BrentAllen

tjhammer, Robin Leach would be talking about someone else with that description, not me. :-) Allowing gay leaders in the BSA would send a message that the homosexual lifestyle is an acceptable alternative. I believe, and my religion teaches, that homosexual behaviour is immoral. I don't know whether gays choose to be gay, or are born that way. That really doesn't matter much to me. What does matter to me is if they have chosen to live that lifestyle, then the membership policies prohibit them from joining the BSA. The right to free association is guaranteed in the Constitution.

tjhammer, I think you are assuming more than I am stating. By "lifestyle" I simply mean living in a physical sexual relationship with a member of the same sex.

"Or do I have to tow the party line and cast disdain and judgement just to wear the uniform?" I guess I'm still wondering why anyone would join a group they thought was so bigoted. Does the good in the program just outweigh what you see as the bad? Or do you think the policy is going to change some day? The Sierra Club does some wonderful things, but I refuse to join because of their politics. Same thing with the National Wildlife Federation. tjhammer, You don't know ANYTHING about me, just some cartoonish image you cling to as justification for YOUR prejudice. I have family members who are gay, but I would not want nor allow them to be my son's Scout leader. I do not hate them. I accept them for who they are, as they do me. packsaddle, "The fact that two persons engage in an expression of love, to me, is never immoral." So, if a 50 year-old man expresses love (physical expression) for a neighbor's 10 year-old boy, you won't think that is immoral? Get rid of the pedophile laws?

"Why in the world would anyone think that???" You might want to ask Tim Curran. In a conversation with Quentin Alexander, he said "he specifically wanted to [be in the scouts] because he so firmly believed personally in a homosexual lifestyle that there was, quote, not anything wrong with it and he wanted to make sure that other kids understood that." http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/data2/californiastatecases/s039738.pdf I don't think I have ever seen the prohibition about discussing sexual issues with Scouts. I didn't realize the mission was "to prepare young people to make ethical choices over their lifetimes, except about sexual issues, by instilling in them the values of the Scout Oath and Law." Again, I ask, if gays are allowed in as leaders, how are you going to stop them from advocating their lifestyle? I'm not saying they all will, but what if some do? You wouldn't be able to kick them out - so what would you do?

Calico, I don't think your argument holds water. In the late 1970's, the BSA saw the error of their ways and went back to a pre-1970's model - backwoods camping, traditional Scouting. The numbers started to rise again. The population didn't change any during that time - if anything, the trend was still toward urban - but Scouting changed back to traditional, and the numbers went up. I don't think your argument can explain that occurance. I've lived in metro Atlanta my entire life, but I love the outdoors, the wilderness areas. That is true of a lot of people in the South. What B-P found in 1907 still holds true - boys are drawn to the outdoors, to the smell of a campfire, to the camaraderie of a group of close friends, to the challenge of camping in the wilderness. Some people view discrimination as immoral. Some view homosexuality as immoral. Which group is larger? If you allow gays as leaders, are you going to allow them to discuss homosexuality with the boys? In case anyone needs a reminder, Scouts Canada "evolved" to allow in gays, girls and athiests - look what happened to their numbers. A nose dive.

"Well said. Sometimes one needs to evolve or become a fossil." I've seen this time and time when discussing BSA policy regarding gays and athiests. IIRC, the BSA tried to "evolve" back in the early 1970's, after the counterculture era of the 1960's. Urban Scouting took the place of the backwoods. What happened then?

