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2011

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BY DONNA CASSATA

Associated Press

WASHINGTON —Republican Rep. VernBuchanan is fighting off a con-gressional ethics investigationlinked to a former businesspartner and campaign dona-tions.

Democratic Rep. MaxineWaters is battling a charge ofimpropriety about work shemight have done to benefit herhusband.

They are among nearly adozen lawmakers seeking re-election while caught up infederal or congressional investi-gations that are perfect fodderfor campaign foes, rival politicalcommittees and free-spendingoutside groups.

But unlike the headline-grabbing, sex-driven Internetscandals of the past year and ahalf, these probes center onmore complicated financialdealings.

Roughly five months to theNov. 6 elections, they pose lessof a threat to political careers,especially for deep-pocketedincumbents or lawmakers indistricts that are barely compet-itive.

Last year, in the politicalequivalent of a New Yorkminute, Democrat AnthonyWeiner and Republican ChrisLee quit the House after explicitphotos hit Twitter and the Web.

Buchanan, Waters andseveral other lawmakers whoare the subject of House ethicscommittee probes defiantlyremain in Congress, insistingthey did nothing wrong as theypush ahead with their cam-paigns. Most are favored to winon Election Day.

“I think you have to befound guilty to have it reallymake an impact,” said BobEdgar, the president and CEOof the good-government groupCommon Cause and a formerPennsylvania congressman.

And even that won’t unseat

some lawmakers.In 2010, the House cen-

sured — the most seriouscongressional penalty short ofexpulsion — Democratic Rep.Charles Rangel of New Yorkfor 11 ethics violations, includ-ing failure to pay some taxesand using congressionalresources to raise money for anacademic center bearing hisname.

Yet he easily won re-elec-tion, and is favored to win againin November if he survives theJune 26 Democratic primary.

In a campaign season

dominated by voters’ fearsabout the economy, ethics isn’tdrawing the same attention itsometimes does.

The slow pace of the inves-tigations also is a factor; theWaters probe has dragged onfor almost three years.

“Ethics seems to resonatemuch more when the economyis less of an issue,” said MelanieSloan, executive director ofCitizens for Responsibility andEthics in Washington, a gov-ernment watchdog group.

“The economy prettymuch trumps everything.”

AP photo

In this Nov. 18, 2010, file photo, Rep. Maxine Waters, D-Calif., is seen on Capitol Hill in Washington.Ethical clouds are hanging over at least a dozen lawmakers, but in most cases, they don't appear to behaving much of an impact on their re-election prospects.

BY SETH BORENSTEIN

AP Science Writer

WASHINGTON — The contro-versial practice of hydraulic fracturing toextract natural gas does not pose a highrisk for triggering earthquakes largeenough to feel, but other types of ener-gy-related drilling can make the groundnoticeably shake, a major governmentscience report concludes.

Even those man-made tremorslarge enough to be an issue are very rare,says a special report by the NationalResearch Council. In more than 90 years

of monitoring, human activity has beenshown to trigger only 154 quakes, mostof them moderate or small, and only 60of them in the United States.

That’s compared to a global averageof about 14,450 earthquakes of magni-tude 4.0 or greater every year, said thereport, released Friday.

Most of those are caused by gas andoil drilling the conventional way,damming rivers, deep injections ofwastewater and purposeful flooding.Only two worldwide instances of shak-ing — a magnitude 2.8 tremor inOklahoma and a 2.3 magnitude shaking

in England— can be attributed tohydraulic fracturing, a specific method ofextracting gas by injection of fluidssometimes called “fracking,” the reportsaid. Both were last year.

“There’s a whole bunch of wellsthat have been drilled, let’s say for waste-water and the number of events havebeen pretty small,” said report chairmanMurray Hitzman, a professor of eco-

nomic geology at the Colorado Schoolof Mines. “Is it a huge problem? Thereport says basically no. Is it somethingwe should look at and think about? Yes.”

With increased drilling to satisfythe country’s thirst for energy, it isimportant to watch injection and otherwells better and consider potentialrepercussions before starting, thereport said.

The research council report showsthat most of the tremors that can beblamed on humans occurred inCalifornia, Texas, Colorado,Oklahoma, and Ohio. California and

Oklahoma had the biggest man-madeshakes as byproducts of conventionaloil and gas drilling.

The report makes sense as far as itgoes, said U.S. Geological Survey seis-mologist William Ellsworth, but sincethe research council started its study,government geologists have noticed astrange increase in earthquakes thatseem man-made.

At a professional seismology con-ference in April, Ellsworth presented aUSGS report on a six-fold increase inman-made quakes.

Get updates on national and world newsthroughout the day:

TheUnion.com/AssociatedPress

READ MORE

Report: Don’t worry much about quakes, fracking

BY JIM KUHNHENN AND

ALICIA A. CALDWELL

Associated Press

WASHINGTON —President Barack Obama sud-denly eased enforcement of thenation’s immigration laws Friday,an extraordinary step offering achance for hundreds of thou-sands of illegal immigrants tostay in the country and work.Embraced by Hispanics, hisaction touched off an election-year confrontation with manyRepublicans.

Obama said the changewould become effective immedi-ately to “lift the shadow ofdeportation from these youngpeople.”

“Let’s be clear, this is notamnesty, this is not immunity,this is not a path to citizenship,this is not a permanent fix,”Obama said from the WhiteHouse Rose Garden. “This is theright thing to do.”

The administration said thechange will affect as many as800,000 immigrants who havelived in fear of deportation.

It bypasses Congress andpartially achieves the goals of the“DREAM Act,” legislation thatwould have provided a pathwayto citizenship for young illegalimmigrants who went to collegeor served in the military.

Under the administrationplan, illegal immigrants will beable to avoid deportation if theycan prove they were brought tothe United States before theyturned 16 and are younger than30, have been in the country forat least five continuous years,have no criminal history, gradu-ated from a U.S. high school orearned a GED or served in the

military.They also can apply for a

work permit that will be good fortwo years with no limits on howmany times it can be renewed.

The move comes in an elec-tion year in which the Hispanicvote could be critical in swingstates like Colorado, Nevada andFlorida. While Obama enjoyssupport from a majority ofHispanic voters over Republicanchallenger Romney, Latinoenthusiasm for the president hasbeen tempered by the slow eco-nomic recovery, his inability towin congressional support for abroad overhaul of immigrationlaws and by his administration’s

aggressive deportation policy.Some Republicans in

Congress — and the governor ofArizona, whose state has been atthe center of enforcement con-troversy — strongly criticized theObama action. But the responsefrom Romney was more muted.

Romney said Obama’s deci-sion will make finding along-term solution to the nation’simmigration issues more diffi-cult. But he also said the plight ofillegal immigrants who werebrought to the U.S. as children is“an important matter to be con-sidered.”

Obama acts tospare many youthsfrom deportation

Ethics problems lose edge as re-election issue

“Let’s be clear,this is not

amnesty, this isnot immunity, thisis not a path tocitizenship …”

— PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA