Mine Owners Cry 'No Money' as Iron County Board Faces Decision on GTAC Lease

"Why should Iron County be subsidizing billionaire Chris Cline at the expense of poor, local taxpayers?" (StellaReport)

Few objective Wisconsin citizens believed Gogebic Taconite's (GTAC) proposed massive open pit mine operation was a full-employment and pro-environmental center in disguise despite repeated statements by mining company officials assuring benign and encouraging results.

But some residents of Iron County will believe pretty much anything in their desperation for promised jobs and money from the Koch brothers. But reportedly, the Iron County Board is considering that it has been taken for a long ride.

GTAC funneled over $ Millions into GOP coffers and allies, including of course Scott Walker who asked that GTAC money defending his Recall election be funneled through Wisconsin Club for Growth. (Marley, Bice and Bergquist, Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel) GTAC coughed up $700,000 for Club for Growth at Scott Walker's urging.

Now, GTAC's lease with Iron County is up for renewal.

An Iron County attorney, Anthony Stella, is blasting GTAC's cries that it has no money and needs to lease the Iron County land for free with no payments to Iron County until 2016. (StellaReport)

Writes Stella:

This whole scenario should also be a wakeup call. Chris Cline [the billionaire behind GTAC] is not serious about this project. He can't be. He has severed the umbilical cord between him and GTAC. He is not only embarrassing Iron County, he is embarrassing [GTAC president] Bill Williams and the local GTAC employees. They have come bearing promises of a $1.5 billion investment, and now can't pony up $10K to secure the rights to property which is essential to their plans? Clearly Cline has the money. He has made the deliberate decision not to spend it on this project, just as he already instructed GTAC to lay off all the workers and stop spending any more money last fall.

WAKE UP IRON COUNTY! If GTAC can't afford to come up with $10K to pay Iron County for a year, they certainly aren't in a position to spend the millions that will be required for more drilling and testing over the next year. This is also a red flag. These guys cannot even manage a budget during this early phase. Are we going to trust that they can run a profitable mining venture? When it comes time for cleaning things up and reclamation, will they say they're out of money? If they can't honor their contracts before they've even gotten started, they can't be trusted to honor them later.

We heard excuses from Bill Williams about why nothing is happening. First he said they let employees go last fall because it was late in the year and they couldn't finish environmental work before winter. Last week we heard they would not drill this winter because no snow had been removed. Days later he told Wisconsin Public Radio they were holding off over fears that an EPA decision on a mine in Alaska might lead to a similar decision against GTAC, and he added that Iron County's proposed zoning ordinance also was a concern. But now we learn the real truth. The well has gone dry. Chris Cline won't fork over any more cash, even after generously giving $700K to his buddies in Madison.

What about Cline and GTAC's abiding concern for jobs and the environment? Turns out this was BS, and even credulous Iron County residents may begin to wonder if the proposed mine's destroying and poisoning the environment was ever a bright idea to begin with.

Stella noted last night at the Citizens Concerned about the Proposed Penokee Mine site (Facebook):

"I have had very encouraging and constructive talks with several board members in Iron County. There's reason to believe a dozen or more are open to rejection of the lease extension agreement. This needs to be approached right, including making sure they have the right legal advice going forward. There's also a lot of pressure on some of these folks, so try to resist the urge to attack board members for past decisions made. If everyone is constructive going forward, we'll get the best results. As Mike Wiggins [of the Bad River band of the Lake Superior Chippewa] said the other night, 'the parties all have a lot of mutual interests, and it's time to focus on moving forward with those instead of fighting over the past or things we can't agree on.'"

Wiggins is right, one wonders if GTAC will pull the plug as the collapse in global iron ore prices leave locals holding the bag and finding it empty.

Implausible Deniability by Mining Company in Wisconsin

Microscopic image of asbestiform grunerite, one of the most dangerous
forms of asbestos, from the site of GTac’s proposed iron mine.
Image is from a scanning electron microscope (SEM) made at
UW-Madison by the Wisconsin Geological and Natural History Survey.

There came to northern Wisconsin a mining company that did not know

Mike Simonson of Wisconsin Public Radio reports the confirmed presence of dangerous asbestiform grunerite at the site of the proposed open pit mine in the Penokee Hills range in northern Wisconsin has resulted in a new company strategy: "Gogebic Taconite (GTac), the company behind the proposed iron ore mine in the Penokee Hills, says it won’t take rock samples from an area where asbestos-like fibers were found."

Out of sight, out of mind.

So, asbestiform grunerite is present, but GTac simply will go somewhere else and pretend this dangerous toxin does not exist.

Writes Simonson: "The fibers are in grunerite deposits, but in a letter last week to the DNR [Department of Natural Resources], GTAC continues to deny its existence, saying: 'Our position remains that asbestosform material is unlikely to be present in the reserve.'"

This position is a lie, a bald-faced lie, already disconfirmed multiple times.

