare.
If you find me speaking without reserve, and if you think that I seem to transgress the limits that courtesy imposes upon me, pardon me for the Liberty I may be taking.
If nonviolence is to be evolved in individuals, societies or nations truth has to be told, how ever harsh or unpopular it may appear to be for the moment.
One thing is certain if the mad race for armaments continues;
it is bound to result in the slaughter such has never occurred in history.
If there is a Victor left, the very victory will be living death for the nation that emerges victorious.
There is no escape from the impending doom save through a bold and unconditional
acceptance of a nonviolent method with all its glorious implications.
Democracy can only be saved through nonviolence, i.e. ahimsa.
My notion of democracy is that under it the weakest should have the same opportunity as the strongest.
This can never happen except through nonviolence.
In nonviolence, the masses have a weapon, which enables a child, a woman or even a decrepit old man to resist the mightiest government successfully.
If your spirit is strong, mere lack of physical strength ceases to be a handicap.
A nonviolent revolution is not a program of seizure of power.
The first condition of nonviolence is justice all-around in every department of life.
If one does not practice nonviolence in one’s personal relationships with others
and hopes to use it in bigger affairs, one is vastly mistaken.
Nonviolence to be a creed has to be all-pervasive.
I cannot be nonviolent about one activity of mine and violent about others.
That would be a policy, not a life force.
Nonviolence cannot be a mere policy. It must be a creed or a passion.
My soul refuses to be satisfied so long as it is a helpless witness
of a single wrong or a single misery.
But it is not possible for me to mend every wrong or hold myself free
of blame for all the wrong I see. An unjust law its self is a species of violence.
There may be far more violence in the slow torture of men and animals, the starvation and exploitation to which they are subjected out of shellfish greed,
the wanton humiliation and oppression of the weak and the killing of their self respect that we witness all-around us today, than in the mere taking of life.
A man or a woman with a passion expresses it in every little act.
Therefore, he or she who is possessed by nonviolence
will express it in the family circle, in their dealings with neighbors, in business and in their dealings with opponents.
During my experience, I have not yet come across a situation when I had to say I was helpless, that I had no remedy in terms of nonviolence.
As the means so is the end. The means may be like unto a seed, the end to a tree;
there is just the same inviolable connection between the means and the ends as there
is between a seed and a tree. We reap exactly as we sow.
What you do may seem insignificant,
but it is very important that you do it.” - M.K Gandhi

Obama Global Warming Plan Involves Cooling Air

2009-07-08T21:20:00.000-07:00

John Holdren talks about his role as President Obama's science adviser during an interview with The Associated Press, in Washington, Wednesday, April 8, 2009. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)
WASHINGTON — Tinkering with Earth's climate to chill runaway global warming _ a radical idea once dismissed out of hand _ is being discussed by the White House as a potential emergency option, the president's new science adviser said Wednesday.
That's because global warming is happening so rapidly, John Holdren told The Associated Press in his first interview since being confirmed last month.
The concept of using technology to purposely cool the climate is called geoengineering. One option raised by Holdren and proposed by a Nobel Prize-winning scientist includes shooting pollution particles into the upper atmosphere to reflect the sun's rays.
Using such an experimental measure is only being thought of as a last resort, Holdren said.
"It's got to be looked at," he said. "We don't have the luxury ... of ruling any approach off the table."
His concern is that the United States and other nations won't slow global warming fast enough and that several "tipping points" could be fast approaching. Once such milestones are reached, such as complete loss of summer sea ice in the Arctic, it increases chances of "really intolerable consequences," he said.
Twice in a half-hour interview, Holdren compared global warming to being "in a car with bad brakes driving toward a cliff in the fog."
He and many experts believe that warming of a few degrees more would lead to disastrous drought conditions and food shortages in some regions, rising seas and more powerful coastal storms in others.
At first, Holdren characterized the potential need to technologically tinker with the climate as just his personal view. However, he went on to say he has raised it in administration discussions.
"We're talking about all these issues in the White House," Holdren said. "There's a very vigorous process going on of discussing all the options for addressing the energy climate challenge."
Holdren said discussions include Cabinet officials and heads of sub-Cabinet level agencies, such as NASA and the Environmental Protection Agency.
The 65-year-old physicist is far from alone in taking geoengineering seriously. The National Academy of Sciences is making it the subject of the first workshop in its new climate challenges program for policymakers, scientists and the public. The British Parliament has also discussed the idea. At an international meeting of climate scientists last month in Copenhagen, 15 talks dealt with different aspects of geoengineering.
The American Meteorological Society is crafting a policy statement that says "it is prudent to consider geoengineering's potential, to understand its limits and to avoid rash deployment."
Last week, Princeton scientist Robert Socolow told the National Academy that geoengineering should be an available option in case climate worsens dramatically.
Holdren, a 1981 winner of a MacArthur Foundation "genius" grant, outlined these possible geoengineering options:
_ Shooting sulfur particles (like those produced by power plants and volcanoes, for example) into the upper atmosphere, an idea that gained steam when it was proposed by Nobel laureate Paul Crutzen in 2006. It would be "basically mimicking the effect of volcanoes in screening out the incoming sunlight," Holdren said.
_ Creating artificial "trees" _ giant towers that suck carbon dioxide out of the air and store it.
The first approach would "try to produce a cooling effect to offset the heating effect of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases," Holdren said.
But he said there could be grave side effects. Studies suggest that might include eating away a large chunk of the ozone layer above the poles and causing the Mediterranean and the Mideast to be much drier.
And those are just the predicted problems. Scientists say they worry about side effects that they don't anticipate.
While the idea could strike some people as too risky, the Obama administration could get unusual support on the idea from groups that have often denied the harm of global warming in the past.
The conservative think tank American Enterprise Institute has its own geoengineering project, saying it could be "feasible and cost-effective." And Cato Institute scholar Jerry Taylor said Wednesday: "Very few people would rule out geoengineering on its face."
Holdren didn't spell out under what circumstances such extreme measures might ever be called for. And he emphasized they are not something to rely on.
"It would be preferable by far," he said, "to solve this problem by reducing emissions of greenhouse gases."
Yet there is already significant opposition building to the House Democratic leaders' bill aimed at achieving President Barack Obama's goal of cutting greenhouse gas emissions 20 percent by 2020 and 80 percent by 2050.
Holdren said temperatures should be kept from rising more than 3.6 degrees. To get there, he said the U.S. and other industrial nations have to begin permanent dramatic cuts in carbon dioxide pollution by 2015, with developing countries following suit within a decade.
Those efforts are racing against three tipping points he cited: Earth could be as close as six years away from the loss of Arctic summer sea ice, he said, and that has the potential of altering the climate in unforeseen ways. Other elements that could dramatically speed up climate change include the release of frozen methane from thawing permafrost in Siberia, and more and bigger wildfires worldwide.
The trouble is that no one knows when these things are coming, he said.
Holdren also addressed other topics during the interview:
_ The U.S. anti-ballistic missile program is not ready to work and shouldn't be used unless it is 100 percent effective. The system, which would be used to shoot down missiles from countries like North Korea or Iran "needs to be essentially perfect ... that's going to be hard to achieve."
_ Holdren said NASA needs some changes. He said the Bush administration's plan to return astronauts to the moon was underfunded so money was taken from science and aeronautics. Those areas, including climate change research, were "decimated," he said.
The administration will "rebalance NASA's programs so that we have in space exploration, a suitable mix of manned activities and robotic activities," Holdren said. Doing that "will only get under way in earnest when a new administrator is in place."
Holdren, who advises the president on such decisions, said he hopes Obama will pick a new NASA boss soon.

Office of Science and Technology Policy: http://www.ostp.gov/

Cult of the Atom - Nuke Power's Report Card

2009-07-08T21:11:00.000-07:00

Cult of the Atom: Secrets of the AEC book review NYT
THE CULT OF THE ATOM. The Secret Papers of the Atomic Energy Commission. By Daniel Ford. Illustrated. 273 pages. Simon & Schuster. $13.95. According to Daniel Ford, the mindset that allows obscurity to replace truthfulness flourished in the offices and adjunct laboratories of the now-superseded A.E.C. In ''The Cult of the Atom,'' Mr. Ford, an economist and former executive director of the Union of Concerned Scientists, persuasively assails what he regards as the duplicitous nature of much of the commission's work. Relying heavily on internal memoranda released through Freedom of Information Act requests, he explores the ways in which the A.E.C., empowered and directed by Congress not only to regulate the nuclear industry but also to promote nuclear energy, played ''the incompatible roles of coach and umpire, of partisan as well as judge.'' Mr. Ford argues that many Americans, who were defensive if not sorry about the bombings of Japan, welcomed the early utopian visions of nuclear power - including plutonium-heated swimsuits for scuba divers. Soon, as he describes it, leading scientists were ''looked upon as the high priests of a state religion.'' One can easily understand their unwillingness to admit infallibility, incompetence or ignorance. The result of this all-too-human response, Mr. Ford suggests, was the bypassing of the building of prototypes and the proliferation of very large nuclear reactors close to major metropolitan areas. According to Mr. Ford, A.E.C. engineers who reviewed the safety devices at the Indian Point plant in Westchester County ''used to joke half-seriously among themselves'' that its site at Buchanan, N.Y. ''should be renamed 'Hiroshima-on-Hudson.' '' This is frightening: Mr. Ford describes many occasions on which the A.E.C. censored negative findings of its own scientists - or published inaccurately Pollyanaish precise stifled dissent in its ranks by cutting financing to recalcitrant staffers and relied on industry manufacturers to perform critical tests and write their own regulations. As an example, in 1971, the engineering staff of the A.E.C.'s National Reactor Testing Station in Idaho prepared a chart on the state of knowledge about emergency core-cooling systems. It listed in one column the 29 major technical areas where information was needed to predict whether the systems would work, and in another, it summarized the ''current status'' of available information. The ratings were as follows: four incompletes, three unverifieds, one preliminary, eight inadequates, two inaccurates, four uncertains and seven missing. In 1973, after almost two years of hearings on the systems, the A.E.C. reaffirmed the existing designs. At times, ''The Cult of the Atom'' reads like an awesomely bad report card.

Department of Energy Secretary Chu

2009-07-08T21:09:00.000-07:00

Secretary Steven Chu, US Department of Energy, 1000 Independence Ave. S.W.
Washington, D.C. 20585

Greetings Secretary Chu:
The Hanford Dose Reconstruction Project estimates my exposure at birth and for the first two years of my life at 2,900,000 MREMS of radiation in 1946. I’ve beat cancer two times and have had multiple health challenges in my sixty-three years. Eight of ten of my school friends are dead from cancer. Four of six of my immediate family has experienced cancer, two died from it. I’m alive because a Chinese M.D., fourth generation Acupuncturist, etc. treated me until I was cancer free. I still have other challenges that are a part of Radiation Sickness Syndrome and have had eight surgeries. I have spent my life seeking a way to stay alive.
I have researched nuclear power, Hanford, Chernobyl, Radiation and the history of the Atom. My bread board’s wood held up the drafting table that redesigned the Enola Gay to be able to drop the first atomic bombs.
At this time it will take the clean-up crews at Hanford 167 years to vitrify to glass the contents of storage tanks that leak radiation into the water table next to the Columbia River.
Between Three Mile Island and a Washington State Initiative that made the stock holders liable for cost over-runs rather than rate payers building new plants stopped.
Before this folly is taken up again it would be wise to review what was done wrong, find which safety features are lacking and open the warehouse full of black boxes that were filled with ignored as unsolvable problems by the AEC (because of cost considerations). When an agency of government is charged with both promoting and regulating such a potentially harmful or even deadly program the conflict creates a need for secrecy and bad decisions.
One critical problem that is flashing red and all regulators seem color blind to it is the emergency back up system that requires water (that would not be there) to push hydraulics up for an emergency shut down of the reactor core. I forget if this is a Westinghouse or General Electric design problem.
If you haven’t read “The Cult of the Atom: Secrets of the Atomic Energy Commission” by Daniel F. Ford published in 1982 by Simon and Schuster you would be wise to do so. So many of the problems of nuclear power plants were discovered as the new technology came online. The need to justify nuclear power as practicable was so great that if a critical problem would cost money it was black boxed and buried. I’ve attached a book review.
There are several other unintended consequences that have been suppressed through time that really should be addressed that are not covered by Mr. Ford’s book. If you are interested I could put together a briefing for you.
I spent a decade researching the moral and political thoughts of Mahatma Gandhi when I married into the family and administered special projects for the Gandhi Memorial International Foundation. I’ve participated with world leaders strategizing Global Survival at Conferences in Toronto, Oxford and Moscow. Now I do document searches of peer reviewed science, submit official comments to various public policy formulation processes and write poetry.

Speaking and working for a Quality Common Future for Our Seventh Generation,
Theresa Marie K. Gandhi
P.O. Box 437, Clinton, WA 98236 360-341-1218
www.tmgandhi.com tm@tmgandhi.com

Senator Cantwell - Public Option is a Must

2009-07-08T21:01:00.000-07:00

Senator Cantwell, June 25, 2009
You are now officially a Corpracrat. Being against the Public Plan as included in President Obama's Health Care Reform Plan is the very least you need to do. Your position will put affordable health care out of reach for millions because of having to pay 25 - 40% more than Health Care costs. Profiteering Big-Pharma and Insurance Mega Corporations are the trolls under the bridge on the way to health. And AMA Drs. making War on the bodies’ “invaders” does not build healthy bodies but attacks them thinking that will make the body fight back. What is really needed is Single Payer Universal Health Care. We do not need more obscenely priced drugs and inferior Drs. who together have created a pandemic of 500,000 deaths a year from Drs. “practicing medicine and prescribing drug combinations” that kill. This thinking and limited choice of access to true healers needs reform. Treating a symptom with a drug does not cure the cause of disease. Nobody’s body has ever had a deficiency of an Rx drug. The exception is for diabetes which is caused by Congressional subsidies to Corp. Agra-Biz for corn, its GMO products and ubiquitous caustic corn syrup.
I and many of my family, friends and community are very, very unhappy with your position against a “Public Option”. I have read and underlined parts of the President’s Plan. “Medical, Insurance, Pharma –M.I.P.- if what they have said is true, should - in a free market, be able to compete. Do you want to give M.I.P. free reign with no incentives to bring down costs or do you serve the people who voted for you, our families, elders, children, friends and community?
I voted and worked hard to defeat Gov. Dixie Lee Ray because she would have allowed the Northern Tier Oil Pipeline to destroy Puget Sound. We defeated her in the Primary, the first time in the history of the state. Are you next? Your position puts you in the "I will work to deny you your Senate seat in the next election camp; Even if I have to vote for an independent or run on the Green Party". I've gotten a law made and signed into law in 1988. I have wanted to be a United States Senator for decades.
I lost my right to run for the US Senate when Group Health denied me life saving surgery in 1976. I did what I had to in order to secure surgery. The day after I went to a private surgeon he spent two and 1/2 hours inside my pelvis that had massive adhesions from uterine tissues of my womb. from a previous surgery. I would have died without the surgery. I know of many who have died because they could not get care and because of the treatments they received like my younger brother. If you have a couple of hours I could tell you horror story after horror story and never repeat myself. Eight out ten of my high school pals are dead from cancer and its treatment. The dead believed that Medical/drugs, radiation and surgery used to attack their bodies hoping their immune system would kick in and heal the body failed. Harvard and the Mayo Clinic have declared chemotherapy contrary to survival.
Not a user friendly way to heal and be healthy. I’d rather focus on solutions.
Historically making a profit on healing or medical insurance was illegal until the Sherman Act took Health Care taken out of Our Commons. We are still paying the price for Hearst, Rockefeller, etc. profits.
The Medical - Insurance - Big Pharma inc., invested $3.4 million in Senator Baucus. How much did they pay to buy you off?
Since 1977 I have watched as Congress stood by and let monopolies destroy millions of American lives. Big Pharma lies, the AMA lies to suppress competition, the Medical Insurance Corps. lie, deny and maximize profit. They use lies to spread fear. Big Pharma Corps. have invested hundreds of millions of dollars in Big Tobacco stocks. The mark-up on drugs are obscene. Check my two attachments to verify.
I’m a Hanford Downwinder with a DOE number. I received 2,900,000 MREMS of radiation at birth in 1946. I’ve beat cancer two times because as an educated registered nurse I looked beyond AMA doctor’s “practicing” medicine and spent three decades researching how specifically to heal cancer and gain health. When I needed surgery I was able to have eight, starting at age eleven. I took responsibility to learn how to heal and detoxify my body. I’m alive, I have survived and I’ve written about my journey. 3 e-books, poetry, essays and photographs on www.tmgandhi.com share my solutions for individual and Global Survival.
There is no one talking about real reform in health care. All I’ve heard or read is that it is all about how many dollars will the AMA Drs. Big Pharma and Medical Insurance get from the hundreds of billions spent by a very sick American population. No debate on real reform has happened yet. That is what I want to be apart of. Why did acupuncture and Chinese herbs eliminate a brain tumor without brain surgery, more deadly radiation or cyotoxic drugs? This from an FBI authorized M.D. and 4th generation Chinese Master Acupuncturist at a fraction of what the AMA way would have cost. Radiation would have killed me like it did my brother at Fred Hutch. I wrote a speech for Dr. Jerry Goh when he was introduced to a Senate gathering.
I am looking at your record with squinted eyes. I and many believe the next election will throw the money changers, i.e. the Corpracrats, out of the Temple of Liberty, i.e., the Capitol. I am a 3rd generation democrat that has been and is very unhappy with the sold out corpracratic democrats.
I’ve been talking with others about replacing you and many others in the Senate & House. Please save me a lot of botheration and change your position to what we the people want instead of the lobbyists.
“God is Truth and Truth is God”, - M. K. Gandhi, my ex-great grand-uncle-in-law.

Respectfully sharing my truth,
Theresa Marie K Gandhi, P.O. Box 437, Clinton, WA 98236 tm@tmgandhi.com 360-341-1218
cc: News outlets; internet list serves; my blog, friends and community newspapers in WA State.

Dear President Obama March 26, 2009

2009-07-08T20:49:00.001-07:00

President Barack Obama, 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, Washington, D. C. 20500

Dear President Obama,
I support your budget and please do not listen to the money washed republican Corpracrats. There are democratic Corpracrats you need to also be careful of. President Eisenhower edited out the word Congressional when he warned us of the military industrial congressional complex. And please, trickle down does not work. Please bury it.
Why would you listen to me? Ever since being offered an internship with Senator Warren Magnusson in the early seventies I have educated and prepared myself to be a United States Senator. In 1980 while volunteering at Democratic National Headquarters so that Ron Reagan would not win I got a bill out of committee. In 1988 I got a law made making October 2nd a National Day of Recognition for Mahatma Gandhi and shook hands with President Reagan in the Oval Office. Since 1982 I have researched, applied and taught the moral and political thought of Mahatma Gandhi with a focus on how specifically to achieve inner and world peace. Staying on truth and being non-violent in thought, word and deed is a passion and moment to moment experience for me. As an ordained minister knowing the constant Presence of God makes life worth living and is a gift to be used wisely. In 1983 I married a relative of Mahatma Gandhi.
Thank you for being open to communications from us common folk – some of us are wise and can see from afar the forest of unwise advice and even lies you have to weave your way through to find truth and wisdom. Our history of Presidents is filled with grievous attacks on those with the courage to make changes that took power from the powerful. I know you are one who can with the backing of common Americans as your constituency implement the changes that could restore and invigorate our Republic. Keep talking to us to let us know what you are doing and why and what we can do to help you.
I, like you, don’t speak unless I know the issues and know that I can back up what I say with reliable sources, references, peer reviewed scientific studies and have a probable solution to contribute to the challenge.
I campaigned for you by telling over 500 friends, family and fellow social justice activists to tell five people to tell five people, etc. to vote for you. Three Bush coup d’etats ended by blackmailing Congress that if they didn’t submit and give money to Wall St. martial law would be declared. And GW Bush signing an Executive Order authorizing 10 million uses of sonar that could kill the last marine mammal was too much. Another time I’ll communicate some of my Comments on the U.S. Navy NWTRC draft EIS/OEIS 2008. They and other examples of my work with photos can be found on my blog via my web page; www.tmgandhi.com.
Of IMMEDIATE CONCERN.
1. When you put the foxes who robbed the hen house in charge of designing, rebuilding and installing anti-theft procedures I knew we were in big trouble. The coup d’etat from the power elite bankers worked and America could be forever under the thumb of a powerful cabal. It’s not too late to get rid of the foxes. Will you?
2. Only you can request the State Department or Department of Commerce in preparation for COP15 in Copenhagen in December establish a Working Group on Global Warming and its relationship to ionospheric heaters, i.e. Star Wars. HAARP uses weapons of mass destruction technology that can be used for modifying the ionosphere over very large areas for "over-the-horizons" telecommunications disruption, creating computer errors and perhaps even creating negative biological effects. What is known from other government documents, HAARP planning documents and International Red Cross documents is that what is possible with these new systems could have global catastrophic consequences. The HAARP system intends to beam 3.6 million Gig watts of effective radiated power of high frequency radio energy into the ionosphere and then use it as a weapon or at the least control the weather as a “force multiplier”. This energy drives extreme weather and creates climate disruption on a scale never seen before. Humanity and the continued existence of the west coast plus…. depends upon your considered thought, decision and action in this regard.
When you heat the sky to bow it to control and target over the horizon Extreme Ice melt occurs and temperatures have risen at least 4 degrees in Alaska, home of HAARP. Talk with Senator Mark Begich of Alaska about the work his brother Nick has done in researching and writing books about the patents, capability and implications of the technology that is online in Gakona, Alaska. I’m sure you have been briefed about the military uses of this technology but not the probable grievous harm.
Studying the history of geo-political strategic military actions I understand the need to have a security system on our northwestern frontier that can monitor the skies of the whole planet. The collateral damage could be the elimination of all artic ice sooner than we could possibly imagine. The perma frost is turning into swamp and the ripples could go around the world.
President Obama we need your leadership to admit what we, the Soviets and other countries are doing in the artic and in space and decide for the sake of humanity, the global coastal residents and our seventh generation to solve the issues that have gotten us to the present but may prevent us from having a future.
3. As a radioactive Hanford downwinder in the future I will communicate with you my research on the history of the Atomic Energy Commission, fourth generation nuclear weapons, i.e. Deplete Uranium and the poison gas created upon explosion. My bread board held up the drafting table where the Enola Gay was modified to be able to carry the bombs to Japan.
4. The USDA is one of the biggest contributors to the ill health and high medical expenses of Americans. Corporate farming is making Americans obese and malnourished at the same time. Your Secretary of Agriculture will not understand this link nor will he enable healthy organic farming that produces mineral rich wholesome alive and healthy food. My care giver son grows organic food so I may live. Please do not sign H.R 875 “The Food Safety and Modernization Act” into law. It is poorly written and makes it harder maybe impossible for organic family farms to stay in business. Monsanto is a bad actor and needs to be examined.
5. Can you please make sure that the State Department, the Military, law enforcement, prisons and schools teach conflict resolution techniques developed by Mahatma Gandhi, Martin Luther King, Jr., and Cesar Chavez and used by Assistant Secretary General Robert Muller? After 40 years in the United Nations he became the Chancellor at the University of Peace in Costa Rica but was only paid $1.00 a year with no support staff. Could you please fund the University for Peace and the U.S. Peace University? Or could you ask the United Nations to do so? Learning non-violent conflict mediation is very important if peace is to be possible.
Before we marched across America in Operation SALT March in 1984 I learned from Ford Motor Company that Peace is a threat to National Security. This should not be so.
Thank you for your kind consideration of the issues I have raised. I would like to shake the hand of the President with the courage to tackle and solve the challenges I have touched upon today. I hope you will be open to receiving my questions and suggestions in the future.

