In 1984 my beautiful redheaded daughter Jade Patrice was born, and I, as an elated dad opened a Savings account for Jade Patrice and for her brother Justin.

Months before her First Birthday I became an Unemployed Coal Miner and found work through the Wyoming Employment Comission. Being sent to work hundred miles away for a Sub-Contractor (ARAMARK) South of the Tetons in Western Wyoming.

On this land of the Bridger National Forest, owned by the Citizens of the United States of America we explored the capture and retention of Natural Gas.

Not knowing the results of that Excavation, Drilling, Trenching and Building in that area, I left ARAMARK and moved South to Texas, to finish with my Degree Studies.

I received a letter from the SAVINGS and LOAN Office of Westland Federal Savings and Loan of Rawlins, Wyoming. I was told that having not deposited more and more monies into Justin and Jade Patrices' accounts, that those monies would be turned over to cover the Saving and Loan DEBT of this Nation. (Thank you, Neil Bush)

Disgruntled, I wrote to the President of Westland Federal Savigs and Loan and suggested that same fate should be his; I never received a reply.

Although the sum of both of their accounts was probably less that One Hundred Dollars, it was their MONEY, not Neil Bush's money, not George Herbert Walker Bush's money: NOT THE BUSH SAVINGS, but a small investment in the future of my of children of our children, where this Government claims that "We The People" do not save enough!

Almost two decades later, the entire TRUTH came around. This Project was only a small part of the WHOLE PICTURE, not just in Wyoming, where Vice President(to be in the running) Cheney, needed to move back from Texas to Wyoming to run for that VP position, but right into Houston, Texas where Daddy George Herbert Walker Bush called home. Where GEE DUBBYA Bush was the guvuna';where

Mrs.(Phil ibuster) Graham, spent her livelyhoodism on the Board of Directors of ENRON, those same crookies who filched this Country of Billions of ENERGY Dollars.

My family, my wife and our children, just a small pittance when Jade was born, but this Nation, HOW MUCH MORE WILL WE STAND FOR?

Is this a 'Give and Take' Government or just a TAKE, TAKE, TAKE government?

Three of the 14 letters written in regards to the likelihood of contamination of private water wells have been written by people claiming some knowledge of oil & gas drilling/production practices. None of them mention significant personal familiarity with coalbed methane production, yet in different ways all 3 attempted to dismiss the author's contentions based on personal knowledge of a rather different business --> traditional oil+gas production.

Producing formations in coalbed methane tend to be shallower than those historically tapped for oil+gas production. The producing rock layers in a location at the periphery of the Powder River Basin (or other western coal basins) may well be shallow enough to allow contamination of aquifers during fracking, especially if it is employed heavily and continuously.

Despite what Ironclad claims, uphole contamination _is_ possible. If the annular space between the casing (that iron piping Lark mentioned) and the exterior rock wall of a hole is poorly packed prior to cementing then upward migration of formation fluids is possible. If cement cracks over time due to drying & shrinkage, then uphole contamination is possible. My husband had seen water well drillers struggle with these issues when attempting to create safe producing wells for municipal water supplies. (I'm assuming bentonite downhole, with cement above, guys. I DON'T know what standard practice is for these types of production wells.)

Lack of understanding of technical details on the part of the author is a real problem with this article. It leave her open to (likely) off-base criticisms of her basic contention --> that drilling & producing off these wells is polluting groundwater. Just as important however, she may have missed a related source of groundwater pollution --> the dewatering drilling & pumping done to prep producing rock/coal layers for gas extraction. Dewatering coal seams may liberate aromatics like benzene; reinjecting this formation water for fracking may spread them around underground.

The nut of it is that both the federal & state governments are not performing appropriate, legally mandated oversight at this point in time. The result may be permanent degradation of accessible aquifers in a dry, drought-prone part of the United States.

Call it naivete, but I'm somewhat amazed that in this day and age, companies are still allowed to pump toxic chemicals into the ground for whatever industrial purpose. I'm not a geologist, but I'm guessing that it shouldn't be surprising that these chemicals manage to find their way into the water table and eventually cause harm to the residents of the area. This behavior is callous and evil. There's no other way to describe it.

The gas companies have clearly made a basic cost-benefit calculation and decided that the risks posed by potential civil liability are vastly outweighed by the profits they stand to make. With such a strictly economic mind-set, I'm afraid the only options these poor residents have are either to try and set the state attorney general on them, or hire a law firm and explore a civil remedy. Money is the only thing these companies care about. I hate to say it, but is seems that state action is rather unlikely here. It's a sad day in the U.S. when citizens can't depend on public officials to protect their health and well-being. Some conservatives like to constantly bash "trial lawyers," and go on about tort reform, but I'm afraid such attorneys are needed more than ever in modern American society. When politicians are paid to look the other way, regulatory agencies are shills for the industries they are supposed to be regulating, and the state AG is nowhere to be found, something else has to fill that void. What the Republicans want is to make it as difficult as possible for average Americans to protect their legal interests and avail themselves of the legal process. Meanwhile, Corporate America gets to have an army of litigators on standby 24-7 for whatever crisis arises.