The United States Geological Survey warns about the danger of naturally-occurring asbestiform:

According to the U.S. EPA and the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry potential health effects of exposure to asbestos can include asbestosis, mesothelioma, and lung cancers. In the past, most medical research and regulatory focus has been on the health effects of asbestos used industrially or commercially. However, there have been increasing concerns recently regarding the potential health effects of naturally-occurring asbestos (NOA), which occurs as an accessory mineral in some rocks ... .

A Wintery Hike Along the Tyler Fork River in the Penokee Mountains
- Photo by Greggory Jennings at
Citizens Concerned about the proposed Penokee Mine

You never wish mesothelioma onto anyone, not for the worst of humanity, not even for the sick, dangerous sociopaths who would inflict this horrible disease onto others.

In light of the fact of the confirmed presence of asbestiform grunerite at the GTac mining sight, here's a phone conversation that will never take place between Bill Williams, president of the Gogebic Taconite LLC (GTac) and Christopher Cline, billionaire CEO of Cline Resource and Development company, the father conglomerate of GTac.

Bill Williams: 'Hey Chris, we gotta shut down our proposed open pit mine up there in Wisconsin. Multiple independent analyses have confirmed the presence of dangerous asbestiform grunerite, and we know this will adversely affect the habitat of Native-American treaty-protected species, for starters. We close, or I resign and go to Spain to face justice for our arsenic leak.'

Christopher Cline:—'Geez, Bill, no way did I know the GTac mine would adversely affect the habitat. You are so right. We are pulling up stakes and leaving—today. You put out the word, and issue an apology to the folks up in Iron County and Ashland County in Wisconsin. All we care about are the environment and jobs; and I don't care how much money leaving today costs us, we are out, if I have to come up from Palm Beach and do this myself.'

Gogebic Taconite ore samples contain: "a highly concentrated form of asbestos fibers...it is the most dangerous." From Wisconsin Public Television Here and Now's reporter Mike Simonson:

Too Beautiful to Bomb‏

We need the feds to come in and stop the calculated use of unlawful violence to intimidate the Wisconsin community.

View from Penokee Hills, Iron County Wisconsin
Proposed site of huge Iron Ore Open Pit Mine

Bad River Estuary

Bad River wetlands or sloughs flows into Lake Superior

USA Today Piece on GTac Is Uncritical Mining Company PR

Carol Pogash in her piece for USA TODAY goes out of her way to accept Gogebic Taconite's (GTac) PR as fact, and presents a superficial piece of journalism typical of the corporate press.

A couple of examples:

"In March, the governor signed the law, written with GTac's help."

Right, GTac helped alright. They wrote the bill, even the GOP admits this.

"The mine would be built by Gogebic Taconite (GTac), creating 700 jobs and indirectly, several thousand more."

Wow!

But this is according to GTac's Northstar Study, "The Economic Impact of the Gogebic Taconite Mine," which was commissioned by GTac; thus reported as fact by Pogash.

Maybe Christopher Cline and GTac are secretly full-employment activists, environmental conservationists who are only marginally concerned with making money.

One can go on.

Mining Company May Dump Its Wisconsin District Attorney

Mining Company: We're for you, Wisconsin

Gogebic Taconite Mine (GTac) wrote its own Wisconsin legislation; keeps scientific data secret from the people; forbids environmental experts from approaching the proposed mine site, and is now wants to keep the Wisconsin people away from 1,000s of acres of forests, as demanded in new legislation proposed and supported solely by the Republican Party.

This follows GTac's worst blunder yet in hiring a bunch of heavily armed, wanna-be Rambos from Arizona, Bulletproof Security, parading around on GTac's proposed $1.5 billion open-pit iron-ore mine site in the Penokee Hills of northern Wisconsin.

But perhaps the most foolish of GTac's blunders is keeping its Iron County (Wisconsin) District Attorney, Martin Lipske, as its legal frontman.

Lipske went from a Gov. James Doyle-endorsing Democrat to an Independent (he won reelection in 2012 after a controversial recount) after word went out in Iron County in 2011 that GTac was coming in with Republican support.

Lipske presents to the Wisconsin public the legal equivalent of the face of the corporate terrorist—corrupt, a shady reputation with a history of professional misconduct, and perversely disdainful of innocent Wisconsin people.

Check out Martin 'Marty' Lipske on search sites, and you won't find out much beyond the fact his license to practice law was suspended for professional misconduct, and he put an innocent man in prison after losing DNA evidence in 1997; and protecting favored defendants in Iron County, including favored prostitutes. Hey, welcome to Hurley, Wisconsin in Iron County.

Lipske had his license to practice law suspended six times in Wisconsin, once for professional misconduct in a suspension that lasted almost four years shortly before Iron County Judge Patrick J. 'Madman' Madden recruited Lipske to move from Douglas County (Wisconsin) to run for District Attorney in Iron County where Madden has served as judge with an equally corrupt reputation since 1986.

Rob Ganson’s photo of Bulletproof Security using silencers
on their semi-automatics was taken July 6, 2013 in Iron County

Madden recused himself from Lipske's latest attempted miscarriage of justice after Lipske targeted anti-mining Iron County resident, 76-year-old Robert Gollubske, for Gollubske's bumbled attempt to contact the FBI after Gollubske's home and farm were rocked by explosions by a local blacktop company that Gollubske fears is a precursor of what the huge open-pit mine will wreak upon the Penokee Hills range.