Gunny, You are going to run into a little bit of a maze on this issue. There is generally a good reason for it, however. For instance, I am NRA Rifle Instructor certified. With that certification, I can teach Rifleshooting merit badge and supervise shooting activities for Boy Scouts (All training and shooting activities must be supervised by a currently certified NRA rifle instructor or NRA coach who is 21 years of age or older.) However, I do not qualify to supervise or operate a BB range for Cub Scouts with that certification. In order to run BBs, I have to attend BSA BB certification, which is good for 2 years. The BSA certification class is very specific to the age of the boys and the types of ranges they will fire on. The class was not a waste of time. Our council offers BB and Archery certification on the same day, one right after each other, so you can complete both in one day. As for Wilderness First Aid, our Council offered 3 ARC and 1 SOLO course this year. What's the difference between the two? Go here to find out: http://www.doubleknot.com/openrosters/DocDownload.asp?id=19652 I attended the ARC course and really enjoyed it - pretty intense. Our council is offering an ARC CPR/First Aid/AED Instructor class this fall. Tuition is $150. Those who complete the entire course will receive a Red Cross CPR/First Aid/AED Instructor card with the Wilderness First Aid Basic instructor endorsement. The council will then reimburse you $50 for each Council WFA class you serve on as an instructor, up to $150. WFA isn't currently required for any activity that I'm aware of, but may be required (1 participant) for Philmont crews in 2008. If so, I'm sure the BSA will let us know which certs meet the requirement. You are just getting started on a (hopefully) long journey. Don't burn out in a sprint from the start. You've done more since May 1 that most Scouters do in a year. As for Wood Badge, I suggest attending after a year or two as a Scouter. It won't certify you for anything, except maybe being "certifiable" :-) I hope you enjoy it at least half as much as I did; if so, you will love it!

I had a CM from another district proudly tell me his Pack had done away with the Pinewood Derby, since it created so many bad feelings for the boys who didn't win. I actually laughed outloud at his comment, thinking he was kidding. Unfortunately, he wasn't. On the other hand, one of the staffers at Summer Camp told me his Troop requires Scouts to attend Green Bar training in order to make Eagle. I told him I thought that was a great idea, but asked how did they get around the "no adding to the requirements" rule. He said they took a round-about path - in order for a Scout to be eligible to run for or be appointed to one of the required leadership positions, they had to attend Green Bar. They have had very good results with this plan.

In the spirit of open scientific debate... Inside the Beltway John McCaslin July 27, 2007 Getting hotter The head of the Environmental Protection Agency says he will investigate a threatening letter sent by the leader of an EPA-member group, vowing to "destroy" the career of a climate skeptic. During a Capitol Hill hearing yesterday, Sen. James M. Inhofe, Oklahoma Republican and ranking member of the Environment and Public Works Committee, confronted EPA Administrator Stephen L. Johnson about the strongly-worded letter written July 13 by Michael T. Eckhart, president of the American Council on Renewable Energy (ACORE) that was sent to Marlo Lewis, senior fellow of the Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI). "It is my intention to destroy your career as a liar," Mr. Eckhart wrote. "If you produce one more editorial against climate change, I will launch a campaign against your professional integrity. I will call you a liar and charlatan to the Harvard community of which you and I are members. I will call you out as a man who has been bought by Corporate America. Go ahead, guy. Take me on." CEI does not dispute climate change, however it differs with certain environmental groups, including ACORE, on the causes. After Mr. Inhofe read Mr. Eckhart's comments, which were first reported by Inside the Beltway two weeks ago, the EPA chief promised to probe the matter. "Statements like this are of concern to me. I am a believer in cooperation and collaboration across all sectors," Mr. Johnson assured. "This is an area I will look into for the record." When Mr. Johnson confirmed that EPA is a member of ACORE, Mr. Inhofe asked if "it is appropriate to be a part of an organization that is headed up by a person who makes this statement." Late yesterday, Mr. Inhofe announced he will send letters to the departments of Agriculture, Commerce, Energy, and EPA, urging them to "reconsider their membership of ACORE." Based in Washington, ACORE's mission is to increase the use of renewable energy. Its 400-plus "paying" organizational members come from government, financial institutions, trade associations, academia, and other professional services. Besides ACORE, Mr. Eckhart is co-chairman of the World Council for Renewable Energy and a member of the Clinton Global Initiative. Previously, he was CEO of United Power Systems; vice president of the venture capital firm Arete Ventures; a General Electric manager; and a principal of Booz Allen Hamilton's energy practice. In a written response sent to Inside the Beltway last week, Mr. Eckhart apologized to "all the public who were offended" by his choice of words. He said he intended his letter to be a "private communication" in the context of "personal combat and jousting." However, this column earlier this week published another letter Mr. Eckhart sent in September to CEI President Fred Smith, saying "my children will have a lesser life because you are being paid by oil companies to spread a false story." He said he would give CEI, which advocates "sound science," 90 days to reverse its "position" on global warming, "or I will take every action I can think of to shut you down," including filing complaints with the Internal Revenue Service "on the basis that CEI is really a lobbyist for the energy industry."

