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Posts published in “Day: May 13, 2007”

Enron?

It's been noted in a number of other places, but the quote is so startling we thought it ought to be noticed here too. It appears in a press release by Oregon House Minority Leader Wayne Scott, R-Canby, about a proposed corporate tax increase proposed by Representative David Edwards, D-Hillsboro:

“This is a tax increase on every business in Oregon, from Enron on down to Mom and Pop."

Enron?

Dam-pull’s new allies

Most intriguing Sunday story is a piece in the Eugene Register-Guard suggesting a gradual tide-turning on removal of the four eastern Washington Snake river dams. Conventional wisdom has been that, regionally, dam removal is a political non-starter. Some polls have indicated deep division in the public, but politicians overall are strongly lined up against a teardown, and that could be another indicator. And there are those studies showing a rise in electric rates if the dams were gone.

So consider this paragraph from the R-G, in profiling a farmer for whom dam removal is becoming increasingly thinkable:

It is still a relatively rare phenomenon, but one becoming more noticeable: Some members of the dams' natural constituency, such as farmers, are talking to their downriver antagonists about a future that might not include the four lower Snake River dams. There is talk of reconstituting a regional rail system to deliver Jones' wheat to Portland. There is talk of a wind farm to replace the electricity - enough to power most of Manhattan - generated by the four dams.

NOTE Should be noted, and wasn't originally: This article originated in the New York Times. And see also Kevin Richert's blog take on it.