Lipske has also launched a heavy-handed prosecution against 26-year-old Katie Kloth whom Lipske wants to prosecute with a violent felony and three misdemeanors for protesting the Gogebic Taconite mine in June 2013.

However, Lipske now refuses to prosecute Bulletproof Security for operating without a license in Wisconsin, among other continued violations of Wisconsin law.

The gig is up on Lipske; everyone knows the guy is bent. GTac has its own district attorney.

The only question is how long before Cline Resource and Development Company (of which Gogebic Taconite (GTac) is one subsidiary) comes to the conclusion that Lipske is too much a liability.

In the July 2013 - August 2013 issue of Mining Magazine, Lee Buchsbaum puts it thusly in a piece in which Buchsbaum paints a picture of a lot of money at stake for keeping a frontman like Lipske in place with all his dirt. 

GTac would do better with the image of a semi-automatic rifle with a silencer pointed out in the north woods of Wisconsin. Writes Buchsbaum:

Though not as sexy as gold or platinum, many have argued that iron ore, the primary ingredient in steel, remains the world's most important commodity. ...

The majority of US iron-ore production is concentrated in Minnesota and Michigan, though historically it has also been produced in volume in Wisconsin and, during World Wars One and Two, it was extracted in large quantities from the southwestern states of Utah and Nevada. However, the heart of the industry remains in Minnesota. ...

 In total, 13 iron-ore mines (11 open pits, one reclamation operation, and one dredging operation), nine concentration plants and nine pelletising plants were operational during 2012, as reported by the USGS. However, eight mines operated by three companies - Cliffs Natural Resources, Essar Steel, and US Steel - accounted for virtually all of the production.

New direct-reduction-injection (DRI) processes, cheap natural gas and the enlarged Panama Canal are now driving investors to open new mines and return to old diggings and tailings piles, while reaching out to new international customers.

One of the biggest recent moves in the US iron-ore segment is the entry of what might prove to be a major new producer. Gogebic Taconite (Gtac), a subsidiary of the expanding US coal producer Cline Resource and Development Co (also owner of Foresight Energy) has literally redefined the concept of high-productivity, low-cost longwall mining.

Legislation vital to the re-establishment of iron-ore mining in Wisconsin passed with support from Gtac and, on June 18, Gtac filed for permits regarding its iron-ore mine and processing plant - the first new iron-ore mine in the state for decades. ...

GOGEBIC: NEW SHOOTER

Following an arduous and contentious two-year effort to change the mining laws in Wisconsin, on June 18, officials from Gtac, filed with the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources a sample plan and pre-application notice outlining the firm's intent to file an application for an iron-ore mining permit, the first one requested in nearly a century.

Though the bulk sample plan is preliminary to the firm's first pilot efforts to actually recover and determine the quantity and quality of the ore in the deposit, the pre-application is also the first step in a process company officials hope will one day lead to the development of an operating taconite mine.

Gtac has estimated that the US$1.5 billion operation will eventually be capable of producing 8Mt/y of iron ore in phase one of the project, fully 15% of the current total US production.

Extracting from a two-billion-tonne body of crude taconite ore, the deposit Gtac will mine is approximately 35.4km long and dips at about 65 degrees to the north, while outcropping along the top of a hill. ...

Gtac's overall vision is similar to what the Cline Group has accomplished in a relatively short time in the Illinois coal fields. ...

"The company sat on this reserve for 60 years. During its restructuring in 2001 and 2002, US Steel purged its nonproductive and fallow resources," says Gtac mine president Bill Williams. "We now have a clear permitting process, and we're targeting the 2016 to 2017 timeframe to be in production."

Christopher Cline, a Billionaire Who Could Not Care Less about Wisconsin

Penokee Hills

Mary Annette Pember has nice bio on billionaire and mega-yacht enthusiast, Christopher Cline, the man behind the proposed Gogebic Taconite Mine.

So, Cline's proposed 20-mile open pit mine going is going to cause terrible problems in the waters and land of northern Wisconsin.

Tell it to somebody who cares; Cline's busy at his 33,413 square foot mansion in North Palm Beach, Florida, and having his cronies funnel money to Scott Walker and other favored politicians.

Writes Geraldine Fabrikant in the Times:

The 161-foot Mine Games, a boat built by Trinity Yachts of Gulfport, Miss., was put on the market for $27 million (in 2011) ... because its owner, Chris Cline, who heads Cline Resource and Development, a mine development company, had a larger boat on order.

If you think Cline is in this for anything but getting his money and leaving behind a waste, you're kidding yourself.

So, when Cline's water carriers tell you all Cline cares about is full employment, jobs (just ask 'em) and the environment, if you have an IQ exceeding 80, don't believe it.

Cline knows he's not wanted; but that is not his concern.

Corruption Fuels Mining Company's Moves in Northern Wisconsin

When the multibillion-dollar mining corporation with a record of poisoning the environment came into Wisconsin and announced it intended to dig and operate a 20-mile, open pit iron-ore mine in the Penokee Hills of Northern Wisconsin under the authority of state legislation the mining company drafted, opposition arose quickly.