Or maybe, Calico, McGivney had no intention of ever letting her son join the BSA, due to politics, and just wanted to disparage the organization. And maybe she wants to scare as many other parents as she can, hoping they won't let their sons join as well. She obviously knows nothing about the BSA - the Aims or Methods. I would think a rationale person would look at the good and bad, and see if one outweighs the other significantly. How many lives have been saved by Boy Scouts, trained in First Aid? Does she really see no positives, only danger?

Beavah, My Safety Afloat card does not say I am now qualified to take a group whitewater rafting down a Class IV river. It states I will make sure there is qualified supervision, "who is experienced and qualified in the particular watercraft skills and equipment involved in the activity." It also states they must complete "rescue training for the type of watercraft to be used in the activity..." If Scouters do as you say, no amount of training is going to help them - they are just clueless! What knowledge should the adults have? They should have the knowledge to complete those trainings, and follow the rules - it's that simple! If you aren't qualified and experienced in the activity, hire someone who is. This ain't rocket science. If someone wants more training in the different activities, attend Powder Horn.

"They concluded they needed all of half an hour overview to teach any module of WB." Wow, do I feel inferior, looking back at all the time I've invested as a staffer for the course that begins next weekend. Have they been invited to staff? Maybe they can come over here to Atlanta and teach me a few secrets. Heck, maybe they can teach our entire staff a few secrets. Since Gunny (and other military personnel) has already seen the material, maybe he can just ask for his beads. Gunny - sounds like you are ready. To learn "the BSA way" you might want to pick up the merit badge book on hiking and review it. I find the BSA Field Book to be very valuable. After that, nothing beats experience! Thanks for your dedication to Scouting.

I personally would love to see the BSA require training for all Scouters. If I were king, I would require it be completed before any Scouter could wear a uniform. Speaking of the uniform, I would love to see that required, in full, as well. Uniforming and training get the same treatment by some units - it is viewed as optional. This is usually the fault of the SM/CM. They can either rally the troops and be leaders on the issue, or they can follow the pack, which usually sinks to the lowest common denominator. It is a shame our volunteers don't see value in the training. The most common excuse I hear for not attending training is they don't have the time. If they don't have enough time to attend training, how are they ever going to have enough time to operate a unit? We bought a house in a very good school district. We expect the teachers to be well trained. Why would I send my son to a Troop where the leaders aren't trained? Why would any parent?

Gee, I thought you got your science news from out of work politicians. Did you ever take the time to read all of the IPCC reports, and notice what happened to predictions each time they issued a new report? I didn't think so. Where, exactly, do you get your science news? Specifically.(This message has been edited by BrentAllen)

Carrying my post over from the closed thread. To Gern: Who is the "fenced in suburbanite with no experience or training"? On which trip was there only one leader present? I must have missed something. Some Troops may only car camp or do very limited hiking, in very moderate climates. What type of training would you mandate for those leaders? We already mandate BALOO for Cubs and Webelos leaders. Certain trainings are required for certain types of activities, in order for a Troop to get a Tour Permit. What else would you mandate? How would that prevent the boy in NC from wandering off? I think the parents have the ultimate responsibility in deciding if they will let their son go on a trip. They need to be very knowledgeable about the training the leaders have, and their skills. As you know, someone can sit through a training class and pick up a card without learning a thing. There has been talk of mandating Wilderness First Aid for HA trips. Problem is there aren't nearly enough courses being offered to meet the demand, if it were required. Sorry to hear training isn't very popular in your area. Here, the Wilderness First Aid classes were all sold out. Climb-on Safely at Summer Camp had to turn Scouters away. BALOO has been sold out for every course for at least the past 4 years. I seek out training, whether it be First Aid related or other BSA areas. This is my third year serving on the Steering Committee for our Scouters Academy, the Council's largest training event. I have over 30 years of camping experience, and 25 years of hunting experience - here and in Africa. I'm smart enough to know I don't know everything, and that Mother Nature and wild animals plays by their own rules. I read lots of morbid books, like Death in Yellowstone, Bear Attacks of the Century, Death in Silent Places, and Into Thin Air so I can learn from other's mistakes. The day I stop learning is the day they take me to the morgue. Highlighting an accident where a boy fell in a river is not pointing out lax training. It is taking cheap shots at an organization she despises. BTW, the leader involved in the Superstition Mountains incident she mentions was a former Navy Seal. What type of training are you going to recommend for him? Fenced in suburbanite?

Tempest In A Teapot INVESTOR'S BUSINESS DAILY Posted 7/25/2007 Global Warming: A private firm's downgrade of its hurricane forecast raises an obvious question: If scientists can't get near-future projections in a limited area right, how can they predict the climate decades from now? A reasonable response is: They can't. But the global warming climate of fear did not blow in on the soft breezes of reason, but by the storm winds of emotion. Forecaster WSI Corp. said Tuesday that the season ending Nov. 30 will bring 14 named storms, six of which will grow into hurricanes, three of them major. WSI's initial forecast was for 15 named storms, eight hurricanes and four majors. Why the change? "Because," said WSI forecaster Todd Crawford, "ocean temperatures have not yet rebounded from the significant drop in late spring." Could it be that the 2007 hurricane season is turning out to be as overrated as 2006? Remember last year's predictions that we were in for a brutal spell of storms? It had been quiet, they said, and we were due for a series of Katrina-like hurricanes. But as we wrote last November, as the much-dreaded '06 season whimpered to a close, the storm year came in like a lamb and went out the same way. For years, the Greenshirts have told us that emissions of carbon dioxide resulting from man's addiction to fossil fuel-based energy are turning the planet into a sweltering hothouse. The United Nations' Intergovernmental Panel On Climate Change has projected a temperature increase of 2 to 11.5 degrees Fahrenheit for the 21st century due to the greenhouse effect. As a result, alarmists say, ice caps will melt, glaciers will thaw and sea levels will rise as much as 20 feet, causing floods and death in low-lying areas. Storms are also predicted to increase in both frequency and intensity. To prevent this coming Category 5 cataclysm, we're supposed to shell out trillions of dollars and gladly adopt Spartan lifestyles. Instead of trying, as their grandparents did, to see how many bodies they can squeeze into a telephone booth, today's college kids are expected to see how many they can get in a Prius. Yet the fact remains: The local weatherman can't forecast more than about 10 days out, and neither can the experts tell us how warm, or cool, the planet is going to be in 2100, 2075 or even 2050. Even short-term predictions have been off. James Hansen, NASA scientist, predicted a 0.45-degree Celsius (0.81-degree Fahrenheit) rise in global temperature from 1988 to 1997. But in reality (a place environmental activists rarely visit) the increase was a mere 0.11-degree Celsius. We hope no one in Hansen's neighborhood relies on him to tell them when it's going to rain or when they'll need a coat and hat. Setting aside the hubristic notion that alarmists know what the right temperature is, too many other factors besides the greenhouse effect influence climate for them to declare they know exactly, or even approximately, what's coming. Solar activity, for instance, is among the most powerful, as are the El Nino and La Nina phenomena. We also question the concept of a "global" temperature. How could such a thing be measured when weather stations dot rather than blanket the Earth? Danish physicist Bjarne Andresen, a professor at the University of Copenhagen, made sense earlier this year when he said it's "impossible to talk about a single temperature for something as complicated as the climate of Earth. "A temperature can be defined only for a homogeneous system (and) climate is not governed by a single temperature," he said. "Rather, differences of temperatures drive the processes and create the storms, sea currents, thunder, etc. , which make up the climate." The formula for a climate of fear, though, requires nothing more than a lot of thunder and a bit of heat generated by political activists.

My old SM told me that years ago (probably around 15), our Council was having a hard time getting our Troops to go to Woodruff. The camp has great facilities, but the staff left a lot to be desired. Council invited all the SM's to a steak dinner for a sales job on attending the camp. After all the sales pitches and schmoozing, not a single Troop signed up. Council finally got the message and improved the staff. We have the same facilities they had back then, but the staff is now pretty phenomenal, and the camp is full. Feedback is a gift! It truly is!

2 overzealous moderators to close threads when the conversation gets a little heated.

