Where Have All the Young People Gone?

I recently wrote an article about the "brain drain" problem facing Wyoming and other Midwest and Rocky Mountain states. Check it out here.

I also designed a small (and fictional) online newspaper for an online journalism class. I'm not going to quit my day job, but it was kind of fun.

Dry Fork Power Plant bad for environment and business

In October 2007, the path was paved to create an institution that has the power to pollute the air, land and water of Wyoming for decades to come. It was then that Wyoming environmental regulators issued a permit that would allow the Basin Electric Power Cooperative to build a $1.3 billion, 385-megawatt coal-fired power plant north of the town of Gillette. This plant will supply power to the Dry Fork Coal Mine, and excess electricty will be sold out of the state (KURL News).

While the plant will undeniably generate money for Wyoming, creating jobs in Gillette and bringing in cash from electricity sold to adjacent states, the environmental impact is unacceptable. When the plant is completed, it will be one of the dirtiest, most pollutant plants in the state (Sierra Club). This is because instead of being equipped with modern machinery, the plant will use 50-year-old technology to burn the coal. Using this archaic system, it is estimated that over the next 40 years the Dry Fork Power Plant will spew more than 3 million tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere (KURL News). Each year for decades, the plant will emit more than 25 million tons of methane (Earthjustice). The plant will also release mercury and it is predicted to contribute to acid rain and haze in the region (Sierra Club).

The Basin Electric Power Cooperative is undoubtedly aware of the negative environmental impact the Dry Fork Power Plant will have. After receiving its permit from the state to build the plant, the Co-op withdrew its application for a $750 million federal loan to help finance the construction. In order to receive the loan from the government, the Co-op would have to prepare and submit an environmental impact study on the plant (KURL News). In this report, the Co-op would be forced to document the various destructive qualities of the plant.

The power plant isn’t expected to be finished until 2011, but various environmental groups such as Sierra Club Wyoming and the Power River Basin Resource Council are already speaking out in protest (Western Resource Advocates). The national environmental conservation group Earthjustice filed a motion with the Wyoming Environmental Quality Council protesting the issuing of an air quality permit to the Co-op. The hearing in that case won’t take place until November (Earthjustice).

In addition to having destructive effects on Wyoming’s environment, the building of the Dry Fork Power Plant also puts Wyoming behind the times when it comes to national attitudes about environmental responsibility. Last year alone, plans for 59 coal-fired power plants were abandoned in 23 states under pressure from state governments and the public to reduce pollution and emissions (Stateline.org).

Wyoming’s own governor, Democrat Dave Freudenthal, issued a statement in March 2008 saying, “Whether you believe in global warming or not, the political and economic realities have changed, and Wyoming needs to adapt to those changes.” By using 50-year-old technology to run the plant, the Co-op is overlooking opportunities to produce cleaner and safer energy. Technology exists (and is utilized in many states) that allows coal-fired power plant emissions to be stored underground or turns the carbon dioxide byproducts into synthetic natural gas (Stateline.org).

Times are changing and Wyoming can’t afford to fall behind, especially when it comes to one of its most profitable resources: coal. As one of the nation's top producers of coal and coal energy, Wyoming should be seen as innovative, not stagnant. The Dry Fork Power Plant is fundamentally environmentally irresponsible and out of touch with changing political and cultural views about energy production. But this isn’t an all or nothing situation: the Basin Electric Power Cooperative could build the plant in a way that is safer for the environment and still produces profitable energy. Why it is choosing not to is a mystery.

Only 51 Payments To Go

Today I received my first bill for the 2008 Honda Civic that I bought a couple weeks ago. It was scary signing those papers in the dealership and realizing that I was now, officially, in debt. Although I have no doubt that I will be able to handle this loan, it’s still kind of a daunting to know that I used to owe nothing and now I owe thousands.

As I enter my adult life, I am determined to not make the mistake that many Americans have made and not get over my head in debt. At $288, my monthly car payment accounts for 8 percent of my gross monthly income. And since I rent my apartment and have no student loans, that 8 percent accounts for all my current debt. This puts me well below the 30 percent cap that many experts say is a comfortable amount of debt.

Unfortunately, many people in my age demographic are spiraling out of control when it comes to their debt, credit card and otherwise. They are spending more, saving less, and ignoring that golden rule of finances: what goes out must not be more than what comes in. According to the Federal Reserve's Survey of Consumer Finances, 76 percent of Americans in their 20s are in debt. Gen Y consumers are “saddled with more student debt than previous generations, are continuing to rack up credit card debt, and are not putting money away for retirement or other savings.” People my age account for every one in ten bankruptcy filings.