With sincere thanks for your being President,
Theresa Marie Kothari Gandhi
Whidbey Island Chemically Injured Network
Whidbey Island Environmental Action Network
Whidbey Island No Spray
Green Party of Island County
P.O. Box 437, Clinton, Washington 98236

HAARP & Global Warming to: Senators Cantwell & Murrary

2009-07-08T20:45:00.000-07:00

Honorable Senator Cantwell,
Could you please communicate with your fellow Senators, especially on the Foreign Relations Committee in a discussion of the atmospheric heaters powered by 3.6 million watts, i.e. SDI’s HAARP, that are weapons of mass destruction, contribute to Global Warming, severe climate events and need to be a part of IPCC’s COP15 December 2009?
US and Russia have used these technologies to wage weather wars. See www.earthpulse.com, research posted. Researcher, Dr. Nicholas Begich has published four books on topic, 1st was "Angels Don't Play This HAARP!"
My two page Weather WMD briefing letter posted on blog at www.tmgandhi.com. Also posted is alternative process via adoption globally via grassroots of a Bill of Rights for the Earth.
Rev. Theresa Marie K. Gandhi,
P.O. Box 437, Clinton, WA 98236 USA
tm@tmgandhi.com www.tmgandhi.com –

Honorable Senator Murray,
Will you communicate with your fellow Senators on the Foreign Relations Committee to facilitate discussion of the ATOMSPHERE HEATERS powered by 3.6 million watts, i.e. SDI’s HAARP, that are weapons of mass destruction, contribute to Global Warming, severe climate events and need to be a part of IPCC’s COP15 December 2009?
US and Russia have used these technologies to wage weather wars. See www.earthpulse.com, research posted. Researcher, Dr. Nicholas Begich has published four books on topic, 1st was "Angels Don't Play This HAARP!"
My two page Weather WMD briefing letter posted on blog at www.tmgandhi.com. Also posted is alternative process via adoption globally via grassroots of a Bill of Rights for the Earth.
Rev. Theresa Marie K. Gandhi, Community Organizer
Whidbey Island

Weather WMD and Global Warming - Red Alert 1-28-2009

2009-07-08T20:36:00.000-07:00

To: President Obama; Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change; NOAA; Media; and Concerned Citizens; What would Mahatma Gandhi say about our current challenges and responsibilities globally? Would he issue Red Alerts acknowledging imminent tipping points for our earth’s self-sustaining global commons beyond which our earth will be unable to sustain life? What priorities and processes would he propose to insure our common future? As one who since 1983 explored, wrote about and applied the moral and political thought of Mahatma Gandhi I call your attention to a global threat that is not being investigated, discussed or acknowledged for the grievous harm that has and could occur. There is no reason that is valid enough to keep such a global threat from being researched, discussed, and alternatives found.
November 30 to December 18, 2009 10,000 to 15,000 will gather in Copenhagen, Denmark, meeting in Working Groups, to formulate a plan to deal with severe Climate Change and Global Warming. Not being discussed to date are the part that New World Order Weapons of Mass Destruction are playing in Global Warming by heating the earth’s ionosphere with 6 billion watts of focused energy. Is it any wonder that our climate is violent and more extreme than ever before?
Weather Wars using Weapons of Mass Destruction that have earth changing technology are being used by Russia and the United States. HAARP, in Gakona, Alaska is an atmospheric heater that uses 6 billion watts to focus frequencies to heat and bow the ionosphere for over the horizon targeting as one of its many uses. www.haarp.alaska.edu The United States Air Force and Navy work with Raytheon, owning the Tesla and Eastland patents, operate under the mandate of SDI. The side effects or unintended consequences is putting rips and holes in our planet’s protective atmosphere, pumping huge amounts of energy that feed extreme climate events and global warming. Even though HAARP’s use is damaging a major global life support system I am unaware of it being discussed by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change -IPCC. European Parliament’s Committee on Foreign Affairs, Security and Defense Policy after holding hearings on HAARP sought to draw up a “Green Paper” on “the links between environment and defense”. They were told the Committee lacked the jurisdiction to delve into “the links between environment and defense”. If not them, who can discuss it? Even though HAARP’s use violates the 1977 International Convention ratified by the UN General Assembly which banned ‘military or other hostile use of environmental modification techniques having widespread, long-lasting or severe effects’. It defined ‘environmental modification techniques’ as ‘any technique for changing – through the deliberate manipulation of natural processes – the dynamics, composition or structure of the earth, including its biota, lithosphere, hydrosphere and atmosphere, or of outer space.’
While the substance of the 1977 Convention was reasserted in the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) signed at the 1992 Earth Summit in Rio, debate on weather modification for military use has become a scientific taboo.
Plans and actions to deploy HAARP and Russian technologies into space to base weapons of mass destruction are already under way.
Like the US Navy’s proposal to test life killing radar frequencies off the California, Oregon, Washington Coasts and within Puget Sound harms our selves by destroying marine life whose viability we depend upon. The Navy has used a variety of methods to lock out comments, speed approval and plans to violate the Endangered Species Act. The new radar technology kills whales by destroying their brains.
There maybe other ‘secret weapons of mass destruction’ that I am unaware or that are held so tightly as to still be secret. I do know about HAARP and the Navy’s radar. To be silent would put me among those guilty of crimes against humanity.
I can imagine the Bush administration had something to do with the silence that has and could kill millions, has left millions homeless and has even worse applications than I have even discussed in this letter. Please read the research by Dr. Nicholas Begich.
I have wondered why Vice President Gore has not said a word even though he would have to know given the length of time these technologies have been in existence.
To the IPCC, what will it take to convene Working Groups on these WMD as part of the process to find solutions to Global Warming threats to humanity’s existence?
President Obama, who do you have working on the military’s part in Global Warming and how can this very critical challenge be discussed without invoking National Security? When does humanity’s survival trump secrecy that allows destruction of earth’s atmosphere and oceans?
To those of us who have lost loved ones, homes, businesses and farmers who have lost crops and even their farms what would you have us do to insure our safety and lives?
We’ve been told the Oceans will be dead within 40 years. It seems like just yesterday that it was forty year ago. Weapons of Mass Destruction that now threaten humanity’s survival must be spoken of and another way found that does not threaten all life on our planet. Too many secrets and lies now threaten our very existence. Humanity's survival must be spoken of and another way found that does not threaten us all. This is just one of many topics that Mahatma Gandhi would speak about without reserve seeking that truth is told that humanity may survive.
A number of people have sounded the alarm. Alaska resident Dr. Nicholas Begich, published books about HAARP and spoke to the European Union. These books can be found on his web page, http://www.earthpulse.com. Michel Chossudovsky, Professor of Economics, University of Ottawa, has posted warnings on www.earthpulse.com and http://www.globalresearch.ca. The www.globalresearch.ca web page has a number of articles on the topic. Physicist Dr. Bernard Eastlund, Dr. Rosalie Bertell and others have sounded the alarm.
What will you do?

Speaking for our earth and our seventh generation,
Theresa Marie K. Gandhi, www.tmgandhi.com tm@tmgandhi.com
Whidbey Island, Northwest Washington State where we experience typhoon winds.

Acid Ocean killing Billions of Shellfish - Red Alert!

2009-06-17T01:52:00.000-07:00

Dear President Barack Obama
Thank you for your June 2nd letter.
One billion dead seed oysters from acid ocean waters are a huge Red Alert.*
In 1980 I assembled a bibliography of the “Economic Viability of the Marine Resources” for Puget Sound. Seed oysters were a huge contributor to the potential of hundreds of millions of dollars in 1970 dollars is a reality now. * Clip of front page article in Seattle Times follows.
The Japanese in the 1970s were buying wild seed oysters from Washington to grow on rafts producing 15,000 pounds of protein per surface acre.
Carbon dioxide absorption capacity of the North Pacific has hit a “tipping point”. Now acidic ocean waters are being pulled from deep waters onto Washington and Oregon shore waters where for the past four years seed oysters are no longer able to grow. The same problem can dissolve the shells of a primary food source of Pacific Northwest Salmon. Chinook salmon are already listed as an Endangered Species. Farm raise salmon hurts my liver. The signs are dire. One billion dead seed oysters (the canaries in the ocean) have delivered a very dire warning!
The Corpracrats (democratic and republican) representing vested interests of their corporate contributors are standing in the way of taking the actions that will be needed to solve the problem of the oceans becoming acidic. In the mean time the oceans have less than forty years before they are dead maybe even sooner for major parts of it. No coal is ‘clean’. So called plans for making coal clean burning are decades away thanks to Congressional Corpracrats rewarding major contributors with free Cap and Trade vouchers, delayed compliance dates, etc.
My life’s focus has been on finding solutions to the major challenges we are facing today. Married to a relative of Mahatma Gandhi I researched and wrote how specifically to apply the principles of M.K. Gandhi. I strategized with world leaders on global survival at Oxford, etc.
From your actions and appointments it is apparent that there are gaps in your education and among your advisors on how specifically to solve the many difficult and different challenges that are linked together and need to be solved at the same time.
Not since the 1980 Global 2000 Report to President Carter in three volumes has anyone addressed multiple problems and their relationship. It was the first and only report by any national government on the economic, demographic, resource, and environmental future of the world. It sold over 1.5 million copies in eight languages. I bought a copy and read it. The Japanese had it translated and formed a commission to study how to avert the problems for our common future that the report revealed. Ask President Carter about it. Please read it or delegate an update of the thirty year old report. Comparing the two could provide justification to make major changes.
There is a way to solve the ‘energy crisis’ along with all of the linked challenges but you dismissed the internet writers’ third most asked question of you without thought or investigation. (Contrary to your statement that you didn’t like to comment on issues that you had not studied.) I have been assembling an economic briefing packet for your consideration of a solution that could solve several problems and bring in huge amounts of money (several trillion in 10 years). Over 500 economists agree with me, some from Harvard. It is comprehensive and referenced.
Do you want to know what would solve the challenges of: 1) Global Warming: 2) Agra-biz contributing to huge increases in medical costs; logging of the last 3% of old growth forests for toilet paper; reduce crime and the cost of prisons; and produce jobs for millions of people?
I await your reply and request for the briefing packet on how specifically to solve a number of critically linked challenges. Would you like it digital, via mail or both? Is there a general systems policy staff member to address it too specifically?

Speaking and working for Our Seventh Generation,
Theresa Marie K. Gandhi

Clip from Seattle Times June 14, 2009 front page.
Oysters in deep trouble: Is Pacific Ocean's chemistry killing sea life?
By Craig Welch Seattle Times environment reporter WILLAPA BAY, Pacific County —
The collapse began rather unspectacularly. In 2005, when most of the millions of Pacific oysters in this estuary failed to reproduce, Washington's shellfish growers largely shrugged it off.
In a region that provides one-sixth of the nation's oysters — the epicenter of the West Coast's $111 million oyster industry — everyone knows nature can be fickle. But then the failure was repeated in 2006, 2007 and 2008. It spread to an Oregon hatchery that supplies baby oysters to shellfish nurseries from Puget Sound to Los Angeles. Eighty percent of that hatchery's oyster larvae died, too.
Now, as the oyster industry heads into the fifth summer of its most unnerving crisis in decades, scientists are pondering a disturbing theory. They suspect water that rises from deep in the Pacific Ocean — icy seawater that surges into Willapa Bay and gets pumped into seaside hatcheries — may be corrosive enough to kill baby oysters. If true, that could mean shifts in ocean chemistry associated with carbon-dioxide emissions from fossil fuels may be impairing sea life faster and more dramatically than expected.
And it would vault a key Washington industry to the center of international debate over how to respond to marine changes expected to ripple through and undermine ocean food webs.
Scientists noticed the water's pH — the scale measuring acidity and alkalinity — sometimes dropped below normal, becoming more acidic. Seawater typically is slightly alkaline, but when oceans absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere — as they have by the hundreds of billions of tons since the Industrial Revolution — they become more corrosive.
Climate modelers predicted greenhouse gases would make marine waters more acidic by century's end. They expected to notice it first in deep water, some of which hasn't circulated to the surface in 1,500 years and has therefore accumulated more atmospheric carbon dioxide. And deep waters already run higher in carbon dioxide because dying plants, animals and fish sink and decay.
Ripple effects for fish
But two years ago, oceanographers Richard Feely and Chris Sabine, both with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory in Seattle, found more acidified waters already reaching the surface.
The north winds that blow off Washington's coast push marine surface waters off shore. Those waters are replaced by the icy-cold, more corrosive seawater welling up from hundreds of meters below. In a sense, that's exactly what scientists expected — just not so soon.
Corrosive waters can dissolve clam shells, eat away at corals and kill fish eggs. Already, scientists have taken pteropods, tiny marine snails that swim in the open ocean, from the Gulf of Alaska and exposed them to slightly acidified marine water in a laboratory. Their protective shells immediately dissolved.
Those creatures make up 60 percent of the food for Alaska's juvenile pink salmon. Similar creatures support many of the major fish species in Alaska's North Pacific, which in turn supports the billion-dollar Seattle-based industry that provides half the nation's catch of fish.
"The fish we depend on — salmon and pollock and herring — when they're in the first year of their life, they all depend on shellfish for survival," Feely said. "Early models suggest a 10 percent loss in pteropods can cause a 20 percent loss in weight of a fish."
Just last month, Smithsonian scientists published a paper suggesting that in the next century more acidified oceans will threaten the world's shellfish. Oyster larvae, they pointed out, are particularly susceptible. Their early shells are made from an easily eroded form of calcium carbonate.
Researchers believe that might be part of what's already happening on the Northwest coast. If oyster larvae are swimming in marine waters — whether pumped from the sea into a hatchery or in the bay — as deep, acidified water is pushed toward shore, "that could be a problem," said Simone Alin, a NOAA scientist who works with Sabine and Feely.
"Growers are scrounging"
Pacific oysters aren't native to Willapa Bay, but shellfish growers have farmed them here since the 1920s. It's about the only place left on the West Coast where growers look to the wild to get their oysters.
Normally, oysters spawn in the water, producing larvae that swim and eventually attach to a hard surface — typically other oyster shells. This creates oyster seed, called a "set." These succulent mollusks are then moved by hand throughout the bay and take two to five years to fatten up.
But somewhere between the larval stage and settling on a shell, these embryonic oysters are dying. And since only a few young have survived since 2005, "we're running out of oysters in the bay," said Bill Dewey, spokesman for Taylor Shellfish Farms. "Growers are scrounging for whatever they can find."
Standing ankle-deep in sea-water on a south Willapa sandbar last week, Sheldon, owner of Northern Oyster Co., watched his workers gather shellfish at low tide from one of the few places that still had some: a state "oyster reserve," a sort of shellfish bank growers can lease and draw upon to subsidize their own crops.

Craig Welch: 206-464-2093 or cwelch@seattletimes.com
Copyright © 2009 The Seattle Times Company

Global Warming from HAARP not Addressed Mr. President

2009-06-17T01:47:00.000-07:00

President Barack Obama:
Thank you for your June 2nd letter in response to my communicating to you my concerns about Global Warming. The form letter signed by you most likely by one of those signature machines I saw at the Religious Broadcasters Convention is appreciated.
You did not respond to a very important issue that I raised, i.e. HAARP.
In Gakona, Alaska, HAARP using 3.6 million watts of electricity is sending focused beams to the ionosphere to heat and bow it for over the horizon targeting for a number of uses. When the USA, Russia and other countries use these technologies it puts a huge amount of energy into our weather system. Common sense says this has contributed to Extreme Severe Weather Events. Extreme Arctic Ice Melt is happening and again common sense would say there is a link to heating the Artic sky.
For more than just common sense Dr. Nick Begich, Senator Begich’s brother, has written extensively with footnotes and patents of the technology used by the HAARP system. Also noted in one of Nick’s book is a quote from the Air Force calling for the ability to control the weather as a “Force Multiplier”. Ask Dr. Nick Begich or read any of his books from www.earthpulse.com.
As Commander-in-Chief I can understand your belief in the need for such a system but HEATING THE IONOSPHERE CONTRIBUTES TO GLOBAL WARMING and is not smart. Always unintended consequences happen as with HAARP and Global Warming.
Major Ed Dames, former trainer for the military, teaches remote viewing. He and his team have tasked and “seen” the atmosphere with “Swiss cheese” rips from pole to pole. Could HAARP have done this?
Dumping millions of tons of chemicals high in the sky has not solved the root problem of Global Warming. Unless the chem-trails are also a part of HAARP. Instead the barium, aluminum and ? chemicals are changing the pH of food crop soils and the oceans world wide. I have witnessed since 1998 the chemical-trails being laid down in grid patterns in four states and then spreading out and clouding the sky. I know it is very wide spread. Ask Major Ed Dames. His oath of secrecy prevented him from saying more but “no comment” often speaks volumes.
Could you please call together the other Nations that are using the HAARP technology and get everyone to agree to STOP HEATING THE SKY?
If not could you please explain why?

Speaking and working for Our Seventh Generation,
Theresa Marie K. Gandhi
tm@tmgandhi.com

Grandma Tells it Like it Is

2009-04-28T14:04:00.000-07:00

Lawyers should never ask a Mississippi grandma a question
if they aren't prepared for the answer.

In a trial, a Southern small-town prosecuting attorney
called his first witness, a grandmotherly, elderly woman
to the stand. He approached her and asked,
'Mrs. Jones, do you know me?'

She responded, 'Why, yes, I do know you, Mr. Williams. I've known you since you were a boy, and frankly, you've been a big disappointment to me. You lie, you cheat on your wife, and you manipulate people and talk about them behind their backs. You think you're a big shot when you haven't the brains to realize you'll never amount to anything more than
a two-bit paper pusher. Yes, I know you.'

The lawyer was stunned. Not knowing what else to do,
he pointed across the room and asked,
'Mrs. Jones, do you know the defense attorney?'

She again replied, ' Why yes, I do. I've known Mr. Bradley since he was a youngster, too. He's lazy, bigoted, and he has a drinking problem. He can't build a normal relationship with anyone, and his law practice is one of the worst in the entire state. Not to mention he cheated on his wife with three different women.
One of them was your wife.
Yes, I know him.'

The defense attorney nearly died.

The judge asked both counselors to approach the bench and, in a very quiet voice, said, 'If either of you idiots asks her
if she knows me, I'll send you both to the electric chair.'

This was forwarded by Fred Burks (fredburks@gmail.com) on www.earthRainbowNetwork.com
list serve I get every couple of weeks.
A great source of information out of Canada. TmkG

Comments on Navy NWTRC draft EIS/OEIS Dec 2008

2009-03-10T20:08:00.000-07:00

Comments from Theresa Marie K. Gandhi on Navy NWTRC draft EIS/OEIS Dec 2008
Whidbey Island Chemically Injured Network tm@tmgandhi.com
Comments to NWTRC EIS/OEIS draft December 2008 to conduct training, research, development, testing and evaluation of military hardware, personnel, tactics, munitions, explosives or electronic combat systems. NW Range Complex encompasses more than 122,440 square nautical miles of ocean and inland waters of Puget Sound. The range complex also includes more than 34,000 square nautical miles of airspace.
Achieving the Navy’s mandate and mission by any means necessary begins by mis-labeling the “No Action Alternative” as it is not a “No Action Plan” but continued training as usual.
At the least the U.S. Navy must not expand and adopt “Alternative 1 or 2”. Additionally the training must not take place within the Olympic Coast National Marine Sanctuary.
A search for “best available science” needs to be included even when it proves harm can come from standard operational procedures. Comments from the Orca Network need to be implemented and addressed. Comments from the National Resources Defense Council and organizations signing on to their comments need to be taken into consideration, investigated and recommendation adopted.
Volume 1 p. 3.6-1 Not in the Glossary but buried with the text of the EIS/OEIS draft was found the definition of “littoral zone”. As being: “near shore habitats that includes: islets, headlands, rocky inter-tidal areas, bottom-dwelling algaes (e.g., kelp forests), sea grass beds, soft substrate, estuarine and coastal salt marsh wetland, fjords and beaches. Mid-littoral beach is alternately submerged and exposed for moderate periods of time. In other words the NWTRC Study Area from within Puget Sound and south to California includes and “takes” all beaches and coastal salt march wetlands as would be DESIRED TO USE by the Naval Command. Tourists, residents, seed gatherers, clam diggers and fishermen could be restricted from their usual and accustomed shore line beaches. This could produce economic harm to multiple communities in all states on the West Coast.
Alternative 2 is the Navy’s preferred alternative because it would fully support the type and frequency of activities it believes are required to achieve complete Fleet readiness and allow the U.S. Navy to carry out its mission in the Pacific Northwest. RDT&E activities in the NWTRC are comprised primarily of unmanned aerial system (UAS) and underwater vehicle system activities.
Alternative 2 includes all elements of Alternative 1, plus: Increase the level of training activities over levels identified in Alternative 1; and Implement range enhancements, including: new air and sea surface targets; new electronic signal emitters; development of a small-scale underwater training minefield, and development of a portable undersea tracking range.
But missing in this Alternative is the ability of the Navy to maintain the long-term viability of the range complex while protecting human health and the environment not to mention the viability of fifty-one species of threatened or endangered salmon, aquatic species and marine mammals.
Acknowledge that the Navy is not equipped with the properly trained personnel capable of detecting multi-species who do not want to be detected. This is especially true when conducting training war games with multiple vessels, sonars and disrupted waters.
Make a commitment to further train sonar specialists to be able to detect the very elusive endangered marine species. Do not rely on high-frequency sonar technology to find marine mammals until independent researchers have determined its ability or not to harm the marine mammals in seeking to protect them.
Volume I: Hazardous Materials 3.3
P 3.3-14 Bomb and expended ordnance on the ocean floor would be “widely scattered” and have negligible adverse impacts and possibly some slight benefits.
To average the dispersion through out the whole NW Training Range does not make logical sense. To make the statement that “possibly some slight benefits” from bomb or expended ordnance – flies in the face of logic.
3.3.15 Missile’s solid propellant releasing ……ammonium perchlorate, potassium hydroxide, lithium chloride and other hazardous materials …. are expected to rapidly disperse …. that local concentration will be extremely low ….
Are assumptions that low concentrations will not harm those species exposed to them in their natural habitat? I could not find within the references any, or especially “best available scientific studies” to back up the above claim. To average the dispersion through out the whole NW Training Range without the missiles releasing these chemicals evenly throughout the entire range is not a credible statement.
Marine Mammals are immersed in this now toxic habitat, some consuming krill filter huge amounts of sea water through their consumption body parts.
All aquatic life bio-accumulates up the food chain. I saw no references regarding the possible bonding or absorption or not of these toxic materials to algae, krill or shrimp.
3.3.17 ……. molybdenum, titanium, tungsten or vanadium linked with the assumption that these toxic metals “will eventually oxidize …….. into benign by-products ……
Is an assumption not backed up with long term testing in comparable circumstances? No references could be found citing studies proving these heavy particles will ....... “eventually oxidize…into benign by-products”.