Who is the "fenced in suburbanite with no experience or training"? On which trip was there only one leader present? I must have missed something. Some Troops may only car camp or do very limited hiking, in very moderate climates. What type of training would you mandate for those leaders? We already mandate BALOO for Cubs and Webelos leaders. Certain trainings are required for certain types of activities, in order for a Troop to get a Tour Permit. What else would you mandate? How would that prevent the boy in NC from wandering off? I think the parents have the ultimate responsibility in deciding if they will let their son go on a trip. They need to be very knowledgeable about the training the leaders have, and their skills. As you know, someone can sit through a training class and pick up a card without learning a thing. There has been talk of mandating Wilderness First Aid for HA trips. Problem is there aren't nearly enough courses being offered to meet the demand, if it were required. Sorry to hear training isn't very popular in your area. Here, the Wilderness First Aid classes were all sold out. Climb-on Safely at Summer Camp had to turn Scouters away. BALOO has been sold out for every course for at least the past 4 years. I seek out training, whether it be First Aid related or other BSA areas. This is my third year serving on the Steering Committee for our Scouters Academy, the Council's largest training event. I have over 30 years of camping experience, and 25 years of hunting experience - here and in Africa. I'm smart enough to know I don't know everything, and that Mother Nature and wild animals plays by their own rules. I read lots of morbid books, like Death in Yellowstone, Bear Attacks of the Century, Death in Silent Places, and Into Thin Air so I can learn from other's mistakes. The day I stop learning is the day they take me to the morgue. Highlighting an accident where a boy fell in a river is not pointing out lax training. It is taking cheap shots at an organization she despises. BTW, the leader involved in the Superstition Mountain incident she mentions was a former Navy Seal. What type of training are you going to recommend for him? Fenced in suburbanite?

Gern, For a volunteer program, yes.

I'll help you out - it is a real stretch to bring a policy about athiests and gays into a piece about safety in the outdoors. And yes, she is taking cheap shots at the volunteers. She blames them for the kid in NC wandering off. I guess she would have been short-roped to every kid in the Troop, to keep that from happening. I was out at Yellowstone the year Luke Sandurg drowned. Do you know how it happened? The boys were pushing logs into the river, when one clipped his leg and knocked him in. Is the BSA supposed to put together a training course for every possible type of accident that might happen in the outdoors? You help me out - what is the author's point in including these types of accidents? What type of training is she recommending that would have prevented the Luke Sandburg accident? She says the BSA doesn't learn from its mistakes - what do you call the Guide to Safe Scouting? Ken Phillips says he has been involved in numerous BSA backcountry rescues during his 23 years at the Grand Canyon. How many, we aren't sure. But he has stated before that during July and August, his group performs 2 - 3 helicopter rescues each day, and around 400 each year for the general public. My guess is the Boy Scout rescues represent only a tiny fraction of the general population rescues. My Council offers Wilderness First Aid (which includes When Help is Delayed & Trek Safely) many times a year, all staffed by volunteers. We also offer Climb-on Safely, Safety Afloat and Safe Swim Defense training once or twice a week, every week, at Summer Camp. Please tell me of any other group that offers so many training opportunities. As for NOLS, are you willing to pony up $565 for a two-day Risk Management Course? What about $595 and travel cost to Banff for the 3-day Wilderness Risk Management Conference? That trip would cost over a grand before you are done. Here is one other clue for you about the intent of this piece - the title, Demerit Badge. The fact that this helicopter mom can't see all the positive things the BSA offers, and can only focus on the "dozen incidents over the past decade" tells me she has an anti-BSA agenda. Good luck to her with her son's pierced tongue.