Gogebic Taconite, one cog in the huge private mining conglomerate, Cline Resource and Development Group, determined they wanted the iron-ore extracted in what would be the largest mine in Wisconsin's history, and the Republican Party decided they wanted the $15 million they received from the mining concerns.

What the people of Wisconsin want is of no concern.

What environmentalists and Native Americans wish specifically similarly is of no apparent concern, as now Iron County (Wisconsin) officials are threatening to evict, arrest and prosecute the Lac Courte Oreilles band which has set up a Harvest and Education camp near the mining site.

The Bad River Band soon will set a similar camp.

Iron County is the least populated county in Wisconsin, isolated in the north woods; and its district attorney, one Martin Lipske, is known for being corrupt, incompetent and provincial. A lot like the Republican Party.

Worse, Lipske is suspected of deceitfully pursuing and obtaining the conviction in 1997 of an innocent man, Don Miller, now serving a 42-year sentence for a crime that he apparently did not commit, though Lipske has been shown to have been made aware of exculpatory evidence.

Small town justice in the deep north woods in a county selling out the environment and taking away the life blood of an innocent man.

Lipske refuses comment on all matters now, and in recent weeks has gone silent on the mining operation as his history has hit Wisconsin political blogs.

Now, Lipske pursues his effort on behalf of Gogebic Taconite to charge a 26-year-old woman protester, Katie M. Kloth, 26, of Stevens Point, with robbery with force, misdemeanor theft, and two counts of criminal damage to property.

Her crime?

Kloth yelled at Gogebic Taconite personnel and allegedly stole a cell phone some weeks back.

Lipske has amble experience in throwing people in prison for years without cause. But the spotlight is beginning to shine on Lipske now, illuminating a corrupt and cowardly man ... hiding.

This will change, and I predict here Lipske will meet justice for his crimes.

As for the environment under threat by Gogebic Taconite and supported by Iron County officials and the Republican Party, public consciousness of the planet we inhabit has a way of exploding.

"No one should be surprised by what this mining company is doing. So many people in this country have been raised without an environmental ethic. It's hard for them to develop a sense of the earth as an organism when you live in an artificial setting and away from what's natural," said Becky Gawboy, a Native American environmental and education activist living in rural northeastern Minnesota. "Corporations like this mining outfit are simply the culmination of a culture that is obsessed with material things like TVs, isolated and alienated from the living world. Of course they can't make healthy decisions about the environment because they don't see themselves as part of it. They wish to devour it. Really, corporation are evil entities and as corporations have evolved they have become the center of darkness, a rapacious, destructive force."

Iron County, Wisconsin is not Lowndes County, Alabama—a notorious, racist county 1,100 miles almost due south from Hurley, Wisconsin.

But small-town injustice and corruption join Iron County and Lowndes County.

Iron County features an epic case study in corruption and a huge corporation v. families and the environment; the fate of this clash is directly dependent on how many good men and women remain silent.

Scott Walker Is in Way over His Head

Governor doesn't mention illegal corporate armed guards; Native American tribe calls for peaceful opposition to huge open-pit Iron mine, and the Republican Party's granted license to dump waste into water

Reckless and infantile is an accurate description of Scott Walker's ill-considered statement on out-of-state billionaire's Christopher Cline's mining operation, Gogebic Taconite LLC.

Even as Native-American leaders and other citizens of northern Wisconsin call for non-violent protests in the face of military-style corporate militias [since removed because they are illegally operating without a license], Walker did not take the occasion Friday to talk to all parties involved in the manner of a responsible public official.

Instead, Walker stuck to his playbook, dismissing the viewpoint of the Wisconsin people whom Walker has repeatedly failed to consult since ramming through unwanted mining legislation passed on a party-line vote after some $15 million was contributed by mining interests to Wisconsin Republicans, with one dissenting vote—Sen. Dale Schultz (R-Richland Center).

Can Walker recite the objections to the mining operation held by millions of Wisconsinites to their satisfaction?

Does anyone wish to go fishing after the mining company leaves the waters of northern Wisconsin.

No and No.

Walker refuses to try to talk, to engage, and simply speak to the concerns citizens have for their land and water.

An adult would realize that a heavily armed corporate, militarized force presents a clear and present danger, especially when acting illegally, as has been discovered after, not Walker and law enforcement, but rather Jason Stein of the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel began asking questions, specifically, don't these guys need a license to walk around with semi-automatic weapons out of a stated purpose to provide 'security.'

Walker postures in the manner of an agent provocateur, attempting to inflame the very situation Walker and has party has created for the benefit of the mining operation for whom he fronts in Wisconsin.

One would think a sitting governor would front for, represent, the citizens of Wisconsin.

Even the GOP-leaning Wisconsin State Journal today runs a sub-headline in its print edition reading, "Governor doesn't discuss armed guards; tribe calls for peaceful opposition."

The local broadcast television 'news' coverage, exemplified by WISC and WKOW, was as usual not recognizable as news. Rather, the seconds resemble a short, free spot for corporate interests.

