BY GLEN COPE
As all Americans welcome a new year, as well as the opportunities that it will potentially bring, America’s farmers and ranchers are once again preparing for the new growing season.

Farmers who make their living with the soil are inspecting the tractors, planters and other equipment essential to get their crop in the ground–checking for potential problems that could halt their efforts for speedy planting. For the spring calving season, ranchers will begin moving their cows to the “calving pasture” so that quick inspections of the herd will reduce issues with individual cows that may have problems delivering a calf.

A farmer’s life is one of constant cycles that are repeated every year.

Whether it’s springtime planting or fall harvest, making hay in the summer or feeding cows in the winter, the rewards of the farmer’s hard work is truly appreciated by those that make their living from a job that is subject to so many variables, two of which are Mother Nature and the markets.

With each passing day our world is inching closer to 2050, the year when many experts estimate that food production must double from 2010 levels in order to meet global demand.

This challenge is always in the back of farmers’ minds…how to meet this incredible demand, knowing that those who produce food must do so on less land and by using fewer resources.

But farmers are off to a good start. Even as total cattle numbers have fallen to levels not seen since the early 1950s, production efficiencies have allowed ranchers to keep up with increasing demand for beef. Similarly, America’s grain growers, through the use of hybrid breeding and genetically modified seeds, have tripled bushels per acre in the same amount of time.

Farmers are a resilient lot. Perhaps this resolve has come about from the constant forces of nature that sometimes work against them and also contribute to the weathered faces and calloused hands of the people who spend a majority of their day outdoors. Regardless of the means the result is the same: a group of citizens from Florida to Washington, from California to Maine, who do their level best to meet any challenge, no matter how impossible it may seem.

Glen Cope, a fourth generation beef producer in southwest Missouri, is past chair of the American Farm Bureau Federation’s Young Farmers and Ranchers Committee.
– See more at: http://www.mofb.org/NewsMedia/CuttotheChase.aspx#sthash.AWFdwtit.dpuf

 (AP) — Federal investigators say Southwest Airlines pilots who recently landed at the wrong airport in Missouri have told them they were confused by the small airport’s runway lights.

The National Transportation Safety Board said Friday the pilots of the Boeing 737 with 124 passengers on board told investigators they saw the bright runway lights of Graham Clark Downtown Airport, located in Hollister, Mo., and mistakenly identified it as the larger Branson Airport, which is seven miles away.

NTSB said the pilots contacted the Branson control tower and were told they were 15 miles from their target. But the pilots responded they had the runway in sight. They were cleared to land.

The Downtown Airport runway is half as long as the Branson runway. The runways are oriented in a similar direction.

Few topics in modern life have produced as much rancorous and visible public debate as abortion — and one hot point of contention today is simply how close that debate may take place to the clinics that perform them.

The U.S. Supreme Court heard arguments Wednesday over a challenge to a Massachusetts state law, in McCullen v. Coakley, that creates a fixed, 35-foot “buffer zone” around the entrance or driveways of such clinics, forbidding protesters and others from entering the zone, with the exception of women seeking medical services, workers at the clinic, police and those merely walking to somewhere else.

The law at issue is rooted, its advocates say, in years of conflicts around such clinics in which protesters battle — verbally and sometimes more — and where women are harassed or even blocked as they attempt to enter. They argue that both pro- and anti-abortion demonstrators still can state their views, just not in proximity that’s likely to intimidate anyone.

On Wednesday, Justice Elena Kagan questioned the size of the Massachusetts zone, saying she was “a little hung up on why you need so much space.” Justice Antonin Scalia remarked that rather than bar all speech in the 35-foot zone, perhaps just a ban on swearing and screaming could be used.

But those in opposition to the law being challenged say that, as applied, it illegally targets only the speech of anti-abortion forces, and creates a constitutional conundrum in which listeners’ rights are favored over those of speakers, while offering no reasonable alternative for anti-abortion groups to effectively deliver their message. On Wednesday, justices also noted that not all those at clinics to oppose abortion are protesting: Many are there to offer a calm presentation of their views.

Similar arguments were raised over a Colorado buffer zone law upheld by the Court in 2000, in Hill v. Colorado – its last major ruling on the issue. The Colorado statute set out a 100-foot area around health care facilities, and forbade anti-abortion protesters inside such areas from coming closer than eight feet to anyone for the purpose of counseling or protesting – a so-called “floating buffer zone.”

A 1994 federal law forbids violent actions, obstruction, interference, and intimidation outside abortion clinics – in other words, it governs conduct, not the message. Challengers to both the Colorado and Massachusetts laws say those more-restrictive state statutes have it the wrong way around, targeting just anti-abortion speech, while those supporting abortion rights are free to move within the zones and to speak to women as they enter and leave clinics.
Generally, the First Amendment precludes government from considering “content” or “viewpoint” when regulating speech. Massachusetts officials say a history at such clinics of confrontation and violence justifies overriding that general limitation, in the name of public safety.

There are other significant First Amendment issues raised in this case and in the earlier Hill decision, including a proper balancing of what some call “a right to be let alone” vs. free speech rights of speakers on sensitive or even offensive matters.

The essential point of laws banning protests near such clinics is to shelter women seeking information or abortions from the emotional distress produced by often-graphic language, signs, handouts and “in-your-face” tactics used by anti-abortion forces, who see such actions as the final opportunity to reverse a decision to end a pregnancy.
And the equally basic First Amendment question raised is whether protection of “vigorous public debate” over significant issues in our society can be muzzled because of the undeniable distress it causes some women who hear – or are challenged by – that debate.

