Bush and Kerry discuss their positions on science In the latest issue of the journal Nature, President Bush and John Kerry each respond to 15 questions about science and related topics. Because the responses are written, neither candidate sounds like himself -- there are no Bushian malapropisms or Kerryan layered qualifiers -- and for the most part they simply regurgitate campaign-trail boilerplate. However, there are revealing differences, particularly on global warming. When asked, Bush acknowledged that it is a "serious long-term issue," but then said the following: "In 2001, I asked the National Academy of Sciences to provide the most …

Chalk up a win for Wyoming wildlands Here's a rare victory for the wilderness crowd: The U.S. Forest Service announced this week that it will suspend plans to open 157,000 acres of Wyoming's Bridger-Teton National Forest -- much of it roadless -- to oil and gas drilling. Enviros say the forest is one of the most important wild areas in the country to have been marked by the Bush administration for drilling. Local and national conservation groups organized resistance, as did many ranchers, hunters, and anglers. Wyoming Gov. Dave Freudenthal (D), a moderate who has long backed the natural-gas industry, …

Tony Blair calls for action on global warming, critics heap scorn U.K. Prime Minister Tony Blair made a major speech yesterday that referred to global warming as the earth's "greatest environmental challenge," and though he never mentioned U.S. President Bush by name, he pointedly called on the world's wealthiest countries to take the lead in battling it. Saying that international cooperation was vital, he laid out three goals for 2005: to reach agreement among the G8 nations about the nature and causes of global warming; to agree about scientific and technological means to address it; and to persuade large non-G8 …

Conservatives Accuse Blair of Being Weak on Climate Change In a depressing illustration of just how far global consensus on climate change has left the U.S. behind, this week British Prime Minister Tony Blair was criticized for doing too little on global warming by Michael Howard, the leader of the conservative Tory party. Howard attacked Blair for failing to use his close relationship with President Bush to push the U.S. to ratify the Kyoto Protocol. He accused Blair's Labor Party of putting all its eggs in the onshore wind-power basket, ignoring the potential of several other forms of renewable energy. …

Dear Umbra, My husband and I have decided to install a solar electric system. We live in the high desert and enjoy sun 360 or more days a year. We have been surfing to find information and are increasingly befuddled. Nanosys will have new technology out, but I don't know when. Should we wait a year or two for new, less expensive technology or go with existing solar panels? KathyJoshua Tree, Calif. Dearest Kathy, How exciting. One obvious source of information is the internet, which is particularly helpful for understanding the big picture or getting the gist of a new …

Salon.com Delves into Global Warming A new trio of articles on Salon.com does a nice job of laying out the current state of play on global warming, though its conclusions will come as no surprise to regular Grist readers: President Bush has been playing what the National Wildlife Federation's Jeremy Symons calls "whack-a-mole" with federal scientists, trying to obscure their consensus opinion that human activity is driving climate change. He promotes technological miracle fixes like hydrogen cars while refusing to rein in the extractive industries that have given him record amounts of money. John Kerry is more forthright about the …

Arctic Feeling the Heat From Climate Change Global warming is messing with the Arctic more and faster than any other part of the world, to the detriment of the indigenous peoples and animals who call the region their home. Inuit living around the Arctic Circle have seen their ecosystems transformed. Shrinking ice cover means the hunting season is shorter for polar bears; animals who are either white or turn white in the winter as camouflage are more vulnerable as ice melts and rock is exposed; walruses are migrating farther north to follow the cold, while new types of flora and …

ChevronTexaco Heavily Influenced California Restructuring California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's (R) recently announced plan to comprehensively reorganize state government brought grumbles from some enviros, who were piqued by the proposed consolidation of various boards and commissions from which many of the state's groundbreaking environmental initiatives have emerged. This latest news isn't going to mollify them. The proposed reorganization contains several provisions that would directly benefit oil and gas behemoth ChevronTexaco by revising the process for permitting and siting refineries and streamlining the activities of the San Francisco Bay Conservation and Development Commission, which oversees many of the company's interests in the …

Study Shows Systematic Deficiency in Climate-Change Reporting An analysis of climate-change coverage in four major U.S. newspapers from 1988 to 2002 confirms what many enviros have long charged: Media coverage of global warming is woefully deficient. A growing chorus of media critics says that the journalistic convention of "balance," which dictates that in order to remain "fair" a reporter must give equal space to two opposing viewpoints, can distort public understanding of issues on which there is in fact broad consensus. So it goes for climate change: "We respect the need to represent multiple viewpoints, but when generally agreed-upon scientific …

Bush Administration Won't Remove Northwest Dams to Save Salmon The Bush administration announced yesterday that it will not remove dams from the Columbia and Snake rivers in the Northwest as part of its efforts to save endangered salmon runs. According to Bob Lohn of the National Marine Fisheries Service, "Our work shows that you can achieve recovery without removing the dams." The agency said that improvements in ocean conditions, combined with the installation of removable spillway weirs that can guide young fish through the dams, will push forward the recovery of endangered salmon, which NMFS claims is already underway. The …