Compare the statements of Mike Wiggins, Bad River Band of Lake Superior Chippewa Chairman and Scott Walker. Wiggins' statement is statesmanlike, Walker's is petulant.

I think we understand now why Scott Walker chose as his closest and longest-serving associates the likes of the criminally convicted Tim Russell and Brian Pierick, among several other Walker aides now serving criminal sentences.

At his essence, corrupt work for Cline Resource and Development Group; acting criminally, and associating himself intimately with the likes of Russell, Pierick and Kelly Rindfleisch (felony misconduct in public office); this is who Scott Walker is.

Perhaps behaving likes a statesman and responsible public official is too much ask of Scott Walker who has shown himself repeatedly not up to the job.

From left to right: Tim Russell, Scott Walker and Brian Pierick

Wisconsin Atty Asks DA, State Agency about Criminality of Bulletproof Security's Private Army

Before raping our land, poisoning our water, and further corrupting our political system, all agents and contractors involved with Christopher Cline's mining enterprises ought to at least follow Wisconsin law, as attorney Anthony J. Stella, Jr. is asking Wisconsin public officials.

That goes triple for those patrolling the Wisconsin north woods with militarized, semi-automatic weapons.

We know Gogebic Taconite LLC and Christopher Cline do not like Wisconsin citizens, but killing citizens is premeditated murder.

Killing, that's what these weapons do.

Firearms training instructs:  You don't take weapons out, unless you plan to shoot them. And you never point a weapon or use it threateningly towards another person unless you are ready to kill him or her.

Circumstances created by these out-of-state, corporate right-wing militias (and Wisconsin Republicans) need to be stopped.

Wisconsin law enforcement ought to consider these private, corporate terrorists are violating the safety and peace of Wisconsin citizens, as well as breaking the law; and take appropriate action towards Bulletproof's militia now.

If one of these corporate idiots kill someone, it's also on the hands of the Republican Party, and Wisconsin law enforcement which to this point has done nothing to rid Wisconsin of this out-of-state corporate terrorism.

[Thank you Blue Cheddar.]

To be used by Bulletproof's militia to massacre whom exactly?

Okay Mining Co, You're Planning on Killing Whom Exactly?

Used by Adam Lanza to massacre 20 children and six school staff members

To be used by Bulletproof's militia to massacre whom exactly?

Private Military Displays Anti-public Attitude of Mining Mogul and Scott Walker

Rightwing militia, armed against
citizens of northern Wisconsin. Mercs
are paid by rightwing corporations,
for whom the Wisconsin GOP works.

Update: A Teamsters writer asks of "Bulletproof" militia: What are you contemplating, a Ludlow Massacre (1914)? Are folks in northern Wisconsin really that threatening?

Nobody has any business walking around illegally we now know armed with the type of paramilitary weapons used in the Connecticut massacre of 20 children, not in this society.

Not even municipal police officers who risk their lives have any business turning into such an quasi-military force.

News that Gogebic Taconite's armed militia is being kicked out of Wisconsin for the time being is welcome news indeed.

But the private military parading in northern Wisconsin reveals something else that the Gogebic Taconite and Scott Walker have in common: A fear and disdain of the people of Wisconsin.

The GOP's mining legislation written by and for Gogebic Taconite enabling the massive open-pit mine of course also demonstrates the contempt the Republican Party has for the citizens and the democratic processes.

This is not the our parents' Republican Party.

This is an extremist band of social engineers, attempting to remake our country without consulting the citizens of our union and obtaining their consent, and the GOP endeavors to destroy the formal processes of democracy itself as it continues its attack against voting.

That this group of violent-minded social engineers have no regard for the people of Wisconsin is a vast under statement.

Scott Walker's Bombs Include Obliterating Community Control

Christopher Cline's Mega Mansion in North Palm Beach
Mining mogul Cline has his eyes set on northern Wisconsin's iron ore,
but Cline will not appear in person before community boards
concerned about environmental disasters and massive pollution.
The trip to Wisconsin from Palm Beach might interfere with Cline's life.
Cline is an avid mega yacht enthusiast - northern Wisconsin is not his place.
Cline famously sold his $27-million yacht, the 161-foot Mine Games,
because Cline had a larger boat on order, so don't expect Cline to
come up before some County Board and community panels to justify
his company coming in and destroying a near-pristine environment.
The man's too busy for Wisconsin.

Scott Walker never campaigned on taking away the liberty of workers to organise.

Walker never campaigned on taking away local control of communities to set policies protecting citizens, protecting its schools, and local environments.

Walker never campaigned on taking away a women's right to choose, or closing Planned Parenthood centers serving women's health care.

But only two years into Walker's administration, these rights and many others lie in ruin, as if hit by a depleted uranium shell air strike from a corrupt administration literally targeting its own citizens in service to huge-moneyed interests.

It would be nice to hear to voices of opposition on every medium, every street corner. But the guns of opposition have gone virtually silent. For now. Citizen action is gathering and war plans are being made.