Depleted Uranium: 20-mm cannon shells of depleted uranium, their fragments and nano particles created when exploded are no where dealt with in the entire 1,068 pages. Claiming the depleted means the ordnance is only 60% as radioactive as uranium misses the entire point. Exploding DU weapons creates a nano particle poison gas that is carried on the wind inflicting rapid forming cancers in multiple organ systems in a very short amount of time one body at a time. These would widely disperse within the marine environment and then work their way up the food chain to human consumption aquatic species.
This would hold true for birds, like the ones in Afghanistan sitting on a wire that all fell to their deaths with blood flowing out every orifice after exposure to DU’s explosive poison gas cloud. Unless the bird deaths were from a detonated nuclear bomb that a “boots on the ground” veteran witnessed both in Afghanistan and Iraq. The Bunker Buster Nukes used in Afghanistan were encased in DU. As to whether it was the poison gas from exploded DU or the radioactive cloud from a nuclear weapon encased in DU that impacted and killed birds and humans can not be known by this writer. Afghani walking away from the explosion also had blood pouring from every orifice and died shortly there after according to witnesses with boots on the ground in our military.
See www.willthomasonline.net/investigations -“US Veteran with Boots on the Ground Witnessed……..”. And see also referenced studies in “Experts in DU Radiation” submitted with these comments.

Volume 2: References 8
p. 8-4: Reference cited is 35 years old – Hanson, W.C. 1974. Ecological Considerations of Depleted Uranium Munitions. Report LA-5559 Los Alamos Scientific Laboratory……. did not deal with the nanoparticiles that are created from the explosions of DU munitions. My references of credentialed experts accompany these comments in document called “Experts Reports of Findings on DU……”
The only other reference cited on Depleted Uranium was: “Toque, C. 2006. Marine Environmental Depleted Uranium Survey Report ………Gosport, UK”
p 8-50 “Goertner, J.F. 1982. Predication of underwater explosion safe ranges for sea mammals………. It is hard to image that munitions have not been changed or improved in 27 years. I would think that the Naval Surface Weapons Center would have more recent studies. If so then why was it that this study was referenced?
p 8-56 “Kryter, K.D. W.D. Ward, J.D. Miller and D.H. Eldredge. 1966. Hazardous exposure to intermittent and steady-state noise. …….. Forty-three years there isn’t there a more recent study on this topic?
p 8-87 “Hickie, B.E., R.W. Macdonald, J.K. B. Ford and P.S. Ross, 2007. ‘Killer whales (orcas) face protracted health risk associated with lifetime exposure to PCBs,’ Environmental Science and Technology, 41(18):6613-9,” Using Depleted Uranium with a half life of 40 million years will enable uncountable marine lives to have lifetime (however shortened by the process) exposure when moving through or living near by wherever the U.S. Navy decides to use and leave on the ocean floor those fragments of radioactive weapons. Nanoparticiles dispersion will greatly expand the radioactive areas of the marine environment. See references in “Experts in Radiation….”

3.3.18 Underwater Targets. Airborne and surface emitting magnetic or acoustic signals used in training do not mention the decibels, range or potential harm to marine mammals.
3.3.19 Repeated at the end of multiple paragraphs: ……appeared to be minimal and had no detectable effect on wildlife or sediment quality cites no “scientific studies” over time to prove these repeated assumptions as valid.
3.3.20 Torpedoes. Under the No Action Alternative ……..this will have no measurable impact on the PACNW OPAREA environment. No statement is made regarding the “Preferred Alternative” and the impact than increased use and exposure would have.
3.3.21 ….potentially toxic battery constituents with USEPA water quality criteria …. for protection of aquatic life or “best available literature” ………can not be exceeded once every three years. The preferred alternative would not limit exposure to one battery expended every three years. This is an omission as it is not stated how this limit would be overcome.
3.3.22 3.3.23 Explosive Sonobuoys – Potential Impacts of Detonation Byproducts ….in the water, the charges explode, creating aloud acoustic signal. No decibel readings or range of sound is mentioned thus omission claims no harm when in fact there very well could be. When a 4 # bomb of whatever source exploded underwater near NSA Whidbey 5,000 fish floating on top plus up to 20,000 that had fallen to the bottom were killed and a law suit was filed. This fish kill was witnessed. How many are not? No mention of potentially massive fish kills can be found within these pages. Is it that there are no computer codes to record such events?
3.3.23 3.3.23 – 25 Again with underwater detonations of C-4 there is no measurement of the acoustic signal or of the number of fish or marine mammals that would swim through these regions in the five hours that these exercises take to complete. There was no mention and probably no computer input code for reporting dead fish or marine mammals sighted during or after the exercises are complete for the day in the report filed under “test results”.
(Governor/President Bush’s No Child Left Behind achieved a no drop out rate because the computer code to record “drop outs” was eliminated.)
3.3.24 3.3.26 _.27 Aviation Fuel and Other Propellants …..fuel (dumped over water west of NAS Whidbey) ….dissipates in the air……small number of incidents………neither …….have an measurable impact on the environment. Downwind of this air dissipation the breast cancer rate in San Juan County is the highest of any County in Washington State. Even the Counties closest to Hanford had less. What could be in the air that could cause this…..jet exhaust, fuel dumped more than a few times or maybe exhaust from ships burning bunker diesel fuel?
3.3.25 3.3.28 .29 .30 Bombs, Missiles, Naval Gunfire, Targets and Countermeasures, Torpedoes and Small Caliber Rounds A repeated phrase…..”this increase would not have a measurable impact on the environment.” This statement is contrary to reality. Yet again, no mention of the acoustic byproduct on the resident aquatic life of firing and exploding these weapons ordnances are mentioned.
3.3.26 3.3-31 Underwater Detonations It is good news that the Navy will be relocating this process to Imperial Beach, CA from the near shore of Island and Jefferson County but not good news for marine life off of Imperial Beach. Implications for acoustic harm to marine life from underwater detonations in Imperial Beach, CA are not spoken too nor addressed in the No Action Alternative let alone in the Preferred Alternative.
3.3.27 3.3-32 -37 Repeated…..”will have no impact on the environment from bomb, missiles, etc…..” is not backed up with scientific proof of remarks and assumptions. Again no mention of the acoustical impact on marine life.

Through out the Hazardous Material sections there is an assumption that the toxic materials expended in exploding ordnances will have “no measurable impact of the environment” is not back up with any proof. Instead the Navy takes a particle and averages it dispersal against the whole area when in fact it is not dispersed throughout the whole 122,440 square nautical miles of the NWRRC.

Volume 1: 3.9 Marine Mammals
page 3.9-2 “There are 32 species of marine mammals known to occur in the NWTRC Study Area (Table 3.9-1). Again the “magic math” or “voodoo math” that has 0.00055 of one whale per squared km is not how reality presents itself. Whales and other marine species travel in “pods” and “schools” and occupy concentrated areas that are always moving. The “J” pod of Southern Resident Orcas do not spread throughout the 122,400 squared nautical miles- nm (420,163) square kilometers km of the PACNW OPAREA as shown within the EIS/OEIS draft.
3.9 -17: “Federal Agencies (i.e. U.S. Navy) must consult with NMFS to ensure actions will not destroy or adversely modify the Killer Whales (Orca) Habitat. Critical habitat means a more focused analysis on how the action would alter the habitat and how it will affect ability of habitat to support the populations conservation.”
Critical habitat designation encompasses parts of Haro Strait, waters around the San Juan Islands, the Strait of Juan de Fuca and all of Puget Sound – a total of just over 6,475 km squared …. excluded are 18 military sites covering 290 km squared of the designated area.
How will you warn the marine mammals to not trespass in these 18 “salt water island’s of harm”? Who will you warn Endangered Species to not use their usual and historic marine areas now that the Navy wants to use them to train to kill with weapons of war?

Volume 1 Fish 3.7
3.7-16 ESA Salmon runs overlap from mid May through late October.
Whales follow and feed on salmon, especially ESA listed Chinook salmon. Thus most of NWTRC would be a kill zone for Endangered Species.
Will training be suspended in the areas (all must pass Whidbey Island) where known salmon runs are?
Mitigation Measures, Page 5-23: “Limiting training activities to fewer than 12 months …. would not meet ….. readiness requirement of Navy’s mandate.”
Page 5-24 “Suspending training at night…… Prohibiting or limiting vessels from using MFA sonar in restricted visibility ….. violates international navigational rules… jeopardizes safety of ship and crew.” So much for “Marine Mammal Lookouts” as part of Mitigation Measures.

Volume 2 Appendix E Cetacean Stranding Report
p E-5 “Stranding report ……..Nationwide, between 1995-2004, there were approximately 700-1500 cetacean strandings per year…” Or possibly 13,500 strandings a year and even more for the years 1998, 2003 and 2004 are occurring.
It is known that from 2001 -2004 17,866 cetaceans and 5,928 pinnipeds were stranded. In three years from just two species the total is 27,794 strandings. Or 927 strandings per year.
Figure E-1 p E-6 Number of Stranding (Level A Data) shows: 1998 about 4500; 2003 about 4500 and 2004 about 4,000 a year. (The Figure did not allow an accurate number to be determined.) This seems like huge numbers of strandings are occurring. Are these mammal lives so discard-able that NMFS would give the Navy an LOA to “take”, harm and or kill, as the Navy pleases within Sanctuaries designated to insure marine mammal survival?
Source: Table E-1 page E-5 NMFS. Orca population in 1996 was 96 and has recovered to 87 animals within Puget Sound.
With increased terror producing underwater weapons and sonar this kill “take” rate per year can only increase. Five years another 45 marine mammals could be dead. If within the Orca population that could mean they are below the number needed to survive as a species.
Conclusions:
p E-22 “Subarachnoid and intracochlear hemorrhages were believed to have occurred prior to strandings and were hypothesized as being related to an acoustic event. ….no large-scale acoustic activity besides the Navy sonar exercise occurred in the time surround the stranding events.”
The U.S. Navy knows these facts related within the draft EIS/OEIS. Navy experts have reported on studies that show the ability of marine mammals to hear at greater distances than is admitted to within this draft up to 300 miles and maybe even further. And yet the Navy sought, most likely with the Bush administration’s help, a license to “take” i.e. kill marine mammals within their designated Sanctuaries. So with 122,440 square nautical miles the Navy must also use a very small portion of this total that is set aside for marine mammals in order to accomplish it’s training mission. At the least the Commander who is enabling this to happen should be ashamed. To those of us who are patriots and whose immediate family members have served, (42 years for my immediate family) in the Navy and Coast Guard, it shows a disregard for life that is near to extinction. Where is your courage of imagination to enable mission readiness and marine life to both win?

Volume 2 Draft EIS/OEIS December 2008
Mitigation Measures 5
P 5-23; 2nd line, third paragraph: “However, the fall habitat requirements for most marine mammals in NWTRC are unknown.” It is known that salmon migrate from mid April to mid October to and from historic spawning rivers and streams. Marine Mammals will be within Puget Sound and off of West Coast rivers following their desired aquatic food, i.e. Chinook and other Endangered Salmon species. March 8, 2009 two grey whales were spotted between Whidbey Island and Everett. This is very early for such a sighting. With global warming this could become more common for this and other species of "whales".

Volume 2 Other Considerations 6
p 6-2 Securing a LOA under Section 7 of the Marine Mammal Protection Act …..to permit “takes” as appropriate within the two Marine Mammal Sanctuaries in the NWTRC so as to not limit nor constrain the Navy’s DESIRED use of the entire NWTRC area even though the Sanctuaries are small areas compared to the totality of the huge NWTRC Study Area is an unconscionable act of planned Endangered Species Extinction. Such hubris shows a lack of imagination, creativity or even strategic planning. If the Naval Commander could look into the eye of a terrorized whale who was experiencing trauma and maybe even death from a state sponsored terrorist act against an ocean resident mammal within a designated sanctuary he might find the will to plan training activities in a different manner.
If an “Axis of Evil Nation-State or “Terrorist” would propose and or do the same we would declare war against them. Only our own military has the right to “take” harm unto death, designated Endangered marine mammals within their designated protected habitats and “Sanctuaries”.
If it is true that President Bush signed an Executive Order giving the U.S. Navy authorization to use marine mammal killing sonar ten million times in five years then multiple extinction events can be expected sooner rather than later.
What is your budget for true mitigation and replacement of dead or extinct marine mammals? Will you create a huge salt water inland sea in Utah beyond the reach of sonar that kills?
As one of two survivors of ten dead within a cancer cluster I can identify with marine species who die because the Navy must have every square nautical mile available for their use even when the activities planned will kill protected and endangered species even to extinction.
6.3 page 6-6 “Construction of the shallow water minefield would cause short term and temporary impacts during construction” Not addressed are the explosive and acoustic effects from any explosions within the shallow water minefield.
6.3 page 6-6 “No habitat associated with threatened or endangered species would be lost as result of implementation of the Proposed Action.” An yet within two designated Marine Mammals Sanctuaries the Navy applied for and secured an LOA in order to “take”, i.e. kill, harass or harm marine mammals. These restrictions were put into place because of threatened habitat and Endangered Species status of marine mammals.
Everyone except the U.S. Navy is required by law to respect, honor and protect these multiple marine mammal species and their prey, i.e. Chinook and other salmon.

Volume 2: References 8
Page 8-46. “Everitt, R.D., C.H. Fiscus, and R.L DeLong 1979. Marine mammal of northern Puget Sound …….November 1, 1977…..NOAA ……….
The populations are no longer the same as they were 32 years ago. Is there no more recent “report on investigations”?

Experts Reports on Radioactive Depleted Uranium

2009-03-10T20:04:00.000-07:00

Doctor reports, scientific findings and truth censored by US Military.
Abstract of articles assembled by Theresa Marie K. Gandhi

DU’s exploded small particle size and crystalline structure make the presence of DU dust in the environment such an extreme hazard. This differentiates its properties from that of the natural uranium dust that is ubiquitous and to which we all are exposed every day, which seldom reaches such a small size. This point is being stressed, as comparing DU particles to much larger natural ones is misleading.
Marine Mammals ingest large amounts of salt water in one form or another. Nanoparticiles of exploded DU weapons in salt water have not been tested and most likely would be absorbed into various organ systems as has been documented to humans in the following reports of studies conducted by radiation experts.
The military promotes the misleading results from large sized uranium studies.
NWTRC draft EIS/OEIS thirty-five year old reference was not conducted on the explosive nanoparticiles of current DU weapons.
“Hanson, W.C. 1974 Ecological Considerations of Depleted Uranium Munitions. Report LA-5559. Los Almos Scientific Laboratory of the University of California. Los Almos, N.M.” Using this reference combined with the experts reports to follow does not inspire trust in the only other DU reference:
“Toque, C. 2006. Marine Environmental Depleted Uranium Survey Report – Kirkcudbright Training Area – 2004, Environmental Sciences Department, Institute of Naval Medicine. Gosport, UK” – volume 2, page 8-5.
Marion Fulk, former scientist with the Manhattan Project and nuclear physical chemist at the National [nuclear weapons] Laboratory at Livermore, California. “Internalized DU particles, Fulk said, act as ‘a non-specific catalyst’ in both ‘nuclear and non-nuclear’ ways. This means that the uranium particle can affect human DNA and RNA because of both its chemical and radiological properties. This is why internalized DU particles cause ‘many, many diseases,’ this is how DU causes severe birth defects”, Fulk said.
According to Falk, more than 30 percent of the DU fired from the cannons of U.S. tanks is reduced to particles one-tenth of a micron (one millionth of a meter) in size or smaller on impact. "The larger the bang" the greater the amount of DU that is dispersed into the atmosphere, Falk said. With the larger missiles and bombs, nearly 100 percent of the DU is reduced to radioactive dust particles of the "micron size" or smaller, he said.
Bombs with DU, i.e. dirty bombs are the perfect weapons for killing lots of people

Dr. Asaf Durakovic, then Professor of Radiology and Nuclear Medicine at Georgetown University in Washington was quoted as saying, "The [US government's] Veterans Administration asked me to lie about the risks of incorporating depleted uranium in the human body." In 1997 he cited experiments, by others, in which 84 percent of dogs exposed to inhaled uranium died of cancer of the lungs.
At that time Dr. Durakovic was a colonel in the U.S. Army. He has since left the military, to found the Uranium Medical Research Center, a privately funded organization with headquarters in Canada. (Note about Dr. Durakovic; first, he was warned to stop his work, then he was fired from his position, then his house was ransacked, and he has also reported receiving death threats. Evidently the U.S. D.O.D is very keen on censoring DU whistle-blowers!)
Diagnostic distinction was shown between natural uranium and DU using the technique of Thermal Ionization Mass Spectrometry – TIMS. Dr. Durakovic, UMRC research associates Patricia Horan and Leonard Dietz, published a unique study in the August 2002 issue of Military Medicine Medical Journal. The study is believed to be the first to look at inhaled DU among Gulf War veterans, using the ultra-sensitive technique of thermal ionization mass spectrometry, which enabled them to easily distinguish between natural uranium and DU. The study, which examined British, Canadian and U.S. veterans, all suffering typical Gulf War Syndrome ailments, found that, nine years after the war, 14 of 27 veterans studied had DU in their urine. DU also was found in the lung and bone of a deceased Gulf War veteran. That no governmental study has been done on inhaled DU "amounts to a massive malpractice," Dietz said in an interview.

Ross B. Mirkarimi, a spokesman at The Arms Control Research Centre stated: "Unborn children of the region are being asked to pay the highest price, the integrity of their DNA." "The depleted uranium left by the U.S. bombing campaign has turned Iraq into a cancer-infested country. For hundreds of years to come, the effects of the uranium will continue to wreak havoc on Iraq and its surrounding areas."
A 2001 study of DU’s effect on DNA done by Dr. Alexandra C. Miller for the Armed Forces Radiobiology Research Institute in Bethesda, Md., indicates that DU’s chemical instability causes 1 million times more genetic damage than would be expected from its radiation effect alone. It should be noted that her studies shows that DU is “neoplastically transforming and genotoxic” are based on in vitro cellular research.
British toxico-pathologist Vyvyan Howard has reported that the increased toxicity of the nano-particle is due to its size. A University of Rochester study exposed nano-particles of Teflon for 15 minutes in mice nearly all died within 4 hours.
Leuren Moret is Past President of the Association for Women Geoscientists, has a background in the Geosciences. Has conducted extensive scientific research on atmospheric dust, the transport and cycling of radionuclides through the environment and through biological systems. She is recognized as an international expert, on the impact on global public health and the health of the environment, from radiation caused by atmospheric testing, nuclear power plants and depleted uranium.
“Exposure pathways for depleted uranium can be through the skin, by inhalation, and ingestion,” Leuren Moret wrote. “Nano-particles have high mobility and can easily enter the body. Inhalation of nano-particles of depleted uranium is the most hazardous exposure, because the particles pass through the lung-blood barrier directly into the blood.
“When inhaled through the nose, nano-particles can cross the olfactory bulb directly into the brain through the blood brain barrier, where they migrate all through the brain,” she wrote. “Many Gulf era soldiers exposed to depleted uranium have been diagnosed with brain tumors, brain damage and impaired thought processes. Uranium can interfere with the mitochondria, which provide energy for the nerve processes, and transmittal of the nerve signal across synapses in the brain. “Damage to the mitochondria, which provide all energy to the cells and nerves, can cause chronic fatigue syndrome, Lou Gehrig’s disease, Parkinson’s disease and Hodgkin’s disease.”
THREE EFFECTS OF DEPLETED URANIUM INTERNAL EXPOSURE
1. Chemical – changes in a substance due to an alteration of its chemical composition caused by changes in its atoms or molecules;
2. Radiological – changes when the nucleus of an isotope undergoes disintegration and releases energy in the form of alpha or beta particles and/or gamma rays. About 30% of radiation damage to cells is caused by the “bullet effect” of the alpha and beta particles tearing through the cells. About 70% of the damage is caused by changes in the cells and biological molecules from the energy dissipated along the pathway of the alpha and beta particles and gamma rays;
3. Particulate – changes caused by the particle size, the most harmful being nano-particles which are defined as particles with a diameter of 0.1 micron and smaller.
The “particulate effect” of exploded Depleted Uranium creates gas and dust, formed on the battlefield. This produces large numbers of extremely fine particles. The greatest number by mass on the battlefield is formed in the nano-particle range – 0.1 microns and smaller (1). There is a particulate effect caused by these nano-particles in living tissues. There are now 16 peer-reviewed journals devoted to the new field of nano-technology.
Dr. Helen Caldicott “the two Gulf wars have been nuclear wars because they have scattered nuclear material across the land, and people---particularly children--- are condemned to die of malignancy and congenital disease essentially for eternity." Because of the extremely long half-life of uranium 238, one of the radioactive elements in the shells fired, "the food, the air, and the water in the cradle of civilization have been forever contaminated," Dr. Caldicott explained.
Doug Rokke, formerly the top U.S. Army DU clean-up officer and now anti-DU crusader, says Israeli tankers fired radioactive shells during the invasion of Lebanon last year. U.S. and NATO forces also used DU ammunition in Kosovo. Rokke says he is quite ill from the effects of DU and that members of his clean-up crew have died from it.
Dr. Keith Baverstock, The World Health Organization's chief expert on radiation and health for 11 years and author of an unpublished study has charged that his report "on the cancer risk to civilians in Iraq from breathing uranium contaminated dust was deliberately suppressed. Dr. Keith Baverstock informed the media; Iraq's arid climate would increase exposure from its tiny particles as they are blown about and inhaled by the civilian population for years to come.

As a special advisor to the World Health Organization, the United Nations, and the Iraqi Ministry of Health, Dr. Ahmad Hardan has documented the effects of DU in Iraq between 1991 and 2002. "American forces admit to using over 300 tons of DU weapons in 1991. The actual figure is closer to 800. This has caused a health crisis that has affected almost a third of a million people. As if that was not enough, America went on and used 200 tons more in Baghdad alone during the recent invasion. With over 250,000 Nagasaki bombs used that works out to over one million pounds of radioactive dust scattered throughout Iraq.
Dr. Hardan also states: "I arranged for a delegation from Japan's Hiroshima Hospital to come and share their expertise in the radiological diseases we are likely to face over time. The delegation told me the Americans had objected and they decided not to come. Similarly, a world famous German cancer specialist agreed to come, only to be told later that he would not be given permission to enter Iraq."
Not only are we poisoning the people of Iraq and Afghanistan, but we are making a concerted effort to keep out specialists from other countries that can help. The U.S. Military doesn't want the rest of the world to find out what we have done.
The Japanese began studying DU effects in southern Iraq in the summer of 2003. They had a Geiger counter which they watched go off the scale on many occasions. During their visit, a local hospital was treating upwards of 600 children per day, many of which suffered symptoms of internal poisoning by radiation. 600 children per day? How many of these children will get cancer and suffer an early and painful death?
Dr. Yuko Fujita, an assistant professor at Keio University, Japan who examined the effects of radioactivity in Iraq from May to June, 2003, said: "I doubt that Iraq is fabricating data because in fact there are many children suffering from leukemia in hospitals," Fujita said. "As a result of the Iraq wars, the situation will be even more desperate starting in five to 10 years and beyond."
The March 14, 2004 Tokyo Citizen's Tribunal that "convicted" President Bush of war crimes gave the following summation regarding DU weapons: (This court was a citizen's court with no binding legal authority)
1. Their use has indiscriminate effects;
2. Their use is out of proportion with the pursuit of military objectives;
3. Their use adversely affects the environment in a widespread, long term and severe manner;
4. Their use causes superfluous injury and unnecessary suffering. (To enemies, civilians, troops and American weapons makers.)
Chalmers Johnson, president of the Japan Policy Research Institute, writes in his "The Sorrows of Empire"(Henry Holt and Co.) that, given the abnormal clusters of childhood cancers and deformities in Iraq as well as Kosovo, the evidence points "toward a significant role for DU."
"Ingested DU particles can cause up to 1000 times the damage of an X-ray", said Mary Olson, a nuclear waste specialist and biologist at the Nuclear Information and Resource Service in Washington D.C.