A clue as to how the Court may view McCullen may be found in a 2011 ruling in which emotional distress to the listener also was a core issue, involving protesters at a funeral service for a U.S. Marine killed in the line of duty. In that case, Snyder v. Phelps, the father of the fallen Marine sued a group known as the Westboro Baptist Church over its virulently anti-gay signs and visible picketing at his son’s funeral.

In an 8-1 decision, the court upheld the Westboro group’s right to protest and to use the most-effective place and manner of free speech, as long as it did not physically disrupt the services, and even if it caused pain to the Snyder family.

“The principle (is) that debate on public issues should be uninhibited, robust, and wide-open,” Chief Justice John Roberts said in the majority opinion. “The First Amendment protects our right to express ourselves, and the depths of our opinions and emotions, in the most strident terms,” he wrote. “Speech is powerful. It can stir people to action, move them to tears of both joy and sorrow, and – as it did here – inflict great pain … (but) we cannot react to that pain by punishing the speaker. As a nation we have chosen a different course, to protect even hurtful speech on public issues to ensure that we do not stifle public debate.”

Nothing about the national debate over abortion is simple – and that applies at times to even the words and manner we use in talking about it.

Gene Policinski is chief operating office of the Newseum Institute and senior vice president of the Institute’s First Amendment Center. gpolicinski@newseum.org

7 p.m.  UPDATE(AP) — One of two teenagers wounded in a Philadelphia school shooting is out of the hospital, and another boy who police suspect was involved has turned himself in.

The shooting happened in the gym of the Delaware Valley Charter High School in north Philadelphia on Friday afternoon.

A girl and a boy each suffered a gunshot wound to an arm. Police say the girl was discharged from a hospital Friday night. The boy is in stable condition.

Investigators believe as many as three boys may have been involved in the shooting.

They captured one boy at his home shortly after the shooting. They say a second boy turned himself in with his family Friday night.

Police are trying to determine whether the shooting was accidental or intentional.

Police Commissioner Charles Ramsey says a “breakdown in security” allowed the gun into the school.

2:55 p.m. PHILADELPHIA (AP) — Police say they’ve captured a boy who shot two students at a Philadelphia high school gym.

They say the shooting happened at the Delaware Valley Charter School in north Philadelphia on Friday afternoon.

Police Commissioner Charles Ramsey says the shooter “was captured not too far from his home” but the gun hasn’t been recovered. He says it’s unclear if the shooting was accidental or intentional.

Authorities say a male student and a female student were shot. Each student was shot in an arm.

The students have been taken to a hospital near the school. Police say they’re in stable condition.

A spokesman for the school district hasn’t responded to a call seeking comment.

It’s the second U.S. school shooting this week. Authorities say a seventh-grader opened fire Tuesday in a New Mexico middle school gym, wounding two classmates.

Gov. Jay Nixon today announced that the freewill offering taken at the conclusion of the Jan. 9 Governor’s Prayer Breakfast raised $4,354 for The Samaritan Center in Jefferson City. The Prayer Breakfast offerings, which began in 2010, have raised $15,739 total for the center, an interfaith social service agency that has worked to meet the emergency and crisis needs of mid-Missourians since 1987. Marylyn DeFeo is the founder and volunteer executive director of the center.

The amount is in addition to the thousands of dollars from the breakfast that benefit the Governor’s Student Leadership Forum on Faith and Values. The entire Prayer Breakfast program, which featured Convoy of Hope founder Hal Donaldson as the keynote speaker, can be viewed online at www.missourigpb.com.

“Organizations like The Samaritan Center are demonstrating faith in action every day by helping Missouri families in need,” Gov. Nixon said. “The generosity of those attending the Prayer Breakfast will help the center in providing for even more Missourians, and is an inspiration for all of us to give generously.”

Monday (Jan. 20) is the National Day of Service, a day set aside to honor the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. through volunteer service to the community. The Governor also encouraged Missourians to participate by giving of their time to help their neighbors and their communities.

“The National Day of Service provides an excellent focus on serving others, and the ways we can help our neighbors and our communities are almost endless,” Gov. Nixon said. “Please take a few hours on Monday to donate your time and your talent for this effort, because you will be the one reaping the greatest reward.”

(AP) — A Missouri death-row inmate scheduled for execution this month says the state prison system is improperly storing expired doses of a new lethal injection drug provided by an Oklahoma pharmacy that’s not licensed to do business in the neighboring state.

Attorneys for Herbert Smulls filed a complaint with the Oklahoma State Board of Pharmacy on Friday. They want the board to recall an “expired, unsafe” batch of the sedative pentobarbital provided to Missouri by an unidentified Oklahoma compounding pharmacy. The complaint says the pharmacy gave erroneous instructions to store the drug at room temperature.

Missouri switched to its one-drug execution method late last year and has since killed two inmates. The complaint includes Missouri state records showing the pentobarbital given to both inmates had expired eight to 10 days earlier.

(AP)  Cerner Corp. says a $4.3 billion campus that will be built over the next decade on the site of a former Kansas City shopping center will be the largest in Missouri.

North Kansas City-based medical records maker described the project Friday at a news conference attended by Gov. Jay Nixon and Kansas City Mayor Sly James.

Cerner executives say they expect the first building will be completed and 1,500 people working at the site in about 30 months. Eventually, as many as 15,000 are expected to work at the 4.5 million square-foot campus.

Cerner currently employs more than 9,000 people in the metropolitan area, with many of them based at an office complex in western Wyandotte County, Kan.

(AP)  Springfield police are investigating after a body was found at a garbage collection business.

Police Lt. Brian Phillips says the body was found early Friday at a collection site in southwest Springfield by an employee for WCA Waste Corp. He says the body came from a truck that collects trash from large containers in the area.

The site is a transfer station for WCA, a commercial and residential waste management company.