Walker won't back down—because he's so brave (ask him)—from taking away the power of communities enacting residency requirements for their local employees.

Walker and the GOP are sneaking the anti-residency provision into the state budget, against almost unanimous opposition from community mayors, village presidents, town managers and other elected municipal representatives.

As more extreme, severe-weather events occur, Walker's usurpation could have another unforeseen effect, at least an uncared-about effect.

Said Larry Arft, City Manager in Beloit, Wisconsin: "Don’t forget, public works employees are also first responders. Winter storm events, summer rain storms, wind storms, we have people on call for our utilities. 24/7 somebody has to be on call and they need to be there in a few minutes."

Not Walker's concern.

If communities start passing laws protecting their land in any capacity, how can out-of-state billionaires strip the land? What would be next, stopping fracking?

Walker is getting set to cash in on his work for billionaires and out-of-state interests who could not care less if Wisconsin tips over and falls into Lake Michigan, as long as the Christopher Clines (a pure bastard of a man hooked up with the Carlyle Group) and the Koch brothers get their hands on our resources, the Wisconsin people and our public land and waters be damned.

Wisconsin GOP: Not Lawful Is No Problem

If Republicans pass a bill into law that is unlawful and unconstitutional, and furthermore is found to be irreparably harmful to Wisconsin citizens by a circuit court judge who subsequently halts implementation (issues an injunction) of the law; then that the law is on hold until a higher court rules or another order rules otherwise.

This is a fundamental check of the judicial branch of government on the other two branches, needed especially when the two branches are temporarily occupied by corrupt partisans.

But a fundamental check not anymore, if the Republican Party's conception of government is ultimately upheld.

A new bill proposed by Republicans, and supported solely by Republicans shows how intent the GOP is on using their gerrymandered legislative majorities to pass unconstitutional bills against political opponents, and in service to moneyed interests such as the Koch brothers and the Cline Resource and Development Group mining interests.

Under the new bill, Assembly Bill 161 (and Senate Bill 154), judicial oversight by a circuit judge is radically altered and its rulings no longer have the force of law, if Republicans object (within 10 days).

Then, an injunction is no longer operative (the injunction is stayed) and whatever unconstitutional laws the Republicans enact will remain the law of the land until and unless another state appellate court acts.

During that period of time, GOP lawlessness is the law of the land.

This GOP bill eviscerates judicial protection of citizens from corrupt partisans. (See also the Wisconsin Legislative Reference Bureau memo of April 10, 2013.)

Notes John Nichols:

(T)he purpose of judicial oversight is to frustrate the ambitions of power-hungry legislators and executives. The whole point of the separation of powers outlined in the federal and state constitutions is to ensure that no branch of government can casually diminish the rights of citizens, or create imperial government.

So, can the Republicans do this?

The only quote I found on the constitutionality of the proposed bill is by former Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice Janine Geske.

Geske said,"To statutorily undo a court order before another court has acted on it is clearly to me an infringement on a court's independence, I don't think it will withstand constitutional scrutiny." (Marley. Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel, April 10, 2013)

Assembly Bill 161 reads like the 2011 U.S. House spending bill declaring a House bill passed by the GOP has the force of law should the U.S. Senate fail to approve another spending bill within some three weeks of passage of the House bill.

That bill was widely ridiculed as unconstitutional, and the bill faded.

But the undeniable effect of the Wisconsin bill is: The Constitution is not in force, and judicial enforcement of the law no longer is operative because the Republicans have said so, and this matter will not fade so fast.

Consider:  In the case of the Wisconsin Assembly Bill 161, Republicans say a judicial order has no force of law because the Republicans have crafted a bill explicitly stating such.

So what happens when a judge finds this law (a fast-tracked bill for now) unconstitutional, and Republicans object to the judicial order, saying their objection nullifies the judicial order under their unconstitutional law?

In that case, the matter becomes more than an obscure GOP power-grab, and becomes a full-blown Wisconsin constitutional crisis—the like of which I have never seen in this state.

Welcome back to Scott Walker's Wisconsin, still here and still power-mad and corrupt.

New Film Says, Stop the Disaster Inflicted by the GOP and Mining Goon, Christopher Cline

The Iron Current

One would believe that self-consciously polluting water and watersheds is an act of mass poisoning perpetrated by sociopaths like the kind of crazies hunted by the FBI.

They should be.

What the Republicans and Christoper Cline's minions are doing is unforgivable.

A new documentary film coming out chronicles the crime before it happens—The Iron Current.

The documentary examines the issue of iron ore mining in northern Wisconsin and its impact on local citizens and the environment. The Iron Current: The goal of this documentary is to show how the communities and citizens of Northern Wisconsin are reacting to a proposed iron ore mine near Lake Superior. If permitted, this mine would be the largest open pit iron ore mine in the world, up to four and a half miles long and reaching depths of one thousand feet during phase one. With the unemployment rate near twelve percent in the area, many residents are aware of the need for good paying jobs. Other residents however, aren’t willing to gamble the environment for the jobs, especially the people of the Bad River Indian Reservation, which is located at the mouth of the Bad River on Lake Superior. The proposed mine would be placed at the headwaters of the Bad River, six miles upstream from the Indian Reservation.

