(DES MOINES) - Gov. Terry Branstad and Lt. Gov. Kim Reynolds used their weekly press conference this morning to highlight the state's ongoing efforts to address the impact of this summer's drought in Iowa.

The most recent USDA drought monitor shows that almost 75% of Iowa is now in the D-2 severe drought stage and roughly 25% in the D-3 extreme drought stage. At the time of the governor and lieutenant governor's drought summit in Mt. Pleasant less than two weeks.

Joining them at the news conference was Secretary of Agriculture Bill Northey, Department of Natural Resources Director Chuck Gipp, Department of Transportation Director Paul Trombino, and Department of Homeland Security and Emergency Management Director Mark Schouten.

Branstad and Reynolds will continue their efforts, and wanted to ensure Iowans were aware of the following measures that have been taken thus far:

• Two weeks ago, the governor sent a letter to USDA Secretary Tom Vilsack informing him of the worsening conditions in Iowa, where he requested the secretary to declare Secretarial Disaster designations for Iowa counties as soon as they qualify. Also in the letter, the governor asked the Secretary to open up CRP lands as soon as federal guidelines allow. Just recently the Secretary announced the USDA will open CRP lands for emergency grazing in 26 counties in Iowa and that CRP lands will be open for the rest of Iowa counties as soon as Aug. 2^nd for haying and grazing.
• Last week, state-owned land managed by the DNR was opened for our farmers and producers for emergency grazing and haying. Having access to additional 6,000 acres is something that should provide immediate relief to those who are being impacted by these conditions.
• Another item of significant concern was the need to relax certain rules and regulations that would hinder swift relief for those who need it the most. There is an increasing demand for access to hay, straw and stover for our livestock producers. As a result, the governor approved a proclamation that temporally waives certain weight and width and hours of service requirements for those transporting hay, straw and stover.
• The state opened up DOT roadside ditches as another avenue for our farmers to bail hay. Through this program, farmers can obtain a DOT permit to bail roadside ditches as an economical and efficient way for producers to obtain hay for their livestock.
• The Beginning Farmer Loan Program, through the Iowa Agricultural Development Authority, allows all farmers to obtain low-interest loans to assist them with costs for eligible projects. Despite its name, the program eligibility is not based on the age of the farmer, but rather, the net worth of the applicant.
• Administration staff, along with key state agency staff members, will hold weekly conference calls with leadership of Iowa farmer and producer associations. The purpose of these calls is to ensure that the concerns and questions of our impacted farmers and producers are being heard and addressed.
• The administration has launched a web site, http://governor.iowa.gov/drought, to act as a one-stop-shop on all flood-related items and news from state government.

"We want to assure Iowans that every effort will be taken on their behalf with regard to this drought," said Gov. Branstad. "We will work with federal partners, state agencies and departments, and all Iowans as we combat the effects of this drought. This is a top priority of my administration."

The lieutenant governor noted that the administration is taking a proactive strategy with regard to the drought.

"Our administration firmly believes that the best way to attack any potential disaster is through a proactive strategy," said Reynolds. "We will continue to engage every department and agency that has a role to play in these efforts."

Several studies and surveys show that many men, regardless of religious piety, share a curiosity in internet pornography:

• 54 percent of pastors said they viewed porn within the past year in a recent Pastors.com survey

• 50 percent of men viewed pornography within one week of attending a marital fidelity event, including Promise Keepers, the survey revealed

• 47 percent of religious respondents said porn is a problem in their home, reveals a Focus on the Family poll

• Every second, 28,258 internet users view pornography, according to worldwide porn industry stats. The majority are men

"Here is more evidence that too many of us - including 'religious' people - are looking for answers outside ourselves. We have a growing spiritual void in North America, and the ripple effect ranges from pornography to drug abuse to domestic violence as people struggle to fill the void," says Dennis Bank, author of Sanctiprize (www.sanctiprize.com).

"Psychology, medications and these other pain relievers do nothing to get to the root of the problem, which is our need to get back to the inherent wholeness we were born with."