Gern, I see her main point as being that the Boy Scouts are dangerous, and if her son joins, he is going to be at serious risk. That is ridiculous. Think about how many Boy Scouts are out there, camping every single weekend. The percentage of accidents is extremely low, probably lower than any other camping group. Also remember this is a volunteer organization, which is supposed to be boy-run. We don't charge expensive fees and we don't have high-paid outdoor guides. Add all that up, and I'd be glad to compare our safety rating with any other group. Read a book like "Death in Yellowstone" and see how dangerous the general population can be in the outdoors. Then go back and reread the requirements for Scout thru First Class. Given the choice, I'll take Scouting over a pierced tongue any day of the year. Other facts to consider: Mrs. McGivney holds a degree in Journalism, and she teaches the same subject at Norhern Arizona University. She oversees the campus newspaper. Her main success appears to be a book on Leave No Trace. Being prejudiced, I see the possibility of her being a liberal with an idealogical disagreement with the BSA over the G policy. I'm guessing she is the type that cringes when she sees a Troop of Boy Scouts coming down the trail, ruining her outdoor experience with nature - how dare they! Finally, from an article she wrote on Survival Schools: "Despite years of experience in the backcountry and hauling myself out of more than a few scary situations, survival school has been on my mind of late." http://www.boss-inc.com/08bp.html She allowed herself to get caught in "scary situations"? I'm not letting my son go camping with her! Edited to add a success story from Summer Camp at Camp Woodruff: The week before we attended, one of the Scouters had a heart attack in his Troop's site after walking back from the Friday evening campfire. The Scouts and Scouters started CPR and others went for help. The camp staff brought in the AED and got it going. It hit him 5 times before the EMTs arrived. They hit him once with their's. They got him to the hospital, where he recovered and was released the next Wednesday. Plenty of other success stories out there as well - see Boys Life mag for one every month. A writer with an agenda wouldn't be interested in them, would she?(This message has been edited by BrentAllen)

Yes, just more anti-BSA manure. She really struggled to find a way to throw in the G issue. Good thing she isn't going to let her son join - she sounds like she would be Captain of an entire fleet of helicopter parents. http://outside.away.com/outside/culture/200707/boy-scouts-1.html The Big Idea Demerit Badge Is Boy Scouts of America doing enough to keep kids safe? By Annette McGivney MY TEN-YEAR-OLD SON, Austin, likes to hike, camp, and climb. He toddled across the Alaskan tundra at age two, hiked to the bottom of the Grand Canyon at four, and floated the Green River at six. In other words, he's a perfect candidate for the Boy Scouts of America. In some corners of the country it would be considered unpatriotic not to sign him up. But here's the truth: I'd rather see Austin pierce his tongue than earn a merit badge. My distrust of the Scouts reached a tipping point in March, when 12-year-old Michael Auberry, from Greensboro, North Carolina's Troop 230, disappeared while on a camping trip in the Blue Ridge Parkway. Fortunately, after a four-day search, Auberry was found alive and well. He'd wandered away from camp, it was later reported, and gotten lost. I was relieved, of course, that Auberry emerged unhurt. But then I got angry. What irked me wasn't the incident itself but the way Scout leaders reacted. I had followed the Auberry story on the Associated Press news wire, reading regional and national coverage of the search. Instead of apologiesa kid had been lost, after allwhat I saw was a round of collective back-patting by Scout leaders across the country who proudly recounted how the wayward boy had used his Scout-taught survival skills. "Preparing kidsthat's our motto. That's what we do," Ely Brewer, of the Mid-Iowa Council of Boy Scouts, told Des Moines TV station KCCI. Fine. Auberry knew how to make a bed out of leaves. But here's a thought: How about making sure he doesn't wander off in the first place? Auberry's epic actually had a much brighter ending than at least a dozen incidents over the past decade in which Scouts have died or nearly died. Most infamously, in 2005, two Scouts and five leaders were killed in two separate lightning incidents and one power-line mishap. In unrelated BSA accidents that same summer, Chase Hathenbruck, 15, drowned in New Mexico's Animas River, and Luke Sanburg, 13, drowned in the Yellowstone. The year before, Kristoffer Jones, 14, died when he fell 1,000 feet from a sheer cliff while hiking in Utah's Zion National Park. But even these tragedies wouldn't be so tragic if not for the hubris that still managed to pervade the Boy Scout leadership. In March 2006, nine Scouts and three leaders were backpacking in Arizona's Superstition Mountains when they became stranded by a snowstorm. Unprepared for the conditions, they had to be rescued by helicopter. "The boys proved themselves to be men," leader David Perkins told Phoenix TV stations. Or the leaders proved themselves to be inexperienced: A severe winter storm had been forecast days before. I live in Flagstaff, Arizona, and had planned a trek in the Superstitions that same weekend, but I postponed it after a routine weather check. The typical response from Scout leaders to all of the above? Freak accidents. Tell that to the parents who've sued the