The documentary will examine many complex topics surrounding this issue. The proposed mine site lies upon the oldest mountain range in the world called the Penokee Hills, which contains one half of the remaining Iron Ore left in the continental United States. It is an environmentally rich area consisting of many rivers and streams which make up the Bad River Watershed and the Kokaggun sloughs, nicknamed the Everglades of Lake Superior. The Bad River Watershed is considered the most pristine estuary left throughout the Great Lakes by many biologists and also serves as an important spiritual center for the Lake Superior Ojibwe people.

(Directed by Dean Vogtman; produced by Dean Vogtman and Dan Fitzpatrick).

For sale

Give me, give me, give me, says the GOP.
You got it, say rightwing billionaires

"We’re helping (Scott Walker), as we should. We’ve gotten pretty good at this over the years. We’ve spent a lot of money in Wisconsin. We’re going to spend more." - David Koch (Singer. Palm Beach Post; February 20, 2012)

Koch, it was revealed last year, also boasted of siphoning money into the campaigns of Wisconsin GOP senators as well.  

Republicans have gotten pretty good at being the post-Citizens United party of billionaires, grabbing up money in a period in which concentration of wealth is worse than in the Gilded Age.  

Republicans maintain their alliance with the religious right and Catholic Church out of practical political necessity. The same with gun manufacturers. (See today's Homeowner Shoots and Kills Teen Who Entered Wrong Home After Party.)

But GOP hearts are where they get their money—rightwing billionaires like Christopher Cline of Cline Research and Development (Mining), the Koch brothers, Diane Hendricks, and rightwing forces such as Sheldon Adelson, and assorted other billionaires funneling money into Super PACs.

For Republicans, Wisconsin, the United States, public land, the public school system, anything they can get their hands on are for sale.

One Wisconsin Democrat, Sen. Lena Taylor (Milwaukee) has her hands out and wants to suck in some of the anti-public school, rightwing money as Taylor apes her GOP colleagues.

Let's hope Taylor is an aberration. We know Scott Walker, Paul Ryan and hacks such as Pennsylvania Republican Governor Tom Corbett are the norm.

Scott Walker Trying to Provoke Those Opposed to Massive Open Pit Mine

Stand against Scott Walker and Christopher Cline

Update: Meanwhile, back in Madison Scott Walker's Department of Administration "plans to implement emergency rules for citing protesters, which would bypass the need for public input," and allow the police to successfully target anyone protesting Walker's policies, even to the point of closing the state capitol because of the declared emergency.
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"I think (mining-related companies) would like to get going as quickly as possible," Scott Walker said. "Even with the threat of legal action, I don't think you'll see a slowdown of the process."

Scott Walker knows exactly how his words are received, and now Walker is attempting to again play the part of agent provocateur.

Just days after Walker signed the mining bill gutting environmental laws, in typical Walker fashion, Walker is directing his rare public comments with words intended to offend, insult and inflame those who oppose the huge mine.

Opposition to the Gogebic Taconite's [of Cline Resource and Development Group] open-pit iron ore mine in northern Wisconsin is growing; and Native Americans have made clear they will not stand down as their land is raped and the waters are polluted.

Walker acts like the operation and legality of the open pit mine is a fait accompli.


Wisconsin League of Conservation Voters

Walker gives no measure of respect whatsoever to the widespread opposition and the many legal and constitutional problems with the mining bill and the proposed mine.

He doesn't even attempt to address any concern, no matter how widespread, no matter how obviously valid, no matter the grave nature of what an open pit mine can do to an ecological system

"I think (mining-related companies) would like to get going as quickly as possible," Walker said last week. "Even with the threat of legal action, I don't think you'll see a slowdown of the process."

Walker wants conflict; that's why he shows open contempt by pretending to believe opposition does not exist, and that no serious issues are in play.

Walker has his hand on the National Guard trigger, and would love to call for federal law enforcement to block Native American resistance, all in service to the mining industry and Walker's political career.

As Al Gedicks notes, Gogebic Taconite's open-pit mine is "not only a major rollback of environmentally protective mining laws, it is also a well-funded mining industry assault on the grass-roots environmental, sport fishing and tribal movement."

Governor as troll: One who makes inflammatory commentary intended to offend.

A corrupt governor and a con artist, Cline Resource and Development Group's Scott Walker may one day look back and discover that the open-pit iron ore mine was a bribe and callow insult too far.

Stand with the Bad River Tribe Site

Stand with our environment, our state and the Bad River Tribe

Stand with our environment, our state and the Bad River Tribe,

"Throughout the process, Republican leaders along with the Governor have falsely claimed that the bill would not reduce environmental standards. However, the day following Senate deliberation of the bill, Senate author Tom Tiffany finally admitted the truth - that his bill would not only allow for 'adverse environmental impacts' to occur during mining, but that the bill was written to protect the company in the case of an inevitable lawsuit."

