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Reynolds favors local control of wind turbine locations

Posted on by Rick Watts

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Former Governor Terry Branstad championed statewide standards that overrode local attempts to restrict where livestock confinements may be built, but his successor says she will not propose statewide standards for placement of wind turbines.

The Madison County Board of Supervisors will hold a September 10th public hearing about a county-wide moratorium on construction of wind turbines. “This is a local decision, so that’s exactly what they should be doing,” Governor Kim Reynolds said during a news conference Tuesday.

Reynolds said permits for wind turbine towers are issued by local, not state officials.

“This is something that local governments will be deciding,” Reynolds said. “They’re the ones that grant them and can make the decision not to.”

The Madison County Board of Health claims wind turbines can cause nausea and headaches for people who live in nearby homes. Wind industry officials say there are no scientific studies that make those conclusions. Reynolds told reporters Madison County officials have the authority to follow through on rules barring wind turbines from within a mile-and-a-half of a home.

“Right now, the way that it’s set up, it’s a local decision,” Reynolds said, “so that’s the current proceedures, the statute that they’re operating under.”

After five Iowa counties passed local ordinances raising the minimum wage locally, Governor Terry Branstad signed a state law overriding those local decisions. Branstad also touted statewide curriculum standards for Iowa’s public schools schools.

Farmers’ Almanac calling for snowy cold midwest winter

Posted on by Rick Watts

BY 

RADIO IOWA – The new edition of the Farmers’ Almanac predicts a freezing, frosty winter is ahead for Iowa and the rest of the Midwest.

Sandi Duncan, the publication’s managing editor, says they’re calling for above normal snowfall and below normal temperatures.
Duncan says, “We’re calling this winter a ‘polarcoaster’ winter because we think there’s going to be quite a few thrills and chills up and down the thermometer this winter.”

The Almanac is forecasting what it calls a “memorable” storm that will produce “hefty snows” for the region between January 20th and 23rd, followed by bitter cold as low as 40-below zero. “We’re looking at the coldest outbreak of the season to be at the end of January and the beginning of February,” Duncan says. “Overall, in your region we’re calling for a frigid and snowy winter.”

This past spring was lousy for many farmers in the region, with prolonged cold, wet weather and widespread flooding. The Almanac is predicting essentially a repeat for next spring. “We do see a very slow start to spring once again with chilly, wet conditions hanging on into April,” Duncan says. “The good news is, we also have a summer forecast, and we see scorching temperatures with not the greatest but near-normal precipitation. Hopefully, things will even out a little bit as summer continues to take hold in 2020.”

Meteorologists at the National Weather Service often put little stock in forecasts more than a few weeks out, but Duncan notes the Farmers’ Almanac has been predicting the weather for longer  than the National Weather Service. The Almanac’s forecasts extend out from six to 16 months and they’re based on a formula established two centuries ago.

“It was set on a bunch of rules that we’ve altered slightly but we still consider a lot of the rules that our founding editor in 1818, we still follow them,” Duncan says. “They are rules that talk about sunspot activity, tidal action, the Moon, the position of the planets. They apply them to different weather conditions and they’ve been doing a pretty good job for us.” She says those who follow the publication’s long-range outlooks say they’re 80 to 85{99cd714f394079a7f0ed2eb1518dd31342ff3ceb5b6c267c3ad8acd5b5a7d66b} accurate.

Eric Paslay Announces Live Album

Posted on by Bob Ballard

Eric Paslay is getting ready to release a live album. “Live In Glasgow,” which is expected out sometime later this year, features ten tracks recorded during his European tour last summer.

“The first time I played in Glasgow I fell in love with the fans’ passion and energy and knew immediately we had to record my live album there,” Eric shares. “It was a blast! If we were able to capture even half of the good vibes that were in that room that night, we made a great record.”

Check out the track list below:

“Song About A Girl”
“Barefoot Blue Jean Night”
“Angel Eyes”
“Amarillo Rain”
“Even If It Breaks Your Heart” / “Learning To Fly”
“Here Comes Love” / “On The Road Again”
“High Class”
“She Don’t Love You”
“Less Than Whole”
“Friday Night”

Source: Music Row

 

Today in 1971, John Denver’s “Take Me Home, Country Roads,” hits #2 on the pop singles chart. 

Posted on by Bob Ballard

Today in 1971, John Denver’s single, “Take Me Home, Country Roads,” peaked at #2 on the pop singles chart.

