Today's Washington Post story by Michael Mosk, "McCain Pushed Land Swap That Benefits Backer," was actually scooped Ken Olsen, a reporter for the Vancouver Columbian, whose by a 2003 Alicia Patterson Foundation article was "Secret Landswaps Taxpayers Help Finance."

According to Olsen, in 2000, the General Accounting Office

recommended the Bureau of Land Management and Forest Service abandon their land exchange programs, concluding they were irrevocably broken. The agencies instead should auction acreage they want to get rid of and buy what is worthy of public ownership.

I'd wager that not many people read of this particular deal until the Post covered it. Mosk provides documents for readers weigh the evidence for themselves. While McCain's office stresses that SunCor was not involved until after the land swap, that does not mean that SunCor and the landowner and political supporter Ruskin have not profited.

I've observed similar deals here, such as the 1986 Virginia Tech land swap in which a Tech employee engineered a trade of his agricultural land for 247 acres at tje omtersectopm pf 460 and Peppers Ferry Road, which soon became a shopping center. It seems such swaps almost always involve the taxpayer losing title over public land more attractive for commercial development without adequate compensation. As Betts of SunCor said, his company was not

really interested in spending a lot of time on it until we knew if the legislation would pass.

And although they are not land swaps, per se, McCains maneuvering also brings to Montgomery County's condemnation of land in Nellie's Cave for a road on a planning commsion recommendation voted on by landowner Joe Draper so that a developer Joe Draper, which enabled him to build an upscale subdivision. And of course, recently, there is outgoing Blacksburg mayorRoger Hedgepeth's 2006 race to get the rugby field next to Margaret Beek Elementary School rezoned commercial for a bait and switch. What was suposed to be a lifestyle center and housing now will be used for what appears will be a Wal-Mart store just 4 miles form another one right down from said intersection of the Tech land swap.

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Interesting visitor of the day: Someone from Silver Spring, MD, spent over 25 minutes reading 3 pages, after finding my blog on a Google search of "critique warner lieberman & climate change science." The out-click was to the FOE fact sheet. Someone from Puerto Rico searched Google for "linares v. jackson" found my post, about tenant rights or the lack thereof under HUD.
Someone came form NewsTrust and read not only the featured piece on lcimate change, but also my piece yesterday on the FEC. But what I'm most thrilled about is the person from Boulder yesterday, who spent almost 20 minutes reading 22 pages, having searched Google for "inez, ky" martin county coal mine."