- Wisconsin Sen. Bob Jauch (Poplar, Wisconsin), via Sarah LittleRedfeather Kalmanson

View of the econsystem immediately downstream from Gogebic Taconite’s proposed mine

Update: Must reads today by Charles Pierce (Esquire) and Brian Pierson (Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel), an attorney representing the Bad River band of Chippewa arguing for the rule of law.
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From Rep. Tod Ohnstad (D-Kenosha):  Aerial view of the econsystem immediately downstream from Gogebic Taconite’s proposed mine in northern Wisconsin.

"The way the Republicans have rushed this bill through the committee process left me no choice but to vote against it,” said Rep. Ohnstad. "We would have more hearings of the Kenosha City Council about whether to put up a new stop sign!"

As for Gogebic Taconite's Christopher Cline: You really think I give a shit, I live in Palm Beach!

Cline is like locusts; or more specifically the privately held Cline Resource and Development Group.

He buys up the politicians for sale; his companies come in, consumes all the natural resources; and then they as Cline's companies leave a wasteland.

He wants to despoil a pristine environment, and make a lot of money doing it.

What the people of Wisconsin, and the people of Ashland and Iron counties want is not Cline's concern.

Mining Owner from Palm Beach Gave Tommy Thompson $2,500, $10,000s More to GOP in 2012

Christopher Cline of Palm Beach Gardens, Florida and head of Gogebic Taconite gave Tommy Thompson $2,500 for Thompson's unsuccessful run for U.S. Senate in 2012, a search at the Center for Responsive Politics reveals.
Cline has numerous companies that he uses to funnel money into politicians with their hands out.

Cline also contributed over $100,000 in 2012 alone to GOP organizations and figures including Mitt Romney and House Speaker John Boehner, and remains a dirty coal producer who some call the New King of Coal.

As for Wisconsin, taking the iron and trashing the environment will do nicely.

Gogebic Taconite's Christopher Cline is set on raping the land in northern Wisconsin and no one is going to get in his way.

Certainly, not the people who live in in Iron and Ashland counties.

GOP May Find Out: Not a Good Idea to Mess with Folks' Land and Homes

Bad River Is Terrible Place to Rip Up and Plunder

GOP and Mining Interests: We're just here to help.The privately held Mining group that rewrote Wisconsin's environmental laws with GOP complicity is of course in this for the money, and it doesn't care what it leaves behind.
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Messing with people's land is not wise, no matter how illegally and underhanded the Wisconsin Republican Party has decided to scheme with the Florida-based Gogebic Taconite.

Scott Walker is in Florida for a fundraiser; wonder if any of his mining buddies are around.

For Gogebic Taconite to come to Iron and Ashland counties and rip up and pollute the land on the Bad River Watershed—which empties into Lake Superior, and the homes of the Bad River Indian Reservation and Wisconsin residents on this pristine land—will prove a difficult proposition no matter how many Republicans Gogebic Taconite have in their pockets.

In fact, this attack on a way of life may make Scott Walker's attack on workers look like a walk in the park by comparison.

"GOP extremists are fully in charge of Wisconsin state government and are willing to attack a native culture and the state's constitution for political and partisan hegemony," notes Jim Rowen after news that the state assembly passed the iron mining bill on a party line vote.

Now, GOP extremists may just find out how badly it plays to savage the Wisconsin Constitution, and pillage the pristine Bad River and Lake Superior in the land that Wisconsin citizens and Native Americans up North call home, many of whom live there because it's stunningly beautiful.

As for Gogebic Taconite, it is but one $billion company of the privately held Cline Resource and Development Group, of billionaire Christopher "Chris" Cline fame.

Cline is this for money, period. Not for jobs, not for preserving the land, not for helping Northern Wisconsin. In 2011, the New York Times (Geraldine Fabrikant) ran a piece on the slowing market for mega yachts.

The 161-foot Mine Games, a boat built by Trinity Yachts of Gulfport, Miss., was put on the market for $27 million several months ago, for example, because its owner, Chris Cline, who heads Cline Resource and Development, a mine development company, had a larger boat on order.

Not sure who Cline and his partners are going to have do Gogebic Taconite's public relations campaign up north in Wisconsin, but I can tell you they are going to be good.

Consider our neighbor to the South, Illinois. From the AP:

An investor who's trying to develop an iron ore mine in northern Wisconsin also owns a coal mine in Illinois that's accused of doing too little to resolve long-standing water pollution problems.

The Illinois Environmental Protection Agency is seeking enforcement action over Macoupin Energy, alleging that the company isn't adequately addressing groundwater problems at its Shay 1 mine in Carlinville, Ill., the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported (http://bit.ly/14ts7XI) (on March 6, 2013).

The agency said it plans to refer the case to the Illinois attorney general's office.

Macoupin is one of four Illinois mines owned by billionaire Christopher Cline, who wants to build a $1.5 billion iron ore mine just south of Lake Superior ... .

The proposed Wisconsin mine, known as Gogebic Taconite, is at the center of a debate over whether Wisconsin should ease environmental safeguards and make other regulatory changes to the process of granting mine permits.

Republicans and the huge energy companies assure us: Don't fret over the environment, climate change, your land, your water, or your backyard; we're just here to help.