Dr. Alim Yacoub of Basra University conducted an epidemiological study into incidences of malignancies in children under fifteen years old, in the Basra area (an area bombed with DU during the first Gulf War). They found over the 1990 to 1999 period, there was a 242% rise. That was before the recent invasion.

In the fall of 2002, the Uranium Medical Research Center -UMRC field team went back to Afghanistan for a broader survey, and revealed a potentially larger exposure than initially anticipated. Approximately 30% of those interviewed in the affected areas displayed symptoms of radiation sickness. New born babies were among those displaying symptoms, with village elders reporting that over 25% of the infants were inexplicably ill. In Afghanistan, unlike Iraq, UMRC lab results indicated high concentrations of Non-depleted Uranium, with the concentrations being much higher than in DU victims from Iraq. Afghanistan was used as a testing ground for a new generation of "bunker buster" bombs containing high concentrations of other uranium alloys.
It appears that by going after a handful of terrorists in Afghanistan we have poisoned a huge number of innocent civilians, with a disproportionate number of them being children.

The Pentagon/Department of Defense have interfered with UMRC's ability to have its studies published by managing, a progressive and persistent misinformation program in the press against UMRC, and through the use of its control of science research grants to refute UMRC's scientific findings and destroy the reputation of UMRC's scientific staff, physicians and laboratories. UMRC is the first independent research organization to find Depleted Uranium in the bodies of US, UK and Canadian Gulf War I veterans and has subsequently, following Operation Iraqi Freedom, found Depleted Uranium in the water, soils and atmosphere of Iraq as well as biological samples donated by Iraqi civilians. Yet the first thing that comes up on Internet searches are these supposed "studies repeatedly showing DU to be harmless." The technique is to approach the story as a debate between government and independent experts in which public interest is stimulated by polarizing the issues rather than telling the scientific and medical truth. The issues are systematically confused and misinformed by government, UN regulatory agencies (WHO, UNEP, IAEA, CDC, DOE, etc) and defense sector (military and the weapons developers and manufacturers).

In Kosovo, similar spikes in cancer and birth defects were noticed by numerous international experts, although the quantity of DU weapons used was only a small fraction of what was used in Iraq.

Conclusions
If terrorists succeeded in spreading something throughout the U.S. that ended up causing hundreds of thousands of cancer cases and birth defects over a period of many years, they would be guilty of a crime against humanity that far surpasses the Sept. 11th attacks in scope and severity. Although not deliberate, with our military campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan, we have done just that. If the physical environment is so unsafe and unhealthy that one cannot safely breathe, then the outer trappings of democracy have little meaning. At least under Saddam, the Iraqi people could stay healthy and conceive normal children. Few Americans are aware that in getting rid of Saddam, we left something much worse in his place.

Depleted uranium (DU) weaponry meets the definition of weapon of mass destruction in two out of three categories under U.S. Federal Code Title 50 Chapter 40 Section 2302.
DU weaponry violates all international treaties and agreements, Hague and Geneva war conventions, the 1925 Geneva gas protocol, U.S. laws and U.S. military law. By insisting on its use, Johnson adds, "the military is deliberately flouting a 1996 United Nations resolution that classifies DU ammunition as an illegal weapon of mass destruction."
By insisting on its use, Chalmers Johnson, president of the Japan Policy Research Institute said, "the military is deliberately flouting a 1996 United Nations resolution that classifies DU ammunition as an illegal weapon of mass destruction."
Terry Jemison at the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs stated in August 2004 that over 518,000 Gulf-era veterans (14-year period) are now on medical disability, and that 7,039 were wounded on the battlefield in that same period. Over 500,000 U.S. veterans are homeless.
In some studies of soldiers who had normal babies before the war, 67 percent of the post-war babies are born with severe birth defects - missing brains, eyes, organs, legs and arms, and blood diseases.
Cancer starts with one alpha particle under the right conditions. One gram of DU is the size of a period in this sentence and releases 12,000 alpha particles per second.
What we can do to halt the use of genocidal DU weapons.
Because DU weapons violate the 1925 Geneva Protocol that prohibits “the use in war of asphyxiating, poisonous or other gases and of all analogous liquids, material or devices”. DU weapons in nano-particle form are a “poisonous gas”.
Francis Boyle, Professor of International Law at the University of Illinois and author of The Criminality of Nuclear Deterrence thinks so. He has launched a campaign for a global pact against uranium weapons. The Government of France is the official depository for the 1925 Geneva Protocol. Boyle contends every state submit a letter to the French government to enforce a ban. “All that needs to be done is for anti-DU citizens, activists and NGO's in every country to pressure their Foreign Minister to write to their French counterpart, drawing attention to the “Protocol for the Prohibition of the use in War of Asphyxiating, Poisonous or Other Gases and of Bacteriological Methods of Warfare”, of 17th June 1925, prohibiting uses as above. The letter should add that this Protocol is believed to: “already prohibit the use in war of depleted uranium ammunition, uranium Armour plate and all other uranium weapons”. Belgium, last month, outlawed uranium weapons.
A request should be made that the letter is circulated to all other High Contracting Parties to the 1925 Protocol and addressed to: His Excellency, The Foreign Minister, Republic of France, 37, Quai d'Orsay, 75351 Paris, France. Or Fax: 33-1-43-17-4275
1. “Characteristics of Particles and Particle Dispersoids”, HANDBOOK OF CHEMISTRY AND PHYSICS 53rd Edition (1961).
http://www.mindfully.org/Nucs/Particle-Dispersoids-TableSep61.htm
USA weapons designed, manufacture and sold to Israel two new categories of genocidal weapons. Hundreds of children have lost their legs and soon after their lives from: DIME bombs-Dense Inert Metal Explosives: are genotoxic, 100% carcinogenic bomb, developed and manufactured by the USA. The undetectable shrapnel from this highly-developed explosive attacks the immune system, and causes thousands of amputations, which only stave off the spread of cancer in its victims for 4 to 6 months. In other words, while the fighting may end with a death count of several hundred, months later the numbers will be ten times higher, when the focus is no longer Israel's attacks on Gaza. Essentially, with the tax dollar support and assistance from the United States, Israel is committing genocide and so are we.
White phosphorous was used in Lebanon and Gaza and made in the USA for Israel.
The burns, blackish in color, reached deep into the muscles and bones. Even after treatment was begun, the blackish color returned. When autopsies were done, reports showed that the cause of death was poisoning from elements of white phosphorous that had entered their systems, causing cardiac arrests. If they didn’t did die from burning to death down to bone and teeth. "You know, the most important thing you can tell people in your country is that U.S. taxpayers paid for many of the weapons used to kill people in Gaza," said Dr. Saeed Abuhassan. "And this, also, is why it's worse than an earthquake."
http://www.currentconcerns.ch/archive/2006/03/20060312.php

Global Warming and ATOMSPHERIC HEATERS at COP15

2009-02-01T17:31:00.000-08:00

Re: Weather Weapons of Mass Destruction, Global Warming and COP15

Honorable President Obama,
What would Mahatma Gandhi say about our current challenges and responsibilities globally? Would he issue Red Alerts acknowledging imminent tipping points for our earth’s self-sustaining global commons beyond which our earth will be unable to sustain life? What priorities and processes would he propose to insure our common future?
As one who since 1983 explored, wrote about and applied the moral and political thought of Mahatma Gandhi I call your attention to a global threat that is not being investigated, discussed or acknowledged for the grievous harm that has and could occur. There is no reason that is valid enough to keep such a global threat from being researched, discussed, and alternatives found.
November 30 – December 18, 2009 10,000 to 15,000 will gather in Copenhagen, Denmark, meeting in Working Groups, to formulate a plan to deal with severe Climate Change and Global Warming. Not being discussed to date is the part that New World Order Weapons of Mass Destruction are playing in Global Warming by heating the earth’s ionosphere with 3.6 million watts of focused energy. Is it any wonder that our climate is violent and more extreme than ever before?
Weather Wars using Weapons of Mass Destruction that have earth changing technology are being used by Russia and the United States. HAARP, in Gakona, Alaska is an atmospheric heater that uses 3.6 million watts to focus frequencies to heat and bow the ionosphere for over the horizon targeting as one of its many uses. www.haarp.alaska.edu
The United States Air Force and Navy work with Raytheon, owning the Tesla and Eastland patents, operate under the mandate of SDI. The side effects or unintended consequences is putting rips and holes in our planet’s protective atmosphere, pumping huge amounts of energy that feed extreme climate events and global warming.
Even though HAARP’s use is damaging a major global life support system I am unaware of it being discussed by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change -IPCC. European Parliament’s Committee on Foreign Affairs, Security and Defense Policy after holding hearings on HAARP sought to draw up a “Green Paper” on “the links between environment and defense”. They were told the Committee lacked the jurisdiction to delve into “the links between environment and defense”. If not them, who can discuss it?
Even though HAARP’s use violates the 1977 International Convention ratified by the UN General Assembly which banned ‘military or other hostile use of environmental modification techniques having widespread, long-lasting or severe effects’. It defined ‘environmental modification techniques’ as ‘any technique for changing – through the deliberate manipulation of natural processes – the dynamics, composition or structure of the earth, including its biota, lithosphere, hydrosphere and atmosphere, or of outer space.’
While the substance of the 1977 Convention was reasserted in the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) signed at the 1992 Earth Summit in Rio, debate on weather modification for military use has become a scientific taboo.

Plans and actions to deploy HAARP and Russian technologies into space to base weapons of mass destruction are already under way. There maybe other ‘secret weapons of mass destruction’ that I am unaware or that are held so tightly as to still be secret. I do know about HAARP and the Navy’s radar. To be silent would put me among those guilty of crimes against humanity.
I can imagine the Bush’s administrations had something to do with the silence that has and could kill millions, has left millions homeless and has even worse applications than I have even discussed in this letter. Please read the research by Dr. Nicholas Begich.
I have wondered why Vice President Gore has not said a word even though he would have to know given the length of time these technologies have been in existence.

President Obama, who is working on HAARP’s atmospheric heater’s effect on Global Warming? How can this very critical challenge be discussed without invoking National Security? When does humanity’s survival trump secrecy that allows destruction of earth’s atmosphere and oceans?
Sir, can you speak with the co-chairs of Working Group III, Climate Change, Impacts Adaptation and Vulnerability, at IPCC and make sure that the topic of weather modification atmospheric heaters for military use is dealt with as a part of COP15?

To those of us who have lost loved ones, homes, businesses and farmers who have lost crops and even their farms what would you have us do to insure our safety and lives?
We’ve been told the Oceans will be dead within 40 years. It seems like just yesterday that it was forty year ago. Weapons of Mass Destruction now threaten life on our planet. Too many secrets and lies now threaten our very existence. Humanity’s survival must be spoken of and another way found that does not threaten us all. This is just one of many topics that Mahatma Gandhi would speak about without reserve seeking that truth is told that humanity may survive.

A number of people have sounded the alarm. Alaska resident Dr. Nicholas Begich published books about HAARP and spoke to the European Union. These books can be found on his web page, http://www.earthpulse.com. Michel Chossudovsky, Professor of Economics, University of Ottawa, has posted warnings on www.earthpulse.com and http://www.globalresearch.ca. The www.globalresearch.ca web page has a number of articles on the topic. Physicist Dr. Bernard Eastlund, Dr. Rosalie Bertell and others have sounded the alarm.
What can and will you do?

Speaking for our earth and our seventh generation,
Theresa Marie K. Gandhi, www.tmgandhi.com tm@tmgandhi.com
Married into family of Mahatma Gandhi now living back home on Whidbey Island, Northwest Washington State where we experience typhoon winds.

A Bill of Rights for the Earth

2009-01-26T23:46:00.000-08:00

The creation, ratification and implementation of a Bill of Rights for the Earth can insure our common future. To unite and teach the process of participatory democracy to the peoples of the earth: creating, ratifying and implementing responsible stewardship of the commons of our earth; its seeds, air, water and its sources, such as, soils, wetlands, aquifers, oceans, rivers, lakes, ground water and what goes into these resources. Bringing back our oceans from the brink of collapse is necessary for humanity to survive sixty years given the oceans will be without fish in forty years. Thinking globally and acting locally we gain the knowledge now verified by “The Theory of Everything” that we are all one, connected and interdependent with each other.
Our Common Healthy Future is the responsibility of each individual, community, village, region, nationality, tribal nation and nation state. Our Common Future depends on the sustained quality of the environment of our earth. It is time to take steps to create the legal framework that will ensure the commons of our earth are available for our seventh generation to live with the right to clean water, breathable air, and an atmosphere whole and in place. A Bill of Rights for the Earth is a beginning of a way for us to unite in the acknowledgment that our earth is one and we are all one with all creation in a web of life.
We have entered a time unprecedented in the history of humanity, a time in which changes are happening so fast, a time when opportunities to implement new ways of thinking and new ways of being open us to unlimited possibilities. It is time to begin to forge new legal structures and implement new public policies to unite us in our common future, insure our individual sovereignty and establish new methodologies that guarantee security.
A Bill of Rights for the Earth is a first step in a grassroots process to create a global constitution. The unification of the peoples of the earth in the common bond of being for the survival of our shared sustainable environment is an action whose time has come. These actions can be a process that ends all wars.
A major challenge has been that a self-supporting loop is created as poverty creates ecological disasters and a non-supporting earth leaves its people without wealth. Poverty is violence. Public policies that perpetuate poverty are unjust and need to be changed. Changes of such a magnitude have not before been in the best interest of those whose wealth has been made from the poverty of the many. It is now time for this to change. It would be better for all if these changes can take place in a planned nonviolent process. Being for the sustainable survival of our earth's resources is a way these nonviolent changes can bring about peace.
Methodologies for the ratification of a Bill of Rights for the Earth could include: Town Hall Meetings via radio, television and world wide web; Local study groups; Action councils; Economic conversion teams; Re-education centers; Earth corps reclamation teams; Mediation and Peace keeping teams. A project like www.BluePlanetProject.net is a good example.

© Copyright Theresa Marie K. Gandhi February 23, 2008
For information, participation, feedback or ideas contact: tm@tmgandhi.com

PLAN-IT TURTLE: a Vision for Our Common Future

2009-01-26T23:42:00.000-08:00

Women, men and children are at peace with each other. Children are conceived consciously, born nonviolently and raised in secure loving homes. Every child is a wanted child! Individuals know family, clan, culture, native language, self-sufficiency and love wisdom of elders. Joy, laughter, love and friendship are every moment experiences.
Peacemakers and friends, knowing all life is sacred, unite the world’s population in life consciousness. Universal truth and spirituality are awakened. Self-realization is common. Religions accept each other’s truth. Love, truth, compassion and forgiveness ignite within the hearts and minds of all people, heal the past and allow a peaceful present.
We wage peace with our biochemistry; addiction and disease no longer exist. Global ecological health consciousness and individual responsibility unite us in our diversity, transform humanity and our planet. Men, women and children are equal partners in creating a healthy, peaceful and secure world!
Creating, ratifying and implementing a Bill of Rights for the Earth gives humanity a sane and practical process to create global democracy at the local level. We work together to insure basic needs for all people are met: home, health, sanity, safe nourishing food, clean water and air, non-alienating labor, supplements and health practitioners of our choice, social justice, liberty, freedom, security and peace.
TURTLE, a political party with only one plank - it is sane to love the earth and each other as our self, is open to all earth’s people. TURTLE, The United Resolution To Love Earth, is a process to set aside differences and work together for our global sustainable environment. We select women and men of Virtue and Honor with high moral character to implement public policies to ensure sustainability of our commons and on quality of life for our seventh generation.
The global military industrial complex has gone out of style as competition to make peace profitable sweeps the planet. We the People gather and create bioregional Councils of Wisdom to mediate conflict. Town Hall forums and public meetings facilitate renewed vigor in participatory democracy renewing our democratic republic. Participation in the formulation of public policies that contribute to our passing on to our seventh generation a planet with its commons in a state of health, its oceans, rivers and lakes not longer sewers for corporation’s toxic effluent and our air and atmosphere clean and balanced as originally created. We become an example of what is possible and positive. An Environmental Service Corps cleans up the past toxic carcinogens of industrialized war making. Making Peace Profitable catches on and sweeps out war whose time is ended.
PLAN-IT - global environmental security system implements nuclear, chemical and biological weapons disarmament via a sea, earth and space station system. We participate and witness the peacemaking process in person, on television, radio and computer. We work heart to heart and people to people implementing a common sense plan for our common healthy future!

© Copyright Theresa Marie K. Gandhi February 23, 2008

How the USA PATRIOT Act redefines "Domestic Terrorism"

2008-11-04T21:57:00.000-08:00

Section 802 of the USA PATRIOT Act (Pub. L. No. 107-52) expanded the definition of terrorism to cover ""domestic,"" as opposed to international, terrorism. A person engages in domestic terrorism if they do an act ""dangerous to human life"" that is a violation of the criminal laws of a state or the United States, if the act appears to be intended to: (i) intimidate or coerce a civilian population; (ii) influence the policy of a government by intimidation or coercion; or (iii) to affect the conduct of a government by mass destruction, assassination or kidnapping. Additionally, the acts have to occur primarily within the territorial jurisdiction of the United States and if they do not, may be regarded as international terrorism.
Section 802 does not create a new crime of domestic terrorism. However, it does expand the type of conduct that the government can investigate when it is investigating ""terrorism."" The USA PATRIOT Act expanded governmental powers to investigate terrorism, and some of these powers are applicable to domestic terrorism.
The definition of domestic terrorism is broad enough to encompass the activities of several prominent activist campaigns and organizations. Greenpeace, Operation Rescue, Vieques Island and WTO protesters and the Environmental Liberation Front have all recently engaged in activities that could subject them to being investigated as engaging in domestic terrorism.
One recent example is the Vieques Island protests, when many people, including several prominent Americans, participated in civil disobedience on a military installation where the United States government has been engaging in regular military exercises, which these protesters oppose. The protesters illegally entered the military base and tried to obstruct the bombing exercises. This conduct would fall within the definition of domestic terrorism because the protesters broke federal law by unlawfully entering the airbase and their acts were for the purpose of influencing a government policy by intimidation or coercion. The act of trying to disrupt bombing exercises arguably created a danger to human life - their own and those of military personnel. Using this hypothetical as a starting point, we will go through the USA PATRIOT Act and explore the new governmental powers that could be brought to bear on Vieques Island protesters whose conduct falls within the overbroad definition of domestic terrorism.
Seizure of assets - Sec. 806: Section 806 of the Act could result in the civil seizure of their assets without a prior hearing, and without them ever being convicted of a crime. It is by far the most significant change of which political organizations need to be aware. Section 806 amended the civil asset forfeiture statute to authorize the government to seize and forfeit: all assets, foreign or domestic (i) of any individual, entity, or organization engaged in planning or perpetrating any act of domestic or international terrorism against the United States, or their property, and all assets, foreign or domestic, affording any person a source of influence over any such entity or organization or (ii) acquired or maintained by any person with the intent and for the purpose of supporting, planning, conducting, or concealing an act of domestic or international terrorism against the United States, citizens or residents of the United States or their property or (iii) derived from, involved in, or used or intended to be used to commit any act of domestic or international terrorism against the United States, citizens or residents of the United States, or their property.
This language is broad enough to authorize the government to seize any assets of any individuals involved in the Vieques Island protests or of any organization supporting the protests of which the person is a member, or from any individuals who were supporting the protesters in any way. Possible supporters of the protesters could include student organizations that sponsored participation in the demonstration, the Rainbow/Push Coalition, the Rev. Sharpton's National Action Network, and religious or community organizations that provided housing or food to the protesters.
The civil asset forfeiture power of the United States government is awesome. The government can seize and/or freeze the assets on the mere assertion that there is probable cause to believe that the assets were involved in domestic terrorism. The assets are seized before a person is given a hearing, and often without notice. In order to permanently forfeit the assets, the government must go before a court, but at a civil hearing, and the government is only required to prove that the assets were involved in terrorism by a preponderance of the evidence. Because it is a civil proceeding, a person is not entitled to be represented by an attorney at public expense if they cannot afford to pay an attorney. The time between seizure and forfeiture can sometimes be months; meanwhile, organizations or individuals whose assets are seized are forced to make do without the assets. Only the most financially flush non-profit organizations would be able to successfully defend themselves against government forfeiture. In short, without the full due process afforded in criminal cases, the U.S. government can bankrupt political organizations it asserts are involved in domestic terrorism.
Disclosure of educational records - Sec. 507: This provision of the USA PATRIOT Act requires a judge to issue an order permitting the government to obtain private educational records if the Attorney General or his designee certifies that the records are necessary for investigating domestic or international terrorism. No independent judicial finding is required to verify that the records are relevant. This means that the Attorney General may obtain the private educational records of a student involved in the Vieques protests by asserting that the records are relevant to a domestic terrorism investigation. These records may include information such as a student's grades, private medical information (counseling, abortions), which organizations the student belonged to, or any other information that the educational institution collects about its students.
Disclosure of information from National Education Statistics Act - Sec. 508: This provision of the USA PATRIOT Act requires a judge to issue an order for the government to obtain educational records that have been collected pursuant to the National Education Statistics Act. NESA includes a vast amount of identifiable student information from academic performance to health information, family income, and race. Until now, this information has been held to strict confidentiality requirements without exception. Again, all the government needs to certify is that the information is relevant to a terrorism investigation and the court has no choice but to issue the order.
Single-Jurisdiction Search Warrants (Sec. 219): This section of the USA PATRIOT Act amends Rule 41(a) of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure to authorize the government to go before a singe Federal magistrate judge in any judicial district in which activities relating to the terrorism may have occurred, to obtain a warrant to search property or a person within or outside the district. This means that the government could go to a single judge to get a warrant to search the property or person of the Vieques activists in New York, Chicago, California, or wherever else the protesters were from. If the government chose to go before a magistrate in New York, a person in California, who wished to seek to have the warrant quashed because he or she believed it was invalid, would have to find a way to appear before the New York court that issued the warrant. This would be a daunting task for most.
POST-PATRIOT ACT LAWS
Since passage of the PATRIOT Act, two other new laws have passed that implicate domestic terrorism.
Taxpayer Information - 26 U.S.C.A. Sec. 6103(i)(3)(C) requires the Secretary of the Internal Revenue Service to provide taxpayer information to the appropriate Federal law enforcement agency responsible for investigating or responding to the terrorist incident. If abused, this provision could be used by law enforcement to gain access to confidential taxpayer information of political protesters.
Regulation of biological agents and toxins - 42 U.S.C.A. Sec. 262a and 7 U.S.C.A. Sec. 8401 regulate biological agents and toxins. If a person is involved with an organization that engages in domestic or international terrorism, he or she is not permitted to gain access to these regulated agents. Under the law, the Attorney General identifies individuals involved in ""terrorism"" to the Department of Agriculture. Once the person is listed, he or she cannot get access to any of the regulated agents or toxins. This provision will probably not impact most people, however, it might impact someone such as a scientist who might regularly use biological agents or toxins in their work.
Conclusion - The ACLU does not oppose criminal prosecution of people who violate the law, even if they are doing it for political purposes. However, we do oppose the broad definition of terrorism and the ensuing authority that flows from that definition. One way to ensure that the conduct that falls within the definition of domestic terrorism is in fact terrorism is to limit the scope of the conduct that triggers the definition. Thus, domestic terrorism could include acts which ""cause serious physical injury or death"" rather than all acts that are ""dangerous to human life."" This more narrow definition will exclude the conduct of organizations and individuals that engage in minor acts of property damage or violence.

