Mitt Romney's new coal-pandering ad (see here) warned coal miners that Obama hated them and also jobs are going to China. Here's the ironic twist: A slowdown in the Chinese economy may be hurting coal mines.

From the Wall Street Journal:

[T]he Chinese economy is slowing and so is its steel industry. That has sent the price of coal used for steelmaking down nearly 50% to $170 a metric ton. Those coal producers who counted on Chinese sales are reeling. …

While many have blamed the downturn in the U.S. coal industry on cheap natural gas supplanting coal and tougher environmental regulations, the slide in metallurgical coal demand has been equally devastating. Coal companies were caught flat-footed after ramping up production last year with the expectation that steep prices would cover their rising costs, despite coal's past cyclicality. Instead, demand in China began to falter just as Australian metallurgical coal production -- interrupted by floods last year -- surged back into the market. …

China's metallurgical coal imports dropped to 2.6 million metric tons in August, from an average of 4.5 million metric tons per month through July. Now coal mines are closing throughout Appalachia.

The U.S. sends a lot of coal overseas -- meaning that fluctuations in international demand can really hit home. The Journal outlines some of the recent coal company bankruptcies or contractions: Patriot Coal, Alpha, Consol.

The proposal is strongly endorsed by this guy.

From Reuters:

Imposing a $20 per metric ton carbon tax in the U.S. could reduce the country's budget deficit by 50 percent over the next 10 years, a report by the Congressional Research Service said on Tuesday.

Such a tax would generate approximately $88 billion in 2012, rising to $144 billion by 2020, the report said, slashing U.S. debt by between 12 and 50 percent within a decade, depending on how high the deficit climbs.

Please print this article out and throw it on top of the giant pile you keep of policy proposals that could dramatically reduce the deficit but will never, ever make it into law.

Quartz (a new business news website, not the rock) raises a good point about oil drilling in the Arctic: It's still much more expensive than drilling in most other places.

Little is known about the average cost of producing oil or gas in the Arctic, since none of the fields under scrutiny has been developed. But a geologist from the United States Geological Service who evaluated drilling in Greenland estimated that it would require prices of $100 to $300 a barrel and more to extract the larger volumes that are attracting company interest. That’s way above the marginal cost of existing oilfields.

Meanwhile, a boom is under way in less-expensive drilling locales—Mozambique, French Guiana and Angola among them, where break-even production costs are less than $70 a barrel. Given that plans for this drilling stretch into the 2020s, activity in the Arctic is likely to be far in the future.

Photo by Travis.

The Acela, Amtrak's "high-speed" rail line, is not actually high speed, hence my putting that term in quotes. At least: it wasn't, until today, sort of.

New Jersey's senators are excited.

Today, U.S. Senators Frank R. Lautenberg (D-NJ) and Robert Menendez (D-NJ) applauded Amtrak for taking an important step to advance high-speed rail on the Northeast Corridor by conducting a test run of high-speed trains in New Jersey. The initial test run is expected to take place tonight between Trenton and New Brunswick, where Amtrak will test its high-speed Acela Express equipment at 165 mph, which is 5 mph above the expected future maximum operating speed of 160 mph and 30 mph above the current maximum speed of 135 mph.

Trains in other (far better!) countries go up to 200 miles an hour, so that's not that great. But: Yeah! Alright! Faster Amtrak! A trip of 400 miles that used to take just under three hours will now take ... two and a half. And the 20-or-so-minute trip between Trenton and New Brunswick will be shortened by, like, five?

This past weekend marked the opening of the largest wind farm in the U.S. -- a site that will power 235,000 homes. The Shepherds Flat Wind Farm near Arlington, Oregon, is a just the latest example of our nation's clean energy industry powering our homes, businesses, and economy. Work on the Shepherds Flat project began in 2009 and brought with it more than 400 construction jobs. The Shepherds Flat project will continue to provide 45 full-time jobs for Oregon's Gilliam and Morrow Counties, in addition to agricultural jobs which will continue on the farmland at the project site. The cherry …

This is a bag of rice, as you can see because it is labelled "RICE." (Photo by Shutterstock.)