If highly religious men have an advantage over those who are less religious, it's not much, he says. Beyond pornography, there are pressures that may make pastors and other religious leaders especially vulnerable to sexual temptation, says Bank, a nondenominational minister. They include :

• Leadership is often a lonely job. More than half of the pastors answered that they feel privileged to be a church leader, but they're also easily discouraged and lonely, according to a LifeWay Research survey of 1,000 Protestant pastors.

• They have a position of power. As the authority on religious leadership in their spiritual community, followers seek a pastor's guidance and influence. Some followers become attracted to the pastor because of his position and may seek sexual affection.

• A lack of accountability. Ministers tend to have a great amount of flexibility in their schedule, and they are trusted figures in their church. For smaller and more isolated congregations, these factors are especially strong.

• No one to share pressures and struggles with. Most of a pastor's inner circle of friends tends to be members of his church, and these struggles may be of a sexual nature. For fear of losing trust, he may act out a fantasy rather than tell someone about it.

• They feed off the approval of others. The nature of the job will attract some who have a strong need for constant approval from others. For that reason, sexual advances from a misguided church member may feel very affirming.

There are plenty of mixed messages in churches these days, Bank says.

"The problem is not that we Christians just haven't found the right gimmick yet - gimmicks are part of the problem," he says. "The problem is we have become distracted from the inherent goodness that God has given us all. What society needs is a spiritual enema!"

About Dennis Bank

Dennis Bank is a former officer with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and former businessman. He completed Calvary Chapel Bible School's study program and attended the University of Saskatchewan, Acts Seminary (British Columbia) and the Royal Mounted Police Academy. He is currently an unaffiliated, non-denominational minister who offers seminars on reconciliation and healing.

A popular photographer in Taiwan is making waves in the global animal-rights community with his dignified portraits of doomed dogs.

Tou Yun-fei, a two-time winner of his government's photography award, gave up his job as a well-compensated staffer at a magazine for two years to shoot more than 40,000 human-like images of abandoned canines in Taiwan's animal shelters - just before they were to be put to death.

"These shots, which took up so much of the photographer's time, are striking because of the humanity captured in the expression of the dogs," says Kenneth Newman, a 33-year veterinarian and author of Meet Me at the Rainbow Bridge (www.meetmeattherainbowbridge.com). "Efforts like this in the United States are part of the reason we euthanize far fewer animals today than we did 30 or 40 years ago.

"Now, we need work on changing the laws so that the judicial system recognizes the value of a pet as more than a piece of property."

How effective have U.S. public awareness campaigns regarding pet overpopulation been?

• U.S. dogs are less likely to be euthanized in shelters than in other countries (including Tou's Taiwan). The Humane Society of the United States reports 3 to 4 million cats and dogs are put down every year. A precise number is not known because there is no central data reporting agency for animal shelters.

• During the 1970s in the United States, an estimated 12 to 20 million cats and dogs were euthanized at shelters. These reduction is credited in large part to public awareness  and spay/neuter campaigns, according to the Humane Society.

• In the 1970s, there were 67 million pets in U.S. homes; today, there 135 million.

Newman says the next logical step in our society is passing a law that requires courts to consider the emotional value of a pet when considering legal compensation to owners whose animals die as a result of someone else's neglect, malice or mistake.

"There have been a few instances where plaintiffs made a case for compensation beyond the animal's market value, because of their bond with the pet, and some judges have agreed," Newman says. "But it shouldn't be left to chance. Our laws should accurately reflect the value of our pets for the average American," he says. "Ninety percent of pet owners consider their animals to be part of the family."

Newman experienced a real-life tragedy in 2008, when a careless driver backed up 25 yards without looking, striking Newman and his beloved Labrador, Gracie, and pinning them between the veterinarian's station wagon and the driver's bumper. This inspired him to propose Gracie's Law (available for reading or sharing on his website), which would entitle the owner of a pet killed through an act of malice or negligence to $25,000 in damages.

Gracie's Law would not supersede current laws, he says, which entitle owners to the property value of their pet. And it would not replace criminal prosecution for acts of malice. And owners who decline a recommended veterinarian procedure to save a pet would not be held accountable under the law, he says.