It was released as a single performed by Denver on April 12, 1971, peaking at number 2 on Billboard’s US Hot 100 singles for the week ending August 28, 1971. The song was a success on its initial release and was certified Gold by the RIAA on August 18, 1971, and Platinum on April 10, 2017. The song became one of John Denver’s most popular and beloved songs. It has continued to sell, with over 1.5 million digital copies sold in the United States. It is considered to be Denver’s signature song.

The song has a prominent status as an iconic symbol of West Virginia, which it describes as “almost Heaven”. In March 2014, it became one of the four official state anthems of West Virginia.

Judge orders drugmaker to pay $572 million in opioid lawsuit

Posted on by Rick Watts

By SEAN MURPHY

NORMAN, Okla. (AP) — An Oklahoma judge on Monday found Johnson & Johnson and its subsidiaries helped fuel the state’s opioid crisis and ordered the consumer products giant to pay $572 million, more than twice the amount another drug manufacturer agreed to pay in a settlement.

Cleveland County District Judge Thad Balkman’s ruling followed the first state opioid case to make it to trial and could help shape negotiations over roughly 1,500 similar lawsuits filed by state, local and tribal governments consolidated before a federal judge in Ohio.

An attorney for the companies said they plan to appeal the ruling to the Oklahoma Supreme Court.

Before Oklahoma’s trial began May 28, the state reached settlements with two other defendant groups — a $270 million deal with OxyContin-maker Purdue Pharma and an $85 million settlement with Israeli-owned Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd.

Oklahoma argued the companies and their subsidiaries created a public nuisance by launching an aggressive and misleading marketing campaign that overstated how effective the drugs were for treating chronic pain and understated the risk of addiction. Oklahoma Attorney General Mike Hunter says opioid overdoses killed 4,653 people in the state from 2007 to 2017.

Hunter called Johnson & Johnson a “kingpin” company that was motivated by greed. He specifically pointed to two former Johnson & Johnson subsidiaries, Noramco and Tasmanian Alkaloids, which produced much of the raw opium used by other manufacturers to produce the drugs.

“That’s the message to other states: We did it in Oklahoma. You can do it elsewhere,” Hunter said. “Johnson & Johnson will finally be held accountable for thousands of deaths and addictions caused by their activities.”

Among those seated in the courtroom on Monday were Craig and Gail Box, whose son Austin was a 22-year-old standout linebacker for the Oklahoma Sooners when he died of a prescription drug overdose in 2011.

One of the attorneys for the state, Reggie Whitten, said he also lost a son to opioid abuse.

“I feel like my boy is looking down,” Whitten said after the judge’s ruling, his voice cracking with emotion.

Oklahoma pursued the case under the state’s public nuisance statute and presented the judge with a plan to abate the crisis that would cost between $12.6 billion for 20 years and $17.5 billion over 30 years. Attorneys for Johnson & Johnson have said that estimate is wildly inflated. The judge’s award would cover the costs of one year of the state’s abatement plan, funding things like opioid use prevention and addiction treatment.

Attorneys for the company have maintained they were part of a lawful and heavily regulated industry subject to strict federal oversight, including the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency and the Food and Drug Administration, during every step of the supply chain. Lawyers for the company said the judgment was a misapplication of public nuisance law.

Sabrina Strong, an attorney for Johnson & Johnson and its subsidiaries, said the companies have sympathy for those who suffer from substance abuse but called the judge’s decision “flawed.”

“You can’t sue your way out of the opioid abuse crisis,” Strong said. “Litigation is not the answer.”

Attorneys for the plaintiffs in the cases consolidated before a federal judge in Ohio called the Oklahoma judgment “a milestone amid the mounting evidence against the opioid pharmaceutical industry.”

“While public nuisance laws differ in every state, this decision is a critical step forward for the more than 2,000 cities, counties, and towns we represent in the consolidation of federal opioid cases,” they said in a statement.

Also on Monday, the Kentucky Supreme Court declined to review an earlier ruling , making previously secret testimony from former Purdue Pharma President Rickard Sackler and other documents public. The court record was sealed in 2015 as part of a $24 million settlement between Purdue and Kentucky.

The 17 million pages of documents were being shipped Monday from Frankfort to Pike County, where the case originated. The Pike County Circuit Court Clerk’s office could not immediately say how and when they would be available.

___

Follow Sean Murphy at www.twitter.com/apseanmurphy

 

Hero pilot of Flight 232 crash in Sioux City has died

Posted on by Rick Watts

Woody Gottburg, KSCJ, Sioux City

RADIO IOWA – Captain Al Haynes, the pilot of United Airlines flight 232 — which crashed in Sioux City in 1989, has died at the age of 87.