Recent revelations that rice produced in some regions of the South have abnormally high levels of arsenic have prompted some congressmembers to spring into action. From the Hill:

Three House Democrats have proposed required federal standards on arsenic levels in rice and rice products after a recent Consumer Reports investigation that found high levels of arsenic in rice cereal. … The Reducing food-based Inorganic and organic Compounds Exposure (RICE) Act would require the Food and Drug Administration to set a maximum allowable level of arsenic in rice. [Rep. Rosa DeLauro (D-Conn.)] and other members noted that currently the only FDA rules on arsenic, a chemical that is poisonous in high doses, are related to bottled water.

Cons:

• Stop with the acronyms. Seriously.
• I'm sure that the regulation-friendly House Republicans will rush to pass a bill that would have a negative economic impact on mostly Southern farmers.
• Too bad the House just ended its session on Friday.

Pros:

• People would eat garbage -- literally garbage from a Dumpster -- if it contained enough sugars and saturated fats. So maybe limiting the amount of poison they ingest makes sense.

Photo by Edible Office.

“In the course of getting a plate of food to our table, we’re paying a lot of attention to the farmer, the chef, the farmers market -- all of that is as it should be, but we pay very little attention to the thing that starts it all, the seed.” That sentiment comes from Janisse Ray, farmer and author of the new book The Seed Underground: A Growing Revolution to Save Food.

And it’s true; for many of us, seeds are a mysterious, invisible piece of the food puzzle. While we’re busy thinking about how to fix our food economies, seeds often slip through the cracks. And we’ve lost an almost unfathomable amount of genetic diversity as a result; depending on whom you ask, anywhere between 75 to 95 percent of our fruit and vegetable varieties have been lost for good. Highly functional, often bland, hybridized and genetically engineered varieties have taken over the commercial market -- as opposed to the more delicate, complex heirloom varieties with stories and names attached, such as Dragon Tongue beans, Country Gentleman sweet corn, and May Queen lettuce -- and Monsanto, Dupont, and Syngenta now own over half of the world’s seeds.

God, we missed you so much, fall. Don't ever leave* us again. (* Ugh.)

Today is the last day of summer in these United States. It has been a crappy one.

Not, like, your summer. I'm sure your summer was great: ice cream and swimming and lots of time at the arcade, or whatever you do for fun. I mean it's been crappy for these United States.

For one thing, it was hot. 2012 is on track to easily be the hottest year in America's recorded history:

Since January, year-to-date temperatures for the continental US have consistently run well above the 20th-century average with each passing month – reaching a maximum of 6 degrees Fahrenheit above average for the period ending March 31, then declining steadily to 4 degrees F above the 20th-century average for the period ending August 31. …

Still, that 4 degrees is at least a full degree higher than January-to-August averages in any of the five warmest years on record.

Yaaaaaay.

Taxes on cigarettes are considered "sin taxes," costs intended, in part, to punish bad behavior. One bad behavior that cigarette taxes in New York punish: being poor.

Photo by DucDigital.

From the AP:

Low-income smokers in New York spend 25 percent of their income on cigarettes, according to a new study, which led advocates for smokers’ rights to say it proved high taxes were regressive and ineffective. …

In New York, which has the nation’s highest cigarette taxes, a pack of cigarettes can cost $12, though many smokers have turned to buying cheaper cigarettes online or to using roll-your-own devices.

Wealthier smokers -- those earning $60,000 or more -- spend 2 percent on cigarettes, according to the study. ...

[The American Cancer Society's Russ] Sciandra said state statistics showed that smokers earning less than $30,000 a year paid 39 percent of state and city taxes on cigarettes. He added that more of the cigarette tax revenue should be used to finance smoking-cessation programs.

To some extent, this is a function of percentages. If you only have $100, $25 will seem much more dear than if you have $1 million. But the impact is real. The Atlantic's Derek Thompson wrote about how people at various income levels spend their money. For an average low-income household, housing, utilities, and transportation alone generally eat up almost three-quarters of the budget.

Not satisfied with already being known as the most anti-environmental House of Representatives in history, this week House Republicans are again attempting to gut fundamental health and environmental laws to please polluters -- specifically, the coal industry. In a new package of bills, House leadership is taking aim at a staggering array of basic laws that hold polluters accountable and ensure Americans have access to clean air and drinkable water; it fundamentally weakens the Clean Air Act and eviscerates the protections of the Clean Water Act. It will increase disease and deaths of tens of thousands of Americans, not to …