Scouts in recent years. One case concerns Matthew Tresca, 16, who was killed in August 2002 by lightning at a Pennsylvania Scout camp. Even though a severe thunderstorm warning was in effect for the area and lightning was visible in the sky, Tresca and other boys were sent by Scout leaders from the safety of the dining hall to their tents, where Tresca died after a bolt struck a metal tent spike. In 2004, in testimony for a lawsuit brought by Tresca's parents against the BSA in New Jersey Superior Court, meteorologist Ronald Holle, a lightning expert formerly with the National Severe Storms Laboratory in Norman, Oklahoma, concluded, "The national and local levels of the Boy Scouts of America failed completely to take into account any recent or current information on the impacts of lightning. The management of the risk of lightning was extraordinarily poor and at an extremely low level of understanding compared to similar organizations. If planning had been emphasized at the national level, and local individuals had used this information correctly, the completely preventable death of Matthew Tresca would have been avoided." The BSA reached an undisclosed settlement with the Trescas, part of which prohibited the family from talking to the media. THEN THERE'S THE BOY Scouts' mission itself, which is "to prepare young people to make ethical and moral choices" (read the complete text at scouting.org), making no mention of wilderness skills. "We emphasize outdoor activities, safety, and stewardship, but do not consider ourselves an outdoor or survival training program," says BSA associate director of marketing and communications Eric Moore. That would make more sense if troops spent as much time playing kickball as camping. "Unfortunately, many Scout leaders do not possess the level of decision-making skills that is required in the outdoors," says Ken Phillips, chief of emergency services for Grand Canyon National Park, who has been involved in numerous backcountry rescues of Scout troops during his 23 years there. "Many of the leaders of these trips are not used to the wilderness environment. The kids don't make bad decisions; the leaders do." I can hear the protests, so let me answer: Yes, with more than three million Scouts and a million volunteer leaders in the United States, it's inevitable that accidents will happen. And competent, even excellent, Scout leaders with years of experience and training in wilderness first aid do exist. Plus the BSA mobilizes a vast number of volunteer leaders who sincerely want to help kids. But even kindergartners are taught to learn from mistakes. The BSA, meanwhile, won't divulge accident data and declined to share any statistics for this story. And they've let at least one opportunity to learn from other wilderness-education organizations wither on the vine. Drew Leemon, risk-management director for the National Outdoor Leadership School, says the BSA joined the committee for the annual Wilderness Risk Management Conference from 1997 to 2001, but declined to share accident data with the group. "The Boy Scouts expose so many kids to the outdoors, it's phenomenal," says Leemon. "We wanted the Boy Scouts to be more involved. We hoped their participation would rally the troops and lead to Scout leaders attending the conference. But it didn't happen in any great numbers." Of course, the BSA national office encourages wilderness-safety and first-aid training for Scout leaders. But participation is completely voluntary. According to BSA director of camping and conservation Frank Reigelman, the group's primary means of educating troop leaders is through the Boy Scouts' Fieldbook and other BSA literature. "We provide various publications and planning tools to help volunteers with trip planning. The material is out there if they choose to use it," says Reigelman, who emphasizes that it's hard to enforce requirements in a volunteer organization with 47,000 troops across the country. That argument would be more convincing if they didn't manage to exclude gays and atheists from all BSA chapters. I may rue the day I wished a tongue-piercing on my only son. The mere thought makes me cringe. But at least I know he won't need to be rescued.

I know an old 4-bead SM who would never send a boy home from camp, and he wasn't just dealing with angels all the time, either. Once you send them home, you can't work with them. Instead, he would have the trouble Scout cleaning the latrines and shower house every day. Changing out trash bags around camp and hauling trash. He figured the boy would have it easy, if he was just sent home, whereas that week at camp might be one of the toughest he had been through. The Scout might decide he didn't want to be in Scouts at the end of the week, and that was his choice, but he sure wasn't going to act up again in that Troop. And no, it wasn't just "hard labor" the Scout received as punishment - he also received plenty of mentoring and coaching about what he had done, why it was wrong, and what he should have done. Just another thought.

Incredible - you don't even know what the IPCC reports are!! And you have the gall to tell me I don't know what I'm talking about?? What is that saying about it's better to keep your mouth shut instead of opening it and proving something?? Go here and read. http://www.ipcc.ch/ The IPCC reports came out in 1990, 1995, 2001 and the next one is coming out this year, 2007. The Summary for Policymakers for 2007 is already out. After you have completed your homework, let us know how the temperature predictions changed with each of the reports. Yes, I already know the answer.