Larry Finley, director of Sioux City’s Mid-American Air Museum, became friends with Haynes. Finley says Haynes loved Sioux City and the response he and the crew were given in the aftermath of the deadly crash.

“He made that comment many times in our conversations,” Finley says. “He said, ‘You know, I’ve been to a lot of communities but I really feel at home with the friendliness and the compassion of the people in Sioux City. I never knew anything about Sioux City until we made this unannounced approach to your airport.’”

The DC-10 had suffered complete hydraulic failure enroute from Denver to Chicago with 296 people on board. Haynes managed to guide the crippled airliner to Sioux Gateway Airport, where it crash landed as a fleet of ambulances and fire trucks waited at the scene. While 111 died in the fiery crash, 185 survived.

Finley says Haynes never considered himself a hero and deeply regretted the loss of life in the crash. “That’s one of the reasons that every year, subsequent to the crash, the crew had its own reunion,” Finley says. “Captain Haynes explained to me that it was therapeutic for all of them because they all felt that somewhere in the back of their mind, they were all responsible.”

Without the perseverance of the crew, the outcome could have ended in greater loss of life, as no domestic airliner had ever experienced that type of catastrophe before. “Captain Haynes said that was the reason they made it to Sioux City and it was as successful as it was because individually, the four people in the cockpit had never experienced total hydraulic failure on an aircraft like that,” Finley says. “He says it was everybody having input into the final solution.” With all hydraulics out, Haynes steered the plane by using the thrusters on the two remaining engines, one on each wing.

Haynes died Sunday at a Seattle hospital. Funeral arrangements are pending.

Grassley and Vilsack meet up to tout USMCA ratification

Posted on by Rick Watts

By:   Amy Mayer, Iowa Public Radio

RADIO IOWA –  Two prominent politicians from opposing parties held an event Monday to call for approval of the U.S. Mexico Canada Agreement. The new deal would replace the North American Free Trade Agreement, updating some provisions and changing others.

U.S. Senator Chuck Grassley appeared at a dairy in Des Moines with Democrat Tom Vilsack, the former Iowa governor who served as President Obama’s agriculture secretary.

“When everybody thinks everything in Washington is partisan and there’s an opportunity to stress bipartisanship — and with somebody of Governor Vilsack’s background particularly as secretary of agriculture for eight years in the previous administration, it brings credibility,” Grassley told reporters.

Vilsack is now the president of the U.S. Dairy Export Council.

“It is the hope of the dairy industry and dairy farmers across the US that we get this ratified before the end of the year,” Vilsack said. “We don’t want this bleeding into 2020 and all the political ramifications of that year.”

Vilsack said trade tensions with China are an should be the “impetus” or incentive for getting the USMCA ratified.

Taylor Swift Is The Highest Paid Woman In Music

Posted on by Bob Ballard

Earlier this year, Forbes named Taylor Swift the highest-paid entertainer of the year, so it’s no surprise that she now also tops the mag’s list of the Highest Paid Women in Music.

Taylor, who just released her seventh album, “Lover,” earns the top spot by bringing in $185 million in the past year, topping the second-highest paid female artist, Beyonce, by more than $100 million.

Top Ten Highest Paid Women in Music

Taylor Swift ($185 mil)
Beyoncé ($81 mil)
Rihanna ($62 mil)
Katy Perry ($57.5 mil)
Pink ($57 mil)
Ariana Grande ($48 mil)
Jennifer Lopez ($43 mil)
Lady Gaga ($39.5 mil)
Celine Dion ($37.5 mil)
Shakira ($35 mil)

 

 

William Penn eyes bounce back season

Posted on by Rick Watts

BY 

RADIO IOWA – William Penn coach Todd Hafner says team chemistry is rarely associated with football but it was a factor in a disappointing 2018 season. The Statesmen stumbled to a 2-4 start, lost to four teams ranked in the top ten, and finished 4-7. It snapped a string of four straight seven win seasons for the program.

We were a little bit behind the eight ball”, said Hafner. “We did not play very good at times and our team chemistry wasn’t great. It gave us a lot of things to work on in the spring and so far this fall our team chemistry has been fantastic and I really think this team is headed in a good direction.”

Quarterback Tyler Wood was injured early in a season opening loss at Morningside and missed a couple of game in 2018. He returns for his senior season to direct Penn”s triple option offense.

“He is the type of kid that can make a small mistake and make up for it with his athletic ability,” added Hafner. “We have designed plays for him and hopefully he can stay healthy and carry us through.”

They will need to be good early in a challenging Heart of America Conference schedule that finds the Statesmen playing three ranked foes in their first four games. The opener against 18th ranked Evangel is August 31st in Oskaloosa.

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