As a whole, Americans hold more than $850 billion in credit card debt and in those households that utilize credit cards regularly the average debt is more than $8,500. That’s a lot of money, especially if you’re only making the minimum monthly payments.

Of course, not everyone gets into trouble with debt because they are irresponsible or reckless. For people who are living on minimum wage, have been laid off or lost their insurance, or can’t cope with rising fuel and food prices, sometimes going into debt is the only way to keep their heads above water. For example, my sophomore year of college I had to have surgery. The cost for the operation plus five days in the hospital was more than $12,000. Luckily for my family and me, my mother’s insurance covered almost all of it. I can’t even imagine how someone with no insurance, making $5.85 an hour would even begin to pay that back.

I am the first to admit that I am not perfect when it comes to budgeting. I love handbags, fast food, and new music, and I occasionally spend more of my discretionary income than I should. But I never spend money that I don’t have. I don’t want to work for 40 years and have nothing to show for it at the end. So I’m going to pay this car bill and every one after it until it’s paid off in 2012. Every month I’m going to put away at least 8 percent of my income into a savings account. And most importantly of all, I’m not going to spend money I don’t have.

For an illuminating and disturbing look at the American credit crisis, check out James Scurlock's 2007 documentary Maxed Out: Hard Times, Easy Credit and the Era of Predatory Lenders.

Iraq: Admit Failure

There were many reasons for going to war that made sense to a lot of people back in 2003. We were a nation gripped by fear and we were being guided by a president and administration that still held the confidence of much of the American public. But five years, billions of dollars, and thousands of lives later, we must admit something that America has never been good at: We made a mistake.

Let me start by saying that I have been adamantly opposed to the war from the very beginning, but I can understand why some people believed that it was the right thing to do. As laid out by the Bush Administration, going to war with Iraq seemed like a rational and, dare I say, responsible thing to do. They showed us satellite images of the bunkers where the weapons of mass destruction were being stored. High ranking officials assured us that Saddam Hussein was a cohort of Osama bin Laden. We felt pity for the Iraqi people who were being brutalized by their tyrannical leader. Still riding the wave of goodwill that he garnered after Sept. 11, President Bush seemed like a sure, confident, and competent leader.

But there were no WMDs. And there has never been proof that Hussein had any real connection with bin Laden. For those of us who don't believe in blindly trusting those who have been elected to serve and lead us, it is now glaringly clear that this country was led into a war under false pretenses. Our emotions were manipulated at a strategic time by powerful men who knew exactly what they were doing. We aren't in Iraq right now to stop terrorism or free the oppressed or ensure world peace. We are there protecting our oil, trying to keep this region of the world that we are grossly over-dependent on under our thumb.

What has been the cost of this involvement? More than 4,000 U.S. soldiers have been killed and 30,000 have been wounded, many gravely and permanently. As for the people we were "liberating," a recent joint American/Iraqi survey put the number of Iraqi civilians killed since 2003 around a staggering 650,000 ("Study: War blamed for 655,000 deaths"). How is life better for these "casualties of war"?

Less important than the loss of human life, but still extremely troubling, is the financial toll. Financial analysts are now predicting that the cost could top $1 trillion by the time the war is resolved. While that is just an estimate, the bill is growing by a concrete $200 million per day ("Cost of Iraq war could surpass $1 trillion"). Who is going to foot that tab? Not George Bush. It's going to be future generations of tax payers, who are going to have to contribute a substantial portion of their hard earned wages towards paying for a war that accomplished absolutely nothing.

Even though a solution isn't clear (how could it be with this magnitude of a mess?), the first step is admitting that we made a mistake. We failed. Admit that we shouldn't have gone there because we did so for the wrong reasons. For those of us who disagreed with the war from the beginning, that's a pretty easy statement to make. For people who truly believed that going to war in Iraq was the right thing to do, it's probably not so easy. But the evidence speaks for itself and it's time for this country as a whole to take responsibility for its actions. Start dealing with this situation from the standpoint of correcting our mistakes and getting out somewhat intact, rather than forging ahead still foolishly and irrationally believing that we can come out on top.

But there will always be people who believe that the president knows best and that it's our jobs as citizens to follow along. So I guess if President Bush's idea of a successful military campaign is one that kills nearly a three-quarters of a million civilians, costs American taxpayers thousands of billions of dollars, destabilizes a whole region, and causes an entire generation to lose faith in its government, then congratulations, "Mission Accomplished."

For more information on the Iraq War, past and present, visit CNN's War in Iraq Archive.