Articles of Impeachment

2008-10-18T02:22:00.000-07:00

"Impeachment is not a political question. Impeachment is a constitutional duty. It is the one power and highest duty the Constitution rests in the Congress to preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States when the President, Vice President, and other civil officers of the United States commit treason, bribery, or other High Crimes and Misdemeanors. George Bush has deliberately, falsely and systematically mislead the Congress and the American people concerning the most criminal, costly and harmful acts of his administration, leading us to war, tragic loss of human life, the devastation of Iraq, military expenses reaching trillions of dollars, disruption of the economy that will take decades to overcome, a contemptuous assault on the Bill of Rights, an international humanitarian disaster, deliberate antagonism and provocation of nations and people, most once friendly, and an enlarging assault on the earth's environment. On June 5, 2008, a long delayed five year U.S. Senate Select Committee on Intelligence study and 170-page report unanimously found President Bush, Vice President Cheney and other top officers had made false charges and systematically presented a more dire picture about Iraq than justified by intelligence provided only to them. The Committee included both Democrats and Republicans. Today President Bush is exerting all his power and influence to repeatedly urge Europe, Israel and others to support an attack on Iran which he intends to commence in the remaining months of the presidency. Iran is larger than Iraq and Afghanistan, has millions of people, richer by a multiple, unimpaired by recent war and will fight fiercely if attacked. He is negotiating a permanent U.S. military presence in Iraq placing the U.S. on Iran's border. The next several Presidents of the United States will spend their time in office miserably fighting wars started by Bush, as our economy is consumed in military spending. Impeachment, a Constitutional duty, is the only way to prevent George W. Bush and his cabal from vastly enlarging the disastrous wars he has already inflicted on the world and the American people. The House of Representatives must quickly consider Bills of Impeachment long overdue, and the Senate must prepare to sit in judgment of President Bush, Vice President Cheney other officers who are implicated. In a brilliant and courageous speech on the House floor, Congressman Kucinich continued to show his integrity and stance in defense of our constitution. On Monday night he introduced 35 articles of impeachment against President Bush. Each article was elucidated with stunning evidence of it's validity."

Article I
Creating a Secret Propaganda Campaign to
Manufacture a False Case for War Against Iraq.
Article II
Falsely, Systematically, and with Criminal Intent
Conflating the Attacks of September 11, 2001,
With Misrepresentation of Iraq as a Security Threat
as Part of Fraudulent Justification for a War of Aggression.
Article III
Misleading the American People and Members of Congress
to Believe Iraq Possessed Weapons of Mass Destruction,
to Manufacture a False Case for War.
Article IV
Misleading the American People and Members of Congress
to Believe Iraq Posed an Imminent Threat to the United States.
Article V
Illegally Misspending Funds to Secretly Begin a War of Aggression.
Article VI
Invading Iraq in Violation of the Requirements of HJRes114.
Article VII
Invading Iraq Absent a Declaration of War.
Article VIII
Invading Iraq, A Sovereign Nation, in Violation of the UN Charter.
Article IX
Failing to Provide Troops With Body Armor and Vehicle Armor
Article X
Falsifying Accounts of US Troop Deaths and Injuries for Political Purposes
Article XI
Establishment of Permanent U.S. Military Bases in Iraq
Article XII
Initiating a War Against Iraq for Control of That Nation's Natural Resources
Article XIIII
Creating a Secret Task Force to Develop Energy and Military Policies
With Respect to Iraq and Other Countries
Article XIV
Misprision of a Felony, Misuse and Exposure of Classified Information
And Obstruction of Justice in the Matter of Valerie Plame Wilson,
Clandestine Agent of the Central Intelligence Agency
Article XV
Providing Immunity from Prosecution for Criminal Contractors in Iraq
Article XVI
Reckless Misspending and Waste of U.S. Tax Dollars in
Connection With Iraq and US Contractors
Article XVII
Illegal Detention: Detaining Indefinitely And Without
Charge Persons Both U.S. Citizens and Foreign Captives
Article XVIII
Torture: Secretly Authorizing, and Encouraging the
Use of Torture Against Captives in Afghanistan,
Iraq, and Other Places, as a Matter of Official Policy
Article XIX
Rendition: Kidnapping People and Taking Them Against
Their Will to "Black Sites" Located in Other
Nations, Including Nations Known to Practice Torture
Article XX
Imprisoning Children
Article XXI
Misleading Congress and the American People About
Threats from Iran, and Supporting Terrorist Organizations
Within Iran, With the Goal of Overthrowing the Iranian Government
Article XXII
Creating Secret Laws
Article XXIII
Violation of the Posse Comitatus Act
Article XXIV
Spying on American Citizens, Without a Court-Ordered Warrant,
in Violation of the Law and the
Fourth Amendment
Article XXV
Directing Telecommunications Companies to Create an
Illegal and Unconstitutional Database of the Private Telephone
Numbers and Emails of American Citizens
Article XXVI
Announcing the Intent to Violate Laws with Signing Statements
Article XXVII
Failing to Comply with Congressional Subpoenas and
Instructing Former Employees Not to Comply
Article XXVIII
Tampering with Free and Fair Elections, Corruption
of the Administration of Justice
Article XXIX
Conspiracy to Violate the Voting Rights Act of 1965
Article XXX
Misleading Congress and the American People in an Attempt to Destroy Medicare
Article XXXI
Katrina: Failure to Plan for the Predicted Disaster of Hurricane
Katrina, Failure to Respond to a Civil Emergency
Article XXXII
Misleading Congress and the American People, Systematically
Undermining Efforts to Address Global Climate Change
Article XXXIII
Repeatedly Ignored and Failed to Respond to High Level
Intelligence Warnings of Planned Terrorist Attacks in the US, Prior to 911.
Article XXXIV
Obstruction of the Investigation into the Attacks of September 11, 2001
Article XXXV
Endangering the Health of 911 First Responders

- More on this through http://kucinich.us/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1660&Itemid=1

Speaker Pelosi: "Impeachment is off the table."

Martial Law threatened if $700 billion not given to wealthy!

2008-10-18T02:09:00.000-07:00

Congressional leaders were threatened with Martial Law in America unless so called "Bank Bailout" approved. (Oct 3, 2008)
A Democratic Congressman has warned that a panic atmosphere is being intentionally created in order to get the financial bailout billed passed, further stating that several members of Congress were told before Monday's vote that martial law will be instigated in America if the legislation fails. Congressman Brad Sherman of California's 27th congressional district told the House in a speech yesterday evening that he personally knew of several Congressional representatives who have said they were threatened with the prospect of all out martial law should they vote in opposition to the $700 billion bailout. Sherman essentially intimated that powerful forces who want the bill passed have attempted to blackmail elected representatives. "The only way they can pass this bill is by creating and sustaining a panic atmosphere. That atmosphere is not justified." Sherman stated. "Many of us were told in private conversations that if we voted against this bill on Monday that the sky would fall, the market would drop two or three thousand points the first day, another couple of thousand the second day, and a few members were even told that there would be martial law in America if we voted no." The Congressman continued. "That's what I call fear mongering. Unjustified. Proven wrong. We've got a week, we've got two weeks to write a good bill. The only way to pass a bad bill is to keep the panic pressure on." Sherman urged. (Watch Rep. Sherman speaking in the House yesterday) On the Eve of a second Congressional vote on the legislation, these revelations show that freedom in America is under direct attack. The Congress should instigate an immediate investigation into these serious allegations to uncover which private individuals and administration officials, if any, are involved with directly threatening a military takeover of the workings of the U.S. government. CLIP from www.earthrainbownetwork.com

No $700+ Billion Corp Welfare Coup d'etat

2008-10-18T01:48:00.000-07:00

Howdy Friends, Family and Fellow Community Organizers!
I've been watching History unfold through the last three coup d'etats involving 1st, Reagan, who I spoke with in the Oval Office, via Iran deal with VP HW Bush on hostage release for weapons, etc; 2nd & 3rd GW Bush/Cheney. The 10 steps are in place to launch a corporate fascist war making Empire including Martial Law without Congressional input. One of the reasons to declare Martial Law is a Wall Street and/or USA financial stability disaster.
The Congress approved putting a shipping blockade on Iran and that is an Act of War. The US placed just such a blockade on Japan before they attacked Pearl Harbor.
When the Congressional leadership and Senators met to figure out how to save the deregulated monetary institutions that had lobbied long and hard to be able to follow Free Market, i.e. unbridled greed, Congressional leaders were threatened with Martial Law if they did not give up control of spending more than a trillion $ to the dictatorship of Bush/Cheney. To spend one Trillion dollars: you would have to spend/give away $100 million every day for 82 years.
See article posted on my blog on just such a threat of Martial Law if hundreds of billions are not given to the bankers who followed their greed. I wondered if just such a threat was why House Speaker Nancy Pelosi took impeachment off the table. Or did she just decide to break her oath to protect and defend the Constitution against enemies foreign and domestic because ? ………why? What consequences are there for those who took such an oath and violated it?
An Irish American fourth generation democrat, precinct committee woman and elected representative to the Washington State Democratic Convention, I quit the party when Congress “bailed out” the Savings and Loans junk bonds. I remember that the Bush brothers made off with several hundred million dollars out of an Indiana Savings and Loan.
I gathered petitions to get the Green Party legal and on the ballot in Santa Fe, New Mexico. As Community Organizers we were successful. In Germany the Greens have the power of coalition building in law making to make a difference because they hold the 5% needed for a majority. Republicans and Democrats elected with Corporations’ monies I call Corpracrats.
Check out what Robert Kennedy Jr. has written about the stolen election in Ohio in 2004.
I sent letter for your information and hope you will share and ask your friends, family and local media to communicate with Congress quickly to just say No! Also, since this seems to be a done deal ask why. Ask Congress to make sure it can’t happen again.
Rep. Rick Larsen’s staff said constituents were flooding their office with comments about the so called “bail out” that were running 50-50 between no and hell no. Rep. Barney Frank D-Massachusetts is Chair of the Banking Committee and he needs to hear from those folks in his district. Majority leadership is held by Senator Byrd in WV; and Rep Henry Reid D-NV and of course Speaker Pelosi from San Francisco, and President-elect Obama.
If you have a 401 account or stocks there is a clause hidden in the so called “bailout” funding package that puts your money at risk. The conglomerate financial firms are permitted to use your brokerage account funds for their own liquidity. (That is just one of the horrors that await a privatized Social Security.) Secretary Henry Paulson was on Nixon's team, started at Goldman Sacs with $10 million in debt and left it with $120 million in bad debts, wants to be above the law and write any check he wishes with no oversight. The bill - to - law is very short and you can download it.
Parts of the following letter was taken from Campaign for America's Future, www.OurFuture.org. The last paragraph is mine and I held back a bit.

With Love and a shared vision of restoring: Free Speech; the Bill of Rights; Habeas Corpus; the Constitution; International and Environmental Treaties honored; the National Guard comes home and Community Organizers across the land join and say yes to life, our common future and our children's seventh generation.
Respectfully submitted,
Theresa Marie Kothari Gandhi, tm@tmgandhi.com; www.tmgandhi.com

November 9, 2008 (Sent September 19th.) Use the information provided to write your own letter.
Honorable Congressman Rick Larsen: (Put in your own Senators and Representative’s names.)

No $700+ Billion blank check to the Bush administration for Wall Street.
Please, common sense must not be thrown out the window by rewarding those who paid lobbyists to get you to deregulate the financial institutions to allow greed to feed that is the cause of the problems.
1. No Taxation Without Representation. If our tax dollars are going to buy bad assets from irresponsible bankers, the American people must get something for it. Equity in bailed out firms. Strong regulation so this doesn't happen again. Stern public oversight. And, no golden parachutes for CEOs with our money. (Monies received from this financial coup d’etat saw CEOs paying themselves excessively large amounts and giving out stock holders bonuses. TmkG)
2. No Help for Wall Street Without Help for Main Street. To truly get our economy back on track, we must aid the victims, not just the predators. Freeze foreclosures. Renegotiate bad mortgages. Create jobs generating clean energy and modernizing infrastructure. Prevent cuts in local police, health, roads and school budgets. Extend unemployment insurance and food stamps.
3. No Insider Dealing. Wall Street can no longer be allowed to write their own laws. Legislators should refuse campaign money from Wall Street PACs or executives. We need a "time out" on contact between paid Wall Street lobbyists and elected officials while the crisis is addressed. Any congressional meetings with Wall Street officials must be immediately posted on a single website for complete transparency.
The next 24 hours will likely determine whether these common sense solutions prevail, or whether the Bush administration gets $700 billion more of our money to do with as it pleases.

“I demand that Congress ensure sensible checks and balances when dealing with hundreds of billions of our taxpayer dollars. The very wealthy CEOs should be the ones who have to pay for their folly not my great-great grandchildren. Wall St and McCain, i.e. GOP pushed for deregulation and are now surprised that greed fed wants not needs. Freedom and Free Trade have only been free for the profit takers and very detrimental for workers, children, women, elderly and the environment.
It would only be fair if all CEOs who made more than $900,000 a year be required to contribute 45 % of any amount of money or stock options paid above that amount to bail out what they wrecked with their pursuit of greed. Actually all Corporation Charters should be revoked until their books can be brought to balance by those who profited from wreaking the very financial institutions they are begging Uncle Sam to be responsible for. If they don’t then charge them with conspiracy to defraud the American Public. This action qualifies all of them as enemy combatants with this unconscionable attack on the financial stability of America.” TmkG
Ralph Nader suggested that a 1% tax on the sale of derivates (not taxed at present) could raise hundreds of billions of dollars and generate the money and wealth that greed has destroyed.

Please insist that your Representative, Senators and President-elect Obama defend the Constitution against enemies foreign and domestic.
Speaking for our common future and for a quality life for our seventh generation,
Theresa Marie Kothari Gandhi
P.O. Box 437, Clinton, WA 98236 tm@tmgandhi.com

If Only 1 Book out of 7,000 read I Could Take - This 1 is the 1.

2008-10-18T01:37:00.000-07:00

If I could take only one book on a long journey or even to travel the stars it would be "Celebrate Your Divinity." Orest has woven together through histories ancient and modern many wisdom/truth seekers knowledge from exploring inner space to know that the Presence of God is within each of us!
From inner space to outer space the search for knowledge by Nobel winning physicists unfolds as a page turning mystery in a search for the theory of everything. It is a page turner read all through the night!
How these two great searches complement each other and are woven together is at the core of the mystery that unfolds!
And during the whole exploration of The Nature of God and the Theory of Everything is a constant "1" Love in flowing ripples through the words into your heart touching the personal and Divine within your unique oneness. Just an awesome experience!!!!!!! of "1".
Thank you Orest and all who participated in this treasured book for the ages to be available at just the right time. I want to share Celebrate Your Divinity with as many people as possible. As a gift that each may enjoy the journey, know your God within and Celebrate Your Divinity!
What I learned starting the year the movie GANDHI won eleven Academe Awards and I married into the family of Mahatma Gandhi is on my web page, www.tmgandhi.com. For three decades I have explored Gandhi's moral and political thought for answers to challenges addressed in Orest's book. Please let us share probable solutions that we insure a quality future for our seventh generation and earth with healthy life support systems. The knowledge I gained from my life's journey is why I know that this book is very, very important to explore.

Theresa on Front Page local Newspaper, again.

2008-08-02T16:49:00.000-07:00

SOUTH WHIDBEY RECORD JEFF VANDERFORD, Sports, Port of S. Whidbey
Police say denture maker may have victimized hundreds

Theresa Marie Gandhi said she was the victim of a scam by Oak Harbor denturist Kevin Kowalski, and wants to get the word out to other South Enders. Jeff VanDerford / The Record
Theresa Marie Gandhi is mad enough to chew nails and spit rust.
If only she could, that is. Gandhi has been missing a good set of teeth since the arrest of an Oak Harbor denture maker who police say may have scammed hundreds of elderly Islanders.
“I’m not vain, so it doesn’t matter how I look. But not being able to eat is killing me. Literally,” the Clinton woman said. Gandhi is one of hundreds of alleged victims of Kevin Kowalski, a denture maker and the owner of the Oak Harbor Denture Center. Kowalski was arrested by Oak Harbor police in late June on suspicion of first-degree theft and Medicaid fraud.
He was released on bail pending further investigation by the police and state’s Attorney General’s Office. Kowalski’s operation was the only supplier of dentures in Island County; he ran a similar business in Mount Vernon. He is a “denturist,” someone who specializes in making and fitting dentures.
Oak Harbor Police Lt. John Dyer said the Medicaid fraud unit of the Attorney General’s Office has taken over the case, which is based on a series of complaints from people who paid Kowalski thousands of dollars for dentures they never received. Kowalski is being investigated for accepting full payments, or partial down payments, for dentures that he never made or that do not work or fit properly.
“We have at least 100 alleged victims in the north part of the county,” Dyer said. “The total runs to 266, according to the state.” Dyer said he didn’t know how many South Whidbey residents were affected. Multiple attempts by The Record to reach Kowalksi were unsuccessful.
Clients were usually referred to Kowalski by a friend, or a dentist sent them to Kowalski’s office, Dyer explained. Kowalski would ask clients to make a full or partial payment in cash — from $1,000 to $2,400 — for a set of dentures. Some of the dentures he made were faulty and couldn’t be used. Clients who have recently returned to the Oak Harbor Dental Clinic office have found that the premises have been vacated.
Gandhi has spent a lifetime fighting for good causes, noble work that paid poorly, she said, and now she lives on a small pension. “All I want is for this incompetent fool to get his just rewards: a jail sentence. And I want other folks on the South End to let the attorney general know if they’ve been burned like me,” she said. “He’s the only person on the island who makes dentures and takes Medicaid, so I had to see him,” Gandhi added. Due to a host of medical disabilities including bone loss, Gandhi was scheduled for oral surgery at the University of Washington on April 15 but needed dentures before acceptance.
“Kevin made a full bridge but it didn’t work,” she recalled. “A second one hurt because it threw my teeth out of alignment. I couldn’t chew anything and my throat began to swell, so I had to use my tongue to chew.”
Frustrated, she returned yet again, and this time her teeth were coated with a plastic resin substance that looked bad and felt worse.
“He said there was nothing wrong and I was dismissed,” Gandhi said. “I just stood at the door and told him I wasn’t leaving until the goop on the outside was gone,” she said.
“He told me dentures are supposed to hurt ,and that’s just not true.”
She filed a report with the Attorney General’s Office the next day.
“I don’t mess around,” she said. “This guy had a license and was reimbursed by the state.”
A prolific writer and poet, Gandhi is the great grandniece-in-law of Indian pacifist Mahatma Gandhi.
“I met my former husband Yogesh K. Gandhi when he came to the Academy Awards presentations in Los Angeles in 1983,” she remembered. “He’d been invited as a representative of the family by the director of the film ‘Gandhi,’ Sir Richard Attenborough. I was in L.A. as the result of my work with the Unity and Diversity Council.”
Meanwhile, Gandhi is moving on. She sought a second opinion and she’ll find out next week when she can get replacement dentures.
But it has been hard on her.
“Not to have proper nutrition is very dire, at my age and being a cancer survivor,” she said. “But the operative thought is, I am a survivor.”
Spokeswoman Bev Maddox of the state’s Medicaid fraud control unit in Olympia said she couldn’t comment on the case because it’s still under active investigation.
Dyer said anyone who thinks he or she is a victim in the case should call 360-679-9567 to make a report. People can also stop by the Oak Harbor Police Department at 860 SE Barrington Drive to make a report in person.
Jeff VanDerford can be reached at 221-5300 or jvanderford@southwhidbeyrecord.com.
South Whidbey Record Sports, Port of S. Whidbey Jeff VanDerford can be reached at jvanderford@southwhidbeyrecord.com or (360) 221-5300. Published: July 26, 2008 10:00 AM

Stop War Celebrate Peace!

2008-07-14T18:52:00.000-07:00

Protesting war can get you hurt these days
if done in public places where police can come.
With Big Media part of the war machine
nonviolent protesters are called terrorists these days.

Let us pause and find another way.
One thought that comes to mind
let’s protest in ball stadiums and gather there
those big stadiums with sound, uplinks and lights
are seldom used and are just right
to gather together to make a plan
with the local community there in the stands.

We’ll use teamwork and our own nonviolent security
harmony through nonviolent conflict
we’ll learn how to replace those who would war.
With poetry, dance and making music
broadcast to others across the land
so they can also learn how to lend a hand.

Into bull pens without cows
to speak of the need to speak out loud
to question and find the meanings of words
that have been twisted to mean the Empire’s fair.

We’ll look at the screen to see the score
just what it means to get cheap shoes, cheap gas and more
how it’s killing us and way too fast
called Free Trade but costly and unjust
it can be changed but it must be us.

We’ll huddle to assemble our crews
to implement change and understand the rules
that comes to be in a bush league world
where an eye for an eye breaks all rules.

Let’s come together to figure a new play
a way to do it because as you can see
the bush league season destroyed democracy.
A future with wars is the end of all games
as baseball would end in the US of A.

It could get worse so to save the game
that made America great with ballparks to play
let’s gather together to figure it out
learn some lessons of what it’s all about.

Then on through the season with permits and such
we can gather together without getting hurt
by police who make war with gas and clubs
on war protestors who gather to say
we have to stop war and find another way.

© Copyright Theresa Marie K. Gandhi February 23, 2008
www.tmgandhi.com www.tmgandhi.blogspot.com

We could start at our local school, farmers market or fair grounds. These could be recorded and posted online. Later as it took off we could look at getting major funding and hire a Big Sports Arena.