"When you consider the fact that a majority of pet-owning Americans would prefer to be stranded on a desert island with their pet rather than any other human being,'' he says, "that's when you know animals should be legally valued above inanimate objects."

About Kenneth Newman, DVM

Kenneth Newman graduated from Purdue University with a Doctor of Veterinary Medicine degree in 1979, and has been a veterinarian for 33 years. After experiencing a badly broken leg and the death of his Labrador retriever in 2008, he drafted and began advocating for Gracie's Law. Newman lives with his wife and their son, as well as several pets.

After my then-6-year-old son was abducted and taken to Mexico in December 1992, I traveled to Mexico City to plead for his return via the Hague Convention Treaty. The response from the Central Authority director surprised me.

"The U.S. has a very poor record of returning children to Mexico as well," he said with a cold,   almost personal glare. I never forgot that.

Eventually, I realized the treaty would be of no help to me and I went on to privately recover my son in April 1993. It was a surreal rescue drama undertaken with the help of a specialized team, disguises, decoy car switches and a stealth flight in a small plane. My young son and I escaped under the noses of the Mexican military, flying 450 miles to Brownsville, Texas, through Mexican airspace.

In Brownsville, the FBI immediately detained and interrogated me, acting on frivolous allegations from Mexico City. Stunned, I was told that the U.S. agents intended to send my son back to Mexico with a Mexican consulate official.

I recount the whole nightmarish experience in Broken Treaty: The True Story of a Father's Covert Recovery of his Missing Son from Mexico (www.brokentreaty.info).

My son is now an adult and I am still contacted for advice by left-behind parents; not only those of children taken to Mexico, but from parents who "hit a wall" trying to recover their children from the overwhelming complexities of the U.S. judicial system.

What should take weeks turns into months and in some cases years as parents in other countries attempt to retrieve children abducted to the United States. Petitions drag through delays and appeals. The State Department's own statistics demonstrate what should be serious concerns if the United States wants to lead by example.

A 2010 Compliance Report drafted by the State Department shows that parents filed 324 Hague Convention Treaty applications involving 454 children abducted to the United States from other treaty partner countries. The United States accounts for a staggering 23 percent of all incoming and outgoing caseload petitions. The report showed that we have the poorest record in terms of treaty-specified case resolutions for applications under the accord. We also have the highest ratio of pending cases awaiting resolution.

Hague Treaty guidelines call for expeditious proceedings within six weeks of the date of commencement, but the United States has no clear domestic policy guidelines to even determine if the cases should be heard by federal, state or local courts. Between federal and local venues, there are potentially 31,500 judges who could hear a Hague case. The sobering reality is that most judges are not educated about the treaty. Many who do hear these cases deny the petition because they fear that returning the child will automatically result in custody being awarded to the left-behind parent.

They don't realize that the treaty specifies children be returned to the state of "habitual residence," where the proper forum by the requesting court country's jurisdiction will make any final custody determination.

Several nations have taken steps to streamline the Hague petition quagmire by appointing specifically trained courts and judges within a limited number of courts. The United Kingdom, Austria, Finland, Ireland, Portugal, Romania and Sweden are on the cutting edge of amending their procedures to limited jurisdiction and have greatly reduced the delays in restitution of abducted children.

I hope to see the United States consolidate Hague cases to appointed courts with treaty-educated judges, so we can rightfully enjoy reciprocity by the world community on the return of wrongfully detained children abroad. I know only too well the anguish of the left-behind parent who sees the Hague Treaty as the only hope to recover a child.

About The Author: Steve Fenton is a specialty building contractor. After his estranged wife spirited their son, an American, away to Xalapa, Mexico, the father decided he had to take action. With little to no help from the U.S. and Mexican governments after a year and a half, the determined father went on a clandestine recovery mission across the border. What ensued were life-changing events that have defined the lives of father and son.  His book was written with some technical assistance from Capt. Chesley "Sully" Sullenberger, the pilot who would later become a national hero after safely landing U.S. Airways Flight 1549 in the Hudson River.