Cosmic Window to Stop War and Save our Republic

2008-01-21T03:57:00.000-08:00

Howdy Friends of Peace:
We have a rare window of opportunity to affect our future in a positive way. Take time to focus a positive alternative thought to war with Iran and the End of America. I send out this alert not to spread fear but rather to offer a probable solution using a critical window of time to make a difference.
I just received John Hogue's January 14th prognosticatings Filipino Monkey Business on a coming war with Iran distilled from his 30 years of studying and writing about Nostradamus. A short clip is quoted below. It was not on his web page www.hogueprophecy.com. Contact him at talktome@hogueprophecy.com.
A Cosmic window for a Great Experiment is from today January 20th through February 12, 2008. Please hold the thought that: “A Diplomatic solution for ending hostilities with Iran is found, now!” And: “Grassroots participation in the formulation of public policy restores our democratic republic!” Say these out loud three times. Send out thanks and gratitude that it is so. Do this as often as the thought or concern comes up. Doing so at noon and/or midnight together can make it stronger and more effective. Alternate the probable solution brush stroke thoughts and trust that how specifically will be filled in.
John Hogue:
“Back in my November 2007 Hogue Prophecy series, "When Calamitous War under Cancer Comes," I predicted the astrological importance of a transit of Mars through Gemini in January and February as the time a decision to go or not to go to war with Iran in 2008 will be made:
"On 31 December, Mars leaves Cancer and continues its backwards retreat into Gemini. Now the plans for war will become most intense and aggressively argued in secret meetings of cabinet members and Pentagon brass with the president and vice president. Look for the most spirited debates for or against going for war happening throughout January 2008. While the rest of the country's collective attention is on the primaries picking Republican and Democratic candidates for the coming presidential elections, “Inside the White House and Pentagon heated debates are occurring to bomb Iran or forget it, jump or scrap the Iranian air strike plan are going on with unprecedented intensity. This is because Mars will retreat backwards over its natal position in the birth chart of the Untied States, which is 21 degrees Gemini, from 20 January to 12 February 2008. This is the period where it is possible our prayers and meditations for peace might sway the hearts of those within halls of power who might put their trust one last time on a last minute diplomatic solution with Iran." When Calamitous War under Cancer Comes, Part 4, (30 November 2007)
It would seem that the last ditch diplomatic effort has already come. Its aim, to prepare US allies for the war. The rhetoric of Bush is as volatile as it was before the NIE (National Intelligence Estimate) concluded that Iran had stopped its nuclear weapons program back in 2003. Since then the president's arguments contradicting the NIE have become verbatim echoes of criticism released for public consumption by Israeli intelligence. I am afraid to say it is more than likely this president went to Israel to listen to agents of Mossad and the Israeli government pitch an Israeli option for a unilateral strike by the Israeli Air Force against Iran's main nuclear reactors and research installations at Busheir, Natanz, Arak and Esfahan. ……….
The chessboard is set. I sense agreements to open airspace over Iraq were discussed. The plan will be ready for final approval in early February. The attack could come as soon as early March or as late as June 2008. Unless a Filipino Monkey wrench can be thrown into the infernal works, Bush's war on Iran is still on.” John Hogue
I think an Art Bell “Great Experiment” could be a “Filipino Monkey wrench”. I’ve sent a request. Each of us can contribute to a positive future by holding a focused positive thought, sharing this call for shinning light on decisions being made about our future behind closed doors. Do what ever your imagination can create. I’m writing the Foreign Intelligence Committee Members of the Congress. When I wrote Donald Trump he took out a full page ad in the New York Times with my message plus his on making peace profitable. I’m composing another letter to him and others who could help with actions we can take to prevent a war, greater repression, lack of freedom and blowback at home. February 12th is here in a blink, take action sooner rather than later.
This alert and my reading Naomi Wolf’s “The End of America” showing how the 10 steps to put into place a fascist America with a dictator has inspired me to request your help in this window of time to turn around a dark vision of the future that it not happen. Let us work together to keep our precious democratic republic, honest elections and unite with a focused mind to stop Bush/Cheney’s march to war.
Speaking Truth to Power, Theresa Marie Gandhi
www.tmgandhi.com www.tmgandhi.blogspot.com tm@tmgandhi.com

Truth Rides Tall

2008-01-15T20:46:00.000-08:00

In a Western White House without any walls
it’s there in a moment, a new way to see
homeland governance not on TV
by the people, we the who
now the where and here’s what we do.
A kitchen cabinet at a round table
in the light, not behind a veil
no shadows, no secrets in our ship of state
open meetings with no hate
not based on fear or lack of need
but earth stewards in a world
where turtles are first
honored equally are frogs and slime
right through prime time
old and young each a part
of flying the whole, not apart
of being the whole, not apart
no shadows, no secrets, just an open wall
in a western white house, where truth rides tall.
In a western white house without any walls
we’ll gather together and figure a way
how to grow trees without shrub in the way
sustained for millennium
no war or greed, no fear or trepidation
to keep us in line
but righteous actions
as we walk our talk
and know within just where we’re at
on a western shore with an eastern grin
of knowing self with an inner grin.
Meeting in the open to reclaim our land
taken by shadows, by slight of hand
restored in beauty from peace within
lights up a window in each mind within
and so it goes, each one just knows
from knowing self and the inner grin
by honoring each and all living things
we honor our selves and what we bring
each to its own – inside a ring
of inner knowing, it’s a wholistic thing.
© Copyright Theresa Marie Gandhi 12-25-05

Island County Wetlands Regs Codify ESA Salmon Deaths

2008-01-11T08:28:00.000-08:00

The following poem was spoken as if the stuffed Chinook salmon I held was speaking to the Island County Commissioners January 7, 2008.

Wetland’s Salmon Mitigated Away

I’m a fish out of a wetland, my children will die
with no stream water to grow my fry.
Salmonid, my babies, can’t live downstream
if wetlands are bulldozed away.
Gone by way of development, stamped okay.
Practical you say, reasonable okay
to kill my kind you pave and slay.
Do you not know the cost to you under the ESA?
$15,000 - $25,000 for each salmonid without habitat
protected today by Federal law, the ESA
is the cost to progress, so the law says.
Progress paved over, the sources that fed
so many streams, that are now dead.
In the past Island County shorelines were fed
as uphill wetlands fed the streams
that are lost to memory – now a Dairy Queen.
So King Salmon, Chinook my kind
are an Endangered Species, because development holds sway
over stewardship of what was our birth ways.
These regulations you would codify
will kill us faster than you do today.
Your planning process has ignored the call
from our Governor to save Marine life for a future day
by saving existing wetlands, no matter the cost
or Puget Sound and all who live in it will die and be gone
no salmon, no herring, no whales, no way
if the source of our lives, your wetlands
are mitigated away.

© Copyright Theresa Marie Gandhi January 7, 2008

County says Wetlands Rules almost Complete

2008-01-11T08:24:00.000-08:00

Theresa Marie Gandhi uses a stuffed fish as a prop to raise concerns
Monday about the county’s new wetlands rules. (photo caption)
By Brian Kelly Jan 09 2008
Critics continue to take aim at new regulations
COUPEVILLE — Puffed up by a largely laudatory letter from the state, Island County commissioners said Monday they were nearly ready to adopt new rules covering development on properties with wetlands.
Approval of the new rules could come before the end of the month. Commissioners will hold one last meeting on Jan. 28 for a public hearing on four final amendments to the wetlands regulations.
At the commissioners’ meeting earlier this week, officials acknowledged that the complex rewrite of the regulations has not been universally popular.
“Obviously, this is a complex document,” said Val Hillers, chairwoman of the county’s planning commission.
“There were people who were not happy with various parts of it,” she said, but all agreed with the goal of the new rules: to maintain healthy, functioning ecosystems and protect critical areas.
Hillers estimated that the planning commission spent at least 1,000 hours reviewing the new rules.
Public input was extensive, she said, “and the ordinance, we have read, and reread, and reread and thought about. And made many changes in reflection to the concerns of the public and other people who have given input.”
“This ordinance has many compromises,” Hillers added. “We have really attempted to both protect critical areas and permitted uses of property. There are times when those goals are somewhat conflicting, and we have struggled really hard with that.”
Although a hearing was not held this week on the new rules, some residents used the public comment period during this week’s commissioners’ meeting to lambast the new regulations.
Members of the Whidbey Environmental Action Network and others have said the new rules don’t go far enough and give too much leeway to developers.
Holding a stuffed animal under her left arm, activist poet Theresa Marie Gandhi of Clinton warned of potential damages the county could face if the new rules do not protect salmon as the Endangered Species Act requires.
“I don’t know if you know fish; this is a Chinook. It has something to say to you all today,” she said with he fish’s head aimed at the board of commissioners.
It’s an endangered species, she added, and Island County shoreline is its habitat.
“I’m a fish out of a wetland. My children will die, with no stream water, to grow my fry.”
“To kill my kind, you pave its way,” she added.
“Do you not know the cost to you, under the ESA?”
The county began its rewrite of its rules covering “critical areas” - environmentally sensitive spots such as wetlands, streams and steep slopes - three years ago. Some asked the county to start over.
“I think it needs a major overhaul. There’s too many loopholes. It’s not going to work,” said Angie Homola of Oak Harbor.
County officials, however, said the new rules had been extensively reviewed and will mean greater protection for wetlands in Island County.
“It requires, and no other jurisdiction has done this, it requires that critical areas be avoided if they can be. That the impacts be reduced if they can’t be avoided, that impacts be restored if they can’t be avoided.” explained Keith Dearborn, a Seattle lawyer hired by the county to assist in the rule update. “And it requires mitigation compensation if there is intrusion into a critical area or a critical area buffer.”
Dearborn said the rules were not a one-size-fits-all approach. Properties with different types of wetlands, and different types of proposed land-use activities, will face different sets of regulations — including the size of “no go” areas such as buffers.
“The critical area ordinance is being tailored on a case-by-case basis to match up with the impact being generated by the proposal. That’s a lot more work for staff, but it will be vastly better in terms of protection,” Dearborn added.
Dearborn, who helped write the county’s first set of critical areas regulations in the 1980s, said a scientific review of the existing regulations shows that some are too stringent.
“Buffers established by the existing system are, 80 percent of the time, larger than the buffers that will be established under the new rules. For most property owners — five-acre lot, single-family home development — the buffers will be smaller in the new system,” he said.
“It’s clear the vast damage to wetlands was long before that ordinance was adopted. and in fact, since that ordinance was adopted, very little if any damage has been done to wetlands in Island County,” added County Commissioner Mac McDowell.
“I think the public, in my opinion, owes you a debt of gratitude almost - not almost - if their concern is preserving wetlands,” he told Dearborn.
Commissioner John Dean said county government has had a bad rap for being pro-development. The new rules reflect a balance, he said.
“I felt early on, when I read the ordinance, from a layman’s standpoint, that the county truly was trying to find some middle ground and some balance. I feel they have accomplished that,” Dean said.
“I think we hit some middle ground that is fair to both sides. We will protect the environment, and we will allow people to live here, we will not boot them off their property.”
Dean said some people believe county government is pro-growth. He didn’t agree.
“I don’t see that. People work overtime to reach that balance,” Dean added.
Commissioners also enthusiastically pointed to a Jan. 4 letter from the state that gave glowing praise for the new rules.
Though the letter mentioned one flaw in the rules - one that the county plans to amend after a public hearing later this month - it said the county’s work on the regulations could become a model for other governments to follow. The state Department of Community, Trade and Economic Development said the Island County effort was “among the highest quality work prepared so far” in using the standard of “best available science” in the preparation of rules to protect critical areas.
The letter said the regulations would be effective in protecting wetlands from the adverse impacts of development, and praised the county’s monitoring program and rural stewardship program.
County officials eagerly handed out copies of the letter at Monday’s meeting, and one reporter had four copies of the letter before the meeting concluded.
Four final amendments are expected before the rules are adopted on Jan. 28.
Most appear minor. Planning director Jeff Tate said one change would delay the implementation of the new regulations until July 1.
Ordinances typically go into effect 90 days after adoption.
“We’ve gone through the ordinance in great detail to look at all of the different things the ordinance now calls for,” Tate said.
The list is long, from creating forms, to training staff, to conducting a public outreach effort on the rules.
“There are a lot of things we need to mobilize,” Tate said.
According to the implementation plan for the wetlands rules, field testing and staff training will be held this month and continue through May.
In February, the county’s wetlands maps will be updated and a new critical areas planner will be hired.
The new rural stewardship plan will be edited in March, and land-use applications will be updated in April.
The outreach effort to contractors, real estate agents and consultants is also expected to kick off in April and continue through June.

Viewpoint - Why Wetlands Matter

2007-12-10T18:02:00.000-08:00

Dear Editor at South Whidbey Record,
Island County Planning and the Planning Commission met Dec 11th to consider comments submitted from the public by Nov 30th on draft Wetlands Regulations that is a part of a Critical Area Ordnance -CAO. Their goal is to submit for approval to the County Commissioners the final draft on December 18th. I hope that the goal is to incorporate the extensive, valid and professional comments received, into the final regulations that as written lack adequate protections for Wetlands.
The draft Comprehensive Plan says: “No regulation will make any parcel of land unusable.” This is representative of the draft regulations, to make Island County a developer’s dream come true, rather than protecting Critical Areas, Wetlands and Puget Sound. We need a CAO that is legal, understandable and protects these vital areas.
Why it should matter that this draft is not adopted as written is a very probable future where wells fail, the sole source aquifer is depleted, saving Puget Sound is defeated and life here becomes impossible. Because we have no rivers our water comes from rain recharging our ground water through Critical Areas. Wetlands and forests are necessary for this to happen. Oak Harbor doesn’t have enough ground water for its population so their water is piped in from the Skagit River. Central, South Whidbey and Camano Island will not have access to that resource if population development exceeds shrinking Critical Areas and Wetland systems capability to recharge our vital ground water systems.
We have paved over, filled in and eliminated a large percentage of the Wetlands that were here 200 years ago. No one knows what the tipping point passed which our ground water resources will fail to meet the growing human demands. The draft regulations are so complicated and the need to address and incorporate the comments submitted so important that the goal should be changed from adoption by year’s end to next year to allow time to write a CAO where there is no Net Loss. An advocate for preserving Wetlands should be a part of the process of formulating the regulations as that goal is not apparent in the draft or from the staff in the Planning Department. As written it favors those landowners (i.e. developers) who can pay a lawyer to get exactly all that they want.
Experience says that our Planning Department and Commissioners believe that development at any cost is beneficial. This is not so, as value of a wetland and infrastructure costs among other factors are not considered. It can take over a hundred years, if ever, to restore a wetland once it is destroyed or compromised.
The proposed regulations are similar to the County’s Plan to Preserve and Protect Salmon. The responsibility to achieve this is given to land owners. There is no system in place to inform the landowner of neither this great responsibility nor the budget to educate as to how specifically it can be achieved. The Salmon Plan is set up to fail as are the draft wetlands regulations.
A native of Washington State, as the wife of a relative of Mahatma Gandhi, I spent the 1980s meeting internationally with world leaders discussing Global Survival. I have been an advocate for healthy salmon habitat, pure drinking water and the long view in planning for decades. This was why I worked so hard for five years to get the use of herbicides on our roadsides eliminated in the County and reduced in the State. Major corporations are buying up water resources and systems worldwide because of the importance of this vital resource. With major portions of the U.S. in severe drought we are blessed with rain. In the past we too have seen drought years and need to preserve with adequate regulations our aquifer recharge systems. The draft regulations fall far short of this goal.
There are too many benefits from viable Wetlands to list them all in this letter. My comments on Wetlands and Salmon are posted on my blog on my web page, www.tmgandhi.com. Please communicate to the Planning Department Jefft@co.island.wa.us; for the Planning Commissioners via Paulab@co.island.wa.us and your County Commissioners Phil Bakke District1@co.island.wa.us; Mac McDowell District2@co.island.wa.us; and John Dean District3@co.island.wa.us –who will have final say; how very important it is to rewrite the Critical Areas Wetlands Regulations with the County’s resident citizen experts at the table working to incorporate their extensive comments submitted so that the CAO would protect and preserve our Critical Areas and Wetlands that are vital parts of our Commons.
Speaking Common Sense for Our Seventh Generation,
Theresa Marie K. Gandhi
Who am I?
I am a northwest native Activist Poet who speaks with a drumbeat at Rockhoppers in Clinton on occasion. The formulation of public policy effecting forests, salmon, Puget Sound and its Critical Areas has been a major focus in my life since 1975 when a co-written grant funded Town Hall Meetings throughout Washington State discussing “Should women have proportional power in public policy formulation”.
Web page with blog: www.tmgandhi.com turtle8@whidbey.net.
Theresa Marie Kothari Gandhi

Comments on Island County's Wetlands Regulations

2007-12-07T02:22:00.000-08:00

November 30, 2007
To: the Island County Planning Commission
P.O. Box 5000, Coupeville, WA 98239
Commissioners: Mike Jocelyn, Ray Gabelein, Jr., Val Hillers, Bill Massey,
Sheilah Crider, Alan Schell, Scott Yonkman, Wayne Havens and Deb Eidness.
From: Theresa Marie Gandhi, P.O. Box 437, Clinton, WA 98236
Regarding: Comments on Wetlands Update within the Island County Critical Areas Ordinance. (Numbers relate to Comprehensive Plan numbers.)

Who I am and why I am qualified to submit comments.
I returned to the Northwest and Whidbey Island in 2000 after a decade as the wife of a relative of Mahatma Gandhi. As the official Mrs. Gandhi in five countries I attended Global Survival Conferences in Oxford and Moscow, met the Gorbachevs, Mother Teresa, and the President in the Oval Office, and was on National television in India, walked across America in a Gandhi Salt March, developed and presented non-violent conflict resolution ways and means.
After moving here I learned that the sole source aquifer was being polluted with herbicides by the County and State. I used my public relations, research, writing abilities and organizational skills to bring together a coalition of organizations to work to stop the County from using herbicides for roadside vegetation control. Work the coalition did in this regard resulted in significant reductions state wide by the Washington State Department of Transportation. In each case I was commenting on protecting water quality and the storm water runoff that adversely impacts salmon and other marine life.
I submitted comments to the Island County Salmon Plan for WIRA 6 concluding it was a plan set up to fail as it left the landowner the one responsible for saving salmon with out telling them this or how specifically to do so.
I submitted comments to the Puget Sound Partnership and wrote about the importance of not polluting storm water runoff and of maintaining the viability of the wetlands and associated systems of water recharge on islands with sole source aquifers.
I submitted comments to the Department of Natural Resources draft plan to spray herbicides on over one million acres in twelve western states speaking to the same issues of water quality and the various species that depend upon healthy wetlands, streams, creeks, lakes and rivers.
In every instance there was enough turn around time from receiving the notice that comments would be accepted and the due date. It would have been appreciated if Island County Planning had allowed more time between releasing Island County’s Wetlands update draft and all the departments that various parts of the plan would be found. Enabling some of these plans to be filed within the “secret” Farm Plans does not uphold the principle of a Land Constitution.
As part of the Growth Management Act, the Critical Areas Ordnance and Wetlands regulations are a part of a Land Use Constitution and needs to be respected and created with the input of the population that will be impacted by the regulations. There are those of us who think that planning should be for protecting the Commons that support life here. More people would have contributed to the process by speaking on behalf of our islands’ system of trees, native plants and species that are dependent upon us. We are stewards of the systems that provide us all with drinking water from a rechargeable aquifer. Each part; trees, plants and especially wetlands are necessary to recharge our wells and contributes to the water that quality of life depends upon.
Given the way that the draft proposal is written it is obvious that the Planning Department can not be considered to be protecting the future viability of our sole source aquifer and all of the species, vegetation (plants, aquatic life and trees) and water systems that make up the whole web of life. It seems that Planning is all about development and enabling it at the cost of a sustainable, usable aquifer for our seventh generation.

The following are my comments on Island County’s wetlands draft Comprehensive Plan and Critical Areas Ordinance.
Goal. There is confusion in the comp plan and in the ordinance between Critical Areas and Wetlands. This needs to be resolved. The document needs to reflect the intention to protect non-human species, both on land and in Puget Sound. A goal of “no net loss” of wetland area is missing any intention to increase either wetland function or area.
4. The definitions in 17.02B.030 are so elastic as to be useless. There is no way to measure or predict what constitutes “Reasonable and Practical”.
5. Mitigation sequencing stops short of denying a permit in the event the proposal has immitigable impacts. Use of the term “Reasonable and Practical” negates the entire statement and does not say No in these cases.
6. Restoration after damage to wetland and /or buffers is allowed. Success in this regard is not “Reasonable nor Practical” but is problematic and usually fails. The result is a net loss of wetland, both in functions and in area. Restoration can take more than the length of a human life and the original parts making up the wetland are lost with its destruction.
9. a. One sentence says it all. “Under no circumstance will a permit be denied to protect a wetland or make the land unusable.” There may be a fee in lieu, but the project, however damaging, will go forward. The position of Island County that development for human uses will always take precedence over maintenance of a functional ecosystem – which in fact supports continued human life.
9. b. Needed public facilities and services are not defined but this provision encourages the purchase of land containing wetland because such lands will cost less, in the knowledge that “needed public facilities” will trump the need to protect the wetland. This could include cell towers and at its worst, as in North and South Carolina, commercial hog farms with hundreds of thousands of hogs and their waste.
9. c. This ordinance guarantees that there will be a net loss of wetlands.
9. e. What is this supposed to mean?
10. When development plans are given precedence over all else, there will be no fairness or equitability for downstream/downhill landowners. (An example is the current cement plant expansion proposal in Greenbank that will impact all down hill with toxic to life run off.) The ordinance as written is so flexible that there is no predictability.

Wetlands Overlay – Goal: Missing from the goal is “to prevent a net loss in area of wetlands”. Then three policies have been stricken: 1) “avoid land development that causes loss of wetland functions”; 2) “mitigation projects that add to existing wetlands or increase function and values of degraded wetlands are preferred over efforts to create wetlands from no-wetland are preferred over efforts to create wetland from non-wetland areas and should remain subject to wetland area regulations.” 3) “prohibit alteration of land that results in degradation of wetlands (with exception)…” Why were these removed and no policies that are comparable or speak to these issues replaced? The striking of these three items demonstrates a shift in intention. The original wetlands ordinance had a focus on protecting wetlands. The current ordinance shifts the focus to enabling development in instances where wetlands might limit it. This shift leads to guaranteed adverse impacts on individual wetland and on the entire functional ecosystem of Island County.
1) These three policies are supplanted by non-regulatory protections with out a regulatory framework that would enable them to work.
2) Less protection for existing wetlands in favor of squeezing in one or two more houses in the development comes about when buffer averaging is used. Never mentioned is the “other technique” of leaving the wetland alone. It must be acknowledged that there are some areas that can not be developed without destroying them. Without this as a part of the ordinance we will continue to lose wetland areas and functions.

Policy C. In 17.02B.030 “Reasonable and Practical”, are defined in such a flexible way as to make it mean what ever one wants it to and thus makes the entire statement meaningless.
Policy E. is inconsistent with Critical Area goal 9.a. that says that regulation to protect critical areas should not make any existing parcel or lot unusable. Given this document was written by a developer for developers 9.a. will take precedence and the majority of the time a permit to do major damage to a wetland will be issued.
F. Because all enforcement is complaint driven and since the public cannot know the specific buffer assigned to a particular portion of an individual parcel because the ordinance is so convoluted it will be impossible to determine if a violation has occurred. This will result in ‘valid’ complaints greatly diminishing. This will allow new and continuing damage to occur to wetlands without any enforcement.

Since Senator Haugen pushed through a law making all Farm Management Plans secret documents no part of a Land Use Constitution should be allowed to be hidden within this system. As wetlands naturally occur on farm lands how will the County and Public have access to these plans to know if they are following the rules and regulations of the Critical Areas Ordinance -CAO, wetlands regulations and Growth Management Plan -GMP? Either remove reliance on these plans or demonstrate that the county will have access to them for review and that the public will have access to review the county’s determination.
Growing Season in a coastal area is the entire year and the definition needs to be corrected to reflect this.
(Comments on “Highly Erodible Soils” through Wetland Type are left out for lack of time.)
Wetland Functions needs to be rewritten to include the long list of beneficial functions performed by wetland in Island County.
(Comments from here through the end are not included as it is 3:28 AM and I want to submit this before your office opens December 3, 2007.)

My summary:
The draft proposed Wetlands Regulations within the Critical Areas Ordinance is obtuse, so long, complicated, involved, unreadable, not understandable and unworkable as to guarantee the destruction of the majority of wetland and thus Critical Areas. It is a developers plan written by a developer who had veto power over best available science as related to me by Dr. Adamus. The placement of Keith Dearborn as having the final say on what “best available science” would be allowed has contributed to the creation of proposed wetland regulations that favors development over the preservation of islands wide system critical to recharging our sole source aquifer.
If the draft ordinance and regulations are adopted as proposed it would be REASONABLE and PRACTABLE to assume that Island County’s sole source aquifer will be so depleted in the near future as to make drinking water unavailable and all property worthless.
The proposed wetland regulations are not REASONABLE or PRACTABLE. They are convoluted, unreadable (referencing 5 volumes of Hitchcock that requires a one day workshop to learn how to use). The regulations go in circles: if A then B, if B then A making all within the loop as null and void. This works for developers whose profit will be large enough to pay a lawyer to use all the huge number of built in loop holes.
The proposed regulations do not protect wetlands because they are so complicated it is impossible to understand or administer.
They rely on landowners (i.e. developers) to determine the size, shape and type of their own wetlands and buffers. The forty-five buffer possibilities make it too complicated and obtuse to be useful except for developers with lawyers. I can not say this enough as it is so obvious and contrary to the intent of having regulations in the first place.
Within the draft regulations is a statement that NO MATTER HOW HORRENDOUS “NO DEVELOPMENT PROPOSAL WILL EVER BE DENIED TO PROTECT WETLANDS!”
Then hidden within is the worst of the lot in the Conservation District Secret Farm Plans. Taking advantage of this “Secret” place the County and Public cannot know what is being permitted to degrade wetlands that are almost always found on farm lands.
Many wetlands are being defined out of existence.
There are many scientific definitions that are incorrect.
The “reasonable use” exceptions passed in response to the U.S. Supreme Court ruling concerning “the taking of all economic use” of a property has been redefined completely so that the intent of the ruling has evaporated into thin air. Thus you can build whatever you want and deal with the wetlands after all the damage has been done.
The most unreasonable for the health of the wetland and the most practicable for the Developer is that they can just buy their way out of having to adhere to the CAO and Wetland’s Regulations.

Mosaic wetland provisions are flawed and unworkable. There are several problems with the interpretation and implementation of the provision and the numerical standards used. What is meant by the “average” distance “apart” and “upland area between the wetlands” and how they are to be measured is obscure. The definition and its practical application need to be clarified and the standard revised to include greater separation between individual wetlands in the mosaic.

Rural Stewardship Plans (RSAs) are voluntary for retention of forest vegetation so are their durability over time is questionable. Without forest cover over major portions of the landscape, habitat generally and wetland habitat in particular will be degraded from fragmentation.
Best available science say deforestation is causal in watershed wetland habitat, and hydrological degradation.
The Island County Planning Department’s (i.e. Dearborn’s) proposal does not include effective mechanisms to prevent the above mentioned impacts. This is predictable given the minimum expected development in the next twenty years.
This means that the sole source aquifer we all depend upon for drinking water will dry up and living in Island County will end. The whole web of life staying healthy is necessary to support humans living here.
We have unique features not found else where in the Pacific Northwest including but not limited to: a coastal ancient forest, huge old growth red cedars, endangered lupine, rare western wetland plants and glacial kettles.
Creating wetland regulations that protect the systems that recharge our sole source aquifer make the islands livable. Implementing the proposed draft regulations on wetlands will facilitate the destruction of the interwoven systems that recharge the source of our drinking water. Failure to protect these systems threatens the viability of our sole source aquifer that makes life possible here. We live on islands that are different than the mainland and need more care than exists in the proposed regulations to protect our way of life from developers that would make their money, destroy our way of life and leave for other areas to profit from.
There is a comprehensive wetland plan written by professionals, submitted to the county and then filed away because it failed to provide profits above preservation. It exists and should be pulled out of the bottom drawer and used. The entire web of life would be well served if this discarded plan were brought out and considered as a viable alternative to the developers’ proposal currently under consideration. Please at the very least ask to see what the Planning Department has hidden.
Your approval of the proposed regulations will be your vote for the death of Island County as a desirable place to live. Please allow more time for public input.

Growth Management Act in Island County

2007-02-19T15:09:00.000-08:00

WEAN – Growth Management Act - Critical Areas and Farm Plans History
In 1990 the Legislature passed the Growth Management Act (Chapter 36.70A RCW) because they found that uncoordinated and unplanned growth posed a threat to the environment, sustainable economic development, and the quality of life in Washington. The GMA was built on Washington's strong traditions of local government control and regional diversity. It established state goals, set deadlines for compliance, offered direction on how to prepare local comprehensive plans and regulations and set forth requirements for early and continuous public participation. The comprehensive plan called for by the law would become the County’s version of a Land Use Constitution.
In 1992 the Hearing Boards were established and in 1993 people were appointed to hear and determine allegations of non-compliance with the GMA. The shared mission of the three Growth Management Hearings Boards is to help local governments manage growth and to serve the citizens of the State of Washington. They do so by making informed decisions on appeals arising from the implementation or non-implementation of the Growth Management Act in a clear, consistent, timely and impartial manner that recognizes the diversity of the three board jurisdictional regions.
Whidbey Environmental Action Network – WEAN, in reading the law knew from experience that Island County was out of compliance with the GMA law. Experience had shown that the County Commissioners had no intention of stopping uncoordinated and unplanned growth that posed a threat to our common resources so necessary for quality of life that so many of us treasure. Resources like clean water in our wells, healthy wetlands that maintain our aquifers, rare and endangered native species of plants and fish and sustainable habitats for these species.
WEAN worked through the decade of the 1990's to get a GMA compliant comprehensive plan for Island County. The County Commissioners’ response was to hire a former Executive Director of Building Contractors of Washington State for $60,000 in 1997 to write a Land Developer’s version of a comprehensive plan. The amount paid by County taxpayers grew to $1.5 million dollars paid to Attorney Keith Dearborn. Dearborn used a 1984 Wetland Ordinance in 1998. As long as this ordinance remained unchanged he could claim it was grandfathered because if any changes were made it would have to meet the new Best Available Science standard. The fifteen now twenty year old plan was used by the County to address the Critical Areas requirement of the GMA.
The County attempted to meet the GMA law by adopting Agricultural Best Management Practices –AG-BMP. In 1998 WEAN stipulated that the County could meet their Critical Area protection obligations in using the AG-BMP in the Commercial AG and Rural AG zones. WEAN went to the Hearings Board when the County claimed that the AG-BMP was good enough to apply in all zones. The Hearings Board upheld the WEAN claim that AG-BMP plan did not replace a Critical Areas Plan.
Then the Commissioners went Judge shopping and found a winning one in Whatcom County that did not bother to read the record, gave no findings of fact and ruled on a topic not even a part of the court case. This judge’s rulings were overturned when WEAN took the County before the Court of Appeals. A Court panel of three judges upheld legal arguments submitted by WEAN, the County asked for reconsideration and the Court of Appeals did reconsider and slammed the County even harder. The County then took the Court of Appeals proceedings to the Supreme Court and was refused a hearing of the case, making the Court of Appeals action finding Island County out of compliance with the law, the last legal recourse.
The Farms Plans came into contention when the County Commissioners claimed that the very existence of a Farm Plan demonstrated that Critical Areas were being protected on that property. WEAN asked how they could know this, since the Commissioners had never seen a Farm Plan. WEAN asked to see the Farm Plans, not to torture farmers but to verify the statements of the County Commissioners and to determine if Farm Plans really do protect Critical Areas as required by law under the GMA.
The County Commissions having established their commitment to unregulated development over fifteen years, having exhausted all legal recourse and having spent $2 million + in fighting the legal implementation of the Growth Management Act rather than working to create Island County’s version of a Land Use Constitution there was only one thing to do, get even.
The County Commissioners started a divide to conquer and slander campaign against WEAN. They sent out press releases and questionnaires obviously written in the heat of angst, slandering WEAN and telling farmers that WEAN was out to put them out of business. Mike Shelton bragged he knew where “WEAN is Commie” t-shirts could be bought. Public statements and quotes given to the press and printed as fact made WEAN out to be the bad guy.
WEAN is dedicated to preservation and restoration of native biological diversity of Whidbey Island and the Pacific Northwest. The County’s slander that WEAN is out to put farmers out of business is untrue. Founding members are also founding members of Whidbey Island’s Tilth and 2nd generation Whidbey Island farmers. WEAN would never have requested the Farm Plans if the County had not used the AG-BMP to avoid coming into compliance with the Growth Management Act. This was just another obstruction thrown up to keep Island County a development profiteers’ haven.
Why after the Growth Management Act Hearings Board, the Court of Appeals and the Supreme Court ruled that Island County is out of compliance with the law and subject to the state withholding taxes have the County Commissioners not done as court ordered? If the County would not have spent the $1.5 million + fighting the GMA but instead spent the money and time implementing the Growth Management Act they could have saved the taxpayers a lot of money and contributed to our quality of life instead of the opposite.
For our seventh generation,
Theresa Marie Gandhi

Crossing the Rubicon - a book review

2007-02-19T15:05:00.000-08:00

Crossing the Rubicon: The decline of the American Empire at the End of the Age of Oil is a must read that gets to the innermost core of the 9/11 attacks. Michael Ruppert spent two and a half years researching and writing this book. Key points are: Vice President Richard Cheney is the prime suspect in the mass murders of 9/11, on the day of the attacks he was running a completely separate Command, Control and Communications system which was superseding any orders being issued by the FAA, the Pentagon, or the White House Situation Room. May 2001, by presidential order, Richard Cheney was put in direct command and control of all war game, field exercise training and scheduling through several agencies, especially FEMA. It also shows that the Israeli and British governments acted as partners with the highest levels of the American government to help in the preparation and, very possibly, the actual execution of the attacks.” Catherine Austin Fitts, Assistant Secretary of HUD under Bush-1 wrote the forward that tells about $500 billions in fraud at US Department of Housing and Urban Development (“HUD”) used to buy elections, banks and control of multiple media outlets.
With 39 pages of endnotes it is a great factual detective story. Truth needs to be told about the end of oil that so many more will not have to die and that we may make wise decisions for our future.
A truth seeker, Theresa Marie Gandhi
October 2004 letter to the editor

MultiSpecies Salmon Recovery Plan Comments

2006-12-11T00:17:00.000-08:00

Comments on Puget Sound Salmon Plan -March 16, 2006
To: Elizabeth Babcock, National Marine Fisheries Service, Salmon Recovery Division
7600 Sandpoint Way NE, Seattle, WA 98115 PugetSoundPlan.nwr@noaa.gov

To: Elizabeth Babcock, Salmon Recovery Planners and Those interested in Saving Salmon:
As a resident of Island County, who has spent the past five years educating, organizing and fighting cooperatively with several organizations to end pollution of wetlands, streams and near shore habitats by stopping the application of herbicides by Island County Public Works and Washington State Department of Transportation (WSDOT) for roadside vegetation control, have knowledge that could contribute to a successful Salmon Recovery Plan.
I am thankful to the individuals, Tribes, local governments and organizations that have put an immense amount of energy, time and thought into the current draft documents. Even though I contribute to and read regularly the South Whidbey Record and the Seattle P.I., last month was the first that I had heard about the existence of the Salmon Recovery Plan.
There are statements made in the WIRA 6 draft that are a stretch of the truth. Island County’s Critical Areas Ordinance adopted in 1998 has been rejected by the Growth Management Hearings Board, The Court of Appeals and the State Supreme Court by upholding the Court of Appeals ruling. Island County has yet to take corrective measures to come into compliance with the GMA. The Island County Commissioners paid former Executive Director of Building Contractors, attorney Keith Dearborn $1.5 million to write a developer friendly GMA and to fight having to implement a compliant GMA and Critical Areas Ordinance. They continue to obstruct obeying the law and put up any obstacles they can think up rather than acting to enable actual protection of wetlands and near shore habitats. Contrary to Court mandates a GMA compliant Land Use Constitution has yet to be completed and implemented in Island County. With approximately 138 wetlands, multiple streams and unmapped sensitive areas on five islands this is very important and has a direct bearing on a Salmon Recovery Plan having any hope of success.
A primary requirement for a successful Salmon Recovery Plan in Island County is a willing landowner. (WIRA6, C. Commitments and Conditions Needed for Salmon Recovery, page 65 under Board of Island County Commissioners.) I don’t have much hope for success. Nor do others with a history of twenty-five years of environmental activism that call this draft Plan a “do nothing plan”. Multiple times WRIA 6 Multi-Species Salmon Recovery Plan refers to encouraging landowners to be responsible for the success of this plan but specifically how this is to be accomplished, funded or who specifically will be responsible to educate the landowner and community is left out. I did not see a commitment by the County Commissioners to any action other that what others could do and what a willing landowner would provide but not how they would specifically become an educated willing landowner acting responsibly to save salmon.
Two current examples of development trumping environmental stewardship occurred at the March 13th meeting of the County Commissioners. A change of designation of 70 acres of pristine forest and wetlands on South Whidbey from Designated Forest to Timber Land was made it so that it could be subdivided into ten acre parcels for timber harvest, for sale and home development. Future landowners would have to decide to save the wetlands. Designations of two other tracks on Camano Island were also approved. One on Camano Island has a wetland that shows “the presence of a regulated (fish) bearing stream and associated wetland”. This puts the property under the jurisdiction of the Forest Management Plan with no mention of any of these areas being subject to a Critical Area Ordinance. When no one, who had read the legal notices in the Whidbey News Times, objected, the request for a change of designation was Okayed. Too many times to count, a single organization has been present, to give the only oversight and objection to development plans that would have been otherwise approved.
The second example is that currently a number of streams going from wetlands to Puget Sound near shore habitats on Camano Island have 75 times the allowable fecal coliform levels as per EPA regulations. Directly west of Camano Island, Holmes Harbor is currently closed to shell fish harvest because of high fecal coliform levels. The source of pollution has yet to be identified. This occurs multiple times a year adjacent to Freeland and Nichols Brothers Boat Builders.
In the decade of the 1990s approximately 10,000 gallons of herbicides/pesticides were applied to Island County by multiple government agencies, business and private landowners. April 2, 2001 I presented 175 pages of scientific studies documenting links to herbicides/pesticides (pesticides is often used interchangeably with herbicides as an identifier) to a decrease in reproductively in salmon and multiple species; numerous serious illnesses in children; and adults as official comments to Public Works roadside vegetation control program. The peer reviewed studies proving salmon habitat of the Endangered Chinook were at risk was not enough for the County Commissioners to make a change to stop the harmful practice. A year of educating and organizing the population to communicate to the Commissioners to stop using herbicides for roadside vegetation control resulted in a unanimous resolution being passed to stop their use April 1, 2002. Public Works continues integrated pest management (IMP) along County roads. (WIRA 6, page 65, C. Commitments and Conditions Needed for Salmon Recovery, Public Works)
I did not find within Volume 1 of the overall draft Puget Sound Salmon Recovery Plan or in the WRIA 6 (Whidbey and Camano Islands) any mention or intent to decrease use of endocrine disruptors chemicals, i.e., organophosphates. Island County is one of only six Counties adjacent to Puget Sound and Hood Canal that does not apply herbicides to roadsides for vegetation control. Although WSDOT claims an 40% reduction in herbicide use on state routes in WIRA 6, WSDOT applies thousands of pounds of various organophosphates on state routes through out the Puget Sound basin and adjacent to Hood Canal. Despite multiple educational conversations and communications WSDOT continues to spray herbicides around guardrails which often are uphill from wetlands, streams and Puget Sound without testing for the presence of adverse effects of the chemicals in those water resources.
WSDOT’s Risk Assessment, which was done after my 175 page submission of scientific peer reviewed studies, 2,000 signatures on petitions to stop spray roadsides for vegetation control and Island County’s Resolution to not spray, WSDOT did not address the studies, the endocrine disruption aspects of herbicides used, nor include in the Risk Assessment those studies and Washington Toxics Coalition’s 17 pages of comments. WSDOT found WA Toxics comments “too complete and comprehensive” to be included in the final Risk Assessment. To show no or little risk WSDOT used only Chemical Corporations data and the often “falsified studies” (reference PBS’s Trade Secrets March 26, 2001 broadcast documenting such) submitted to the EPA for registration® of formulations. None of the “inert” adjuvant, surfactants and “Trade Secret” ingredients were studied, nor were the complete formulations studied but only the “Active Ingredients” which often make up a small percentage of the herbicide formulation. Possible increased toxicity of combinations of formulations often used together have not been tested. Some of the inerts: diesel, soaps and chemicals like POEA (polyethoxylaled tallowamine) stay in the environment longer and cause more measurable harm than the organophosphates, such as glyphosate used in RoundUp® and Rodeo®, its water weed counterpart. A Federal Court ruled that Chemical Corporations hiding ingredients under “Trade Secrets” was no longer a valid reason and the data had to be made available. Enforcement of this ruling is needed, but not done.
Organophosphates, such as glyphosate the “Active Ingredient”, found in Rodeo®, RoundUp®, Weed-B-Gone® and others feminize males by affecting the hormones in multiple species. This decreases sperm counts, limits achieving sexual, reproductive maturity and thus produces a decrease in species, especially salmon. Rodeo® application is contraindicated for salmon recovery or survival as it pollutes the near shore habitats critical for food and is an organophosphate. Endocrine disrupting toxic chemicals applied in the environment uptake in the food chain, thus effecting the reproduction of herring, etc. and concentrates in foraging young salmonid doing the damage of limiting sexual maturity and reproduction from a very young age, thus causing extreme harm to the species and what eats salmon, etc.
Spartina removal by hand was first organized by Lori Oneal with the Scatchet Head community at minus summer tides and resulted in the majority of the invasive tideland weed being eliminated in that area. Island County, with the Department of Agriculture, will be applying twenty gallons of Rodeo® for Spartina control into the near shore critical habitats of WIRA 6 this year. No chemical application of Rodeo® has had as great a success as the hand removal. (Reference: Washington Toxics Coalition booklet, Tales of Toxicity: A Grassroots approach to fighting Toxic Pollution, by Kari Mosden, Kate Nelson and Hayden Bass 2005, is available at www.watoxics.org. and Sno-Isle Libraries.
Denmark has banned RoundUp® from use in its country because of its migration into the drinking water contrary to claims by the manufacture. New York State has declared the advertisements of RoundUp® false and misleading and has banned them from the state.
Recommendations I would make are:
1) Make the success of the Salmon Recovery Plan in WIRA 6 dependent on more than a “willing landowner” that at present is uneducated to this fact. Include within tax statements educational materials as to specifically what the landowner can do to support salmon recovery and protection. Offer that upon signing up to be an active educated salmon recovery landowner by pledging to follow some simple guidelines; they choose to have a tenth of a percent of their taxes to go to salmon protection; and they would receive a yard sign acknowledging that a “Salmon Friendly” landowner lives here.
2) Include in the educational material that yard care products registered by the EPA stating that the buyer is libel for any damage are likely to damage salmon. Ask that they pledge to not use: RoundUp®, Weed-B-Gone®, 2,4,D and other weed and turf builders that offer to kill weeds, pests, insects, moss, etc. as poison does not stay where it is put. Include information on alternative methods of pest, weed and moss control and suggest that a less than perfect lawn is a sign of a good salmon steward. Promote native plant yards as smarter than green lawns.
3) With the weight of your organization and the validity of the scientific reports on the harm done to salmon (request scientific studies of what I and others such as Washington Toxics have) that the Washington Department of Agriculture, Department of Ecology and Washington Department of Transportation stop using herbicides/pesticides for weed control. Include this information in the final Puget Sound Salmon Recovery Plan. I have already sent such a letter to the Governor regarding the Puget Sound Partnership program goals being unachievable as long as toxic chemicals continue to be used by the state uphill of and in Puget Sound and Hood Canal.
4) An immediate stop to the use of Rodeo® being used in critical near shore waters needs to be put into place. Contact: Department of Agriculture, Spartina Program, P.O. Box 42560, Olympia, WA 98504 and Island County Noxious Weed Control Board, Susan Horton, Program Coordinator, P.O. Box 5000, Coupeville, WA 98239-5000. Monies used to purchase the 20 gallons of Rodeo® for attempted Spartina control, would be better used organizing hand removal at summer minus tides. Year after year toxic chemicals are the primary tool used and still the problem is there as are the effects of the toxic chemicals on salmon recovery.

Respectfully submitted, Theresa Marie Gandhi

Corporatocracy - What we can do!

2006-12-07T17:46:00.000-08:00

Corporatocracy - What we can do!
Cut back on oil consumption, don’t go shopping, read a book instead exercise, meditate and downsize home, wardrobe, car, office and most everything else.
Protest against “free” trade agreements and against companies that exploit desperate people in sweatshops or that pillage the environment.
Nothing is inherently wrong with the people who work for banks, corporations and overnments, our problems are not the result of malicious institutions, rather, from fallacious concepts about economic development.
At fault are our perceptions about how they function, interact and of the role the managers play in that process.
Worldwide communications and distribution networks could be used to bring about positive and compassionate changes.
Imagine if clothing and food companies became symbols of companies whose primary goals were to clothe and feed the world’s poor in environmentally beneficial ways.
We need a revolution in our approach to education to empower ourselves and our children to think, to question and to dare to act.
You can set an example. Be a teacher and a student and inspire everyone around you through your example.
Take specific actions to impact the institutions in your life.
Speak out whenever any forum presents itself: write letters, e-mails and phone in questions, concerns and vote for enlightened school boards, county commissions, local ordinances and public representatives.
Shop consciously and get personally involved.
The world is as you dream it and we can exchange an old nightmare of polluting industries, clogged highways and overcrowded cities for a new dream based on Earth-honoring and socially responsible principles of sustainability and equality.
It is within our power to transform ourselves, to change the paradigm.
Tools for conflict resolution could render wars obsolete.
Explore the possibilities offered here by John Perkins by offering study groups about Confessions of an Economic Hit Man at the library, book store or hold town hall forums.
(Find a guideline on http://www.johnperkins.org/)
We must commit ourselves absolutely and unequivocally to shaking ourselves and everyone around us awake.
Ask yourself, what will I do to make sure our children and all children everywhere, are able to fulfill the dream of our Founding Fathers and Mothers the dream of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness?
What changes will I commit to making in my attitudes and perceptions?
These are essential questions of our time.
It is now for each and every one of us to step up to the battle line, to ask the important questions, to search our souls for our own answers and to take action.

From Confessions of an Economic Hit Man by John Perkins, http://www.johnperkins.org/. http://www.dreamchange.org/ works transforming global consciousness.
Book donated to Island County libraries by Tom Voorhees.
“Corporatocracy: What we can do” was assembled from the epilogue by Theresa Marie Gandhi.

Thinking Globally, Regionally and Acting Locally!

2006-12-07T17:16:00.000-08:00

December 7, 2006
Editor: South Whidbey Record and Whidbey News Times
Island County’s Taxes to be Wasted Again!
There should be some formula you could figure out from Island County Commissioners not doing due diligence to protect Wetlands, Salmon Streams and Critical Areas from past experience that would allow us taxpayers to figure out how much the newest avoidance action is going to cost. The first time the County hired Keith Dearborn, former head of the Developers Association, to write the Growth Management Act and Critical Areas Ordnance for a few hundred thousand dollars it cost the County over $2,000,000.00 – two million to defend his inability to follow the law up through several courts to the Court of Appeals that found the County in the wrong.
ISLAND COUNTY BOARD OF COUNTY COMMISSIONERS December 11, 2006. 9:30 a.m. Regular Meeting Board of County Commissioners.
Public Comment period per person is ten minuets. Please attend, e-mail and phone your disapproval of the Commissioners repeating a bad mistake again.
….c) Agreement with Dearborn & Moss PLLC for legal and consultingservices for GMA Critical Areas policies and regulations including wetlandsand fish and wildlife habitat conservation. 2-year contract beginningJanuary 1, 2007. Contract amount: $297,380.00 (RM-PLAN-06-133)
3 years ago WEAN submitted proposed changes to the Island County Critical Areas Ordinance, along with an $800.00 fee. The Commissioners, the Planning Commission, and Planning staff took our money but ignored our proposal.
Two years ago we came back and asked what they had to show for WEAN’s money. They acknowledged error and invited us to resubmit our proposal. We did that.
Last year WEAN asked what they had to show for their money and they told us they were busy, they were working on it, we should be patient.
This summer WEAN sent a certified letter to planning director Phil Bakke asking what the county had done with our proposed revisions. He did not give us the courtesy of a reply.
Now, as you can see by the agenda item above, our patience is being rewarded by a new $300k contract with Keith Dearborn. We do wonder why the county would hire an anti-GMA attorney to re-write the Critical Areas ordinance, and why, 3 years after submitting a workable proposal and the $800.00 fee, WEAN still hasn't heard when they intend to address it.
This is how the Commissioners squander your tax dollars. Please attend by person or communications. To see the history of how a few thousand dollars to Dearborn added up to over $2 million see my blog where the history is it posted.
Looking for fiduciary responsibility, tmgandhi

HerStory of Critical Areas GMA and
Whidbey Enviornmental Action Network.
In 1990 the GMA-Growth Management Act (Chapter 36.70A RCW) became law because unplanned growth posed a threat to the environment, sustainable economic development, and the quality of life in Washington. GMA established state goals, offered direction on how to prepare local comprehensive plans and regulations and set forth requirements for early and continuous public participation so that GMA could become a Land Use Constitution unique to local areas.
In 1992 the Hearing Boards were established to make informed decisions on appeals arising from the implementation or non-implementation of the Growth Management Act in a clear, consistent, timely and impartial manner that recognizes the diversity of local regions.
Whidbey Environmental Action Network – WEAN, in reading the law knew from experience that Island County was out of compliance with the GMA law. Experience had shown that the County Commissioners had no intention of stopping uncoordinated and unplanned growth that posed a threat to our common resources so necessary for quality of life. Resources like clean water in our wells, healthy wetlands that maintain our aquifers, rare and endangered native species of plants, fish and sustainable habitats for these species.
WEAN worked through the decade of the 1990's to get a GMA compliant comprehensive plan for Island County. The County Commissioners’ response was to hire a former Executive Director of Building Contractors of Washington State for $60,000 in 1997 to write a Land Developer’s version of a comprehensive plan. The amount paid by County taxpayers grew to $1.5 million dollars paid to Attorney Keith Dearborn. Dearborn used a 1984 Wetland Ordinance because if any changes were made it would have to meet the new Best Available Science standard. In 1998 WEAN stipulated that the County could meet their Critical Area protection obligations in using the AG-BMP in the Commercial AG and Rural AG zones. WEAN went to the Hearings Board when the County claimed that the AG-BMP was good enough to apply in all zones. The Hearings Board upheld WEAN’s claim that AG-BMP plan did not replace a Critical Areas Plan.
Then the Commissioners found a sympathetic Judge in Whatcom County that did not bother to read the record, gave no findings of fact and ruled on a topic not even a part of the court case. This judge’s rulings were overturned by the Court of Appeals. The three judges upheld legal arguments submitted by WEAN. The County then took the Court of Appeals proceedings to the Supreme Court and was refused a hearing of the case, making the Court of Appeals action finding Island County out of compliance with the GMA law, the last legal recourse.
The Farms Plans came into contention when the County Commissioners claimed that the very existence of a Farm Plan demonstrated that Critical Areas were being protected on that property. WEAN asked how they could know this, since the Commissioners had never seen a Farm Plan. WEAN asked to see the Farm Plans, not to torture farmers but to verify the statements of the County Commissioners and to determine if Farm Plans really do protect Critical Areas as required by law under the GMA. The Farm Plans do not meet the legal requirements of the GMA and are now secret and cannot be viewed through a Public Disclosure Act request.
The Commissions fought for unregulated development for twenty years, spent $2 million + in fighting implementation of the GMA, exhausted all legal recourse and then started a divide to conquer campaign against WEAN. They sent out questionnaires slandering WEAN and telling farmers that WEAN was out to put them out of business.
WEAN is dedicated to preservation and restoration of native biological diversity of Island County and the Pacific Northwest. They have fought to keep land for farmers not put them out of business. Steve and Marianne are founding members of Whidbey Island’s Tilth and 2nd generation Island farmers.
Why after the Growth Management Act Hearings Board, the Court of Appeals and the Supreme Court ruled that Island County is out of compliance with the law and subject to the state withholding taxes have the County Commissioners not done as court ordered? If the County would not have spent the $1.5 million + fighting the GMA but instead spent the money and time implementing the Growth Management Act they could have saved the taxpayers a lot of money, brought the community together and contributed to our quality of life instead of the opposite.
Respectfully for our seventh generation,
Theresa Marie K. Gandhi

Participate in keeping Local Control of Media

2006-11-25T12:56:00.000-08:00

The following issues and net neutrality (not corporate controlled) are critical. At present the majority of Americans are getting Orwellian news fabricated by the media corporations who also own weapons production corporations and thus profit from war. These "news" fabrications are then picked up and spread. Keep communicating with the FCC on these issues as it will not go away until corporations no longer own the White House and Congress.
At present the internet is one of the few places where uncensored news and views can be found. Fight for net neutrality at every opportunity and let your Represenatives and Senators know that you know several hundred folks (or more) who feel and vote the same as you do. The Democrats (beholding to Corporations for funding their elections) are on probation because of our voter turn out, we must take this window of opportunity to make sure they are educated.
I got a law made, making October 2, 1988 a National Day of Recoginition for Mahatma Gandhi by talking with every legislator's office on the Hill. I had to get 51% of Congress and 51% of the Senate to co-sponsor the bill before it could come up for a vote. I was on the phone for six months talking with the person in the Senators and Represenatives office that handled that type of legislation. What worked was when I said I knew of 60,000 people in their constituency that wanted the same as I did and just specifically how many did they need to 1) show up in their office; 2) call; 3) write; and 4) vote against them if they didn't support it. The last threat I never brought up but it was implied.
The other part of my team at the Gandhi Memorial International Foundation (GIMF) was Santanam Chary. He would communicate to the East Indian communities across America to contact Senators to co-sponsor Senate Joint Resolution 169 and Representatives to co-sponsor House Joint Resolution 330, especially those that needed to recieve requests to do so. We discovered after going to Washington, D.C. that we got better access from using the pay telephones in the hallway than we did showing up and trying to speak with someone in the office. After the President signed the approved Joint Resolutions into law we went to the Oval Office for a photo opportunity.
This experience added to the three months I spent on the Hill, lobbying for First Aid to be required of all Forest Service and National Park employees, after Mt. St. Helens blew I learned that: a hand written letter has the most weight; then individually typed letters (I witnessed these being tallied up); faxes; short to the point e-mails and telephone calls.
The Forest Service did not want the First Aid law and I was the only one speaking for it (an Agriculture Committe member told me this). It was voted out of Committee and on to the Floor for a vote. (Most legislation dies in Committee.) I split my time between looking for work in the Senate, showing what I could do and I volunteered at Democratic National Headquarters. I'd known in January 1980 that President Carter would lose and I wanted to do everything I could to make my knowing not be so.
Several issues in addition to Corporate Control of Media and the Internet will come up in the next two years that will be critical. Please, participate in the legislative process, especially in Olympia where the fate of the Puget Sound Partnership will have a chance of being successful or not.
Speaking Truth to Power, TmkG

Chairman Kevin J. Martin
cc: Commissioners:
Michael J. Copps; Jonathan S. Adelstein; Deborah Taylor Tate; Robert McDowell
Federal Communication Commission, 445 12th Street, SW, Washington, DC 20554
October 9, 2006

Comments Re: Expansion of Corporate Media Ownership

Honorable Chairman and Commissioners:

This is a submission of my comments to the record on expanding ownership of Corporate Media. Corporate Media already has too much control and it should be broken up to allow more local ownership of television, radio and newspapers. To give mega corporations more would be anti-democratic and an insult to the air waves that are supposed to be where community dialogue could take place. If there had not been such an expansion Fox’s Orwellian War is Peace would not have had such a huge advantage in repeating the misrepresentations coming out of the Bush administration to take us to war.
Los Angeles is an example. The Los Angeles Times decided to charge multiple times the going rate and limit the content of an ad announcing an opportunity to testify on this issue at your recent meeting.
My own experience in 1998 as one of two running the only radio station for 100 miles in any direction in Rawlins, Wyoming is an example. We were live in the morning with local weather, school information, a swap and shop segment and covered on location promotions for local business. The Going Fishing song was the most requested. We did tests on the Emergency Channel and if anything happened the phone would ring off the hook wanting to know, “what was that explosion or questions on whatever happened”. We would find out and let the community know. We covered election night and had the office seekers on to discuss, “why we should vote for them”. On Friday nights the high school got to produce their show. On Sundays local residents produced a Spanish show. In the afternoon we would switch it to the satellite. We always knew that it was 3:47 PM because Spirit in the Sky would play out of Denver with the same music every day. As long as Jolene could sell $15,000.00 in ads the owners were fine with us having a local community radio. The engineer for the owners was stationed 250 miles away. He showed me a new station; it was a continuous CD player in a closet. Community radio has died in Rawlins and with it a sense of community.
I came back to the west coast for family and in 1999 had a radio show in Bremerton, Washington. It really creates a sense of community to have community radio. More and more that possibility has been diminished by your rulings.
Please do not expand Corporate Media’s ownership. You would better be serving “we the people” by revoking your previous expansion and or open the analog frequencies to community ownership as the big guys have gone digital.

Respectfully submitted,
Theresa Marie K. Gandhi

Call to Action to Preserve and Save Puget Sound

2006-11-21T03:28:00.000-08:00

This blog is a bit more about me and about things I have learned and done in working to preserve and save Puget Sound for our seventh generation.
I returned to the Northwest in 1998 just as soon as my eldest granddaughter finished requirements for high school graduation in Rawlins, WY. I’d been living near Oak Creek in Sedona when I returned to Kitsap County to help my family as my forty-one year old brother was dying of cancer. Then I shared a Rawlins apartment with Christina, my granddaughter, as her mother drove a tractor trailer back and forth across the country.
I came back to Kitsap County, Washington to help my mother with the process of my dad dying from cancer. The day after the funeral my sister and I flew to Arizona to drive back with my stored belongings, visit my family in Wyoming and pick up my poodle, Shaktipaw to come with me back to Bremerton where I’d gotten an apartment.
In Rawlins I worked as a radio host on regular programming and produced my own show. Back home in Kitsap County I produced and hosted “Kitsap Views” live on the radio. I was just in time for the November 30, 1999 World Trade Protest and volunteered at http://www.indymedia.org/ when it went live to cover the event. Tom Voorhees was a major part of creating the space, providing equipment and setting up a broadcast production space. I saw he could use some help and we got to be good friends. He introduced me to Whidbey Island and by the following summer I had moved up here. In the time I’d been gone from the Northwest Kitsap County had grown from 40,000 to 240,000, the population of the State of Wyoming. Island County had about 40,000 when I moved here.
March 26, 2001 Bill Moyers broadcast “Trade Secrets” on my Brother John’s birthday. As he had died at 41 leaving four children because he tightened the bolts on a nuclear reactor on board a USSN submarine and the paper booties provided had not protected him. Learning from Bill Moyers how a million documents proved that chemical corporations had lied and colluded threw the years on my brother’s birthday, the combination made me very angry. I spoke with Marianne Edain of Whidbey Environmental Action Network about the program the next day. She told me that they had tried in 1985 to stop Island County from applying herbicides to all County roads and were only able to get No Spray signs for those who didn’t want it near their property. Additionally the State puts a huge amount of herbicides on the highway that ran the length of the island. Living in cities for twenty years I had no idea this was happening. This was just too much. She also said that the deadline for submitting comments to Island County Public Works was in six days. I got busy.
For the next five years I spent most of my time working on this issue, first with the County and then with the State. I compiled 175 pages of peer review scientific studies documenting the endocrine disruption aspects of the multiple herbicides used to control roadside vegetation and the danger of the “inerts”. Later I learned that between the County and State 10 thousand gallons of herbicides had been applied to the Whidbey and Camano Islands in the previous decade. This doesn’t include personal & lawn care use.
I wrote a cover letter, a three page abstract and a three page bibliography of the studies assembled and submitted in the 175 pages. I included the transcript of “Trade Secrets” for proof that whatever the chemical corporations said about their products could not be trusted. I knew the Commissioners would not read what I submitted so I went weekly for the next year educating them and asking questions in my 10 minutes of comment time. Several organizations joined in the fight and a new one was created, Whidbey/Camano Island No Spray – WINS. A year later April 1, 2002 No Spray was passed and the County changed how they did roadside vegetation control.
I learned several things in this process: RoundUp® causes males of multiple species to be feminized, i.e. lower sperm counts, erect penile dysfunction, testicular atrophy and elimination of male genitals; multiple herbicides are causative in non-Hodgkin lymphoma, asthma, Lymphoma, congenital anomalies, miscarriages, Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, Parkinson’s disease, Multiple Sclerosis, Multiple Chemical Sensitivity (MCS), depression and violent behavior in children. I experience additional severe reactions including bleeding out of the ends of my capillaries, i.e. petechia.
The “Trade Secrets” which often make up to 97% of the formulation are much more harmful than the “active” ingredients. These are misnamed “inerts”. Denmark banned RoundUp® from their Country because it migrated rapidly into the drinking water, i.e. the aquifer. The “inerts” are never tested for; the synergistic combinations have not been tested for, especially with other herbicides. Most often several types are used.
March 2002 I met with Doug McDonald, Secretary of the Washington State Department of Transportation – WSDOT, spoke with him about the above issues, the 174 pages of science, showed him the 2,000 signed petitions to Stop Herbicide Spray and told him it would cost less in the long run to not spray. WEAN and I sent in copies of all the above in time for submission of comments to WSDOT’s yearly vegetation control plan. Thus began a long frustrating process educating WSDOT. More about that at near the end of this blog.
Governor Gregoire put forth the Puget Sound Partnership call to restore and make Puget Sound healthy by 2020. I immediately wrote to her and said that the goals could never be met to clean up Puget Sound as long as the State agencies (WSDOT, Dept. of Agriculture and Dept. of Ecology) was spending hundreds of thousands, probably more, on herbicides and pesticides up stream from Puget Sound that ran downhill into watersheds, aquifers, streams, rivers and as stormwater run off directly into Puget Sound.
The majority of the near shore waters around Whidbey Island are designated as habitat for Chinook salmon, listed as endangered species. To harm a fingerling Chinook salmon or its habitat is subject to a $15,000 to $25,000 fine per fish. This is not being enforced.
I began fishing off a dock, row boating and swimming in Puget Sound at age nine. Lakes I fished on during the 1960’s that were clear to the bottom are now cloudy. At eleven I got in a lot of trouble because a friend and I rowed to Blake Island before it was a State Park and you could see the bottom of Puget Sound a long way from shore. No more. Crabs are gone or deformed off Whidbey and Blake Islands. World wide we have fifty years of fishing left maybe less as what bait fish feed on is dying. The cycle of life is breaking down at the bottom of the food chain. Hood Canal, the Gulf of Mexico and many other places are now Dead Zones often from pesticide runoff. Corporate farms up stream of the Mississippi get government welfare to use pesticides and these pour into the Gulf of Mexico’s Dead Zone.
As an example, the Save the Salmon Plan in Island County depends on the uninformed property owner to save the Salmon but does not provide educational material on how to do it and no way to let the property owners know of their responsibility. Unless the Puget Sound Partnership comes up with a better plan than what was tried in the Chesapeake it too will fail. We will need a lot of people getting involved, making a commitment and putting in place enforcement methods to make it happen if Puget Sound is to be saved. Knowing how industry and business works I’m not optimistic but I will continue to work for the application of ecological wisdom in policies and processes involving drinking water, i.e. wells sourcing from healthy aquifers and wetlands, chemical free streams, rivers and a healthy Puget Sound.
What you can do. Link to my web page at http://www.tmgandhi.com/ and read my comments to the Puget Sound Partnership. Check out their web page at http://www.pugetsoundpartnership.org/ and the comments submitted to their plan. Kathy Fletcher of People for Puget Sound submitted comments signed on to by a number of organizations. She is a part of the Partnership advisory committee, check out their web page at http://www.pugetsound.org/. Additionally: Shared Strategy for Puget Sound is at http://www.sharedsalmonstradegy.org/; Puget Sound Action Team is at http://www.psat.wa.gov/; http://www.sustainablenorthwest.org/; Northwest Coalition for Alternatives to Pesticides is at http://www.ncap.org/; Washington Toxics Coalition at http://www.watoxics.org/; and the Orca Network at http://www.orcanetwork.org/. Also check out the Broken Promises series in the Seattle P-I by Lisa Stiffler and Robert McClure at http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/specials/brokenpromises.html .
These are some of several organizations working for a healthy Puget Sound. Several key issues will come up in January’s legislative session and letters from informed folks will help. Write letters to the Editors and inform your local newspapers; ask your local Public Radio and Television to cover these topics. Share what you have learned with friends and family during the upcoming holidays. Tell the Governor and PS Partnership to implement the comments submitted by a coalition of organizations working with People for Puget Sound. Get a copy of the comments submitted by a group of scientists that have been working with the issues of stormwater management for years and know the current Plan falls far short of what it will take if it is to succeed. I found their comments via the Seattle P-I in their Broken Promises series.
Secretary Doug McDonald has already claimed that what WSDOT is doing is adequate and that they are serious about controlling stormwater run off. They are far from where they need to be on this issue. Contact Doug at macdond@wsdot.wa.gov and tell him WSDOT needs to stop using herbicides to control roadside vegetation, especially if your County is No Spray. They also need to include comments from Washington Toxics that they decided was too complete and comprehensive to be included in their illegally done and inadequate Environmental Impact Study on the use of toxic chemicals. WSDOT did not address the endocrine disruption aspects of the herbicides in the process of creating the EIS that only included studies done by Chemical Corporations. It’s on their web page as an example of how they are looking out for the health of people and aquatic life. They are not. The EIS was requested by Doug after receiving my material but it never addressed the issues raised by the scientific studies I had submitted.
If this cause is not your then find your own and make a difference in our world so our seventh generation will have a quality, healthy common future. Use the power of your purse and tell stores that sell herbicides, pesticides, fungicides and other toxic chemicals that you will take your business elsewhere until they sell only salmon friendly products. Stop using Tide, and other phosphate based detergents. Switch to earth friendly cleaning products. Stop using products with perfumes in them as they are created from hydrocarbons and are harmful to life and people with asthma. A salmon can smell one part per trillion.
If you have any questions, e-mail me at tmarie@whidbey.net.
Until next time, Theresa Marie Gandhi

Welcome to HerStory and a poem

2006-11-19T22:00:00.000-08:00

November 19, 2006
Posted by Theresa Marie K. Gandhi

Welcome to my first blog: http://tmgandhi.blogspot.com/ that you can get to via my just launched web page: http://www.tmgandhi.com/. I hope that you will check here often. I live swing shift hours and often work on my computer after 7 PM.
On my web page are two e-books. Love’s Trails and Trials: Knowing Enlightenment! This is a compilation of poems about finding enlightenment, knowing the Presence of God, clarifying my vision and mission and sharing with the reader about how specifically you too can do the processes, i.e. trails and the get through the heartaches, i.e. the trials. After four years of college, the fifth year I did an individual contract that lasted four years being trained to become an ordained Christian Spiritualist Minister. At the time I thought it was for my own enlightenment but after meeting Mother Teresa at Oxford in April 1986 at the Global Survival Conference as the only female Religious leader out of one hundred who met with 100 Parliamentarians and 20 members of the International Press Corps I decided to go ahead and be ordained. My teacher was a Bishop with the Universal Church of the Master chartered in 1908 in Oakland, CA.
I had plans to become a United States Senator, but gave up an internship from a program at the University of Washington to work for Senator Warren Magnusson. It would have taken me across the country for a year from my children who were in grade school. I just couldn’t do that. I did get a law made in 1988 that made October 2, 1988 a National Day of Recognition of Mahatma Gandhi by getting 51% of the House and Senate to be co-sponsors.
At the time I was married to a relative of Mahatma Gandhi and worked at the Gandhi Memorial International Foundation – GMIF. Getting the legislation signed into law got us a photo opportunity with the President in the Oval Office.
Photos with Mother Teresa, in the Oval office with President Reagan and with Shirley Temple Black at the San Francisco unveiling of a statue of Mahatma Gandhi are on my web page, come and take a look.
My other e-book at this time is Truth: a Code of Being. It has a number of poems about my truth on what I see happening in the world. As my webmaster reformatted the chapbook seven poems slipped out and are not a part of the e-book. What follows is one of them, To Seek Truth is to Seek God’s Mind (most of my poems are shorter than this one and some are longer). If you buy the e-book and ask I will send you a file with the seven poems. One of them that didn’t get in is Oprah and Truth and you can find that on my web page.
My letters to the editor are published often and I post to a local list serve here on South Whidbey Island. Most often I will be posting here about current affairs and issues that threaten the survival of our seventh generation. Other e-books, articles and links will be added to my web page through time but for now my webmaster, Debra Malmos, http://www.ifull.com/ has other work she has to focus on.

To Seek Truth is to Seek God’s Mind!

A buckaroo a Texan cowboy dude
with the stroke of a pen –
with the aim of a gun
he’ll smoke ‘em out - no doubt what he’ll do.
A cowboy Prez who speaks his mind
in cowboy lingo with American pride
in reaction to reaction to reaction to need
we go to war with so many in need.
The gloves are off, the planes do fly
with American forces and British fly guys
to avenge a horror forever to live
in humanity’s mind’s eye
we crossed a bridge
from adolescent Republic to a state of mind.
Formed of images burned into mind
as thousands of people vaporized
no bones, no shoes, no bodies, no parts
for grieving loved ones to have a part
but driven deep twin boxes of trade
brought down with box cutter blades.
How to heal this state of mind
from where came the hate
that killed that day?
What is the why and how can we know
what is truth and what is lie-full?
Contradictions from the White House, our Prez
from a reading about a goat when told
his face went blank, long minutes passed
then he flew from danger a credible Prez
not headed to DC but landing at Barksdale
to step to ground to wag a tail
then to Omaha – Strategic Air Command
nuke proof with a General on hand.
Saying the “terrorists” sent threats
with copies of code
to let them know it was as it was told.
Air Force One a target that day
but wait 10 days and its spun back
no threat, no codes – not that way that day
and barely a story of how he ran away.
But on with the war I can’t be against
or my words seditious and I should hush.
Don’t criticize the Prez or his team that wars
until it’s over this thing called war.
To not speak for me is to lie down to die
I can’t stop my knowing
there’s more surprise.
A pacifist heart a pacifist mind
a Gandhi name and a state of mind.
I’ve studied wars histories
censored stories and more
always seeking truth and harmony where
there was conflict, how can we go
on to harmony before there’s no where to go
that’s not downwind of fear, rage and hate
without understanding and truthful debate
denied and shunned and truth not told.
Before courage knows which way to go
wisdom and insight based on knowing what
how and why are we hated and why it’s our biz
to figure it out, do we make it worse
or will we figure it out before it gets worse?
Suppressing truth as politically incorrect
mandating silence with force of law
to silence dissent and give no way to go
into the public to discuss which way to go
is extremely dangerous
as the ways and the means
are the nut - the kernel of which way we go.
If when we get there and we’ve lost
what we fought for then we have lost
our selves an inch at a time.
To grow as a people
each mind needs to see
that manufactured fear, rage and hate
brings death to our shores.
Find out the why, the root, the nut
of where it started and let’s re-think
our level of participation in the public rink.
Get with your community
Tribal nation and close ken
study what is and be for sure
to look for truth not from
corporate media’s gates
but through windows of media
with more than one mind.
To seek out truth is to seek God’s mind.

© Copyright Theresa Marie K. Gandhi October 22, 2006
http://www.tmgandhi.com/
turtle8@whidbey.net